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Made in us
Thunderhawk Pilot Dropping From Orbit




AZ

So how does this work? Let’s say chaos are the invaders. They have Void Superiority. The planet has void shields and shields around the cities/hives. The planet has a competent military with Space Marine defenders. Basically each militaries are equal. No Chaos Space Marines winning the day etc… and the Chaos forces want the planet so they aren’t going to terminatus or anything to crazy….

So with that in mind. How does the enemy Chaos army successfully win?

I was thinking…

Pox Virus or some type of zombie virus equivalent
Propaganda to get the civilians to turn/uprise against the government
Try to get the PDF to turn
Void/Air Power, but if the defenders had missiles or air of their own, it would prove difficult.
Summon demons

But other than that realistically, how would they? You can’t overwhelm them, that would take billions of soldiers and even with the 40K setting that would take thousands and maybe even tens of thousands of Space Ships to do this…. Any ideas how to successfully invade a planet?



 
   
Made in nz
Trigger-Happy Baal Predator Pilot



New Zealand

Firstly having Space Marine defenders is unlikely, though still possible. And if they are there for some reason they likely have a ship in orbit. Was it driven off or destroyed?

As the whole planet cannot be protected by void shields there will always be somewhere to land.

My first priority would be to kill or block any psychic cries for help. There will be an inevitable counter attack, but this will delay it and relief forces would go in blind. This is unlikely as it would likely be in the main hive shielded and fortified. But if there's an opportunity.

beside psychic communication isolated facilities would be my first targets. Especially communications and command facilities. Can't have them being able to coordinate their defences.

For the hives I would ensure that the supply of food and other resources to them were cut. The defenders will be starved.

Terror campaign against civilians around the hives. Make the civilians try to seek safety in the hives. You can use this opportunity to sneak in agents, saboteurs etc. If the civilians are let in it will drain the defenders resources. It will also hurt there morale, especially if the civilians aren't allowed in.

Power stations if not in the hives will be prime targets. No power no shields.

If defence lasers etc become vulnerable they are a target. If hives are then undefended from orbit use your ships to pound them until the shields drop.

Lure the Space Marine defenders out into a trap. Even if they survive, any easy target they might consider a trap.

If you can get agents in the hives (turncoats/cultists etc) do use them spread disease and foment dissent. But don't summon daemons or launch rebellions until you are ready to attack with the main forces, as they are only distractions.

All the while broadcast propaganda on all channels. This will demoralise moral and help with dissent and corruption.

Overwhelm the loyalist forces bit by bit.
Remember fair fights are for losers.
   
Made in gb
Preparing the Invasion of Terra






For me it would just be a repeat of one of Abbadon's Black Crusades. Don't attack the well defended and garrisoned world when you can attack all of the other planets that send it food/water/ammo/workers/troops
That or throw a starship at it.
   
Made in us
Revving Ravenwing Biker




New York City

How you invade a planet would really depend on the planet in question. I only know for sure how i would defend a planet.

If the defenders are expecting the enemy, and are under planetary siege, they'd gather the population into easily defended area's, ideally somewhere underground, and where they can seal themselves off from the outside world, with an ample supply of oxygen if worse comes to worse. This is to ensure that when void shields can be put up, they'll be small and hard to hit. The earth might be able to mask most of its visual and thermal signature, and you only need to cover a very tiny portion of the underground complex/fortress, the entrances. This takes away the enemies greatest advantage, bombardment from orbit. The fortress should have been stockpiled with fuel, rations, clothing, medical supplies, plenty of tools, weapons and ammo, and redundant systems, ranging from electricity and water, to security, intelligence, and communications. It should not just be a dozen or so of these complexes. There should be hundreds if not thousands. This will ensure that no one but the most committed enemies will have the willpower and resources to attempt such a thing, and of those willing, they would pay an enormous price for victory.

Unfortunately, some planets won't have these ideal solutions when facing planetary invasion. Not all planets would be prime for building a thousand underground fortresses. In which case, I'd choose mountains. I can still build bunkers into the mountains, and mountains provide much more area surface than flat ground. On these mountains, I would cram as much surface to space anti-ship weapons as I possibly can. I'd smooth out the sides of the mountains at 75 degree slopes, so that nothing can climb up easily, and without being noticed. And as before, I'd have everything stockpiled so that I can hold out for years. Highest priority resources goes to fueling the shields of course. Without those, the defenders will be facing direct bombardment. The only thing you can do then, is retreat into the mountains and wait for the mountain to go down. If by some Grace of the Emperor, the mountain won't go down, or the besiegers run out of ammunition or something, then the attackers will have to face the horrors of trying to fight and scale a huge fortress and then after making it past the outer layers of defenses, fight a long grinding battle of attrition, with pillboxes, murder holes, and traps around every corner, and long narrow dark corridors that change directions constantly.

And if none of those options are available, I'll try to pull all of my forces off the planet before the enemy can envelope and prevent escape. Any warriors left on the planet are to fight a guerrilla war, sabotage, and gather as much intel on the enemy as possible. Then I get backup and reinforcements, and counter attack with as big a force as I can muster, hitting as fast as possible.

I will forever remain humble because I know I could have less.
I will always be grateful because I remember I've had less. 
   
Made in fr
Stalwart Tribune





This is the kind of case where you should look at medieval warfare rather than anything modern. Fortresses at the time were made to be almost impossible to capture by force, so the standard strategy was to surround the place, cut off all supply routes and wait until the people inside were hungry/thirsty enough to surrender. For the defenders, the goal was mostly to hold on until reinforcements showed up or something else (like diseases, a harsh winter, or the army being needed elsewhere) forced the attackers to lift the siege.

To invade a well defended planet you'd have to do something similar. Since the Imperium's worlds are typically not self-sufficient, a good old blockade should work. If it's a highly populated world depending on nearby agri-worlds for its food, it wouldn't take long until they're in no shape to resist.
   
Made in us
Revving Ravenwing Biker




New York City

OP is correct in that it is infeasible to overwhelm the enemy with sheer force or numbers. Unless you're Tyranids, or an Ork Waaagh I suppose. Actually, if its a colony of several million, it might be feasible.
But for a populated world; say several hundred million, to billions, it is impossible. To invade a planet is to put the entirety of that planet under threat. The entire population will fight you. How many ships or manpower would you require to soundly subdue the population and disperse all desire for resistance? Too many, impossibly many.
There's always the option of exterminatus. But that could be done with a few battleships, and defeats the whole purpose of an invasion/conquering.

So the best options would be ones where you require relatively few forces in comparison to the numbers you're opposing. Completing important and key objectives in the right places at the right time. Cutting enemy communications would obviously be one of the highest priorities. Taking out key enemy leadership, or disrupting alliances and causing in-fighting would also be very valuable. And whatever actions taken should always weigh the merits of demoralizing the enemy and sapping their will to resist. Any brute force or attrition based warfare will never be in the invaders favor (unless you're Tyranids, or an Ork Waaagh).

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/06/14 11:57:56


I will forever remain humble because I know I could have less.
I will always be grateful because I remember I've had less. 
   
Made in us
Thunderhawk Pilot Dropping From Orbit




AZ

How long would it take to starve out a Hive?



 
   
Made in gb
Preparing the Invasion of Terra






Depends how willing the people are to eat each other and how much food the rulers kept in storage.

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/06/14 14:15:55


 
   
Made in us
Revving Ravenwing Biker




New York City

The Great Crusade fleets had thousands of space marines, and one to several million Imperial Army aboard several hundred Imperial Navy ships. They'd be able to take an inhabited world of several billion people decisively. Though it should be noted, it took the 63rd Expeditionary Fleet several months to subdue the Auretian Technocracy. We're talking 100,000 Astartes, several million Army regulars, and a titan legion, and it still took them a good part of a year.

I will forever remain humble because I know I could have less.
I will always be grateful because I remember I've had less. 
   
Made in fr
Stalwart Tribune





usmcmidn wrote:
How long would it take to starve out a Hive?

There's no straight answer, it depends on how much food reserves are stored. With transport in the Imperium being sometimes unreliable, they'd have to keep a decent stock of food, just in case deliveries are delayed by a warp storm or something. I wonder if there are grain silos the same size as hive cities on these planets?
On a truly hyper-populated world, finding a place to store that much food would probably be a problem, so they might run out after only a few weeks or months. If the population is more reasonable, they might have enough food to last up to a year or two. That mostly depends on if the governor is a prepper, really.
   
Made in au
Longtime Dakkanaut




 Gert wrote:
For me it would just be a repeat of one of Abbadon's Black Crusades. Don't attack the well defended and garrisoned world when you can attack all of the other planets that send it food/water/ammo/workers/troops
That or throw a starship at it.


This. I wouldn't see Chaos attacking any highly defended planets unless they had a good reason to.

They'd go for Agri Worlds, Mining Worlds, small Civilized Worlds, etc.

Tygre wrote:

Beside psychic communication isolated facilities would be my first targets. Especially communications and command facilities. Can't have them being able to coordinate their defences.


This is far easier said than done. Astropathic arrays would be some of the most protected facilities on the planet. If this planet does have void shielding, anti-void weapons you could very well expect those facilities to be situated inside the protection of those defences.

Disabling planetary communication could also be a massive feat. If it's anything like our modern day Earth you could be looking at multiple layers of communication. Satellites, the easiest to destroy. Radio and cellular which would have millions of towers across the planet. The US today has something like 300 thousand cellular towers alone. Then there's landline communications, which could be buried underground or laid along the ocean floor.
   
Made in us
Fixture of Dakka





It depends on a lot of factors. Generally, I don't think chaos marines, "want the planet." They're usually performing raids and surgical strikes that play to their strengths to steal resources, grab a relic, or pull off some stunt to make their bosses happy.

But the premise is that they want the planet for long-term keepsies. Sure. It will still depend a lot on what flavor of chaos marines we're talking about and what it is they want the planet for. Turning everyone into zombies might not be the best idea if your intent is to use the local population as slave labor or living sacrifices, for instance. And Khorne probably wouldn't be all that impressed either.

If I plan to be there for a while, shutting down cries for help is probably a smart first move. Agreed with Tygre there. Anything I have planned that involves taking hold of the planet is going to take long enough that I don't want an imperial fleet catching wind and stopping bye. So...

PHASE ONE
* Destroy the local astropathic choir facility if there is one.
* Kill any astropaths I can find. This may mean diverting more forces than I'd normally want to to the imperial palace if the planetary governor is likely to have a personal astropath.
* Issue orders from the get-go to destroy any vessels attempting to make warp jumps. They'll be relatively vulnerable, and they're the other most likely means of word getting out that I'm invading.


From there, my next step is going to depend on what the win condition I'm aiming for is. If I anticipate need to starve the enemy out and run them out of ammo, then Tygre is right to target poorly defended supply facilities. I'll have some momentum in the early part of the invasion that I can use to hit those relatively poorly defended locations efficiently. Attacks on those facilities can probably serve as landing operations too.

However, the presence of astartes defenders that, per your description, I can't just overwhelm through direct confrontation will also serve to make the local population less likely to surrender despite being starved of supplies. And if I'm not allowed to draw them into a head-to-head fight and win that way (through my thousand sons psychic powers, waves of cultists, or whatever other edge I have), there's probably not an easy way to make sure they're all dead.

So instead, I'd focus my initial push on some probably hard to crack nuts that can serve as fortresses once I take them, and then use my established naval superiority to keep the remaining defenders from mounting an overwhelming response while I get on with whatever it is I need the planet for. So...
STAGE TWO:
*Take out any macro batteries or naval facilities capable of threatening my ships that are now alone in orbit.
* Hit a few choice locations with overwhelming force. More force than I probably want to commit. The locations should be defensible once captured, would ideally deprive the enemy of valuable assets once in my possession, and would absolutely NEED to give me access to whatever resources I require for my long-term plans for the planet. So if my goal is to perform a ritual atop a certain mountain, I should probably capture the bases near that mountain.

* Use naval domination to launch orbital bombardments and sorties of air raids to take the teeth off of any massed forces approaching my established bases. Bonus points for taking out established enemy facilities that allow them to produce and maintain flyers, and siege vehicles. Basically, any time the imperials amass a force large enough to potentially threaten one of my bases, I blast them apart until they're no longer strong enough to threaten my bases.

And form there, I just have to maintain my defensive position while I do whatever I came to do. I can take harvested resources up to my ships. I can build vehicles and equipment at captured faciliteis. I can do my mountain ritual. I can unleash daemons on the cities I've captured. Whatever. I just have to protect the safe zone I established with my initial ground attacks and keep the remaining imperials too weak to compromise those safe zones.

The loyalist astartes will presumably launch some heroic operation, probably involving a handful of small units with quirks that make them memorable for the audience. We established I'm not allowed to make sure they died in the first act, so whether their mission goes well or not is basically just up to the author at that point. They'll have to get through my relatively concentrated defensive forces to mess up my end goals though.

Note that certain assets can change this plan significantly. Iron Warriors and Death Guard seem like they'd be content to just win the naval fight, shut down cries for help, and then take their time bombing the snot out of the planet voidshields be darned. The Alpha Legion would have already conquered the planet months ago; all the operatives are just waiting for the signal to make it official. Powerful sorcerers could potentially win a war of attrition by summoning tons of daemons. And again, lots of things might change depending on what my end goal is and whether or not I'm allowed to focus on killing these marines that are already stationed here defending the planet for some reason.


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.
 
   
Made in hk
Longtime Dakkanaut





One key difference though about this concept that everyone in the billions population homeworld will rise up to fight you. In the 40k universe, I think the local population are mostly chaff and worth next to nothing against the threats of a galaxy.

Many of the xenos and chaos threats that actually will take a whole planet have infinite stamina to keep on killing. So, if they want to kill everyone, even if its in the billions and billions on a planet, they could very well do it. Assuming only the planetary defense force (imperical guard), and whatever else space marines on planet have the weapons to fight against chaos or xenos. Everybody else on the planet are just literally fodder.

There are lore and stories of chaos space marines chapters that destroy and kill entire planet populations. Thats because a space marine can just keep on killing and killing non stop. They don't need rest. Same for races like Necrons. And orcs... well, the more they fight and kill, the more orcs gather and just spawn, so unopposed by actual opposition, soon the whole planet will be swarming with orcs.

And demons and tyranids can swarm a planet in such numbers that the billions on that planet mean nothing if they are all chaff.

So, it really boils down to the actual forces that have the weapons to actually fight any invading forces of chaos or xenos. And that would be the imperial guard, and any other forces like space marines who are on planet.

As for how Chaos does it. If you read some of the lore, and some of the campaign books like Vigilous or Charadon. Chaos will usually do the following either in part, or all of them:

1) Summon in demons, usually these will take defenders by surprise.
2) Defeat or drive off the space forces, achieve space superiority. Set up a blockade.
3) Have local cults rise up, insurrections. So, as much as half your local forces may turn traitor.
4) Once space superiority achieved, start the drop assault.
5) Start plagues in crowded hive cities.
6) Have Slanaash seduce and turn top figures in the military and government.
7) Once the land assault starts, spread death and destruction as widespread as possible.
8) Once enough people have been killed, usually demonic rituals long in the making are now satisfied and a huge flood of chaos demons pour in through rifts to swarm the whole planet.

At this point, its usually game over for that planet. Easier to declare exterminatus. The big campaigns we read about like Charadon and Vigilus is because those key planets are too important. Thats when we have a massive war as reinforcements are sent in from the imperium from all quarters and its a huge battleground.
   
Made in au
Longtime Dakkanaut




I imagine the only way for Chaos Marines could win is through mass orbital bombardments and sudden mass corruption. Which always seems to be a risk with regular humans, which is why there's so much bureaucracy when it comes to the Guard and Navy.

Once the population is either subdued by lance strikes, or the majority has fallen to Chaos then the spikey marines land and start their own assault.

It sounds less exciting for sure, but I don't see them winning any other way. They simply could not do conventional warfare.
   
Made in hk
Longtime Dakkanaut





Most of the time, Chaos space marines are a raiding force. Or they will target smaller population planets. When they target big planets with large populations, its usually because those populations are ripe for turning wholesale traitor so they just need a little push from CSM before the entire planet falls into anarchy and chaos.

Those millions of imperial guard are no longer imperial guard but cultists and renegade guard when they have all turned to chaos.
   
Made in us
Armored Iron Breaker




Charlotte, NC

If you can find a copy, I would suggest that you read through the supplement called "Planetfall."
That will likely cover a lot of your questions.

My Hobby Blog: https://tinylegions.blogspot.com/

http://www.classichammer.com- New Games with old Rules 
   
Made in ca
Commander of the Mysterious 2nd Legion





usmcmidn wrote:
So how does this work? Let’s say chaos are the invaders. They have Void Superiority. The planet has void shields and shields around the cities/hives. The planet has a competent military with Space Marine defenders. Basically each militaries are equal. No Chaos Space Marines winning the day etc… and the Chaos forces want the planet so they aren’t going to terminatus or anything to crazy….

So with that in mind. How does the enemy Chaos army successfully win?

I was thinking…

Pox Virus or some type of zombie virus equivalent
Propaganda to get the civilians to turn/uprise against the government
Try to get the PDF to turn
Void/Air Power, but if the defenders had missiles or air of their own, it would prove difficult.
Summon demons

But other than that realistically, how would they? You can’t overwhelm them, that would take billions of soldiers and even with the 40K setting that would take thousands and maybe even tens of thousands of Space Ships to do this…. Any ideas how to successfully invade a planet?


well to start with, what does the planet have that I WANT? Do I need to invade to aquire it? or can I use a more tricky less direct path

This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/07/05 01:23:36


Opinions are not facts please don't confuse the two 
   
 
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