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With the emergence of the Tyranids to the milky way galaxy, the Necrons waking up and killing people, and all the other crazy xenos across the stars is the Codex Astartes still useful when it comes to tactics. Forgive my ignorance but i am pretty sure that Guillman wrote it after the heresy when the Astartes hadn't yet encountered some of the ever changing enemies of the Imperium like the Tyranid's who can adapt their strategy instantly on the battlefield. This obviously applies more to the Ultramarines and their successors because they pretty much live and die by it.

I'm not talking chapter structure which i think works well, I am speaking clearly from a tactical outlook.

My favorite guys are the Raptors because they scout out worlds before a battle and repaint their armor to suit the terrain so they can blend in with stealth.

Lets not forget that the Ultramarines excommunicated one of their own awesome captains for joining up with a Deathwatch kill team to take down a hive fleet because he didn't follow the rule book even though he still got the job done and saved a whole bunch of people.

IIRC they still add stuff to the codex when they encounter new enemies.

Every good book about strategy and tactic tend to be rather vague for there is no such thing has to this, this and this and victory is assured. War has no instruction book, only guide-lines. A real book about strategy will either try to develop a good mindset to focus when thinking as a general or will describe the optimal strategies with certain tools against certain ennemies in a particular situation. The tactical advices of the Codex Astartes are probably like this expect even better than anything else written on the subject by human hands since or before. So no, Tyranids and Necrons don't change much.

You also have to remember that the entire reason for the Codex Astartes was to keep any one Commander from ever again having a force capable of the devastation that the Heresy brought on.
That psychological scar on the Space Marines still remains.
Now what will be interesting to see is in the next edition, will the Emperor finally die...taking the guiding light with him and forcing the Empire of Man to fall back into localized fiefdoms; probably with the regions Space Marine Chapter Master becoming the local Emperor/King/Warlord/Governor-General/whatever for that region? And how many can fall into a logic-bomb saying they still follow the Codex...each Chapter is still 1000 Marines. Except now the Kingdom of Russ has 100 Chapters each based on a specific world in the Empire of the Wolf, ready to move and defend their neighboring planets, but no longer able to react to galaxy wide incursions.

KellyJ wrote:
You also have to remember that the entire reason for the Codex Astartes was to keep any one Commander from ever again having a force capable of the devastation that the Heresy brought on.
That psychological scar on the Space Marines still remains.
Now what will be interesting to see is in the next edition, will the Emperor finally die...taking the guiding light with him and forcing the Empire of Man to fall back into localized fiefdoms; probably with the regions Space Marine Chapter Master becoming the local Emperor/King/Warlord/Governor-General/whatever for that region? And how many can fall into a logic-bomb saying they still follow the Codex...each Chapter is still 1000 Marines. Except now the Kingdom of Russ has 100 Chapters each based on a specific world in the Empire of the Wolf, ready to move and defend their neighboring planets, but no longer able to react to galaxy wide incursions.

He wasn't talking about the army structure.

Tactics wise not really. but they do add stuff as they go besides the most strict smurfs.

The Codex is in no way just Roboute's writings, as there are several quotes sourced to other authors like Balthus Dardanus.

The codex is basically The Art of War of the future. It's as valid as that is. The problems start when people adhere to it as if they're rules, not guidelines. It's fine to go against it if the situation requires, which was Guillimans original idea for how it should be used probably. Just chapters like the UM take it too far and treat it like gospel.

The codex is more valid now than ever. The Ultramarines have the greatest record of all Space Marines, so they should be emulated by others.
The High Lords recognize this, and that's why, in addition to the purity and stability of their gene-seed, over time the proportion of Ultramarine successors has only increased.
Additionally as others have noted, the codex is not a static tome, it receives updates. After the Ultramarines smashed the Necrons on Damnos for instance, Marneus Calgar himself penned a data-scroll containing all the knowledge he had accumulated facing the Necrons, and this was then circulated through the other Chapter Masters.

The Codex is a good thing, as long as it is not held as dogma.

 Gravewalker wrote:
With the emergence of the Tyranids to the milky way galaxy, the Necrons waking up and killing people, and all the other crazy xenos across the stars is the Codex Astartes still useful when it comes to tactics. Forgive my ignorance but i am pretty sure that Guillman wrote it after the heresy when the Astartes hadn't yet encountered some of the ever changing enemies of the Imperium like the Tyranid's who can adapt their strategy instantly on the battlefield. This obviously applies more to the Ultramarines and their successors because they pretty much live and die by it.

I'm not talking chapter structure which i think works well, I am speaking clearly from a tactical outlook.

My favorite guys are the Raptors because they scout out worlds before a battle and repaint their armor to suit the terrain so they can blend in with stealth.

Lets not forget that the Ultramarines excommunicated one of their own awesome captains for joining up with a Deathwatch kill team to take down a hive fleet because he didn't follow the rule book even though he still got the job done and saved a whole bunch of people.

ok first of all you are assuming the codex astartes is some absolutly inflexable paint by numbers micro-managed guide to fighting a war. it's not. all the quotes we've seen from the codex tend to be honestly kinda vague. I suspect it's likely an orginizational and general guide. not specieifcs. fact is if the codex Astartes was absolutly inadaptable to new enemies, the Ultramarines would be incapable of defeating Necrons, Tau or Tyranids,. but we know the Ultramarines have won notable victories agaisnt Necrons and Tyranids (and proably the Tau I just can't recall it). showing clear evidance of learning and adapting when fighting them. So yeah the codex is hardly restricting adaptation. and as others have noted, a strong holder of the codex has one of the best records against these foes.

Secondly, yeah let's look at Uriel Ventris. let's look at what he actually did. he waltzed off to play commando, while leaving his battle company to hold the line against a tyranid swarm. His place was leading his men. he should have sent a subordinate to work with the death watch. instead he claimed "I HAVE TO DO THIS!" and basicly left his company without their commanding officer.
Militaries take that kind of stuff pretty seriously. he basicly abandoned his post.

 Iron_Captain wrote:
The Codex is a good thing, as long as it is not held as dogma.

But Captain, the Codex Astartes does not support this action!

Iron_Captain wrote:
The Codex is a good thing, as long as it is not held as dogma.

Icmiracle wrote:
But Captain, the Codex Astartes does not support this action!

Captain Titus said:
"Try to keep up."

Iron_Captain wrote:
The Codex is a good thing, as long as it is not held as dogma.

Icmiracle wrote:
But Captain, the Codex Astartes does not support this action!

Captain Titus said:
"Try to keep up."

Dakka derped and double posted.

The problem is there are two versions of the Codex depicted in the fluff.

Rick Priestley's version.

And the Graham McNeill is a Bad Writer Version.


Priestley's original depiction of the Codex Astartes described it's primary purpose as to eliminating the flawed techniques that had led to defects and physical/mental corruption that had led the Traitor Legions to fall to Chaos and to "recognise and expunge these weaknesses". So the Codex Astartes was intended to standardize the way Space Marines were made in order to make them better than their Legionnaire forebears. The main portion of the Codex Astartes solely deals with how a Space Marine is supposed to be recruited, trained, indoctrinated, and maintained. Seriously, there is an entire page in Codex: Ultramarines about how the Codex was designed to standardize Space Marine training and geneseed handling, and only 2 short paragraphs about being "Codex Adherent" and what that meant.

When a Chapter is considered "Codex Adherent" it only means that the Chapter adheres to the tenets set forth in the Codex as to training and organization (roughly 1000 Marines arrayed in 10 companies of 100 Marines). When it describes Chapters that don't follow the Codex, it refers to them as varying in "organization, tactical roles and other processes". Processes being the operative word. It's basically saying that while a chapter like the Dark Angels is a Codex Chapter, it does things slightly differently in the way it organizes itself and how it carries out its religious indoctrination, etc.

When the Codex Astartes's strategy and tactics contents are described, it uses phrases like "an authoritative guide to waging war in any number of ways on countless different types of worlds" and a "highly developed treatise combining the wisdom of hundreds of military thinkers throughout history" and how portions "describe actual battles together with the comments of the commanders on the spot." Literally, this is a tome, thousands of pages long, which goes into exhaustive detail about not only the practice, but the theory of warfare.

The Codex Astartes is supposed to be why Space Marines are so good. Not why they are so bad.

Which brings us to the Graham McNeill is a Bad Writer version of the Codex which first surfaced briefly in the 4th Edition Codex: Space Marines (which McNeill is cited as an author of, though it heavily just repeats fluff from Codex: Ultramarines), and is heavily featured in his Ultramarines novels. This version reduces the Codex to an If A, Then B Instruction Manual: Warfighting for Dummies. It basically turns the Codex Astartes into the one thing it could never, ever, actually be. I mean, literally the prologue to the Ultramarines Omnibus, and the point where any sensible reader would probably stop reading, has Space Marine Scouts suggesting that as a reconnaissance element, it is their duty according to the Codex to engage the enemy wherever possible, and shortly later, a Space Marine wrestling with the idea that the Codex would proscribe the use of an improvised explosive device to accomplish an objective. Stop for a second and let it sink in just how ridiculously stupid both those ideas are. And we're still in the prologue of the Ultramarines novel travesty.

The good news is, Games Workshop has more or less been kind enough to continue to ignore most of McNeills work. Both by continuing to reprint Priestley's version, and to steadfastly deny that Uriel Ventris was ever Captain of the 4th Company like he claims (my favorite interpretation being that Ventris is actually mortally wounded in the prologue, and the subsequent novels are his fevered hallucinations). That, and the most recent Tyrannic War Veterans dataslate specifically puts the kibosh on the idea that the formation would be breaking the Codex. Because the idea that using your most experienced troops to do what they are best at when the mission calls for it is what actually makes sense.

Basically, if anything you read about the Codex has a part where a character says or suggests "The Codex forbids >whatever<", it's written by someone with no knowledge of military theory. The idea that the Codex would be proscriptive is fairly insane. Also, if a story suggests that someone could predict what Space Marines would do because they are following the Codex, it is likewise the work of an amateur author who doesn't know anything about military theory. Graham McNeill has done both. Though McNeill has also written stories where characters run out of ammo in one scene, but magically have more in the next, and stories where a character loses an arm at one point, and then fights with two weapons, one in each hand, later in the story.

Basically, you can fall back on the line I eventually added to my signature because it highlights this whole idea very succinctly. Marneus Calgar is described, specifically as "one of the Imperium's greatest tacticians." Marneus Calgar treats the Codex like it is the War Bible. The Ultramarines are specifically referred to as the "Greatest of all Space Marine Chapters" and their victories being "too numerous to count".

If Calgar is one of the greatest tacticians in the Imperium, and the Ultramarines are the premier Space Marine chapter at winning wars and battles, and they follow the Codex... if the Codex Astartes is garbage, how bad is everyone else in the Imperium at warfighting. Think about it for a second. If the Codex sucks, and the best warfighters in the Imperium follow it religiously, that means everyone else in 40K is even worse.

So I don't know how anybody else feels, but ThreestoogesHammer 40K where everyone is a complete, bumbling idiot is a lot less fun to imagine. Which is pretty much where you're left at if you believe McNeill's version. Let's stick with Priestley's. He invented the game.

I'll leave you with a little quote: "If I were to sum up what I've learned in 35 years of service, it's improvise, improvise, improvise." — Gen. James Mattis | USMC Mattis figured this out and he only had 35 years to learn it. Guilliman had two hundred.

I miss the days when there were 10,000 Black Templars and they didn't give a gak about Girlyman's toilet paper.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:


The Codex Astartes is supposed to be why Space Marines are so good. Not why they are so bad.

I think you're confusing genetic engineering, elite weapons and armor, and decades of experience in combat before even being considered for Scout status with Girlyman's toilet paper.

 EmpNortonII wrote:
I miss the days when there were 10,000 Black Templars and they didn't give a gak about Girlyman's toilet paper.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:


The Codex Astartes is supposed to be why Space Marines are so good. Not why they are so bad.

I think you're confusing genetic engineering, elite weapons and armor, and decades of experience in combat before even being considered for Scout status with Girlyman's toilet paper.

no he's not. those give an edge but so does the codex.

BrianDavion wrote:


no he's not. those give an edge but so does the codex.

The only character in 40k who actually gets a bonus from the Codex Astartes is Commander Farsight.

BrianDavion wrote:

 EmpNortonII wrote:
I miss the days when there were 10,000 Black Templars and they didn't give a gak about Girlyman's toilet paper.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:


The Codex Astartes is supposed to be why Space Marines are so good. Not why they are so bad.

I think you're confusing genetic engineering, elite weapons and armor, and decades of experience in combat before even being considered for Scout status with Girlyman's toilet paper.

no he's not. those give an edge but so does the codex.

It serves no purpose to reply to his continually nonsensical jibberish. His intent is to be Dakka's worst poster. Just let him succeed.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
It serves no purpose to reply to his continually nonsensical jibberish. His intent is to be Dakka's worst poster. Just let him succeed.

I see you are still upset GW fired Matt Ward.

Rumor has it there's a whole line of GW books about how awesome Space Marines were before the worst Primarch tried to pass his toilet paper off as a guide to war.

Let's see... what's it called... Holes Helsing... Hollens Hemspring... oh, the Horus Heresy!

Long before Girlyman wrote the worst book in the history of the Imperium of Man, Space Marines not only existed, but managed to do epic, awesome things without Rowboat telling them how to act!

 EmpNortonII wrote:

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
It serves no purpose to reply to his continually nonsensical jibberish. His intent is to be Dakka's worst poster. Just let him succeed.

I see you are still upset GW fired Matt Ward.

Rumor has it there's a whole line of GW books about how awesome Space Marines were before the worst Primarch tried to pass his toilet paper off as a guide to war.

Let's see... what's it called... Holes Helsing... Hollens Hemspring... oh, the Horus Heresy!

Long before Girlyman wrote the worst book in the history of the Imperium of Man, Space Marines not only existed, but managed to do epic, awesome things without Rowboat telling them how to act!

And just how did that work out...

They also had Primarchs around then which I'm sure didn't hurt.

 ImAGeek wrote:

And just how did that work out...

They don't call it the Great Crusade for nothing.

 EmpNortonII wrote:

 ImAGeek wrote:

And just how did that work out...

They don't call it the Great Crusade for nothing.

Didn't end well though did it.

The interpretation of the codex varies greatly. You have Raptors (loose interpretation, series of guidelines and effective tactics) on the other end, and Red Scorpions (strict interpretation, religious dogma) on the other (Although, even Red Scorpions tend to improvise from time to time).

Also, after the 1st Tyrannic war, Ultramarines aren't really a codex compliant. They have formed the Tyrannic War Veterans as a special unit to deal with ongoing Tyranid infestations.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
The problem is there are two versions of the Codex depicted in the fluff.

Rick Priestley's version.

And the Graham McNeill is a Bad Writer Version.

That is heavily subject to personal opinion. Graham McNeill is a better writer than many others who work for BL, and I liked some of his novels. The ones about Uriel Ventris were entertaining to read.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
The Codex Astartes is supposed to be why Space Marines are so good. Not why they are so bad.

No, their genetic modification and equipment is what makes the Space Marines so good, not their tactics. It is not as if the other factions are incapable of making great tactics. Their modifications set the SM apart from other factions, great tacticians can also be found among the Imperial Guard, Chaos, Eldar and others.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
Which brings us to the Graham McNeill is a Bad Writer version of the Codex which first surfaced briefly in the 4th Edition Codex: Space Marines (which McNeill is cited as an author of, though it heavily just repeats fluff from Codex: Ultramarines), and is heavily featured in his Ultramarines novels. This version reduces the Codex to an If A, Then B Instruction Manual: Warfighting for Dummies. It basically turns the Codex Astartes into the one thing it could never, ever, actually be. I mean, literally the prologue to the Ultramarines Omnibus, and the point where any sensible reader would probably stop reading, has Space Marine Scouts suggesting that as a reconnaissance element, it is their duty according to the Codex to engage the enemy wherever possible, and shortly later, a Space Marine wrestling with the idea that the Codex would proscribe the use of an improvised explosive device to accomplish an objective. Stop for a second and let it sink in just how ridiculously stupid both those ideas are. And we're still in the prologue of the Ultramarines novel travesty.

Just because you don't like something does not mean it is bad. At least it is far better than anything written by C.S. Goto, or God forbid, Matt Ward.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
The good news is, Games Workshop has more or less been kind enough to continue to ignore most of McNeills work. Both by continuing to reprint Priestley's version, and to steadfastly deny that Uriel Ventris was ever Captain of the 4th Company like he claims (my favorite interpretation being that Ventris is actually mortally wounded in the prologue, and the subsequent novels are his fevered hallucinations).

iirc, the 5th edition codex has Uriel Ventris as Captain of the 4th Company.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
Basically, if anything you read about the Codex has a part where a character says or suggests "The Codex forbids >whatever<", it's written by someone with no knowledge of military theory.

The idea that the Codex would be proscriptive is fairly insane. Also, if a story suggests that someone could predict what Space Marines would do because they are following the Codex, it is likewise the work of an amateur author who doesn't know anything about military theory.

Iron_Captain wrote:That is heavily subject to personal opinion. Graham McNeill is a better writer than many others who work for BL, and I liked some of his novels. The ones about Uriel Ventris were entertaining to read.

Whether you liked his novels or not, he's still a mediocre writer with poor attention to detail which isn't helped by the lackluster editing at TBL. That's just fact. The enjoyability is subjective. The Twilight and 50 Shades novels are pretty much universally panned as awful, and yet millions of people enjoyed them. The vast majority of 40K fiction falls into this category. Technically sub-par, but easy to read and targeted at an undiscerning demographic. 40K Shades of Gray; with bolter porn instead of housewife porn. Only the occasionally rare offerings by ADB or John French end up falling outside that realm.

Despite his errors though, I still though the first two Priests of Mars books were decent. The last one was a rushed hack job with McNeill's trademark nonsensical, messily depicted battle scenes. Really, McNeill is only good when he's writing human (non-Space Marine) characters and when he's not trying to write battle scenes. It's why his Remembrancers in False Gods, Thousand Sons and Fulgrim were interesting, but the rest of those novels were fairly lackluster.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
The Codex Astartes is supposed to be why Space Marines are so good. Not why they are so bad.

No, their genetic modification and equipment is what makes the Space Marines so good, not their tactics

They're not just tougher, they're also almost universally regarded as amazing tacticians. That doesn't preclude anyone else from being good, it just means on average Space Marines are better than anyone else's average.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
Which brings us to the Graham McNeill is a Bad Writer version of the Codex which first surfaced briefly in the 4th Edition Codex: Space Marines (which McNeill is cited as an author of, though it heavily just repeats fluff from Codex: Ultramarines), and is heavily featured in his Ultramarines novels. This version reduces the Codex to an If A, Then B Instruction Manual: Warfighting for Dummies. It basically turns the Codex Astartes into the one thing it could never, ever, actually be. I mean, literally the prologue to the Ultramarines Omnibus, and the point where any sensible reader would probably stop reading, has Space Marine Scouts suggesting that as a reconnaissance element, it is their duty according to the Codex to engage the enemy wherever possible, and shortly later, a Space Marine wrestling with the idea that the Codex would proscribe the use of an improvised explosive device to accomplish an objective. Stop for a second and let it sink in just how ridiculously stupid both those ideas are. And we're still in the prologue of the Ultramarines novel travesty.

Just because you don't like something does not mean it is bad. At least it is far better than anything written by C.S. Goto, or God forbid, Matt Ward.

Being "not as bad" is still bad.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
The good news is, Games Workshop has more or less been kind enough to continue to ignore most of McNeills work. Both by continuing to reprint Priestley's version, and to steadfastly deny that Uriel Ventris was ever Captain of the 4th Company like he claims (my favorite interpretation being that Ventris is actually mortally wounded in the prologue, and the subsequent novels are his fevered hallucinations).

iirc, the 5th edition codex has Uriel Ventris as Captain of the 4th Company.

Nope. It was 4th that had a picture of him. McNeill's codex.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
Graham McNeill has done both. Though McNeill has also written stories where characters run out of ammo in one scene, but magically have more in the next, and stories where a character loses an arm at one point, and then fights with two weapons, one in each hand, later in the story.

Other authors have done worse (I am looking at you and your transforming Land Raiders, Goto)

Again, the fact that other people are worse doesn't make it not bad.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
Basically, you can fall back on the line I eventually added to my signature because it highlights this whole idea very succinctly. Marneus Calgar is described, specifically as "one of the Imperium's greatest tacticians." Marneus Calgar treats the Codex like it is the War Bible. The Ultramarines are specifically referred to as the "Greatest of all Space Marine Chapters" and their victories being "too numerous to count".

That is what the Ultramarines say about themselves, yes. Language like that was mostly removed in the 6th edition after the travesty that was 5th edition Codex: Space Marines. The Ultramarines have gotten a lot of hate for being described as utterly flawless mary sues, and in my opinion this is some of the worst writing in 40k. It makes the Ultramarines very boring and unlikeable. I do not want to read about perfect people that always do everything perfectly. Flawless characters are not interesting, they need flaws in order to be interesting

Except this flawless version of the Ultramarines doesn't actually exist anywhere other than the imaginations of people with some strange fetish for hating the Ultramarines. The Ultramarines have lost battles and made poor decisions all the time in the fluff. Just because their Chapter Master is described as being great doesn't make them Mary Sues. Otherwise the Blood Angels and Dark Angels would be Mary Sues too. When you were looking for flawless Mary Sues who win all the time and get to do all the cool things Space Marines aren't supposed to be able to do like get drunk and party and have sex with the ladies, you meant the Space Wolves. It's easy to get confused, so don't feel too bad about the error.

However, it was never the Ultramarines that called themselves the greatest. It was Rick Priestley and Jervis Johnson. The guys who created 40K.

Veteran Sergeant wrote: This version reduces the Codex to an If A, Then B Instruction Manual: Warfighting for Dummies. It basically turns the Codex Astartes into the one thing it could never, ever, actually be. I mean, literally the prologue to the Ultramarines Omnibus, and the point where any sensible reader would probably stop reading, has Space Marine Scouts suggesting that as a reconnaissance element, it is their duty according to the Codex to engage the enemy wherever possible, and shortly later, a Space Marine wrestling with the idea that the Codex would proscribe the use of an improvised explosive device to accomplish an objective. Stop for a second and let it sink in just how ridiculously stupid both those ideas are.

Havent read the novels, but you describing it makes me think that this could also be just the (not so clever) interpretation of someone... This wouldn't be the first time some dude misinterpreted a "guide" *cough*religion*cough* and it certainly would fit into the 40k setting.

Those guides often need interpretation to be usable... phrases like "thou shall poop rather sooner then later, cause you will never know what will come in the future" and someone interpreting that they have to gak their pants all the time so their poop doesnt develop into a monster inside them. Reading the guides won't create masterminds. If a fool reads it, his interpretations can make things pretty bad *cough* religion *cough*

I can agree with that. I too prefer the way Priestley writes about the Codex. Personally, I view the Codex as something akin to Sun Tzu's Art of War.

yeah me too. and there is a reason why the art of war is studied to this day. it gives some good advice, but it's also done in a vague eneugh way as not to nesscarily be specific.

in truth I imagine the bulk of the codex though, and the part the Ultramarines fetishize over, is the orginizational one. The part that says 1st company is your veterns. 2-5th companies are battle companies etc.

other chapters may have slight varients on it.; the Ultramarines however would be utterly horried at the idea of a chapter that say.... didn't bother with putting it's veterns in 1st company, and instead each company had a veteran squad. even though if Guilliman himself was asked about it his response would proably amount to "ohh intreasting idea, I'm eager to see how that works"

BrianDavion wrote:

I can agree with that. I too prefer the way Priestley writes about the Codex. Personally, I view the Codex as something akin to Sun Tzu's Art of War.

yeah me too. and there is a reason why the art of war is studied to this day. it gives some good advice, but it's also done in a vague eneugh way as not to nesscarily be specific.

in truth I imagine the bulk of the codex though, and the part the Ultramarines fetishize over, is the orginizational one. The part that says 1st company is your veterns. 2-5th companies are battle companies etc.

Well, like Veteran Sergeant said, everything indicates that's not true. One most of the description by the creator was about separations and training. You can't count many of the subsequent codexes because those were just published because it was time to roll out a new product. The purpose of writing the codex was about making sure trainees didn't become corrupt, and that anyone who did become corrupt couldn't go back and remove those safeguards for more than a small amount of marines.

other chapters may have slight varients on it.; the Ultramarines however would be utterly horried at the idea of a chapter that say.... didn't bother with putting it's veterns in 1st company, and instead each company had a veteran squad. even though if Guilliman himself was asked about it his response would proably amount to "ohh intreasting idea, I'm eager to see how that works"

I think actually that Guilliman had a century or so with dozens of chapters in his Legion, and he experimented at least a little bit. That may have been why he felt he had some useful information to codify.

And yeah, he continued to assimilate new ideas, while the codex continues to be appended.

Iron_Captain wrote:[spoiler]

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
The problem is there are two versions of the Codex depicted in the fluff.

Rick Priestley's version.

And the Graham McNeill is a Bad Writer Version.

That is heavily subject to personal opinion. Graham McNeill is a better writer than many others who work for BL, and I liked some of his novels. The ones about Uriel Ventris were entertaining to read.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
The Codex Astartes is supposed to be why Space Marines are so good. Not why they are so bad.

No, their genetic modification and equipment is what makes the Space Marines so good, not their tactics. It is not as if the other factions are incapable of making great tactics. Their modifications set the SM apart from other factions, great tacticians can also be found among the Imperial Guard, Chaos, Eldar and others.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
Which brings us to the Graham McNeill is a Bad Writer version of the Codex which first surfaced briefly in the 4th Edition Codex: Space Marines (which McNeill is cited as an author of, though it heavily just repeats fluff from Codex: Ultramarines), and is heavily featured in his Ultramarines novels. This version reduces the Codex to an If A, Then B Instruction Manual: Warfighting for Dummies. It basically turns the Codex Astartes into the one thing it could never, ever, actually be. I mean, literally the prologue to the Ultramarines Omnibus, and the point where any sensible reader would probably stop reading, has Space Marine Scouts suggesting that as a reconnaissance element, it is their duty according to the Codex to engage the enemy wherever possible, and shortly later, a Space Marine wrestling with the idea that the Codex would proscribe the use of an improvised explosive device to accomplish an objective. Stop for a second and let it sink in just how ridiculously stupid both those ideas are. And we're still in the prologue of the Ultramarines novel travesty.

Just because you don't like something does not mean it is bad. At least it is far better than anything written by C.S. Goto, or God forbid, Matt Ward.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
The good news is, Games Workshop has more or less been kind enough to continue to ignore most of McNeills work. Both by continuing to reprint Priestley's version, and to steadfastly deny that Uriel Ventris was ever Captain of the 4th Company like he claims (my favorite interpretation being that Ventris is actually mortally wounded in the prologue, and the subsequent novels are his fevered hallucinations).

iirc, the 5th edition codex has Uriel Ventris as Captain of the 4th Company.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
Basically, if anything you read about the Codex has a part where a character says or suggests "The Codex forbids >whatever<", it's written by someone with no knowledge of military theory.

The idea that the Codex would be proscriptive is fairly insane. Also, if a story suggests that someone could predict what Space Marines would do because they are following the Codex, it is likewise the work of an amateur author who doesn't know anything about military theory.

That would actually be true for pretty much every 40k author. Compared to all the unrealistic nonsense and scale issues that one can find in 40k, this is not that strange at all. The only thing we know is that the Codex is supposed to be a treatise on Space Marine organisation and tactics, we can't know what is actually in the Codex or not, so its contents and how proscriptive it is will always be subject to personal opinion. In fact, the current codex states that even in the 40k universe itself, there are countless different interpretations and modifications of the Codex.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
Graham McNeill has done both. Though McNeill has also written stories where characters run out of ammo in one scene, but magically have more in the next, and stories where a character loses an arm at one point, and then fights with two weapons, one in each hand, later in the story.

Other authors have done worse (I am looking at you and your transforming Land Raiders, Goto)

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
Basically, you can fall back on the line I eventually added to my signature because it highlights this whole idea very succinctly. Marneus Calgar is described, specifically as "one of the Imperium's greatest tacticians." Marneus Calgar treats the Codex like it is the War Bible. The Ultramarines are specifically referred to as the "Greatest of all Space Marine Chapters" and their victories being "too numerous to count".

That is what the Ultramarines say about themselves, yes. Language like that was mostly removed in the 6th edition after the travesty that was 5th edition Codex: Space Marines. The Ultramarines have gotten a lot of hate for being described as utterly flawless mary sues, and in my opinion this is some of the worst writing in 40k. It makes the Ultramarines very boring and unlikeable. I do not want to read about perfect people that always do everything perfectly. Flawless characters are not interesting, they need flaws in order to be interesting

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
If Calgar is one of the greatest tacticians in the Imperium, and the Ultramarines are the premier Space Marine chapter at winning wars and battles, and they follow the Codex... if the Codex Astartes is garbage, how bad is everyone else in the Imperium at warfighting. Think about it for a second. If the Codex sucks, and the best warfighters in the Imperium follow it religiously, that means everyone else in 40K is even worse.

If we look at it realistically, Calgar and most other Imperial tacticians are indeed quite horrible. I mean, Calgar risks his own life on the front lines, and his weapons are two fists. That is not very tactically sound. A good commander does not risk losing everything by playing hero on the front lines. He is more useful coordinating troops from a safe position than he is punching the enemy in the face. That is what soldiers are for.
But since 40k is a Fantasy universe, I'd say 'realism' is subject to rule of cool and interesting stories.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
So I don't know how anybody else feels, but ThreestoogesHammer 40K where everyone is a complete, bumbling idiot is a lot less fun to imagine. Which is pretty much where you're left at if you believe McNeill's version.

I disagree.

 Veteran Sergeant wrote:
Let's stick with Priestley's. He invented the game.

I can agree with that. I too prefer the way Priestley writes about the Codex. Personally, I view the Codex as something akin to Sun Tzu's Art of War.[/s[poiler]

The Codex Astartes is self-contradictory because it gives definitive solutions to a great many situations that pop up in wartime. The main problem with it is that combat situations are incredibly fluid and no two are ever alike, making a nonsense out of looking to a particular page for an answer written thousands of years ago, even if it was a primarch who penned it. The other problem is that, if followed to the letter, it makes the devotee/s remarkably predictable and therefore far easier to defeat.

Guilliman would probably turn in his grave, if he had one, if he knew his war 'guide' was being so strictly adhered to .