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If we can't use GW fluff, then you have nothing saying Imperial Guard even exist.

Seems much better, I agree.



So... You are saying only the outliers in favour of your own headcanon is worth using?

No offense mind you, I am a fangirl myself, but fanboyism of this magnitude is unlike anything I have ever seen.

kestral wrote:
Earth's history is full of tiny forces conquering entire nations given a technological advantage, some luck, a bit of ruthlessness and a weakened target. The most classic example is the Spanish and the Aztecs of course, but there are many more.

Could a squad of space marines personally conquer earth if humanity was united against them and willing to die to dive them off? No. In game terms they're barely equal to 100 mook humans. Fluff is kinder to them, but even then it seems beyond reasonable. They might kill a great many leaders, but all that would do would give the problem of having no one who could surrender to them.

Could a squad of space marines (with a ship and some support) conquer earth today? Sure. Divide and conquer. Sow confusion and discord. Claim to be the salvation of the downtrodden. Get one group of natives beating on the other other, provide overwhelming force at the critical point in the conflict, install yourself as God-Kings. It's worked many times in the past.

Kestral, you make good points...except that is exactly how Chaos Space Marines operate...not IoM Marines...Loyalist Marines are all about just attacking point targets and thinking they are going to get some type of shock and awe victory because, reasons. Alternately, using IoM Marines to do targeted raids and decapitation attacks against cult armies, alien gribblies, hedonist pain freaks, etc...but oddly enough, there are two problems to playing whack a mole...one, it doesn't work if the groups are small since there are always another group to take their place and; two, if the groups are big and have survived in 40k for a bit, then they know to have a well defined chain of command, assumption of command protocols, redundant commo systems and will have primary, alternate, contingency and emergency plans to cover all those things that happen in 40k like psykers, aliens, chaos corruption, demons, cyborgs, undead space robots, space marine blitzkriegs, titans, orbital strikes, etc.

Bottom Line: Space Marines, as written in fluff will only work if they fight incompetent, low tech monolithic enemies.

-STS

 Ashiraya wrote:
If we can't use GW fluff, then you have nothing saying Imperial Guard even exist.

Seems much better, I agree.

Did you read what Peregrine said?

If you believe GW fluff 100% then go read C.S Gotto. Come back and tell me you still agree with GW 100%

 Swastakowey wrote:
Wyzila:

Its all tastless bad writing.

Find me an example in nature where a creature the size of walking cattle can move fast enough to dodge hypersonic projectiles? Its physically impossible.

That there is enough of a reason why Space Marines are just stupidly plot armoured with little thought put behind them.

Quote bad writing all you want, but quoting that writing is the equivalent of 2 children arguing over whose imaginary creature is better.

"My monster can move the speed of light!"

"Oh yea? Mine can move the speed of light AND has bullets faster than the speed of light!"

See how terrible GW writing can be for Space Marines (the worst offenders)?

Im not gonna argue with GW fluff (remember, this is the company that wrote in the 5th edition codex that there was an imperial AAA unit that had a kill to death ratio of 999,999,999 to 1 or something equally stupid). So I wont bother arguing because you clearly are using the equivalent of propaganda to justify more propaganda.

No, I use official material produced by a company that is also approved by said company while you try to argue your baseless fanon that simply is not what W40K is, and stopped being ages ago. W40K is no different than Marvel, Star Wars, DC, or any other universe with super-humanly powered individuals that are utterly beyond the capabilities of humans in the modern day. Only W40K is slightly more sensible than most other large fiction franchises, especially in areas such as space combat. The difference between W40K and Marvel, DC, and others like it is that a base human can actually be worth something, sometimes. Rather than the screaming hapless jaded civilians of 616 Earth.

Also, power has absolutely nothing to do with quality fiction. Or are you going to start whining about how overpowered the Culture is?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Swastakowey wrote:

 Ashiraya wrote:
If we can't use GW fluff, then you have nothing saying Imperial Guard even exist.

Seems much better, I agree.

Did you read what Peregrine said?

If you believe GW fluff 100% then go read C.S Gotto. Come back and tell me you still agree with GW 100%

It doesn't matter if you don't like it. You don't own the rights to 40K. You're welcome to cook up your own fanfiction, but don't pretend it actually is the original source material. Unless you can get it licensed by GW. I may hate Goto and Ward, but that doesn't mean I run around screaming NEVER HAPPENED while simultaneously covering my eyes and ears lest I heard about it. They're terrible writers, but it doesn't make them any less valid. Besides, there's the question if you actually disagree so much with W40K, why even bloody bother. Just go off to some other miniature line or fiction franchise if you so seemingly ignore almost everything GW produces.

 Swastakowey wrote:

 Ashiraya wrote:
If we can't use GW fluff, then you have nothing saying Imperial Guard even exist.

Seems much better, I agree.

Did you read what Peregrine said?

If you believe GW fluff 100% then go read C.S Gotto. Come back and tell me you still agree with GW 100%

Unlike Wyzilla's wall of text, however, Goto is an outlier.

 Ashiraya wrote:

 Swastakowey wrote:

 Ashiraya wrote:
If we can't use GW fluff, then you have nothing saying Imperial Guard even exist.

Seems much better, I agree.

Did you read what Peregrine said?

If you believe GW fluff 100% then go read C.S Gotto. Come back and tell me you still agree with GW 100%

Unlike Wyzilla's wall of text, however, Goto is an outlier.

Wyzilla read this too:

No he is GW approved. According to you we should embrace his work and treat it like it makes sense and is worth reading for reasons besides its comedic value. Or is it just really convenient that he is an outlier because he is the best example to show how awful GW is and can be with fluff at times?

Is there anything in the 40K universe that doesnt conflict? Watch the Space Marine movie. See how they die to bolter fire? That completely contradicts how good power armour is. So what are we supposed to think is real cannon? Easy answer. The most sensible bits.

And the most sensible bits kinda destroy how decent Space Marines are... Like the movie they released showed how not so tough and smart Space marines are. Or how CS Gotto killed Eldar Fluff for eldar Players. And so on. Using fluff to back up your arguments is fine. But its all contradictory anyway. So this becomes an argument of opinion.

And in my opinion. Space marines are not that great for the many reasons I have listed.

Well then, how come Plagues Marines die to fairly warm lasguns a bunch of grenades and a bit of electricity?

Or that CSM get stabbed to death with a power sword wielded by a human.

Or chainsword wielded by another human. *shrugs*

 Swastakowey wrote:
Watch the Space Marine movie. See how they die to bolter fire? That completely contradicts how good power armour is.

...And then we have the Space Marine game. In that game you can pump two mags of Bolter shells into a Chaos Marine at point blank range, and he can take it. Whereas the traitor guardsmen die to one or two shots, depending on where you hit.'

I wonder how GW deals with their own cognitive dissonance. The difference between the lowest low-end Marines (Who Bobthehero loves bringing up) and the highest-high end (Which even I admit is absurd, like SM moving at FTL speeds or wiping out a continent with a plasma pistol shot) is absurd and I have no idea how they can think both are true at the same time. The highest-high end is probably propaganda, and the lowest-low end rumours, and somewhere in between is the truth...

Speaking of GW Canon, did anyone play Fire Warrior?

 Bobthehero wrote:
Well then, how come Plagues Marines die to fairly warm lasguns a bunch of grenaders and a bit of electricity?

Or that they get stabbed to death with a power sword wielded by a human.

Or chainsword wielded by another human. *shrugs*

Because Schrodinger canon. I don't like it, but that doesn't give me a right to whine about its existence and pretend it never happened with it being descended and endorsed by GW. Plus Cadian Blood was a damn good book.

The only thing I absolutely hate is when somebody writes mentally slowed and incompetent military force anything. Like the Blood Ravens or Soul Drinkers. Thank god for the Raptors.

 Vash108 wrote:
Speaking of GW Canon, did anyone play Fire Warrior?

unbelievably fond memories of that one. Interestingly I've got some wort of pavlovs dogs thing that goes on whenever I eat a Swedish fish that brings me back to that game.

If we ever had to determine what an "outlier" is, this would be a great place to start.

 Ignatius wrote:

 Vash108 wrote:
Speaking of GW Canon, did anyone play Fire Warrior?

unbelievably fond memories of that one. Interestingly I've got some wort of pavlovs dogs thing that goes on whenever I eat a Swedish fish that brings me back to that game.

If we ever had to determine what an "outlier" is, this would be a great place to start.

Not really an outlier. He was empowered by Khorne.

 Ashiraya wrote:

 Swastakowey wrote:
Watch the Space Marine movie. See how they die to bolter fire? That completely contradicts how good power armour is.

...And then we have the Space Marine game. In that game you can pump two mags of Bolter shells into a Chaos Marine at point blank range, and he can take it. Whereas the traitor guardsmen die to one or two shots, depending on where you hit.

havent played the game. But I can only imagine how much it contradicts everything else GW has written or made in some way or another. But you kind of just proved my point by saying that. Also in the fluff where does it say a Guardsmen can take 2 bolter hits...

Its all contradictory, and a lot of it can be ridiculous. As an answer to your other thread, it seems Space Marines are the worst offenders of bad fluff. And to top it off some space marine fans take the best bits of their factions fluff and treat it like 100% cannon which can in no way be any less than gods. thats why its stigmatized.

For example you told me to 100% treat the fluff as cannon. But I point out CS gotto or the movie and you say to treat it like an outlier. Instead of going "well its how I like to think of them" you say "we should all like to treat it that way because its how it is in the books". But the way you treat it is impossible because the books contradict all the time. this talk would have ended when we both agreed that its opinion, but instead you insisted on your belief that GW fluff is all right and 100% supports your view etc etc. When in reality the fluff supports the both of us.

I will admit, on the basis of fluff alone, my opinion is just as correct as yours. But that just shows how bad GW can be with the fluff. Which is why I dismissed fluff earlier as decent examples and instead resorted to real world examples. Its all opinion, and if you want to believe that 10 Marines can take over a world, then fine. But remember, you are just as wrong as you are right (in pure fluff arguments that is, in anything real world example wise I personally think I have the advantage for my argument )


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Ashiraya wrote:

 Swastakowey wrote:
Watch the Space Marine movie. See how they die to bolter fire? That completely contradicts how good power armour is.

...And then we have the Space Marine game. In that game you can pump two mags of Bolter shells into a Chaos Marine at point blank range, and he can take it. Whereas the traitor guardsmen die to one or two shots, depending on where you hit.'

I wonder how GW deals with their own cognitive dissonance. The difference between the lowest low-end Marines (Who Bobthehero loves bringing up) and the highest-high end (Which even I admit is absurd, like SM moving at FTL speeds or wiping out a continent with a plasma pistol shot) is absurd and I have no idea how they can think both are true at the same time. The highest-high end is probably propaganda, and the lowest-low end rumours, and somewhere in between is the truth...

See above

 Wyzilla wrote:

 Ignatius wrote:

 Vash108 wrote:
Speaking of GW Canon, did anyone play Fire Warrior?

unbelievably fond memories of that one. Interestingly I've got some wort of pavlovs dogs thing that goes on whenever I eat a Swedish fish that brings me back to that game.

If we ever had to determine what an "outlier" is, this would be a great place to start.

Not really an outlier. He was empowered by Khorne.

This is a joke right?

This thread really makes me want to compare all this canon stuff to people's beliefs about the bible, but that's just me. In the end, GW is just trying to make money so they try to make the game fun so it sells and throw the fluff out the window if needed. oh well.

for now I'll just leave this here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emu_War

makes it a lot easier to conquer a planet when you fight guys like this...

good luck staying on topic

 Ignatius wrote:

 Wyzilla wrote:

 Ignatius wrote:

 Vash108 wrote:
Speaking of GW Canon, did anyone play Fire Warrior?

unbelievably fond memories of that one. Interestingly I've got some wort of pavlovs dogs thing that goes on whenever I eat a Swedish fish that brings me back to that game.

If we ever had to determine what an "outlier" is, this would be a great place to start.

Not really an outlier. He was empowered by Khorne.

This is a joke right?

Not really a joke, as IIRC in the novelization he screams BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD (or maybe it was SKULLS FOR THE SKULL THRONE, I can't remember which), which sane and non empowered people tend not to do.

10 SM's can quell a city rebellion, 1,000 can conquer a planet and a legion can stomp a star system to dust.

Now lets put numbers on these.

10 marines - 300,000 average city population
Projected time to objective completion: 1 to 5 years.

1,000 marines (SM chapter) - 8,000,000,000 average futuristic planet population
Projected time to objective completion: 10 to 25 years

100,000 marines, average legion size - many billions of star system inhabitants
Projected time to objective completion: 100 to 1,000 years


Keep in mind that the average SM holds the same amount of knowledge Albert Einstein had....which is amazing. Sergeants, captains, chapter masters and all other high ranking SM staff are even smarter. A primarch = Albert Einstien + Sir Isaac Newton multiplied by 30. That's one smart son of gun. I'm sure each primarch found a diplomatic and militaristic way of gaining planetary rule and respect. Keep in mind most primarchs respected humanity and as such did not resort to the arrows but instead the olive branch. Konrad Curze and Angron are 2 prime examples of primarchs that had failed to rule the planet they inhabited. Angron was enslaved by powerful and sadistic humans while Konrad Curze spent all his time hunting down and killing criminals. As admirable as Curze was it was not enough to befriend skeptics.

As for SM's.

A city rebels and imagine you are the leader of this rebellion. You are fairly smart, your tactful, you know military logic and you are willing to die for your beliefs, meaning you are a tad arrogant and you won't back down to the Imperium and with-hold your rebellion.

Suddenly you have 10 super human power armour clad titans with their weakest weapons being as powerful as your best weapons and intelligence matching that of one of the most smartest humans to ever live on planet Earth and they have the planetary PDF at their disposal. Their first objective is gonna be having you killed, and they will find a decisive way of doing it...believe that. With the leader of the rebellion killed, those 10 SM's are gonna have their way with the rest of those foolish enough to stand by your side and half the rebellion will be killled before the rest realize their error and surrender.

To take over a planet.
A SM chapter will first nuke every continent on the face of the planet for an extended 7 days. Having dazed and confused the planetary forces, the fleet will drop 2 companies of SM's and a couple IG regiments to sieze all planetary Spaceports while along the way eliminating any AA guns along the way. Enemy forces will have no mobility at all to fight a decisive battle. SM's and IG reinforcements will then drop full force to the planet. Average SM chapter tactics will be to eliminate enemy command structure. This will be a lengthy conflict but it will be done and then an even longer time cleansing the planet but that can be counted upon on the IG.

Cleansing a star system will be a repeated and drawn out version of what I just explained.

Of course, this is theory and considered canon, not to mention this is average SM tactics and not always done the way I explained. However, this is the most popular and efficient way of going about a war. I made sure to include IG and PDF forces because SM's will always need aid in the wars they wage. IG are litterally the backbone of the Imperium and don't dispute that. millions of these sould die every single day to ensure the survival and operation of the Imperium. SM's are there to add brute strength and superior thinking and resolve.

The problem is the VAST difference I strength between fluff and rules that gets people confused..

Fluff- strength of ten men, without power armour.. Feel no pain.. Seen it all twice so can never be outflanked.. And are so souped up they never ever miss..
Rules- barely better than human.. Die to a knife of a drunk all the time.. Half the time can't even shoot straight...

Humans
Fluff- think those guys in the rebel ship in the first scene of Starwars..
Rules... Give them a krak grenade and a bit of luck and gak dies in a stiff wind..

So yeah GW can't do both at the same time..

 Swastakowey wrote:


No, space marines are a flawed and outdated concept of "bigger is better". There is nothing practical or useful about a Space marine to even be useful for anything but costing a crap ton of money. Its just childish super hero nonsense to think Space marines are as awesome as you described. In reality they wouldnt last at all in a gun fight. Bullets wont harmlessly bounce off them. The bullets would start hitting vital joints, visors and sensors, even the bolt gun would be subject to a hail of gunfire. Let alone support weapons like mortars and grenade launchers shattering ribs and shocking their targets.

There is a reason the only possible way A space marine unit can take over a planet is through the navy. Why? Because there is no logical way a space marine can win anything. Why? Because they are so stupidly written that its simply a "because space marines are cool and strong" excuse for anything they do.

I wont bother saying anymore, because I know people like SPace Marines and while I think the concept can be cool, there is no way a Space marine could do anything more than a normal soldier in combat. If anything their size and bulk would hinder them in combat. Let alone the fact that they cant help but scream running towards the enemy as their main tactic.

Space Marines are simply incapable of being efficient at anything when you think about it. Let alone how Much food a Space Marine would need to consume to stay active. They would have to carry so much food it would be a hindrance. Also think about how many Marines would die just trying to land from their Drop Pods? Nothing about them is practical or worth keeping them for.

Of course, maybe you can stretch reality better than I can.

Space marines are in 40k for the same reason the robots and monsters are in the Pacific Rim movie. mindless action that doesnt need reasoning or thought. because as soon as you think about it, it all falls apart

"There is no way a Space Marine could do anything more than a normal soldier in combat."

I think, with that single sentence, you have established yourself as being massively hyperbolic or detached from reality.

If you are a 'normal soldier', but your weapon is better, you can now do more.
If you are a 'normal soldier', but your armor is better, you can now do more.
If you are a normal soldier, but your training is better, you can now do more.
If you are a normal soldier, but you heal injuries faster, you can now do more.
If you are a normal soldier, but you don't get older and weaker, you can now do more.

I'm not saying that Space Marines would "really" be as effective as they are in GW fiction, but it simply makes NO SENSE to claim that multiple improvements to the equipment and capacities of normal soldiers don't mean anything at all. If you just gave Guardsmen carapace armor, it would make them better than guys in flak armor. If you just gave them bolters, it would make them better than guys with lasguns.

Da Butcha wrote:

 Swastakowey wrote:


No, space marines are a flawed and outdated concept of "bigger is better". There is nothing practical or useful about a Space marine to even be useful for anything but costing a crap ton of money. Its just childish super hero nonsense to think Space marines are as awesome as you described. In reality they wouldnt last at all in a gun fight. Bullets wont harmlessly bounce off them. The bullets would start hitting vital joints, visors and sensors, even the bolt gun would be subject to a hail of gunfire. Let alone support weapons like mortars and grenade launchers shattering ribs and shocking their targets.

There is a reason the only possible way A space marine unit can take over a planet is through the navy. Why? Because there is no logical way a space marine can win anything. Why? Because they are so stupidly written that its simply a "because space marines are cool and strong" excuse for anything they do.

I wont bother saying anymore, because I know people like SPace Marines and while I think the concept can be cool, there is no way a Space marine could do anything more than a normal soldier in combat. If anything their size and bulk would hinder them in combat. Let alone the fact that they cant help but scream running towards the enemy as their main tactic.

Space Marines are simply incapable of being efficient at anything when you think about it. Let alone how Much food a Space Marine would need to consume to stay active. They would have to carry so much food it would be a hindrance. Also think about how many Marines would die just trying to land from their Drop Pods? Nothing about them is practical or worth keeping them for.

Of course, maybe you can stretch reality better than I can.

Space marines are in 40k for the same reason the robots and monsters are in the Pacific Rim movie. mindless action that doesnt need reasoning or thought. because as soon as you think about it, it all falls apart

"There is no way a Space Marine could do anything more than a normal soldier in combat."

I think, with that single sentence, you have established yourself as being massively hyperbolic or detached from reality.

If you are a 'normal soldier', but your weapon is better, you can now do more.
If you are a 'normal soldier', but your armor is better, you can now do more.
If you are a normal soldier, but your training is better, you can now do more.
If you are a normal soldier, but you heal injuries faster, you can now do more.
If you are a normal soldier, but you don't get older and weaker, you can now do more.

I'm not saying that Space Marines would "really" be as effective as they are in GW fiction, but it simply makes NO SENSE to claim that multiple improvements to the equipment and capacities of normal soldiers don't mean anything at all. If you just gave Guardsmen carapace armor, it would make them better than guys in flak armor. If you just gave them bolters, it would make them better than guys with lasguns.

I think the problem is that there are litterally no definitive ways to picture 40k in terms of power, ratio or likelihood for any one race. It's all "whatever floats your boat" which is fine but it reduces the term "serious 40k discussion" to "wild 40k fantasies" in the very forum we are speaking on. How can there be serious discussion when everything is canon? There is no serious discussion, just bias and illogical opinions.

It is easy kill the head of the snake or like Night lords kill a whole city i the most graphic way and watch the rest surrender. And because GW said so

Vast and profound confusion of the terms "bad writing" with "implausible" ITT.

Space Marines being big enough badasses to fight armies that outnumber them a thousand to one isn't "bad writing", it's implausible.

It isn't bad writing anymore than Batman being able to run into a room and karate-chop twenty machine gun wielding mooks into submission, or Doctor Octopus in Spiderman 2 being completely unscathed after falling hundreds of feet despite being just a normal human with super tentacles sown into his spine could be considered "bad writing".

Conquering a planet and forcing it to submit to your will is another. Taking over a planet and conquering it are two different things.

Conquering is complete and total subjugation along with the destruction of culture and any governing body, and then replacing it with your own.
Taking over a planet is simply forcing them to your will.

Conquering = Spanish destroying, enslaving killing, and converting native populations.

Taking over = treaty of Versailles

can a space marine squad or company conquer a planet yes, but it would have to be vastly technologically superior and also have the ability to drum up allies. (how cortez conquered the aztecs)
otherwise they could only take the planet over via a show of arms or strategic application of force.

When it comes to planets even near our level of technology and without allies, the space marines would be worn thin. This is where the imperial guard comes in and blows the place to kingdome come and then remakes it in the emperors name.

Space marines can be deployed to conquer planets, but they would need to be smart and use all of their assets to their advantage.
in general though the guard is going to be quicker and generally more effective at pacifying an entire planet.

tldr: space marines are the sword of the imperium and must be used elegantly to penetrate the enemies armor where it is weakest. The imperial Guard are the hammer and simply crush the imperium's foes under its weight.

 Ashiraya wrote:
I do not argue game mechanics. Game mechanics are game mechanics, fluff is fluff. It is in GWs financial interest to not make SM too strong on the tabletop, because then everyone would just buy a few of them and get a cheap army of decent points.

Which is true, to a point. Obviously there's a bigger difference between carapace and power armor than a 3+ vs. 4+ armor save. But the tabletop game is meant to be a reasonably accurate representation of how things work. So, while we know power armor is probably better than a 3+ it's probably not many orders of magnitude better like it would have to be for a single squad of marines to conquer a whole planet.

Space Marines bite hard, yes, but the setting bites back! Your SM squad may carve their way through a company without as much as taking damage, but there's billions of guardsmen for each Marine. Eldar and Necrons can arguably match Marines in sheer battle prowess, as can Tyranids. Orks bring numbers and toughness, and so on. I consider the idea of Marines being as weak as you imply implausible; the only way a million Marines can be seen as a faction in their own right next to the others is if they bring such truly ludicrous force concentration that most other forces just crumble. The fact that SM are so strong but still are too few to stop the descent of the Imperium only adds to the grimdark. YMMV.

But if everyone else is just as strong then a squad of marines can't conquer a whole planet. The only way the most ridiculous claims about marine power work at all is if marines are orders of magnitude better than everyone else in the setting, and that's just boring as hell.

 Ashiraya wrote:
I wonder how GW deals with their own cognitive dissonance.

Easily: in-universe propaganda and religious myths. A story about a squad of marines conquering a planet should be interpreted the same way as a story about Jesus coming back and pwning all the sinners: it's obviously not true, it just has religious value for the people who believe in it. Meanwhile the reality is somewhere around what we see in the tabletop game, where marines are pretty good infantry but still die against the big guns. There's only cognitive dissonance if you insist on taking every word of 40k's fluff as literal truth, something GW tells you not to do.

 Lord Tarkin wrote:
Keep in mind that the average SM holds the same amount of knowledge Albert Einstein had....which is amazing. Sergeants, captains, chapter masters and all other high ranking SM staff are even smarter.

Lol, no. The fluff portrays marines as rabid attack dogs who value faith in their genocidal crusade over rational thought. They're well-equiped and competent in battle, but they aren't geniuses.

(And I would point out that this is not how intelligence works, but I assume that everyone but you already knows that.)

Suddenly you have 10 super human power armour clad titans with their weakest weapons being as powerful as your best weapons and intelligence matching that of one of the most smartest humans to ever live on planet Earth and they have the planetary PDF at their disposal. Their first objective is gonna be having you killed, and they will find a decisive way of doing it...believe that. With the leader of the rebellion killed, those 10 SM's are gonna have their way with the rest of those foolish enough to stand by your side and half the rebellion will be killled before the rest realize their error and surrender.

Correction: the 10 space marines drop pod in, take 99% casualties against my AA defenses (seriously, we solved the whole "how to shoot down incoming ballistic missiles" thing in the 1950s). And if somehow enough survive to kill me the deadman's switch I'm carrying sets off my stockpile of nukes and vaporizes all of them. Congratulations Imperium, you've just paid a whole squad of priceless marines (worth more than an entire planet) to do the job of an orbital bombardment on my command bunker.

A SM chapter will first nuke every continent on the face of the planet for an extended 7 days. Having dazed and confused the planetary forces, the fleet will drop 2 companies of SM's and a couple IG regiments to sieze all planetary Spaceports while along the way eliminating any AA guns along the way. Enemy forces will have no mobility at all to fight a decisive battle. SM's and IG reinforcements will then drop full force to the planet. Average SM chapter tactics will be to eliminate enemy command structure. This will be a lengthy conflict but it will be done and then an even longer time cleansing the planet but that can be counted upon on the IG.

So, why exactly are the space marines involved if you're just going to nuke the whole planet until nothing is left alive?

Also, "eliminate enemy command structures" isn't exactly a trivial task since those command structures aren't marked on the maps or carrying giant "shoot me now" signs. More likely you'll just have a bunch of space marines running around killing random stuff while the command structure is hidden far away from the fighting. And if, by some miracle, you manage to identify an important command unit why would you send a squad of screaming idiots with chainswords instead just a few ICBMs? After all, it's not like you're worried about collateral damage when you've just been nuking the whole planet for the past week.

 Peregrine wrote:

 Ashiraya wrote:
I do not argue game mechanics. Game mechanics are game mechanics, fluff is fluff. It is in GWs financial interest to not make SM too strong on the tabletop, because then everyone would just buy a few of them and get a cheap army of decent points.

Which is true, to a point. Obviously there's a bigger difference between carapace and power armor than a 3+ vs. 4+ armor save. But the tabletop game is meant to be a reasonably accurate representation of how things work. So, while we know power armor is probably better than a 3+ it's probably not many orders of magnitude better like it would have to be for a single squad of marines to conquer a whole planet.

Space Marines bite hard, yes, but the setting bites back! Your SM squad may carve their way through a company without as much as taking damage, but there's billions of guardsmen for each Marine. Eldar and Necrons can arguably match Marines in sheer battle prowess, as can Tyranids. Orks bring numbers and toughness, and so on. I consider the idea of Marines being as weak as you imply implausible; the only way a million Marines can be seen as a faction in their own right next to the others is if they bring such truly ludicrous force concentration that most other forces just crumble. The fact that SM are so strong but still are too few to stop the descent of the Imperium only adds to the grimdark. YMMV.

But if everyone else is just as strong then a squad of marines can't conquer a whole planet. The only way the most ridiculous claims about marine power work at all is if marines are orders of magnitude better than everyone else in the setting, and that's just boring as hell.

 Ashiraya wrote:
I wonder how GW deals with their own cognitive dissonance.

Easily: in-universe propaganda and religious myths. A story about a squad of marines conquering a planet should be interpreted the same way as a story about Jesus coming back and pwning all the sinners: it's obviously not true, it just has religious value for the people who believe in it. Meanwhile the reality is somewhere around what we see in the tabletop game, where marines are pretty good infantry but still die against the big guns. There's only cognitive dissonance if you insist on taking every word of 40k's fluff as literal truth, something GW tells you not to do.

 Lord Tarkin wrote:
Keep in mind that the average SM holds the same amount of knowledge Albert Einstein had....which is amazing. Sergeants, captains, chapter masters and all other high ranking SM staff are even smarter.

Lol, no. The fluff portrays marines as rabid attack dogs who value faith in their genocidal crusade over rational thought. They're well-equiped and competent in battle, but they aren't geniuses.

(And I would point out that this is not how intelligence works, but I assume that everyone but you already knows that.)

Suddenly you have 10 super human power armour clad titans with their weakest weapons being as powerful as your best weapons and intelligence matching that of one of the most smartest humans to ever live on planet Earth and they have the planetary PDF at their disposal. Their first objective is gonna be having you killed, and they will find a decisive way of doing it...believe that. With the leader of the rebellion killed, those 10 SM's are gonna have their way with the rest of those foolish enough to stand by your side and half the rebellion will be killled before the rest realize their error and surrender.

Correction: the 10 space marines drop pod in, take 99% casualties against my AA defenses (seriously, we solved the whole "how to shoot down incoming ballistic missiles" thing in the 1950s). And if somehow enough survive to kill me the deadman's switch I'm carrying sets off my stockpile of nukes and vaporizes all of them. Congratulations Imperium, you've just paid a whole squad of priceless marines (worth more than an entire planet) to do the job of an orbital bombardment on my command bunker.

A SM chapter will first nuke every continent on the face of the planet for an extended 7 days. Having dazed and confused the planetary forces, the fleet will drop 2 companies of SM's and a couple IG regiments to sieze all planetary Spaceports while along the way eliminating any AA guns along the way. Enemy forces will have no mobility at all to fight a decisive battle. SM's and IG reinforcements will then drop full force to the planet. Average SM chapter tactics will be to eliminate enemy command structure. This will be a lengthy conflict but it will be done and then an even longer time cleansing the planet but that can be counted upon on the IG.

So, why exactly are the space marines involved if you're just going to nuke the whole planet until nothing is left alive?

Also, "eliminate enemy command structures" isn't exactly a trivial task since those command structures aren't marked on the maps or carrying giant "shoot me now" signs. More likely you'll just have a bunch of space marines running around killing random stuff while the command structure is hidden far away from the fighting. And if, by some miracle, you manage to identify an important command unit why would you send a squad of screaming idiots with chainswords instead just a few ICBMs? After all, it's not like you're worried about collateral damage when you've just been nuking the wholeness planet for the past week.

First off, no need to throw slighted insults. I see you're a SM hater, very easy to notice.

And yes, SM's are quite smart. I know you seem to think all they do is shout incoherent praises and charge into righteous combat but it doesn't work that way. They are the best military strategists the galaxy has seen and that is a big reason they are as successful as they are. Given their weaponry and equipment coupled with their incredible physical prowess makes them almost unmatchable enemies in terms of indivdual fights.

And you didn't actually say a single rebellious city could shoot a drop pod out of the sky? Lol, not happening.

And yes, they will orbital bomb every continent, soften them up a little. Maybe I shouldn't have said nukes but I was trying to make it seem dramatic.

I'd say you're probably right. The Marines go in, shoot/stab/punch/blow up anything important, then the enemy is left paralysed and unable to effectively resist. The Marines or IG then sweep the planet of remaining major resistance, and the IG/local forces take over the role of policing/pacifying.

Do marines even conquer planets? I thought that job came to the guard, and it was the legions that used to conquer planets. I thought that in 40k's time marines are there to kill the enemies of the imperium.

Doombunny wrote:
I'd say you're probably right. The Marines go in, shoot/stab/punch/blow up anything important, then the enemy is left paralysed and unable to effectively resist. The Marines or IG then sweep the planet of remaining major resistance, and the IG/local forces take over the role of policing/pacifying.

IG and PDF's are extreme reasons SM's are able to do what they do. When GW talks about how a 10 man squad can pacify a rebellion of 300,000 inhabitants, everybody starts complaining "how can 10 marines do that, impossible!" No it is possible because they aren't alone. That SM squad will spend at least a few weeks analyzing all possible diplomatic solutions before going on another week readying PDF and police forces to mobilize on startegic positions around the city.

It's not like a squad of marines just bursts into a city guns blazing and "pew pew pew," everything dies.


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 Toastaster wrote:
Do marines even conquer planets? I thought that job came to the guard, and it was the legions that used to conquer planets. I thought that in 40k's time marines are there to kill the enemies of the imperium.

Conquer is a terrible word to use. Guard are the backbone for such tasks and SM's are there to strike at the most important and vulnerable positions they deem winnable by their own standards.

When a chapter of SM's invade a planet, the PDF and IG are responsible for the preservation of mission lengths. The available SM's are there to conduct military operation and complete an X amount of personal goals, making life 10 times easier for the IG to slam the enemy with tanks and sheer man power.

1,000 SM's can statistically put away 98,000 humans. I actually did the math, assuming a regular marine can kill 100, a sergeant can kill 150, a captain can kill 200 and a scout can kill 20 (and 20 at best). Scouts get so few because #1, they really only do reconnaissance and #2, they have not nearly enough experience as their much older brothers.

Now IG can probably kill much more. Let's say a force of 2 million IG assist in an invasion along a SM chapter. At least 1 million, AT LEAST a million enemy humans will bite the dust but that's assuming those IG sucked baddd. IG are much more trained then any single human military unit coupled with the fact they have seen horrors incomprehensible to most planetary citizens. While IG are doing most of the fighting SM's go for the strategic enemy positions and crush them to a bloody pulp. That's how wars are won. IG and SM's work hard together and only by those means will SM's be able to complete their goals.

Of course during the Great Crusade humans were rarely ever needed. A SM legion would just do the job itself.

GW writers have no sense of scale in any regard. A couple of million guard would still be useless against us if modern earth was invaded. North Korea (far from a world power) has 5 million soldiers. Russa, China, America alone could fight off the Imperial guard or Space Marines.

Also if you look at mass invasions from sea, like D-day, show that even a superior force will take huge casualties while trying to land. Coming down from space would exasperate this even further. Let's say one drop ship with 10,000 Guard is dropping into the atmosphere. We just hammer it with missiles and that's a whole army dead. If they set up a mass drop site in say a desert or tundra type area, we would just nuke it and wipe out their whole army.

As for Space Marines, in the real world, they wouldn't stand a chance. We could just flood the skies with Choppers and rain death down on them, thousands of tanks, missiles, snipers...even an armoured super hero would go down under sheer weight of fire.

There are 8 Billion people on this planet, even a million space marines would struggle to do what it is claimed in the fluff.

 KorPhaeron77 wrote:
GW writers have no sense of scale in any regard. A couple of million guard would still be useless against us if modern earth was invaded. North Korea (far from a world power) has 5 million soldiers. Russa, China, America alone could fight off the Imperial guard or Space Marines.

Also if you look at mass invasions from sea, like D-day, show that even a superior force will take huge casualties while trying to land. Coming down from space would exasperate this even further. Let's say one drop ship with 10,000 Guard is dropping into the atmosphere. We just hammer it with missiles and that's a whole army dead. If they set up a mass drop site in say a desert or tundra type area, we would just nuke it and wipe out their whole army.

As for Space Marines, in the real world, they wouldn't stand a chance. We could just flood the skies with Choppers and rain death down on them, thousands of tanks, missiles, snipers...even an armoured super hero would go down under sheer weight of fire.

There are 8 Billion people on this planet, even a million space marines would struggle to do what it is claimed in the fluff.

Solid debate right there actually. You're right, 2 million IG stands zero chance. I'd say...6 billion IG, added with maybe 2 chapters of SM's. Yeah, that's a fight.

But then again, I always thought, SM legions were much more able to conquer planets and for obvious reasons. A legion is ten times the size of a SM chapter.

Idk. It's such an ambiguous scenario. We can compare the 41st millennium to nowadays but we really have no clue what life is like in the future and we cant possibly predict anything. Its all just theory.