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A Town Called Malus wrote: Also, with regards to Marines having enhanced senses either due to their biology or their armour which would help them, the only chapter which was ever given any representation of that, I believe, was the Space Wolves (surprise, surprise) who had the acute senses perk.
Space Marines never got the Night Vision USR or even had access to it through wargear, unlike other races.
Also, any force with thermal imaging could instantly spot Space Marines running around in their power armour, no matter how stealthy they are trying to be, because said power armour is powered by a nuclear reactor which puts out a lot of heat, and you cannot stop it from doing that without ending up with a meltdown or a cooked marine or both. A marine burying itself would quickly cook itself and die due to the heat output of the reactor they have strapped to their back.
can you name a single time in which heat from marine armor reactors has even come up, at all? Cause I sure can't. 40k is set nearly 40,000 years into the future, if waste heat being a problem has NEVER come up, AT ALL, we can proably assume it's simply not an issue with the technology they're using.
Sure. Look at the backpack of a marine model and at the two vents on their backpack. That is where the heat of their power generator is vented to the outside.
Those aren’t vents, they are stabilising jets for use in low gravity:
epronovost wrote: Actually, it would be more reasonable to state that they are the best Space Marines at stealth and that pretty much all of their operations fall under the umbrella of clandestine operations. That doesn't mean they are actually all that good at it compared to let's say, the best light recon infantry regiments of the Imperial Guard or the best recon Hunter Cadre of the Tau (who literally have invisible dudes).
The Raven Guard are noted as being so good at stealth that even Space Marines struggle with them. There is a scene in one of the Uriel Ventris novels where five Raven Guard hide in the shadows during a gathering of the Ultramarines masters of the Chapter, including Sgt. Telion one of the best Scouts of all, and not a single Astartes (barring Calgar and Tigirius who knew they were on world) even noticed them until they revealed themselves. IIRC Ventris even mulls on the idea that the entire command element of the Chapter could have been wiped out before they could raise their weapons.
That speaks more to the utter incompetence of the Ultramarines in securing their position before settling down to have a chinwag than it does to any skills of the Raven Guard. Like, they seriously had no active detection measures which didn't rely on the visible spectrum? No sentries equipped with night vision and positioned to give overlapping fields of view? No radar or sonar or other scanning technology which doesn't even know shadows are a thing that exist? Or hell, just shining a flashlight around the place?
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kirotheavenger wrote: The lore on those 'vents' is inconsistent, sometimes they are vents, sometimes they're stabilising jets.
According to the link, the vents at the bottom of the pack are the heat diffusion system.
So I was wrong about the placement, but not the fact that the armour has to vent the heat from the reactor.
This message was edited 3 times. Last update was at 2021/08/11 10:12:53
The Laws of Thermodynamics:
1) You cannot win. 2) You cannot break even. 3) You cannot stop playing the game.
Colonel Flagg wrote:You think you're real smart. But you're not smart; you're dumb. Very dumb. But you've met your match in me.
I kinda read the discussion here as "Marines can't ever be stealthy" vs. "Marines aren't entirely incapable of stealth". Marines are worse than a worse trained human or ratling. But if a marine needs to be, I'm sure they can make do more than people are giving credit for.
‘What Lorgar’s fanatics have not seen is that these gods are nothing compared to the power and the majesty of the Machine-God. Already, members of our growing cult are using the grace of the Omnissiah – the true Omnissiah, not Terra’s false prophet – to harness the might of the warp. Geller fields, warp missiles, void shields, all these things you are familiar with. But their underlying principles can be turned to so much more. Through novel exploitations of these technologies we will gain mastery first over the energies of the empyrean, then over the lesser entities, until finally the very gods themselves will bend the knee and recognise the supremacy of the Machine-God"
- Heretek Ardim Protos in Titandeath by Guy Haley
kirotheavenger wrote: The lore on those 'vents' is inconsistent, sometimes they are vents, sometimes they're stabilising jets.
According to the link, the vents at the bottom of the pack are the heat diffusion system.
So I was wrong about the placement, but not the fact that the armour has to vent the heat from the reactor.
My point is it's inconsistent.
Other sources do claim that those round nodules are heat vents.
For example, the lore for why earlier marks of armour have the cylindrical heat vents is because they moved to a more efficient power supply which gave off less heat allowing them to use smaller vents (the rounded ones).
Also, IIRC earlier Chaos Space Marine codexes said the reason they had their nodules on stalks is because they had unstable powerpacks that required them to vent heat further away from the user.
Betrayal at Calth depicts Astartes donning special thruster gear for void combat, indicating that they don't have it inbuilt into the armour. Indeed the position and angle of the vents make very little sense if they were for stabilisation, they'd just lift the marine upwards and flip them forwards, not particularly useful.
So in short, they either can't decide what they're supposed to be, what they are is very poorly communicated amongst writers, and/or they deliberately forget what they are as soon as they need to explain some other aesthical design choice. Probably a mix of it all.
Although now we're getting off topic, regardless you're absolutely right that power armour produces heat!
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/08/11 09:43:42
Raven Guard: Consistently shown to excel at stealth, even against Astartes and other advanced individuals. Said to be able to literally become the shadows they hide in. Has never been said that the RG haven't been excellent stealthers despite them being Astartes.
Dakka: Thats stupid! That's just bad writing! That would never happen!
You lot are gonna flip when you hear about Titans being able to walk or about people who are basically Wizards.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/08/11 09:56:20
It's important that fictional settings are internally consistent.
If Ravenguard were actually described as psykers, casting invisibility spells on themselves, no one would be complaining here. Because wizards are an established part of the setting and that would be following the 'rules' those wizards are said to follow.
But they're not, so in universe they're supposed to be operating under the same laws of reality as the rest of us. In reality, you cannot just will yourself invisible no matter how skilled you are.
kirotheavenger wrote: It's important that fictional settings are internally consistent.
If Ravenguard were actually described as psykers, casting invisibility spells on themselves, no one would be complaining here. Because wizards are an established part of the setting and that would be following the 'rules' those wizards are said to follow.
But they're not, so in universe they're supposed to be operating under the same laws of reality as the rest of us. In reality, you cannot just will yourself invisible no matter how skilled you are.
and in reality a titan would never support it's own mass.
BUT THEY DO!
Opinions are not facts please don't confuse the two
kirotheavenger wrote: It's important that fictional settings are internally consistent.
If Ravenguard were actually described as psykers, casting invisibility spells on themselves, no one would be complaining here. Because wizards are an established part of the setting and that would be following the 'rules' those wizards are said to follow.
But they're not, so in universe they're supposed to be operating under the same laws of reality as the rest of us. In reality, you cannot just will yourself invisible no matter how skilled you are.
and in reality a titan would never support it's own mass.
BUT THEY DO!
In universe they use anti-gravity technology, again a staple technology of not just 40K but a lot of sci-fi, to counter some of the mass.
The Laws of Thermodynamics:
1) You cannot win. 2) You cannot break even. 3) You cannot stop playing the game.
Colonel Flagg wrote:You think you're real smart. But you're not smart; you're dumb. Very dumb. But you've met your match in me.
Out of the Warlord, Reaver and Warhound, only the Warlord mentions having gyrostabilisers and anti-grav tech for stabilisation.
And as for internal consistency, the Raven Guard are consistently shown as being excellent at stealth. I'm not claiming all Astartes are amazing, just the RG.
It's also alluded to in many books.
Some describe titans as pulverising streets and stomping deep craters into the ground. Some even describe them as being unable to tread in certain areas as they would sink too deep or even collapse the entire hive section.
But also mechs are standard suspension of disbelief for sci-fi and steam/diesel-punky settings.
So it seems less silly than 8ft tall superhumans willing themselves invisible to other people with superhuman senses.
I don't mind suspension of disbelief. But when I'm expected to suspend it over and over again for the purpose of Space Marines or some flavour of space marines being the best at some particular cool skill I get a bit fed up and less willing to engage in the suspension. It's like, oh, they're also the best at that? Huh. Add in the usually pretty cringey writing that expresses these ideas and you can see why people become disillusioned with it.
Especially if like me you're fed up of all the different varieties of Marines. Like marines get to be the toughest, the best at close combat, the best at shooting, the stealthiest, the smartest, the best Psykers etc etc. All justified with the same tired language. This counter reaction would happen in absolutely any fan community, it's not unique to 40K.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/08/11 10:27:15
Gert wrote: Raven Guard: Consistently shown to excel at stealth, even against Astartes and other advanced individuals. Said to be able to literally become the shadows they hide in. Has never been said that the RG haven't been excellent stealthers despite them being Astartes.
Dakka: Thats stupid! That's just bad writing! That would never happen!
You lot are gonna flip when you hear about Titans being able to walk or about people who are basically Wizards.
But it is stupid, because many of the species in the setting can see in the dark. Earlier in this thread we had people saying that the heightened senses of the space marines, including being able to see in the dark, would make them better at stealth as they could detect and evade enemy forces. Now those senses are incapable of detecting some people whose entire method of evading detection was "stand in the dark", let alone people using more advanced techniques such as "crouch behind rock" or "attach foliage to clothes" or "use directional microphone and binoculars to observe from far away" or even all of these all at once!
It's more believable that the Ultramarines were just embarrassed that the Raven Guard actually thought they couldn't be seen and so didn't mention it.
Basically, the Raven Guard were Kronk
This message was edited 3 times. Last update was at 2021/08/11 10:55:08
The Laws of Thermodynamics:
1) You cannot win. 2) You cannot break even. 3) You cannot stop playing the game.
Colonel Flagg wrote:You think you're real smart. But you're not smart; you're dumb. Very dumb. But you've met your match in me.
A Town Called Malus wrote: Also, with regards to Marines having enhanced senses either due to their biology or their armour which would help them, the only chapter which was ever given any representation of that, I believe, was the Space Wolves (surprise, surprise) who had the acute senses perk.
Space Marines never got the Night Vision USR or even had access to it through wargear, unlike other races.
Also, any force with thermal imaging could instantly spot Space Marines running around in their power armour, no matter how stealthy they are trying to be, because said power armour is powered by a nuclear reactor which puts out a lot of heat, and you cannot stop it from doing that without ending up with a meltdown or a cooked marine or both. A marine burying itself would quickly cook itself and die due to the heat output of the reactor they have strapped to their back.
can you name a single time in which heat from marine armor reactors has even come up, at all? Cause I sure can't.
40k is set nearly 40,000 years into the future, if waste heat being a problem has NEVER come up, AT ALL, we can proably assume it's simply not an issue with the technology they're using.
Sure. Look at the backpack of a marine model and at the vents on the bottom of their backpack. That is where the heat of their power generator is vented to the outside. It generates enough heat that it requires a dedicated system to vent said heat out of the armour system. From the size of the vents we can also tell that the maximum capacity of said venting system is limited, which puts a cap on how hot the reactor can run before it isn't able to vent the heat sufficiently fast to prevent the reactor from overheating and meltdown. This is also limited by the environmental conditions as the vents make clear that the system operates via transferring the energy to the outside atmosphere, it uses the atmosphere as the heat dump. A Marine reactor will be less efficient on a hot planet than a cold one, for example. It will also be incredibly dangerous to operate in a vacuum where the only method of passive heat loss is radiation unless the armour is using its own air supply as a heat dump then venting it into space.
The laws of thermodynamics state that you cannot have a 100% efficient conversion of energy to work. There will always be wastage and the level of wastage is typically extremely high if you want your system to be able to do work fast.
fething Brilliant post... Check Mate on the Astartes Stealth Hypothesis.
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TheBestBucketHead wrote: I kinda read the discussion here as "Marines can't ever be stealthy" vs. "Marines aren't entirely incapable of stealth". Marines are worse than a worse trained human or ratling. But if a marine needs to be, I'm sure they can make do more than people are giving credit for.
Sure, SM can achieve "some" level of stealth but are hugely handicaped by their oversize, overweight and power plant... Surely they arent going to be used as Ninjas.
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2021/08/11 11:22:41
It's like the classic DnD rogue that wants to disappear whilst standing in the middle of a grand hallway surrounded by guards.
But... but I have Silent Step feat!
kirotheavenger wrote: It's like the classic DnD rogue that wants to disappear whilst standing in the middle of a grand hallway surrounded by guards. But... but I have Silent Step feat!
"What do you mean the many royal guards whose entire raison d'être is to watch over and protect the king saw me taking the King's crown from his head as he sat on the throne in front of the entire court? I rolled a 20 on my skill check!"
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/08/11 12:19:12
The Laws of Thermodynamics:
1) You cannot win. 2) You cannot break even. 3) You cannot stop playing the game.
Colonel Flagg wrote:You think you're real smart. But you're not smart; you're dumb. Very dumb. But you've met your match in me.
Gert wrote: Raven Guard: Consistently shown to excel at stealth, even against Astartes and other advanced individuals. Said to be able to literally become the shadows they hide in. Has never been said that the RG haven't been excellent stealthers despite them being Astartes.
Dakka: Thats stupid! That's just bad writing! That would never happen!
You lot are gonna flip when you hear about Titans being able to walk or about people who are basically Wizards.
Yeah 40K is filled with imaginary things, but some are consistent while others are not. Some make sense in relation to the universe, others not. A giant walking robot is very dumb as a weapon system, but believable otherwise. Since all factions have some sort of giant walking robots, using giant walking robots in war isn't that stupid since everybody shares the same stupidity. You don't break immersion and suspension of disbelief in that case. If you tell me, in this universe these weapons are terrifying and efficient and everyone uses them in one form or another, I have to say OK (or not and refuse to engage in the story). The same things goes for swords, axes and spears. Dudes hiding in the shadow 30 ft away from people who see perfectly well in pitch darkness is just bad writing. It goes against stuff you had established earlier. It would the equivalent of saying "those things are super good and dangerous" and never write a story where they actually succeed and gets defeated by more and more mundane things.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/08/11 18:43:58
At that point, GW could have went just an extra mile and declare that all Space Marines are mildly magical and that their power varies from Chapter to Chapter. The Raven Guard magical ability is to turn invisible in darkness or dense shadows. Of course that would require all of them to be psykers and anti-psyker technique would work to counter it or even make them easy to spot. They did no such thing so managed to avoid an easy cop-out built in any science-fantasy universe.
There are tons of things in 40k that seem to be supernatural/psychic in nature without being full blown obvious psyker activity. Not all of them require glowing eyes, magic chants, and psychic tests. You've got exarch powers that basically low-grade psychic effects. You've got drukhari soul/pain eating. You've got mandrakes climbing in and out of the shadow dimension. You've got ethereals, acts of faith, wolf tail talismans, the various spooky things navigators can do with their third eyes, warp fauna like khymarae that can phase through matter...
The way it's written, I get the impression that RG wraith slipping is another example of this. Basically a watered down version of a more overtly supernatural thing Corax can do.
Again that's a bit of a shaky, but at least believable at face value writing. It has several big weaknesses. First breathing apparatus is pretty much a standard piece of equipment for many guardsmen. Hell it's necessary for many to operate on the surface of their own planet because it's too toxic to breath like on many places in Armageddon. It's also standard mandatory gear on all Scions.
IIRC, they were on an asteroid or moon or something that had basically no atmosphere at all. So it wasn't a matter of the air being toxic. It was more that there simply wasn't any air. I could be mistaken, but I thought that guard basically got gas masks; not something with an internal oxygen supply. Scions are very fancy boys who are excellent at infiltration and have very snazzy gear. So marines "merely" having gear comparable to some of the imperium's most elite special forces doesn't seem like an argument against the abilities of marines.
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TheBestBucketHead wrote: I kinda read the discussion here as "Marines can't ever be stealthy" vs. "Marines aren't entirely incapable of stealth". Marines are worse than a worse trained human or ratling. But if a marine needs to be, I'm sure they can make do more than people are giving credit for.
My take is basically that marines are disadvantaged by their large size and colorful armor, but that they have other advantages that they can leverage to make up for it (and exceed the abilities of a not-particularly-sneaky human). Figured out roughly what the patrol routes along a wall are like? Use your transhuman speed to bolt into the next piece of cover in the couple of seconds before the next guard rounds the corner. Enemy fortress is built into a cliff, hidden behind huge walls, and bristling with anti-aircraft batteries? Climb the several miles high sheer cliff wall to bypass the guns and walls. Enemy base is on an island with lots of anti-vehicle batteries watching the horizon? Walk along the bottom of the ocean.
Ever play Chimera Squad? Marines are bristling with alternate entry point options.
Granted, a space marine in your living room should probably be pretty easy to spot. He might be braced against your ceiling in the corner holding perfectly still, but he's probably going to be easier to notice than like, a guardsmen hiding behind my couch. When marine sneakery is written well (imho), it's because they leverage feats that normal humans probably can't pull off. One of the AL novels has a marine basically hold his breath for a few days (week?) while packed into a barrel of meat soup; the idea being that his flesh would just blend in with the soup when scanned. Gaunt's Ghosts are great at what they do, but they don't have the meat soup option when infiltrating an enemy base.
This message was edited 3 times. Last update was at 2021/08/11 19:06:05
ATTENTION. Psychic tests are unfluffy. Your longing for AV is understandable but misguided. Your chapter doesn't need a separate codex. Doctrines should go away. Being a "troop" means nothing. This has been a cranky service announcement. You may now resume your regularly scheduled arguing.
Wyldhunt wrote: There are tons of things in 40k that seem to be supernatural/psychic in nature without being full blown obvious psyker activity. Not all of them require glowing eyes, magic chants, and psychic tests. You've got exarch powers that basically low-grade psychic effects. You've got drukhari soul/pain eating. You've got mandrakes climbing in and out of the shadow dimension. You've got ethereals, acts of faith, wolf tail talismans, the various spooky things navigators can do with their third eyes, warp fauna like khymarae that can phase through matter...
The way it's written, I get the impression that RG wraith slipping is another example of this. Basically a watered down version of a more overtly supernatural thing Corax can do.
Again this is a bad example. Exarchs and Striking Scorpions stealth skills are indeed magical. All Eldars are psykers; all of them. Thus, they can all do some magic. It requires some training to produce some specific effect of course, but any eldar has the potential from casting flames from their bare hands. That's why some can drink souls, others predict the future, some meld your minds. Mandrakes are literal half shadow daemons and half eldar. They are thus all psykers and their abilities completely magical. Khymera are summoned daemons, literal nightmare made flesh through magic. Ethereal are in the more dubious, personality cult/chemical effect and what they do isn't supernatural like being near invisible when in the shadows like Striking Scorpions. The way it's written, not all Raven Guards are psykers, thus they should not all be able to do magic. If a Librarian from the Raven Guard did it with its buddies, we would not have this issue.
IIRC, they were on an asteroid or moon or something that had basically no atmosphere at all. So it wasn't a matter of the air being toxic. It was more that there simply wasn't any air. I could be mistaken, but I thought that guard basically got gas masks; not something with an internal oxygen supply. Scions are very fancy boys who are excellent at infiltration and have very snazzy gear. So marines "merely" having gear comparable to some of the imperium's most elite special forces doesn't seem like an argument against the abilities of marines.
The Imperial Guards and the Navy troopers operate in vacuum from time to time or on planet where the atmosphere is unbreathable which thus require air supply. Air supply is probably not an issue. Scions armor is pressurized and they can fight in the vacuum for a while. It's an argument against the "Space Marines did a stealth operation nobody else could have pulled off" if much more common and numerous elite troopers could have done it just as easily if not even more easily.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/08/11 19:18:42
Regarding the power plant producing a constant thermal bloom, do we have any evidence to say it can't just cycle up and down in output as required?
Sure, we don't know of any fusion reactors that can do that... but we also can't miniaturise fusion reactors or make any effective artificial reactors at all, so I don't see why the ability to modulate output as needed would be an especially outlandish feature for technology that is already far beyond our own.
The Alpha Legion would basically near enough switch off their reactors until needed.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/08/11 19:21:01
ChargerIIC wrote: If algae farm paste with a little bit of your grandfather in it isn't Grimdark I don't know what is.
Wyldhunt wrote: There are tons of things in 40k that seem to be supernatural/psychic in nature without being full blown obvious psyker activity. Not all of them require glowing eyes, magic chants, and psychic tests. You've got exarch powers that basically low-grade psychic effects. You've got drukhari soul/pain eating. You've got mandrakes climbing in and out of the shadow dimension. You've got ethereals, acts of faith, wolf tail talismans, the various spooky things navigators can do with their third eyes, warp fauna like khymarae that can phase through matter...
The way it's written, I get the impression that RG wraith slipping is another example of this. Basically a watered down version of a more overtly supernatural thing Corax can do.
Again this is a bad example. Exarchs and Striking Scorpions stealth skills are indeed magical. All Eldars are psykers; all of them. Thus, they can all do some magic. It requires some training to produce some specific effect of course, but any eldar has the potential from casting flames from their bare hands. That's why some can drink souls, others predict the future, some meld your minds. Mandrakes are literal half shadow daemons and half eldar. They are thus all psykers and their abilities completely magical. Khymera are summoned daemons, literal nightmare made flesh through magic. Ethereal are in the more dubious, personality cult/chemical effect and what they do isn't supernatural like being near invisible when in the shadows like Striking Scorpions. The way it's written, not all Raven Guards are psykers, thus they should not all be able to do magic. If a Librarian from the Raven Guard did it with its buddies, we would not have this issue.
Fair points. I think the point I'm trying to make is that there are "psykers," and then there are "psykers." I'd argue that most or all RG are capable of the low-level supernatural feat of wraith slipping just like most space puppies seem to be particularly good at warding off psychic powers and sisters of battle can pull off their acts of faith and other miracles. We don't think of sisters as being "psykers," but the community seems to mostly agree that faith-based abilities in 40k are basically a psychic stunt pulled off via the collective latent psychic abilities of the group rather than the overt psychic abilities of a psyker.
Basically, I think a combination of having a supernatural being's genseed and the training/culture of the RG chapter lets them pull off the stealth equivalent of an act of faith. It's functionally psychic, but does that make them "psykers"?
IIRC, they were on an asteroid or moon or something that had basically no atmosphere at all. So it wasn't a matter of the air being toxic. It was more that there simply wasn't any air. I could be mistaken, but I thought that guard basically got gas masks; not something with an internal oxygen supply. Scions are very fancy boys who are excellent at infiltration and have very snazzy gear. So marines "merely" having gear comparable to some of the imperium's most elite special forces doesn't seem like an argument against the abilities of marines.
The Imperial Guards and the Navy troopers operate in vacuum from time to time or on planet where the atmosphere is unbreathable which thus require air supply. Air supply is probably not an issue. Scions armor is pressurized and they can fight in the vacuum for a while. It's an argument against the "Space Marines did a stealth operation nobody else could have pulled off" if much more common and numerous elite troopers could have done it just as easily if not even more easily.
But do guardsmen and navy troopers always have void gear on hand? The marines just showed up for work that day, and their default equipment let them do a thing that a guardsman's standard kit probably wouldn't have allowed. Marines and their armor are a bundle of niche little features like that. There's merit to that kind of flexibility.
As for scions being badass, that's great. But again, if you're drawing comparisons between marines and some of the imperium's most sneaky elite boys, that seems to support the idea that marines are, in fact, competent infiltrators. If my basketball skills are merely on par with professional basketball players, that still means I'm good at basketball.
I get the impression that you think I'm making the argument that marines are the bestest ninjas ever, and no one else is allowed to even come close. I'm not. I'd believe that the average catachan is as good or better than the average marine at hiding in a jungle. But that doesn't mean that marines can't be good at stealth or that their raw versatility and assortment of unique tricks aren't assets when someone needs to do some infiltration.
ATTENTION. Psychic tests are unfluffy. Your longing for AV is understandable but misguided. Your chapter doesn't need a separate codex. Doctrines should go away. Being a "troop" means nothing. This has been a cranky service announcement. You may now resume your regularly scheduled arguing.
Fair points. I think the point I'm trying to make is that there are "psykers," and then there are "psykers." I'd argue that most or all RG are capable of the low-level supernatural feat of wraith slipping just like most space puppies seem to be particularly good at warding off psychic powers and sisters of battle can pull off their acts of faith and other miracles. We don't think of sisters as being "psykers," but the community seems to mostly agree that faith-based abilities in 40k are basically a psychic stunt pulled off via the collective latent psychic abilities of the group rather than the overt psychic abilities of a psyker.
Basically, I think a combination of having a supernatural being's genseed and the training/culture of the RG chapter lets them pull off the stealth equivalent of an act of faith. It's functionally psychic, but does that make them "psykers"?
Again, that's murky at best. For all we know Sisters of Battle Act of Faith are basically psychic power produced by a third party, in that case, the Emperor himself, the most powerful psyker in the 40k universe (hence why they also work in places with psychic defense to a certain degree). Plus, even if Acts of Faith were indeed the produce of belief, they are the produce of belief from trillions of humans, some of them psykers, who fervently believe in the God Emperor and the Sisters of Battle are just the focus of them because they are the most faithful of the faithful. A 1000 dudes believing they are the most stealthy people around and thus becoming so by the sheer power of belief, while unintentionally fething hilarious, is probably not how this entire "fervent belief produces magical effects". You need a hell of a lot more than the beliefs of a few thousands or even a few millions to produce such effect according to the lore we have on it.
I get the impression that you think I'm making the argument that marines are the bestest ninjas ever, and no one else is allowed to even come close. I'm not. I'd believe that the average catachan is as good or better than the average marine at hiding in a jungle. But that doesn't mean that marines can't be good at stealth or that their raw versatility and assortment of unique tricks aren't assets when someone needs to do some infiltration.
I do agree with you on that point. In ideal conditions (or in special circumstances) a Space Marine can be stealthy, hell I might even be willing to grant that they are surprisingly stealthy when you take their size and weight in comparison, about as stealthy as a competent guardsman (which is awesome when you consider their disadvantages), but not a badass specialist in the genre like a Catashan Devil or a Ratling Sniper and certainly not a magically powered one like a Striking Scorpion or even worst a Mandrake.
I think one mistake people are making is assuming "equality of training"
Space Marines come from a hard enviroment where they're already pretty good, coming from death worlds etc. (one need only look at catachan to see the kind of people a death world produces) they're given extensive training as part of the trials (obviously what this is varies from chapter to chapter) then they're made mariens given scout training and spend their inital service in the scouts. GW's vague on how long a marine typically serves with the scouts but it's at least one deployment, (it should be worth noting that if a guardsmen survives a campaign he's considered a veteran)
then, with the new primaris marines they spend more time in the tenth company serving with the vanguard unit.
So by time a Marine leaves the 10th company he has considerable skill at these, almost certainly more then your average guardsman.
The Guard aren't some sort of elite Navy SEAL. they're the best of the PDF and are solid troops. but they're not anywhere NEAR as well trained or experianced as a Space Marine (obviously this is a matter of averages. A Veteran Cadian is proably more experianced/better trained then a green Space Marine scout)
Opinions are not facts please don't confuse the two
They're insanely tough to kill, so they can emerge from combat taking wounds that would kill or criple a human and be back in the next fight. they're biologically immortal (or damn close too it)
this means you have a wealth of experiance in a single formation.
you're absolutely right the idea that one man can be as good as a mortal expert in 15 differant fields of study is rediculas. but a space marine is going to have more experiance then an entire squad of guardsmen put together
Opinions are not facts please don't confuse the two
BrianDavion wrote: I think one mistake people are making is assuming "equality of training"
Space Marines come from a hard enviroment where they're already pretty good, coming from death worlds etc. (one need only look at catachan to see the kind of people a death world produces) they're given extensive training as part of the trials (obviously what this is varies from chapter to chapter) then they're made mariens given scout training and spend their inital service in the scouts. GW's vague on how long a marine typically serves with the scouts but it's at least one deployment, (it should be worth noting that if a guardsmen survives a campaign he's considered a veteran)
then, with the new primaris marines they spend more time in the tenth company serving with the vanguard unit.
So by time a Marine leaves the 10th company he has considerable skill at these, almost certainly more then your average guardsman.
The Guard aren't some sort of elite Navy SEAL. they're the best of the PDF and are solid troops. but they're not anywhere NEAR as well trained or experianced as a Space Marine (obviously this is a matter of averages. A Veteran Cadian is proably more experianced/better trained then a green Space Marine scout)
The yet only other problem with that defense is that while some Marines come from harsh worlds, some don't. Maccrage, the homeworld of the Ultramarine is civilized and temperate, one of the best place to live actually so are many other planets of the Realm of Ultramar. Plus, most Space Marines are recruited as prepubescent boys. Not exactly the most skilled even in harsh places. Hell, even those born on feral worlds or in the hyper violent slums of some hive city are basically children. They haven't made their first "big hunt" they aren't men; they are boys.
Onto the training but, the only place where we have info as to how much time it took for a Space Marine to pass from Scout to Devastator in a reserve company was about 2 to 3 years. A Catashan or a Cadian all go to military school from infancy to late teenagerhood where they join cadet groups for a couple of years. A Cadian age 25 has about 10 years of military experience and constant training and about 6 or 7 year prior to that of preparatory training. You random Cadian would make a Navy SEAL look like an undertrained rooky and that's without delving into their even more elite elements. One thing people seem to mistake is that "trained since birth to be soldiers" and "born in a hell where only the strong survive" is par for the course for billions of guardsmen because they read Space Marine fluff, but not that of other factions. Hell from those numbers alone, a random power armored Space Marines might actually have less experience than a random Cadian trooper.
Finally there is the final problem of how many years do you think it takes to master a skill to reasonable degree. Some could take centuries like close combat fighting with a variety of different while others, if you don't get it in a couple of weeks, you'll never get it like walking silently or moving while hugging cover. Training isn't some sort of magic trick. You also need the proper physical and mental aptitudes and the proper equipment. That's why most of us, even if we trained our entire life for it, could never become Olympic gymnasts. We simply don't have the proper aptitude. We could become very agile and strong, but never to their level.
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2021/08/12 01:23:47
That's a quintessentially illogical statement. An average Cadian of age 25 can only be alive (or dying) and there are millions of them (well until the planet exploded, there are less now).
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/08/12 01:25:38
That's a quintessentially illogical statement. An average Cadian of age 25 can only be alive (or dying) and there are millions of them (well until the planet exploded, there are less now).
not really my point is that your average guardsman doesn't survive his first campaign, your average marine does.
Opinions are not facts please don't confuse the two
