Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

 RazgrizOne wrote:
To add to Saithor's claims : The Ecclesiarchy would totally let imperial citizens do that. And these people would totally follow some unknwon space traitors in power armour while they live everyday side by side with the Administratum, which is by contrast a very tangible organization.

Do you understand that the Space Marines are thought of as gods and paragons of humanity by the average imperial citizen? Whereas the administratum is a bunch of paper pushers and social workers? Who's side would you flock to?

DorianGray wrote:

 RazgrizOne wrote:

Space Marines ARE made smarter, faster, and stronger than the normal humans. Read the codex. They are SMARTER. Their superhuman intelligence is why they have higher BS and WS than even the best guardmen.

Normal humans are obsolete and like monkeys. It is not some ironic recreation of the war in heaven.

If you were an Astartes it is NATURAL to think why should superior beings like yourself take orders from some human (like some Navy Admiral or Guard General). No one enjoys taking orders from inferiors. The adeptus astartes are bascially immortal GODs in the fluff compared to normal humans. They should be the ones in power over everyone. Everyone should submit to their will.

Haven't you read the two previous posts?

SM may be considered as gods by normal imperial soldiers or citizens but in the eyes of the Lords of Terra, who ultimately decide whether or not new SM chapters should be created, they are merely a weapon, a high precision tool they can use to help regular forces to win. SM are created by Imperial political power, they don't own it.

Plus, individual strengh is nuts in the military balance. Who cares about your higher BS (not higher than an IG Vet or a stormtrooper that being said) when you have a small fleet, limited armour and next to zero artillery? The last military leaders who though ubermenschen would never lose against the rest of humanity because of their inborn superiority were Nazis. Too bad they did not know sh*t about industrial war and strategic-scale operations.

The high lords of terra can be killed and replaced by either Chapter Lords or other humans serving the will of the Superman.

Assuming they could get past Titans, human soldiers that outnumber them billions to one, Assassins that can engage entire squads of Space Marines on their own, the Imperial Navy, etc.

You forget that just by mere presence and declaration SM Chapters could sway entire systems to their hypothetical rebellion and have mere humans serve them.

Usually not, and the 40k universe has shown that such rebellions pretty much always end with the destruction of the rebels.

SM lead by their rebel human servants could easily combat the SM-less Imperium.

Hrm, probably not, what are you basing that assumption on?

A full SM rebellion and plot to overthrow humanity would be incredibly destructive in the least and probably succeed.

Seems like they've failed every time they've tried so far...

DorianGray wrote:
I'm saying a billion + humans will recognise the superiority of the SM and join their rebellion against the imperium.

Why would the humans care? There's nothing about the SM's that make them superior rulers.

So it is not just the SM themselves now it is billions of normal humans too.

Which is an entirely different scenario than the one earlier presented, and one that has shown to have been defeated by the Imperium countless times going all the way back to the Heresy. Empires run by Space Marines do not endure.

You are thinking to yourself why would a normal human willingly become a slave to supermen?

1. If you don't you will die.

Why and how? The Space Marines are outnumbered billions to one. They can be killed by small arms fire, even if it's extremely difficult, and the SM's die to tanks, artillery, orbital bombardment, heavy infantry weapons, etc like anyone else.

2. You underestimate the willingness of people to look for a leader or overarching god to led them. Think of the support for the Monarchy in modern day England or support of Vladimir Putin who rules Russia with an iron fist.

The Monarchy of England holds very little power, while the methods of maintaining power in Russia for Putin are very different from those used by the Space Marines.

3. They might think life under the supermen would be better than life under the status quo. (It won't but you know...)

There's been countless examples of the SM's doing this sort of thing, and it fails every time.

4. Only the SM could save them from the corruption and threat to humanity like nids, Orks, Chaos. They are better suited to led against these threats than the high lords who probably never even been in combat,

Except the Space Marines are just as fallible as anyone else. *HALF* the original Space Marines were corrupted. Large numbers of post-heresy marines have been corrupted. The Imperial Guard, Imperial Navy, Mechanicus, planetary defense forces, and other organizations fight 99% of the Imperium's wars without ever seeing a single Space Marine boot.

DorianGray wrote:

 RazgrizOne wrote:
To add to Saithor's claims : The Ecclesiarchy would totally let imperial citizens do that. And these people would totally follow some unknwon space traitors in power armour while they live everyday side by side with the Administratum, which is by contrast a very tangible organization.

Do you understand that the Space Marines are thought of as gods and paragons of humanity by the average imperial citizen? Whereas the administratum is a bunch of paper pushers and social workers? Who's side would you flock to?

That might be (though half may also have never heard of them), but they hold other establishments in just as high regard, or fear. Most Imperial citizens are going to be far more compelled to act a certain way by the Inquisition or the Ecclesiarchy than they would by the Space Marines.

Then they wouldn't be really any different from their CSM counterparts aside from not aligning themselves with the pantheon of Chaos. Except even CSM knowledge and don't tread upon those of the Dark Mechanicus (who, if I may, definitely need more appearances in the fluff - like them testing the superiority of their daemon merged invented creations in crusades against the Adeptus Mechanicus or something - and even representation on tabletop would be nice). Remember, Horus had to barter and bribe part of the Mechanicus to ALLY with him in his war against the Emperor. He didn't command these mechanical "monkeys."

Oh, and lets not forget about human ruled and controlled worlds within the realm of chaos which CSM seem to let be, even treat equally in alliances (I.e. Daemonworld) unless they happen to be worshipping a different god.

In short, your proposition would arguably make the Imperium worse for humanity than chaos. Toss the Nazi twisted version of the ubermensch and what an ubermensch does out and maybe it'd be more agreeable. Although then you might be adding an element of noble bright within the Imperium and we all know that the setting being grimdark and all couldn't have that... Oh well, your version might add a pinch to the grimdarkness of it all. Carry on!

If marines tried to take over, I'd just nuke them. There's an unrealistically small number of them. Generally when I discuss marines, I pretend there are at least 1,000,000 of them per chapter or even 1,000,000,000.

Martel732 wrote:
If marines tried to take over, I'd just nuke them. There's an unrealistically small number of them. Generally when I discuss marines, I pretend there are at least 1,000,000 of them per chapter or even 1,000,000,000.

They might make sense at that point

Martel732 wrote:
If marines tried to take over, I'd just nuke them. There's an unrealistically small number of them. Generally when I discuss marines, I pretend there are at least 1,000,000 of them per chapter or even 1,000,000,000.

Yep. Besides which, as for worshipping them, regular guardsmen hate Stormtroopers, Comissars and the Inquisition. What makes you think they wouldn't hate a bunch of eugenics obsessed Space Marines. Not to mention that the Imperium would probably ally with Tau and Eldar before
letting themselves be controlled by the SM.

 Vaktathi wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
If marines tried to take over, I'd just nuke them. There's an unrealistically small number of them. Generally when I discuss marines, I pretend there are at least 1,000,000 of them per chapter or even 1,000,000,000.

They might make sense at that point

Most sci-fi writers have this problem of scale because they don't comprehend the scale of a solar neighborhood, much less a galaxy. You need thousands upon thousands of vessels just to do anything, and billions and billions of troops.

Martel732 wrote:

 Vaktathi wrote:

Martel732 wrote:
If marines tried to take over, I'd just nuke them. There's an unrealistically small number of them. Generally when I discuss marines, I pretend there are at least 1,000,000 of them per chapter or even 1,000,000,000.

They might make sense at that point

Most sci-fi writers have this problem of scale because they don't comprehend the scale of a solar neighborhood, much less a galaxy. You need thousands upon thousands of vessels just to do anything, and billions and billions of troops.

Not really, I never noticed any big problems in the Baen books or in more classic sci-fi like Dune, which had pretty big armies, fleets, or smaller universes.

Just think about the people who write for Star Trek/Star Wars. And 40K for that matter. The scale is completely wrong. Dune was rather vague about the whole thing. But as soon as you start spouting numbers, you can get yourself into big trouble.

Since everyone else has tackled the rest I'll get down a couple things.
First off, many Chapters wouldn't WANT to do this, those who actually care about normal people (like the Salamanders).

Though I would mention that while Mahreens leading the Imperium and taking it over ain't happening, some Space Marines taking charge of a planet or system totally could, Some might even end up decent leaders. The proviso being they could really only go so far before trouble would start brewing.

Martel732 wrote:
Just think about the people who write for Star Trek/Star Wars. And 40K for that matter. The scale is completely wrong. Dune was rather vague about the whole thing. But as soon as you start spouting numbers, you can get yourself into big trouble.

They also tend to miss out something I find completely immersion breaking.

How these fighting armies etc are supplied. In real life, from the men who gather resources right up to the men who hand out these supplies is a huge number of men and effort involved. The bigger the operations the bigger the supply trains etc. The number of fighting men are small, but the number grows smaller when the support staff and material tonnage and so on are not considered as well.

I don't think it is just a lack of scale, but a lack of thought going into the hows and whys of the event or story. Id wager that the efficiency and number of men and machines involved in logistical support is what wins most wars anyway, but that doesn't sound as cool I guess.

Space Marines were not created to be leaders.
Their sole purpose is to fight. To serve humanity.
I would also think that following the Heresy, the High Lords would have developed protocols to deal with a second uprising.

If you want an Ubermensch leader, get the Emperor.

Read some David Weber and John Ringo, they actually do tend to pay more attention to logistics and the mechanics then others. Maybe a little too much, but I like that kind of stuff.

Not everyone wants to just bow down and blow Calgar like Mat Ward and the OP do...

I'd love to see ol' Marneus yell "c'mon guys, let's take 'em over!" and quickly realize the level of bs that Ward's whole "Spiritual Liege lord and all Marines want to touch him where he pees" embodies. A Salamander Scout would just cap him in the back of the head. "God-rebellion" over.

Reading most of the novels, it seems more along the lines that Space Marines were engineered to be subservient and follow orders. The HH shows this in how the majority of the line marines willingly turned just because they were "following orders". The Marines weren't designed with philosophical thought in mind, as a mater of fact if you read the books, the marines that thought beyond their orders or beyond anything to do with combat were looked upon as being different than a standard marine. This usually is what caused those marines to become officers, because they did have the ability to think, but the average marine cared little beyond point, shoot, kill, repeat.

They were created to be weapons that were controllable, the Primarchs were the ones that could think and reason enough to want to change their status from soldier to God. Very few major examples since the HH exist in the lore to show other marines that wanted to rule humanity, with notable exceptions being the Badab War, and the Soul Drinkers. However, if you look at the lore for both of those, the forces of Chaos had a hand in BOTH of those rebellions and changed the character of their leaders beyond that of a normal Space marine.

Just my two cents.

 saithor wrote:
Read some David Weber and John Ringo, they actually do tend to pay more attention to logistics and the mechanics then others. Maybe a little too much, but I like that kind of stuff.

David Weber is one of the worst authors I have ever read. He made up physics so space battles would mirror Napoleonic ship battles. I wouldn't trust him to teach an 8th grade science class.

I support Space Marines taking over the Imperium. Specifically, the traitorous Chaos Space Marines shall consign all of humanity to the ruinous powers!

Without the support of the Adeptus Mechanicus the Space Marines will have a hard time maintaining their equipment and vessels. Additionally, Space Marines are rapid assault shock troops. Without help from the Imperial Guard they will have a hard time consolidating whatever minor gains they could make before being blown apart by the Imperial Navy.

I'd like to point out that, aside from some of the, er, dubious reasoning going on here...

They were never intended as gods, but as rapid shock troops - and after that, cast as angels. Servants, not rulers. Warriors, not lawmakers. Sometimes a space marine gets it into their head to rise above that - and you can ask Huron how well that worked out for him.

No way in hell the Marines would even come to close to being able to subvert humanity.

And using game stats, the best humans, Lord Commissars/General Commissar have better WS and BS than a normal SM. So does that mean they're more intelligent?

They are indoctrinated to serve he emperor only when that fails they can go rogue

All other considerations aside, wouldn't the Codex Astartes also have something to say? Specifically that a Chapter shall rule it's recruiting world - if it has one - and not mess around elsewhere. Marines are meant to fight the enemies of humanity, not lord it over humans. Chapters like Salamanders and Space Wolves that actually seem to care about the affairs of normal men are considered a bit eccentric.

Thousands sons was best legion to serve humankind by leading and teaching but not anymore. Superhumans are crated to serve humankind, we need another ones to lead.

Maybe adMech would be good to lead humanity to glorious future? If you want that kind of future.

They shouldn't because that would be an inherently boring and stupid story to read in 40k. As if this setting needs any more "and then it got even worse!"

 j31c3n wrote:
They shouldn't because that would be an inherently boring and stupid story to read in 40k.

It would also be boring to read of the marines after the takeover, when they're no longer warriors but glorified bureaucrats (like the samurai) filling in forms. "Brother Aphrael, are those TP reports ready?"

Answer - nope.

And as for this uber/untermenschen malarkey, Malcador the Sigilite was ONLY human.

Let me tell you a story.

Once upon a time in M.36, a very bad man by the name of Goge Vandire took over the Imperium.

He enslaved women, taxed planets to death, and hurt a lot of people.

The Adeptus Mechanicus didn't like this very much, so they went on an epic quest to bring the famous hero, Sebastian Thor and his billions-strong army of heroic soldiers to help them, but even the great Confederation of Light wasn't powerful enough to break through Vandire's Terran defences. So they went and begged the Space Marines for help.

The Ultramarines said: "It's not my problem, I have a war in Maccrage to fight."

The Salamanders said: "It's not my problem, I have civilians to save."

The Space Wolves said: "Haha, those idiots, have fun. Not my problem, have a drink." (and then they got drunk, which is why alcohol is bad).

And so it went, until they came to the Imperial Fists. The Setinels of Terra new their duty, and came to help. They brought their friends with them, three other full chapters of the Adeptus Astartes. The Black Templars, largest and most fanatical of the chapters. The Fire Hawks, cursed by ill-luck and dedicated to the defence of the realm. The Soul Drinkers, heroic warriors used to close-quarters and bloody fights.

These four great chapters of the magnificent Space Marines, alloyed with the heroic Confederation of Light, an army billions strong, and the technologically advanced Adeptus Mechanicus layed siege to the Ecclesiastical Palace on Terra. The seat of Imperial power... and they failed.

Vandire's fortress stood fast against their might. The greatest minds of the Adeptus Mechanicus could not figure a way in. The most brilliant siegemasters of the Adeptus Astartes could not force entry. The teeming hordes of human heroes could not stop Vandire's guns.

The one day, the shooting stopped. The doors to the palace opened, and a girl walked out. Armoured, and wielding a silver-bladed power sword, she held high the head of the villainous Vandire.

The armies parted before her, and she marched between them to the command post where the invading forces planned their losing war. Behind her came the palace's defenders, all three thousand who yet lived. Women, some as young as thirteen, in battle-proud armour.

"I," the woman announced to the waiting leaders of the attacking force, "am Alicia Dominica. I hereby offer the unconditional surrender of the Ecclesiastical Palace, and present to you the head of the arch-traitor, Goge Vandire."

All the power of the Space Marines... defeated, in the face of a young woman with the favour of the Emperor.

DorianGray wrote:
It is like a uneducated slave ordering around his wealthy master. It is against natural law.

Quite apart from the fact the rest of your premise is incredibly immature, simplistic and frankly wrong, the fact you wrote this sentence is shocking. Even considering the context, and supposing that you might be trolling, that is bad. (London) Absolute Radio drivetime has a female presenter who likes to troll message boards with incredibly dumb statements and see how many like/unlikes and comments she can get. There was also a group who quoted Hitler's jewish statements and changed them to be about immigrants on Daily Mail pages and got lots of likes. Is this the 40k equivalent? The very idea that uneducated equals unintelligent or unworthy, or the implication that being an owner makes you intelligent, educated or somehow more worthy... Wow. Can you see the error in what you wrote now?

Now, to discuss the rest of your post, your argument is essentially Might makes Right.

You say Space Marines are more perfect and superior in every way. Does that include works of great literature? Do they make better mothers and fathers? Are they great examples of community policing? Have they done a thousand years of charity? You are defining perfection and supremacy in a very narrow range of physical feats and making war.

You describe humans as monkeys compared to Space Marines. On what basis? What have Space Marines created other than instruments of war? Have they created new buildings, or ways of living?

For the Grimdark world they live in, where There Is Only War, Space Marines are the ultimate soldier, and in that context you could make an argument that they are therefore top of the pile, but your post strays into some incredibly dangerous comparisons with more modern equivalents that suggests you seem to believe that physical supremacy and ability to make war makes you superior. I am sure that the Nazis, Genghis Khan and the like would agree with you, but it is a dangerous road to go down.

I really hope this was a troll.

Well, his username is Dorian Gray, who if you read the book, was a lot like Christian Gray, only gay and immortal.

 Furyou Miko wrote:

All the power of the Space Marines... defeated, in the face of a young woman with the favour of the Emperor.

Creative story, but... you call ME biased?

As for the topic, it was intended at least by Guilliman that his Astartes would work as rulers and statesmen once the Great Crusade was over. It's not a thing in 40k though. There are yet wars to be fought.

Astartes are faster, tougher, stronger and mentally superior to mortal men. However, they are needed in the field, not back with the people.