<![CDATA[Latest posts for the thread "How valid is the idea that Space Marines from a later founding are 'inferior copies'? "]]> http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/31.page JForum - http://www.jforum.net How valid is the idea that Space Marines from a later founding are 'inferior copies'?

“Ach, these lads? They aren’t first generation,” said Pasanius kicking a dismembered
corpse at Uriel’s feet, a warrior he didn’t remember killing. “They’re a founding from
way down the line. Copies of copies of copies. You don’t dilute Astartes blood for
thousands of years without seeing it become thin and weak.”

Uriel wanted to say that Pasanius was wrong, that the dead didn’t care whether they
were killed by inferior copies of the first Astartes or the genuine article.


And then in I am Slaughter it states...


Bloodlines and gene-seeds were gradually failing over time. The vigour had waned


So basically the question is, is there supposed to be a marked quality difference between ..... say, a generic Space Marine from a 1st Founding Chapter, or a generic Space Marine from, for example, the 24th founding.]]> http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814683.page http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814683.page GMT How valid is the idea that Space Marines from a later founding are 'inferior copies'?
A lot of Astartes in the Legions would end up looking almost exactly like their Primarchs as the potency of the geneseed re-wrote large portions of their genetic code. We see it in Abbadon, "Little Horus" Aximand, and Luc Sedirae in the XVIth Legion as all three warriors were almost identical, albeit smaller, copies of their father Horus.

Some Chapters also don't have certain organs due to the Heresy which made them "lesser" on a technical level to their previous Legion brothers. The Imperial Fists for example are missing certain organs because they were deemed excessive when the Inductii process was introduced to rapidly increase the Legion's numbers for the latter parts of the Heresy.]]> http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814691.page http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814691.page GMT How valid is the idea that Space Marines from a later founding are 'inferior copies'?
I think they originated with the World Eaters, but desperation saw pretty much all Legions adopt the practice.

The next bit is speculation. But essentially, with all that was lost during the Heresy, and the need to rebuild and rearm as quickly and efficiently as possible? The remaining Loyalist Legions continued to make use of Inductii.

If so? There may be more to it than “in my day, a Marine was a Marine, not these namby pamby long haired flower arrangers. I carried an M-16 and you carry that…that…that….guitar” incredibly ancient warrior yells at high tech cloud type stuff.

Because who knows? It might be Pasanius not fully appreciating how much of an edge his long service has given him over others etc.]]> http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814692.page http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814692.page GMT Re:How valid is the idea that Space Marines from a later founding are 'inferior copies'? 40k is entropy. Technology, genetics, even whole civilisations, with very few exceptions everything gets worse over time.

Part of the purpose of the Geneseed tithe is to monitor for degradation and genetic drift in the geneseed, so not only is geneseed known to mutate, on some level it's expected to.

So with the exception of the First and Ultima foundings, every other founding is derived from a geneseed grown within another Space Marine, a copy of a copy of a copy, introducing more variables and taking the marines further from their pure geneseed, so there are certainly good reasons to assume that later foundings = inferior marines (and this is without factoring in the Inductii)

]]> http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814699.page http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814699.page GMT How valid is the idea that Space Marines from a later founding are 'inferior copies'?
the-gentleman-ranker wrote:

So basically the question is, is there supposed to be a marked quality difference between ..... say, a generic Space Marine from a 1st Founding Chapter, or a generic Space Marine from, for example, the 24th founding.


No, if you compare them during the same era. Yes, the geneseed will develop flaws over time, and in that sense becomes "weaker" but this has really nothing to do with chapter foundings, as that is merely about organisation of the forces. The same "diluting" will happen regardless of the marine is from Ultramarines or from a brand new successor chapter.

The primaris project was about fixing this, and it seems to have worked. Though of course that new geneseed will similarly develop flaws over time. ]]> http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814710.page http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814710.page GMT How valid is the idea that Space Marines from a later founding are 'inferior copies'?
I don't think the first founding chapters have some kind of central store of original gene seed that is the source of all new marines. As with all other chapters, they harvest the gene seed for the newbies from fallen marines.

Therefore, its not about the number of foundings, its about the quality control that is applied to the gene seed through all those generations of marines.

One might be able to make the case that first founding chapters have access to better kit for managing that process, and may have a more stringent QA procedure for what seed gets retained and what is discarded as flawed, but I think on the whole and across the whole piece, the quality of the seed for a brand new chapter founded just prior to the Ultima Founding is likely to be on a par with first founding chapters that are using a similar generation of gene seed.

Edit - This might give the Space Wolves in particular a bonus, as they still have Bjorn from the Great Crusade, who could presumably be used as a baseline for checking genetic drift. Any other first founding chapters with someone that goes that far back?

]]> http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814715.page http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814715.page GMT How valid is the idea that Space Marines from a later founding are 'inferior copies'?
Presumably, if anyone has The Original Fridge, it’s the first founding Chapters, and likely the Second Founding. But from there? Who knows.

Likewise the preservation of knowledge. Typically not the wider Imperium’s strong suit, no. But within the original Legions? Their Apothecarion would, by necessity, be well trained in all the necessaries. So again, First and Second Founding likely preserved that knowledge quite nicely.

But from there? The forces that donated Officers and Specialists to subsequent Foundings were doing so from an inherently smaller pool. And I can’t see many, if any, willingly giving away their Best Minds. People trained by those Best Minds? Yes. But you can still a gradual degradation of full understanding.

Marry that to perhaps lesser equipment? And there’s plenty room for pre-Primaris later foundlings to be lesser Astartes than contemporaries from earlier Foundings.

To a truly noticable degree? Maybe, maybe not. Because whether Veteran of the Long War or just general Veteran? That experience is easy to discount when you’ve just trounced a relatively green Astartes in a bout of fisticuffs.]]> http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814720.page http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814720.page GMT How valid is the idea that Space Marines from a later founding are 'inferior copies'?
I would also say that i don’t think anything I’ve said above invalidates any of the fluff or novels. It’s all super complicated, and marines are just as likely to be subject to arrogance and prejudice as any other population, if not more given original legion exceptionalism that must be rife. It kind of doesn’t matter if the authors have out any thought into it or not, as any of the outcomes are valid to roll into a story given normal human Psychological ranges. Rule of cool, and pick whatever position best suits the story being told ]]> http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814721.page http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814721.page GMT How valid is the idea that Space Marines from a later founding are 'inferior copies'?
Sure, that won’t be universal. Crimson Fist style losses are going to massively impact such considerations.

But it’s still the First Founding that are most likely to have not just the original toys, but the original manuals for said original toys, and to have passed down as much of the original knowledge as possible to its modern Tech Marines and Apothecaries and that.

And I doubt the differences are anywhere near a 15th Founding being given the technological equivalent of two ice cubes and best wishes, with how to do it passed on via interpretive dance.

I think we can also fairly confidently argue that Chapters that maintain strong links to the Primogenitor Chapter/Legion are, at times, able to borrow said Primogenitor’s expertise and tech where their own perhaps can’t overcome an emergent problem.

So, just because your Chapter is a later founding, it doesn’t automatically mean your lads are at the poopy end of the stick,]]> http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814722.page http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814722.page GMT How valid is the idea that Space Marines from a later founding are 'inferior copies'? http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814726.page http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814726.page GMT How valid is the idea that Space Marines from a later founding are 'inferior copies'?
Prior to that, when everyone had their Primarch alive and kicking? Yes keeping at least a portion of your harvested Geneseed centrally for safe keeping makes sense? It wasn’t as essential as it is the modern era. There was also more demand when the size of your Legion was restricted to “as many as you can, mate”, and so quite possibly fewer reserves

Though I do need to re-read the Ravenguard one, where they try drastic measures to recoup losses following Istvaan. I can’t remember if they accessed existing Geneseed stock or not? ]]> http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814728.page http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814728.page GMT How valid is the idea that Space Marines from a later founding are 'inferior copies'?
 Crimson wrote:
I don't buy "the best fridges argument," as the geneseed that is used to create new chapters is held by Adeptus Mechanicus, so they probably have even better storage equipment.


Agreed, but the AM gets it through regular tithes, which will be subject to potential degradation due to the equipment maintained by each chapter.

There are a lot of moving parts in this whole process, all of which will tend to be affected by entropy as Charax pointed out

I still think it points to later foundings as not necessarily having any worse quality gene seed as earlier foundings, on average. There will be outliers in all directions.

]]> http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814741.page http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814741.page GMT How valid is the idea that Space Marines from a later founding are 'inferior copies'? http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814974.page http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814974.page GMT How valid is the idea that Space Marines from a later founding are 'inferior copies'?
If you were the nominated Commander for a battle? All Imperial forces were under your command. Astartes, Militia, Auxilia, Titans, Mechanicum.

In the modern day? Yes it’s definitely advisable to Listen To The Demi-God With Centuries Of Battle Experience, but not compulsory. And so time is spent negotiating and that. Plus, unlike a Crusade Fleet? You’re unlikely to know exactly what resources will be available to you once you get to the theatre. And those forces, unlike your attached Crusade Host of Yore won’t be used to fighting alongside Astartes.

One could even argue the smaller size of a Chapter necessarily reduces the experience you can gain from sparring and training bouts.

A Crusade Fleet would number thousands of Astartes of varying rank and sometimes Legion if you were lucky. That’s a wider range of training partners to hone your skills against. A modern Chapter? Aboard ship may be but a mere handful. So you’re just not going to get the same workout and benefit.]]> http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814978.page http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/preList/818703/11814978.page GMT