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Space Marines are extremely heavily indoctrinated and brainwashed into unquestioning loyalty to their Chapter. The tought of leaving their Chapter and becoming an Inquisitor would never even occur to them. It is an impossibility.

Unless... It is an Alpha Legionary having killed an Inquisitor and taken his place in an attempt to infiltrate the Inquisition.

But for loyalist Marines, the answer is simply no. They are too loyal to their Chapter. If given a choice, they will always return. It only works with Marines that are traitors or otherwise not able to return. A Blackshield would not work because the Inquisition doesn't like them. Other Inquisitors would never let a Blackshield become one of them.

Yes they can. Inquisitors are totally free to anoint their own successors. But most space Astartes aren't exactly top tier inquisitor henchmen material, and no sane inquisitor would want him as his successor. You will need more open minded persons for this, you can't use any of that spiritual liege nonsense.

You can however use "exotic specialists" who just happen to be huge, wearing power armour and now a lot of the way chaos cults operate. So yeah you could get a space marine inquisitor, just not an Astartes unless the inquisitor is really disturbed and has some strange Astartes fetish

Except for Rynn's World, Crown of Thorns, and the first Deathwatch novel, all of which show that the strength and staying power of psycho-indoctrination varies not only from chapter to chapter, but from marine to marine.

Otherwise we'd never have individual renegade marines.

Yes it works in most marines, most of the time, but not all marines, all of the time.

That said a marine who was left for dead by his chapter is either going to turn to chaos, become a Black Shield, or get obscenely lucky and end up as part of a more independent entity, like you say a mercenary company or possibly a rogue trader.
In any case, none of those except for MAYBE Black Shield have any path to end up as an Inquisitor.

jareddm wrote:

That said a marine who was left for dead by his chapter is either going to turn to chaos, become a Black Shield, or get obscenely lucky and end up as part of a more independent entity, like you say a mercenary company or possibly a rogue trader. In any case, none of those except for MAYBE Black Shield have any path to end up as an Inquisitor.

couch... an inquisitor like Eisenhorn would never employ somebody as lowly as a mercenary .. couch
Also a space marine becoming a rogue trader.. Sure why not but you know that this is harder than becoming a inquisitor right.

 oldzoggy wrote:

jareddm wrote:

That said a marine who was left for dead by his chapter is either going to turn to chaos, become a Black Shield, or get obscenely lucky and end up as part of a more independent entity, like you say a mercenary company or possibly a rogue trader. In any case, none of those except for MAYBE Black Shield have any path to end up as an Inquisitor.

couch... an inquisitor like Eisenhorn would never employ somebody as lowly as a mercenary .. couch
Also a space marine becoming a rogue trader.. Sure why not but you know that this is harder than becoming a inquisitor right.

I didn't say they become a rogue trader. I said they are part of an independent entity, such as a rogue trader. As in working for one.

To be an Inquisitor means being one of the rare people in the Imperium allowed access to information and being (reasonably) free to think out of the box of the Imperium's propaganda and religious indoctrination. Often their job is to keep a low profile and investigate mysteries and discover threats before things explode into all out warfare. Sometimes they also have to tolerate skirting or even breaking some of the Imperium's laws for the sake of getting the job done, so they may consort with people like smugglers, low-lifes, and other "undesirables".

A Marine (or anyone otherwise modified to resemble one) is not low profile. Nor is going in with guns blazing, smashing heads, the best way to go about things. Such an approach can drive threats even further into hiding. The mental indoctrination of a loyalist Marine is also hardly suitable for the kind of mental flexibility and tolerance of shades of gray needed in an Inquisitor. A Marine has been trained to ultimately resort to force. They may be more subtle than the sledgehammer of the Imperial Guard but they still ultimately resort to force. Sometimes there are problems that need solving in other ways. Not every problem can be solved with a hammer.

Once again, the OP's angle comes off to me as trying to go for a special snowflake Mary Sue that can do all the physical stuff a Marine can, with all of the power and lack of major accountability that comes with being an Inquisitor. So I would say no to such a power wish fulfillment fantasy.

Iracundus wrote:

Once again, the OP's angle comes off to me as trying to go for a special snowflake Mary Sue that can do all the physical stuff a Marine can, with all of the power and lack of major accountability that comes with being an Inquisitor. So I would say no to such a power wish fulfillment fantasy.

Being as buff as a marine isn't outside the range of inquisitors, nor their henchmen or allies. Just look at Hector Rex and some of the assassin characters in the beast.
Rex even kicked the legendary bloodthirster AN'GGRATH's ass in close combat.. I would like to see your regular snowflake marine inquisitor come close to that ; )

 oldzoggy wrote:

Iracundus wrote:

Once again, the OP's angle comes off to me as trying to go for a special snowflake Mary Sue that can do all the physical stuff a Marine can, with all of the power and lack of major accountability that comes with being an Inquisitor. So I would say no to such a power wish fulfillment fantasy.

Being as buff as a marine isn't outside the range of inquisitors, nor their henchmen or allies. Just look at Hector Rex and some of the assassin characters in the beast.
Rex even kicked the legendary bloodthirster AN'GGRATH's ass in close combat.. I would like to see your regular snowflake marine inquisitor come close to that ; )

And as I already addressed on the LAST page, Hector Rex is among one of the worst Mary Sues written by GW (yes, I lump Forgeworld with GW). He essentially is the Marine + Inquisitor blended together with no flaws or weaknesses whatsoever, and with a perk that no one else, not even a High Lord has received. That is precisely why we don't need another Hector Rex (i.e. Marine + Inquisitor). Characters that are simple power trip wish fulfilment with no conflict, flaws, weaknesses, mistakes or struggles are boring.

Lol no flaws I never claimed there had to be none. There are more than enough flaws to choose from to avoid just that in our beloved grim dark setting. Everything has to be flawed somehow in this universe, renegade space marines and radical inquisitors are definitely no exception it.

Who knows what this "perfect mix" is hiding behind his mask and propaganda.

I don't care what you claim about Hector Rex as you are not GW. Any flaws you try to project onto him are fan creations. The point is Hector Rex as officially written by GW in the Siege of Vraks has no flaws whatsoever and that is why he is an example of terrible writing. He has all the power of an Inquisitor Lord. He has implants and armor and skills enough to defeat one of Khorne's most powerful Bloodthirsters. He has no moments of doubt, hesitation, stress, or makes any errors of judgment. He never gets realistically tempted to fudge things, disobey, or rebel even when the High Lords rule against him, yet this ruling does not seem to cause him any real difficulties in the plot. He also was given an audience with the Emperor, something even the High Lords have not experienced. In the course of the Vraks plot, there is never a moment when it seems he might fail.

He was similar to Draigo in GW's spiral of creating over the top "do no wrong" super characters. As written by GW, he is a flawless character that faces no real difficulties and just sails through everything effortlessly. Flawless characters that never get challenged or face failures are bad characters. Bad as in bad writing. Characters are defined as much by their limits and weaknesses as by their strengths.

Fan creation special snowflakes suffer from this same sort of problem regularly as well. What next? A Marine-Inquisitor Lord-Admiral-High Lord-Assassin?

Iracundus wrote:

Once again, the OP's angle comes off to me as trying to go for a special snowflake Mary Sue that can do all the physical stuff a Marine can, with all of the power and lack of major accountability that comes with being an Inquisitor. So I would say no to such a power wish fulfillment fantasy.

There seems to be an over abundance of people desperate to slam people's ideas down as "special snowflake" and "Mary sue" on this site, and by god it's dull dull dull.

Im sorry, but that's not what I'm trying to do at all. All I'm trying to do is make some cool looking models and put a fun little backstory to them that isn't at odds with established canon. Now I'm sorry if my making interesting and fun characters to assign to my wacky blanchian models offends you in some way, but that's just how I roll. For one thing, I'd be using the Inquisition codex, so my Astartes Inquisitor would have Strength 3 and Toughness 3

Now, as for this whole "Can an Astartes become an Inquisitor" question, since I posted this thread I've done a little extra reading, it seems I missed a little section in the Inquisition Codex about how Inquisitors obtain their rank. Inquisitors have a seal, they have the power to grant this seal to apprentices, whom they train from a young age, or promote from within their warbands. Obviously should the Inquisitor die without passing on their seal, theirs nothing to stop an unscrupulous individual from taking the aforementioned seal.

Ack nope I am not trying to prove that Rex has flaws or spoil some GK for you.

All I was intending to do was offering trying to point out that:

A: Inquisitors can be physically at least as strong without breaking the fluff. There have been numerous examples of this in the fluff. You might not like those examples but they are there.

B: That there is no need to call him out on creating the dull my hero can do it all hero when he justs want to create a cool character. Since you know he could actually be flawed in tons of ways and GW fluff is basicly an over the top parody off oldskool sifi and B movies. And you know it is his army of toys, why would you threat them more seriously than GW does ?

@OP
It gets even murkier there are hints in the novels that some branches of the inquisition might just have came into assistance by just proclaiming that they where inquisition, acted accordingly and passed on their title to the next generations as if nothing had happened.




Automatically Appended Next Post:
It might be good to remember that this is the kind of madness that the modern fluff is based on ; )

Iracundus wrote:
I don't care what you claim about Hector Rex as you are not GW. Any flaws you try to project onto him are fan creations. The point is Hector Rex as officially written by GW in the Siege of Vraks has no flaws whatsoever and that is why he is an example of terrible writing. He has all the power of an Inquisitor Lord. He has implants and armor and skills enough to defeat one of Khorne's most powerful Bloodthirsters. He has no moments of doubt, hesitation, stress, or makes any errors of judgment. He never gets realistically tempted to fudge things, disobey, or rebel even when the High Lords rule against him, yet this ruling does not seem to cause him any real difficulties in the plot. He also was given an audience with the Emperor, something even the High Lords have not experienced. In the course of the Vraks plot, there is never a moment when it seems he might fail.

He was similar to Draigo in GW's spiral of creating over the top "do no wrong" super characters. As written by GW, he is a flawless character that faces no real difficulties and just sails through everything effortlessly. Flawless characters that never get challenged or face failures are bad characters. Bad as in bad writing. Characters are defined as much by their limits and weaknesses as by their strengths.

Fan creation special snowflakes suffer from this same sort of problem regularly as well. What next? A Marine-Inquisitor Lord-Admiral-High Lord-Assassin?

GW isn't immune from making bad fluff but it doesn't excuse raining on somebody's parade because it doesn't subscribe to your measure of flawed or grimdark concepts. The idea of an Astartes Inquisitor is an interesting one but it doesn't mean it makes them infallible or conflicted. The OP was looking to see if that concept has been explored before and examples like Hector Rex can be good to show some of the pitfalls to avoid with characters like that. With that being said relative failure of Rex as an interesting isn't good enough reason to never venture down that narrative path again.

Side topic but what if an Inquisitor is actually part Ogryn so he is stronger/tougher than a normal human but suffers from reduced intelligence because Ogryns are dumb. Maybe he was a part of an Inq's entourage as a body guard/muscle and took up the mantel of Inquisitor when his boss met a sudden end and he must carry on the work his boss started. Seems like a gold mine for humor and crazy situations to run wild. Also would it be possible for a member of Deathwatch to be assigned to join up with a Xenos Inquisitor for a research mission to learn information about some particular xenos threat? Letting the Inquisitor do the more investigational work while being an intimidation/combat asset when force is required.

At this point have we all reached the agreement that, yes they have the possibility to become one. But simply due to practicality they would be better suited to another task within the inquisition?

 Backspacehacker wrote:
At this point have we all reached the agreement that, yes they have the possibility to become one. But simply due to practicality they would be better suited to another task within the inquisition?

No "we" are not "all" in agreement.

Iron_Captain, HoundsofDemos, and I have never in our posts agreed and are quite explicit in saying no. Do not presume to use your own personal opinion to speak for everyone else. There are limits in the 40K universe and it is not "anything goes". Limits do not have to be explicitly stated in black and white. There is nothing explicitly stating that you cannot have a High Lord-Admiral-Space Marine Chapter Master-Lord Solar-Assassin-Inquisitor Lord-secret Chaos Lord. Does that mean such a thing is allowed?

Personally I'd say no- Being a Space Marine is literally a job for life. Space Marine's don't move in Imperial society so wouldn't have skills suitable for anything but the most "kick down the door" inquisitorial actions. Nor is it likely that they would be in a position to be recruited or trained by the Inquisition. Spaces Marines never have the freedom to be in that position.

That said, there are examples of Space Marines who have "retired"- been badly and permanently wounded, but not sufficiently to be entombed in a dreadnought, and have instead gone on to be planetary governors or similar.
Anyone familiar with the First Law books by Joe Abercrombie will remember Inquisitor Glokta, a dashing young hero who is captured and spends years being subjected to horrific torture, but survives as a crippled shell of a man and goes on to put his newfound knowledge of torture to "good" use in his Majesty's Inquisition. It would not be too much of a stretch to see that happening to a Space Marine; captured by the Dark Eldar, tortured to within an inch of his life but then rescued. Unable to serve his chapter he chooses to serve the Emperor in a different way- by learning the role of Inquisitor in the Ordo Xenos...

 Aben Zin wrote:
Personally I'd say no- Being a Space Marine is literally a job for life. Space Marine's don't move in Imperial society so wouldn't have skills suitable for anything but the most "kick down the door" inquisitorial actions.

Such "kick down the door" approaches are more characteristic of the Monodominant Inquisitor faction, and is criticized by others for being like a bull in a china shop. Lots of avoidable collateral damage is often inflicted and it can drive enemies further into hiding so it can be also ineffective.

 General Kroll wrote:

Inquisitors have a seal, they have the power to grant this seal to apprentices, whom they train from a young age, or promote from within their warbands. Obviously should the Inquisitor die without passing on their seal, theirs nothing to stop an unscrupulous individual from taking the aforementioned seal.

There is more to being an Inquisitor than just picking up a carved seal from a dead Inquisitor. There are other additional forms of clearance needed like passwords, electoos, biometric information etc... before one can access all the powers and resources of an Inquisitor. If it were as simple as just having the rosette, then a simple pickpocket could potentially wreak havoc.

 General Kroll wrote:

Iracundus wrote:

Once again, the OP's angle comes off to me as trying to go for a special snowflake Mary Sue that can do all the physical stuff a Marine can, with all of the power and lack of major accountability that comes with being an Inquisitor. So I would say no to such a power wish fulfillment fantasy.

There seems to be an over abundance of people desperate to slam people's ideas down as "special snowflake" and "Mary sue" on this site, and by god it's dull dull dull.

Im sorry, but that's not what I'm trying to do at all. All I'm trying to do is make some cool looking models and put a fun little backstory to them that isn't at odds with established canon. Now I'm sorry if my making interesting and fun characters to assign to my wacky blanchian models offends you in some way, but that's just how I roll. For one thing, I'd be using the Inquisition codex, so my Astartes Inquisitor would have Strength 3 and Toughness 3

Now, as for this whole "Can an Astartes become an Inquisitor" question, since I posted this thread I've done a little extra reading, it seems I missed a little section in the Inquisition Codex about how Inquisitors obtain their rank. Inquisitors have a seal, they have the power to grant this seal to apprentices, whom they train from a young age, or promote from within their warbands. Obviously should the Inquisitor die without passing on their seal, theirs nothing to stop an unscrupulous individual from taking the aforementioned seal.

Except for the Conclave the previous Inquisitor was a member of. Inquisitors answer to other Inquisitors, and their rosettes are actually tied into a database maintained by the Conclave of the region they operate in (most Inquisitors never leave a given sub-sector), which is, in turn, reported up the chain to higher and higher Conclaves, until it ends up on Terra.

Stealing an Inquisitor's rosette will allow you to use it on those who can be cowed simply by its appearance, but the actual data-files contained within the rosette include a holo-lithic image of the Inquisitor's head and face, as well as an imprint of his/her DNA, for use on biometric scanners and the like. Getting caught stealing an Inquisitor's rosette ends in a fate far, far worse than death.

I'll say yes, it is possible. An astartes can become an Inquisitor. However the circumstances must be extrordinary. To define said circumstances here's a few story suggestions:

* A dark angel fallen one gets found by an Inquisitorial team and joins them. After several decades of co-working (as well as hiding the fallen ones identity) he is promted to interrogator and eventually Inquisitor.

* A captured chaos marine sees the error of his ways and requests to serve for redemption. After torture and penance an Inquisitor busts him out to serve him. After several years of serving said Inquisitor the former chaos marine is elevated to Interrogator and eventually Inquisitor.

* As a Space marine fortress monastery gets overrun the newest recruits who've yet to wake up from their coma of physical growth gets evacuated. An Inquisitor steals one of theese (for whatever purposes) and as the neophyte wakes up he makes him a permanent part of his warband. The neophyte gets brainwashed by the Inquisitor and in the future turns out to be excellent Inquisitor material.

* An Inquisitor sews togheter a Frankenstein space marine out of the corpses of other space marines and implants his own brain into its body.

* A veteran space marine breaks a chapter tradition/flees/dishonors his chapter and gets sent on a death mission. He gets intercepted by an Inquisitor who gives him the choice of joining his warband or dying. The space marine (from cowardice or cunning) accepts and false evidence of the space marines death is fed to his chapter. The space marine spends the comming centuries in service of diffrent Inquisitors and the skills that made him a lousy space marines turns out to be what makes him Inquisitor material. He is eventually promoted from bodyguard to interrogator and eventually Inquisitor.

These are all from the top of my head. I can definetly see something like one of theese happen though it's very, very unlikely. If it's simply "a space marine left his chapter and became an Inquisitor" then no.
If it's just a space marines body you're looking for then that makes things much easier from a lore perspective. There's any number of ways an Inquisitor can get the equavelent of space marines stats. He can have remote controlled vat grown bodies, be heavily augumented, try to make himself into a space marine through gene seed experimentations, clone a space marine with a metal head where he downloads his body, make himself an ork/tyranid hybrid, become close to inhuman through warp/xeno shenanigans, swap minds with a space marine through psychic powers... The possibilities for this scenario is pretty much endless.

Finally, deathwatch marines and grey knights are not and should not be considered to be or become Inquisitors.

I don't recall seeing anything in the fluff stating that there are any SM inquisitors, however, I don't think the idea is a bad one.

I suppose you could look at say...the Lamenters and build some fluff using survivors from that legion becoming ordo Xeno inquisitors. I actually think that would be pretty damned cool.