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 Veteran of The Long War wrote:
One that's always annoyed me was the casualty list for the Siege of Vraks. 8 Million? In a war across an entire planet? World War 1 had 100 Million casualties alone and it was just Europe not the entire planet. If it was 8 billion casualties that would be much more believable.

You have to take into consideration though that mankind has spread out across a lot of worldseaming that not every planet in the imperium is going to have as many people as earth most planets wouldn't have anywhere close I would assume especially a planet that is only used to stockpile weapons and ammunition

GW fluff is not that far out of scale when you look at the big picture of things. Most of the comment on the few numbers of everything is very legitimate but to me is another exemple of poor historical vision. Lets take the 1000 marines chapter exemple. This is terribly few especially if you compare it to the size of a modern army. It seems even more ridiculus if you consider that chapter operate at company level (100 strong) for 90% of their operation. What do you do with that? You kill around 10000 enemy soldiers of your choice. It's not a big number, but is it enough to completly destroy any chance of the ennemy of mounting a good defense? It may be the case if you chose your target well. War in the 41st millenium is about has different than war in ancient greece vs war in modern era. The tactics, the strategie, the logistics the scope of it is completly different. Numbers will of course be strangely low or high from time to time. Consider this: a world is part of the Imperium has long has he give the tithe.

 Lord Tarkin wrote:
Let me put this simply. The average planet population in 40k is 8,000,000,000.

Where exactly is that average established?

The impression I had was that world with more than a few billion in population were primarily hive worlds (and possibly forge worlds). The bulk of Imperial worlds had less than that, often much less. Agri worlds, feral worlds, shrine worlds, fortress worlds, mining worlds, frontier worlds, research outposts etc etc. I would expect the average for Imperial worlds to be significantly less than 8 billion. (Though, once again, that average value would not be too informative, given the wild variance involved.)

 Veteran of The Long War wrote:
One that's always annoyed me was the casualty list for the Siege of Vraks. 8 Million? In a war across an entire planet? World War 1 had 100 Million casualties alone and it was just Europe not the entire planet. If it was 8 billion casualties that would be much more believable.

How many soldiers were fighting? The size of the region under despite doesn't really mean that the casualties will be similarly increased in scale.

Vrakk wasn't as heavily populated as western Europe if I recall.

 PhillyT wrote:

 Veteran of The Long War wrote:
One that's always annoyed me was the casualty list for the Siege of Vraks. 8 Million? In a war across an entire planet? World War 1 had 100 Million casualties alone and it was just Europe not the entire planet. If it was 8 billion casualties that would be much more believable.

How many soldiers were fighting? The size of the region under despite doesn't really mean that the casualties will be similarly increased in scale.

Vrakk wasn't as heavily populated as western Europe if I recall.

The amount of soldiers alone having to fight the planet would be huge though. Otherwise you risk enemy soldiers out flanking your battle lines or simply harassing your men from the rear etc. It takes a lot of men to hold battle lines and ensure they simply cannot be walked around etc. WW1 had natural mountains areas etc that limited the already huge stretch of lines on the western front (even the mountains needed defending) so its not simply determined by population. the area covered would need to be huge in a battle for a planet.

 Pendix wrote:

 Lord Tarkin wrote:
Let me put this simply. The average planet population in 40k is 8,000,000,000.

Where exactly is that average established?

The impression I had was that world with more than a few billion in population were primarily hive worlds (and possibly forge worlds). The bulk of Imperial worlds had less than that, often much less. Agri worlds, feral worlds, shrine worlds, fortress worlds, mining worlds, frontier worlds, research outposts etc etc. I would expect the average for Imperial worlds to be significantly less than 8 billion. (Though, once again, that average value would not be too informative, given the wild variance involved.)

It was several years ago I read that on lexicanum, 8 billion was the average. Since then, I have not been able to find the information so safe to say it was removed, perhaps because of the information you just revealed to me. However, keep in mind that the most common world is actually the civilized world. It can range from 15,000,000 inhabitants to 10,000,000,000. With those numbers, the average population size would be 4,992,500,000 if my math is correct.

http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Civilized_World#.U9WHz2nD8m9

Here's the link to a civilized world on Lexi if you wanna have a look. But nice catch, 8 billion was a bit off.

teban wrote:
I read somewhere, a while ago, that only orphans from officials actually are elegible as battle sisters. I may be wrong - however, at a maximum of 7k sisters per Order (the greater orders) and a few minor orders that number from say 50 to 1k members... They're too few.

So yeah, they're either too few intentionally or just a fail by GW's side

Sisters (and Schola Progenium students in general) come from the "orphans of Imperial servants". The Scions codex was more specific than the SoB codex about it, but IIRC, this broadly just means important people in the Imperium. Officers and such.

Anyway, yes, it can certainly be argued that the numbers of the SoB are too few. ClockworkZion and a friend of his did some maths on it, and found that the numbers given by GW are staggeringly low, given the size of the Imperium as a whole. People who are more in favour of the current numbers argue that they reflect just how elite and special the Sisters are, which is a valid point to some extent. But I certainly think that their numbers should be more than they are currently.

Oh, and also, Minor Orders have a minimum size of 100.

Long story short; Any campaign that involves numbers of men.

 Swastakowey wrote:
The amount of soldiers alone having to fight the planet would be huge though. Otherwise you risk enemy soldiers out flanking your battle lines or simply harassing your men from the rear etc. It takes a lot of men to hold battle lines and ensure they simply cannot be walked around etc. WW1 had natural mountains areas etc that limited the already huge stretch of lines on the western front (even the mountains needed defending) so its not simply determined by population. the area covered would need to be huge in a battle for a planet.

But in the case of Vraks most of the planet was just empty wasteland. The only populated area was around the main fortress and weapon stockpiles. So sure, you need troops to watch the flanks, but you're still only talking about a relatively small area. And, in this case, the relevant area is even smaller because the single central objective is all that matters, it's pretty much surrounded, and the defenders can't retreat or abandon the only thing that matters to counter-attack into some useless wasteland.

 BrotherOfBone wrote:
Long story short; Any campaign that involves numbers of men.

Also women.

And creatures of unknown gender.

 BrotherOfBone wrote:
Long story short; Any campaign that involves numbers of men.

Pretty much yes.

 Ashiraya wrote:

 BrotherOfBone wrote:
Long story short; Any campaign that involves numbers of men.

Also women.

And creatures of unknown gender.

Yeah, like lieutenant Mira

Edit: or should I say....leftenant Mira

 Lord Tarkin wrote:

It was several years ago I read that on lexicanum, 8 billion was the average. Since then, I have not been able to find the information so safe to say it was removed, perhaps because of the information you just revealed to me. However, keep in mind that the most common world is actually the civilized world. It can range from 15,000,000 inhabitants to 10,000,000,000. With those numbers, the average population size would be 4,992,500,000 if my math is correct.

http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Civilized_World#.U9WHz2nD8m9

Here's the link to a civilized world on Lexi if you wanna have a look. But nice catch, 8 billion was a bit off.

*nods* yeah, that seems a lot closer to what I would expect.

 Troike wrote:
Anyway, yes, it can certainly be argued that the numbers of the SoB are too few. ClockworkZion and a friend of his did some maths on it, and found that the numbers given by GW are staggeringly low, given the size of the Imperium as a whole. People who are more in favour of the current numbers argue that they reflect just how elite and special the Sisters are, which is a valid point to some extent. But I certainly think that their numbers should be more than they are currently.

My primary problem with low number of SoB is that them being sooo rare gives GW an easy out when they fail to appear in the material when, by all rights, they should. Cardinal World attacked by DE, no mention of SoB despite defense of Cardinal Worlds being one of their chief responsibilities? It was because they are sooo few that it was just one they don't have the numbers to defend, and not because the writer just forgot them. SM chapter needs purging? Other SM chapter called in (possibly even from whole sectors away). But shouldn't that be the SoB's job? No no no, there isn't enough of them nearby and not because the writer wanted a big manly SM as the protagonist.
Eugh. Can you tell I'm feeling bitter.

 Ashiraya wrote:

 BrotherOfBone wrote:
Long story short; Any campaign that involves numbers of men.

Also women.

And creatures of unknown gender.

Also creatures to whom gender is an alien concept.

 Pendix wrote:

Also creatures to whom gender is an alien concept.

Thus making them of unknown gender.

 Ashiraya wrote:
For that matter, the whole 'heroic scale' thing is a fail, actually, since I would prefer fluff scale.

I do not demand ten foot marines (Like this fella), as that is just too extreme, but at least nine feet? Please?

Fluff accurate marines are seven foot tall; that's how tall GW design studio has always said them to be. Latest reference can be found in the current chaos marine dex. I find it absolutely hilarious that people refuse to believe this and decide that marines must be ten feet tall, and then complain that the models are horribly out of scale (albeit even at seven feet the model scale is slightly off.)

But seven feet is big enough to be imposing, yet be able to operate in a human scale world.

 Pendix wrote:
My primary problem with low number of SoB is that them being sooo rare gives GW an easy out when they fail to appear in the material when, by all rights, they should.

Don't think that GW ever has or will used it to justify a lack of fluff coverage, though. They still had the same numbers back when they recived more coverage. More likely, it was just done on the grounds of making them seem more elite/special, or something like that.

Heve those low SoB numbers been referenced in a while? I think they've been silently retconned away.

Let's talk about Vraks, because I think its interesting. 8 million is the number of combat fatalities being thrown around here, but both lexicanum and warhammer 40k wiki say 14 million for the guard alone, and an unknown number of chaos soldiers.

14 million deaths isn't that high compared to the world wars, ww2 had between 50 and 80 million deaths depending on your source of choice, ww1 had 17 million, most of those confined to a relatively small area of actual combat. However, a sizable majority of ww2s deaths were civilian deaths, because being around a warzone tends to not be good for ones health. WW1 is interesting because not only do military deaths outnumber civilian deaths, but also most of the deaths are directly attributable to enemy action rather than disease.

So where does that leave vraks? 14 million military deaths is a staggeringly high amount considering that the imperium has far better medicine than 20th century earth and disease tends to not be a real problem for the guard. I just don't see hwo 14 million people can die due to enemy action, that's a lot of killing.

 EmilCrane wrote:
Let's talk about Vraks, because I think its interesting. 8 million is the number of combat fatalities being thrown around here, but both lexicanum and warhammer 40k wiki say 14 million for the guard alone, and an unknown number of chaos soldiers.

14 million deaths isn't that high compared to the world wars, ww2 had between 50 and 80 million deaths depending on your source of choice, ww1 had 17 million, most of those confined to a relatively small area of actual combat. However, a sizable majority of ww2s deaths were civilian deaths, because being around a warzone tends to not be good for ones health. WW1 is interesting because not only do military deaths outnumber civilian deaths, but also most of the deaths are directly attributable to enemy action rather than disease.

So where does that leave vraks? 14 million military deaths is a staggeringly high amount considering that the imperium has far better medicine than 20th century earth and disease tends to not be a real problem for the guard. I just don't see hwo 14 million people can die due to enemy action, that's a lot of killing.

Remember the siege of Vraks lasted for about 8 years with both sides being reinforced alot.

Also while the Guard tactics werent as bad as many people make them out to be, they were trying to take a take a fortress the size of Britain.

 Crimson wrote:
Heve those low SoB numbers been referenced in a while? I think they've been silently retconned away.

Interesting point. I've looked, and while the 5E and 6E codexes don't reference the numbers of Major Orders, the 7th rulebook does indeed refer to Major Orders as "numbering several thousand warriors".

I there even a mention of how many Major Orders there are?

I've always had a bit of a problem with the Guard being viewed as expendable cannon-fodder.

IIRC the Guard are usually the cream of a planets PDF, so they are pretty decent troops to begin with. Then they get further training en route to whatever warzone the regiment is assigned to.

However my biggest gripe is as to the view that they're expendable. Yes, there are billions of troops in the Guard. Yes, the Imperium can raise billions more if need be. But if you're in command of an army to re-take a rebellious world, even if you have five million Guardsmen that's not a lot of bodies to subdue an entire world. On top of all that you can't absolutely rely on reinforcements - it's all very fine and well having billions of Guardsmen but they're not much help to you if you're stuck on a planet in an area with warp storms and you're not even sure your request for reinforcements was received.

Even if you do get reinforcements sent, it's not like nowadays when you can reasonably expect them to be with you in a certain time. Thanks to the vagaries of warp travel they might be flung off course by hundreds of light years, they might never come back out of warp space, a passing inquisitor might requisition the lot to go hunt for some random xenos artefact, or they might arrive at their destination anywhere from a few days to a few thousand years late.

 Crimson wrote:

Fluff accurate marines are seven foot tall; that's how tall GW design studio has always said them to be. Latest reference can be found in the current chaos marine dex. I find it absolutely hilarious that people refuse to believe this and decide that marines must be ten feet tall, and then complain that the models are horribly out of scale (albeit even at seven feet the model scale is slightly off.)

But seven feet is big enough to be imposing, yet be able to operate in a human scale world.

Ewww, no thanks. Seven feet, that's not much taller than my brother. Seems absurd a healthy specimen with huge armour and superhuman buffs would not be taller.

In a BL novel whose name eludes me (I can dig up the source if you are interested) a Marine outside of armour is described as half again the height of a man, with a chest like a dining table and hands like shovels.

Assuming this man is about six feet (he did seem well-grown) this would put the marine at a very reasonable nine feet.

Clearly all those 7 feet references are outdated (Like the rather overrated Goodwin statement) or just in-universe propaganda to make Marine feats seem even more incredible!

And before you mention doorways and ceilings, have you noticed how oversized Imperial architecture is? At nine feet they could operate where it matters without issues. In the rare cases where there is a doorway that's too low, just snashing through is child's play for them.

All this is my opinion, of course. Calling it 'hilarious' when others disagree with yours is needlessly dismissive. We're all friends here.

 Ashiraya wrote:

 Crimson wrote:

Fluff accurate marines are seven foot tall; that's how tall GW design studio has always said them to be. Latest reference can be found in the current chaos marine dex. I find it absolutely hilarious that people refuse to believe this and decide that marines must be ten feet tall, and then complain that the models are horribly out of scale (albeit even at seven feet the model scale is slightly off.)

But seven feet is big enough to be imposing, yet be able to operate in a human scale world.

Ewww, no thanks. Seven feet, that's not much taller than my brother. Seems absurd a healthy specimen with huge armour and superhuman buffs would not be taller.

In a BL novel whose name eludes me (I can dig up the source if you are interested) a Marine outside of armour is described as half again the height of a man, with a chest like a dining table and hands like shovels.

Assuming this man is about six feet (he did seem well-grown) this would put the marine at a very reasonable nine feet.

Clearly all those 7 feet references are outdated (Like the rather overrated Goodwin statement) or just in-universe propaganda to make Marine feats seem even more incredible!

And before you mention doorways and ceilings, have you noticed how oversized Imperial architecture is? At nine feet they could operate where it matters without issues. In the rare cases where there is a doorway that's too low, just snashing through is child's play for them.

All this is my opinion, of course. Calling it 'hilarious' when others disagree with yours is needlessly dismissive. We're all friends here.

I believe marines are average 8 feet tall. I remember from the book Rynns World, a Crimson Fist codicier was 6 feet tall and was constantly mocked for being significantly shorter than his brothers

I do not remember that, and I have read the book. I will have to check when I get home on sunday.

That said, now we just need a 10 foot marine propagator and the circle is complete.

 Mythantor wrote:
I there even a mention of how many Major Orders there are?

There's six of them.

Bloody Rose, Sacred Rose, Ebon Chalice, Martyred Lady, Valorous Heart and Argent Shroud.

 Ashiraya wrote:
I do not remember that, and I have read the book. I will have to check when I get home on sunday.

That said, now we just need a 10 foot marine propagator and the circle is complete.

Well, read it again. Whether it makes sense or not doesn't matter, I remember distinctly reading that part.

 Ashiraya wrote:

Ewww, no thanks. Seven feet, that's not much taller than my brother.

So? What your brother got to do with this?

Seems absurd a healthy specimen with huge armour and superhuman buffs would not be taller.

How it is absurd? Giants that are unable to operate in a human scale world seem much more absurd to me.

In a BL novel whose name eludes me (I can dig up the source if you are interested) a Marine outside of armour is described as half again the height of a man, with a chest like a dining table and hands like shovels.

Assuming this man is about six feet (he did seem well-grown) this would put the marine at a very reasonable nine feet.

Seems kinda vague.

Clearly all those 7 feet references are outdated (Like the rather overrated Goodwin statement) or just in-universe propaganda to make Marine feats seem even more incredible!

Unlike BL, the design studio has been really consistent with this over the years. And current CSM book is obviously not outdated.

And before you mention doorways and ceilings, have you noticed how oversized Imperial architecture is? At nine feet they could operate where it matters without issues. In the rare cases where there is a doorway that's too low, just snashing through is child's play for them.

Rhino was originally designed to be used by normal humans.

All this is my opinion, of course. Calling it 'hilarious' when others disagree with yours is needlessly dismissive. We're all friends here.

Well, I find it somewhat amusing when people ignore the clearly stated fluff and then complain that the game does not match the fanfiction in their heads.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Troike wrote:

 Mythantor wrote:
I there even a mention of how many Major Orders there are?

There's six of them.

Bloody Rose, Sacred Rose, Ebon Chalice, Martyred Lady, Valorous Heart and Argent Shroud.

Yes, but there are countless minor orders, so there actually can be quite a lot of sisters.





Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Lord Tarkin wrote:

I believe marines are average 8 feet tall. I remember from the book Rynns World, a Crimson Fist codicier was 6 feet tall and was constantly mocked for being significantly shorter than his brothers

Would fit the seven feet figure. A whole foot shorter is significantly shorter.

 Crimson wrote:
Yes, but there are countless minor orders, so there actually can be quite a lot of sisters.

True, but I'm unsure if the Minor Orders are quite enough to be a game changer on this. They do need to come from the Major Orders, and share a recruitment source with them. So there's limits on how extensive they can become. Not to say that there can't be a great number of them, mind you.

Would the whole "Magnus can't use the warp but Space Wolves can because they say it's from Fenris" debate count?