EYEL1NER
Member
I think it's supposed to sound like it does in "Adeptus Astartes."
lol. It's supposed to be somewhat close to this: Ah*STAR*tēs. I have heard it with a hard 'e' and soft 'e' at the end though, so like either 'tease' or 'tess.'
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Warhammer 40,000 |OT| In the Grim Darkness of the Community Forum There Is Only War
- Thread starter GarthVaderUK
- Start date
Little Old Man
Member
Well obviously the entire 40k range is in an unrealistic 'heroic' scale, but Marine models when compared to the fluff have always been too small (especially when lined up against say Cadian troops). They're meant to be around seven/eight feet tall? And yet in full armour there isn't a huge height difference, assuming Cadians are towards 6ft tall.
Part of that though is that the legs on the existing sculpts have been done in such a way that marines could well be on horseback.
They're not truescale. They're 28mm what's called 'heroic' scale, which is a very comic book-esque exaggerated style, where the hands and feet are generally much bigger than they really should be.
It always amused me that space marines were so tall and strong. I mean, it's utterly worthless a characteristic for fighting battles by any modern definition - hell, it would actually be a negative! If it weren't for the Exterminatus I'd wager a modern military force against a legion of space marines any day.
Could I get some advice on building my army.
I have the space wolves starter pack, 5 terminators, Njal, arjac, sniper scouts and shotgun scouts so far but I'm not sure what to pick up next.
Should I pick up some tanks, a flyer (stormfang), dreadnaughts or more mounted units?
What do you think?
I have the space wolves starter pack, 5 terminators, Njal, arjac, sniper scouts and shotgun scouts so far but I'm not sure what to pick up next.
Should I pick up some tanks, a flyer (stormfang), dreadnaughts or more mounted units?
What do you think?
BreezyLimbo
Banned
A dreadnought is always cool. Space Wolves get their own, right? I think they do.
They get the Murderfang
Yeah, they have 3 dreadnaughts. I could get a unit of them maybe. That'd be cool
AbsolutBro
Member
You're forgetting the plethora of other changes to space marines though. Secondary organs, black carapace, night vision, acid spit, rapid regeneration of small wounds, and on and on. It wouldn't be close, and that's before the disparity in armaments.
And none of that matters in modern warfare. That's my point - 40k space marines are built to fight world war 1, not how we conduct military operations any more. You think having a nasty spit comes into play with modern warfare?
SillyEskimo
Member
Ok, I'll play. The vast majority of our small arms fire is ineffective against power armor. Since we are not built, trained, or armed for close combat, a single jump pack equipped space marine would slaughter a 10 man squad of special forces in the blink of an eye. Then there is the disparity in weapon power. A bolt gun would be effective against all our light armor vehicles. A power sword in the hands of a marine might as well be a light saber, able to carve up pretty much anything in fron of it. Terror would be seen in our ranks as power armored space marines drop pod their way into the heart of wherever they want. Command and leadership would be dead or captured on the very first day. All of this would be squads of space marines vs installations with garrisons of troops and defences. They eoulf both fall before back up could arrive to help.
If we were invaded by space marines as presented in the 40k fiction, I would give the planet perhaps a month before all our leadership was dead and it would be pockets of resistance only. Marines would be on their way and the IG would be sent in to mop up.
If it were Tyranids, we wouldn't last 2 weeks. We would be extinct.
Probably really handy for breaching doors.
Armies don't work that way. They don't line up across a field and then get taken out in the way our games represent them, and the leadership of our forces is scattered and diffused across large geographical areas. Also Space marines would be blown out of the sky by conventional weapons, which we can see from in game effects are on the same level of destruction as 40k weapons (if not more so - supporting air strikes in 40K don't come close to modern military). A Bolter inflicts a debilitating wound on an unarmoured human 2 times out of 3, how is that so much significantly stronger than normal weaponry now? Normal weaponry which has a longer range than bolters...
Plus there are literally 1000 space marines in a legion. I know I've said this before, but that number is utterly inconsequential. It's too small to have an impact on *our* world, nevermind 40k worlds. 1000 space marines can't actually do *anything* even if they were uber gods as described in fiction and not in game. There are six billion people on this planet spread over a vast area, the world would simply carry on. You think anyone living in Mexico City will care that the White House has been occupied by 20 guys in armour? Ultimately no matter the tech advantage, you cannot make up for lack of numbers when occupying territory. If 40k had better tech maybe they could do it, but the fact that 40k is basically "world war 1 with cooler, gnarlier things' limits them significantly. You either need massive, unbelievable numbers (Imperial Guard) or hyper tech with either mind control (Half life 3) or automated mechanical occupying troops. The only thing that works in the space marines arsenal to disrupt a civilised planet is Exterminatus.
Tyrande, on the other hand - yeah we're all lunch there, simply from volume... ;-)
Plus there are literally 1000 space marines in a legion. I know I've said this before, but that number is utterly inconsequential. It's too small to have an impact on *our* world, nevermind 40k worlds. 1000 space marines can't actually do *anything* even if they were uber gods as described in fiction and not in game. There are six billion people on this planet spread over a vast area, the world would simply carry on. You think anyone living in Mexico City will care that the White House has been occupied by 20 guys in armour? Ultimately no matter the tech advantage, you cannot make up for lack of numbers when occupying territory. If 40k had better tech maybe they could do it, but the fact that 40k is basically "world war 1 with cooler, gnarlier things' limits them significantly. You either need massive, unbelievable numbers (Imperial Guard) or hyper tech with either mind control (Half life 3) or automated mechanical occupying troops. The only thing that works in the space marines arsenal to disrupt a civilised planet is Exterminatus.
Tyrande, on the other hand - yeah we're all lunch there, simply from volume... ;-)
SillyEskimo
Member
The rest of the world would take notice when drop pods fall from outer space and destroy and conquer the leadership of every nuke capable country within 24 hours. Now they control all the nukes and would not be restrained in their usage at all.
Taking out Whitehall would pretty much guarantee our submarines aren't going to nuke anything alien invaders say. Simarily with the USA - it's not like they can just turn up and push the buttons themselves.
I mean, these armies are by their own descriptions and outlines modelled on ww1 and ww2 armies. There's a reason we don't fight that way now or structure forces like that - and advances in tech won't make us go back to that way of fighting.
SW:A rulebook comes today! Excited to read through the rulebook. Hopefully will pick up some models soon. Whatever I get it will be the start of my 8th edition army. Skitarii, Genestealers, Grey Knights, and the Shock troop looking guard guys (Militarum Tempestus or something like that?) are what I am looking at.
SillyEskimo
Member
One psyker changes everything.
Can space marine librarians read mind and mind control people btw? Honest question, have never been sure how much like traditional pyschics they are.
Again though, doesn't that argue *against* space marines? Just drop a few pyakers into the population and have then control the leaders.
We build our current military structures against rapid decapitation strikes (it's why there's an Internet) - but we don't have any defenders against a few pyskers taking over the leadership from the shadows.
AbsolutBro
Member
No, but I think never needing to sleep, never suffering from fatigue, immunity to many biochemcal weapons, heavy resistance to radiation, and having an extra adrenal gland right next to your heart all will. They dont got into shock if they get shot, can heal faster and because of their denser bone structure are less likely to suffer some wounds.
As for equipment, keep in mind that the standard issue Bolter is a .75 calibur rocket propelled explosive round. The closest thing, game wise, to modern M4/AK-47s would be an autogun, which has the exact same range as a Bolter. And "wounds an unarmored human 2 out of 3 times"? Are you really trying to put game rules into a fluff discussion? So no, their weapons are not inferior to our own. You want to talk heavy weapons? Keep in mind that standard tactical squads, not even specialist guys, carry man portable laser cannons designed to slice tanks of the 41st millenium into pieces. You really think our modern vehicles stand a chance against that? Or the heavy bolter, which again is man portable for space marines but requires a two-man team for Imperial Guard, which fires a .998 caliber rocket propelled explosive round? Well, lots of them. And let's not forget that once upon a time the Space Marines used raditation missiles from man portable rocket launchers; essentially using dirty nukes on a regular basis because they themselves were immune to the radiation. You want area control? Your opponent cant hold ground that turns their organs into goo. How about anti-plant missiles, as they turn our crop areas into barren wasteland. They can eat all kinds of things we cant, so what do they care.
Air support isn't as much a thing in 40k because it is a recent addition to the game, but look back at Epic and you might get the scale you're looking for. Thunderhawk gunships have been a thing for ages. It's the AC-130 gunship of "we hate your xenos face".
And we havent even gotten into Power Armor, or if we really do get mildly annoying, Terminator Armor.
20 Space Marines to hold the White House? Please, 1 space marine to kill everything that moves in the white house. The bullet proof vests that Secret Service and Federal Police wear might as well be paper mache.
And sure, there may be only 1000 space marines per chapter, but there are 1,000+ chapters.
Oh, and dont forget they have psychic members who can literally melt your brain by looking at you, and open a rift into the Warp if they REALLY get desperate.
And we have modern weapons that can snipe you from a mile away. Psychic powers used to blow shit up is rarely actually impressive - it's the same in comic books.
And you are sort of arguing my point. The only way space marines can win is by basically destroying a world and everyone on it. It doesn't matter how tall you are or how many hearts you have, or even how big your guns is - you cannot occupy a planet with 6 billion people on it with 1000 space marines. It's not logistically possible with the tech level the imperium demonstrates and the way they fight.
I mean come on, we all make fun of the picture of the commissar in the tank waving a sword at the enemy. 40K is great, fun setting, but it makes Star Wars looks like hard sci if by comparison. In particular. The space marines themselves just don't work at all as a concept at those sizes. 1000 space marine chapters is 1,000,000 space marines in total. That's literally worthless. Gather every space marine in existence into one spot and one tiny Tyranid Swarm would overrun and destroy them.
Space marine chapters need to be far, far bigger to have any impact in *any* world, be it real life or the 40K universe.
And you are sort of arguing my point. The only way space marines can win is by basically destroying a world and everyone on it. It doesn't matter how tall you are or how many hearts you have, or even how big your guns is - you cannot occupy a planet with 6 billion people on it with 1000 space marines. It's not logistically possible with the tech level the imperium demonstrates and the way they fight.
I mean come on, we all make fun of the picture of the commissar in the tank waving a sword at the enemy. 40K is great, fun setting, but it makes Star Wars looks like hard sci if by comparison. In particular. The space marines themselves just don't work at all as a concept at those sizes. 1000 space marine chapters is 1,000,000 space marines in total. That's literally worthless. Gather every space marine in existence into one spot and one tiny Tyranid Swarm would overrun and destroy them.
Space marine chapters need to be far, far bigger to have any impact in *any* world, be it real life or the 40K universe.
While I think everybody at GW wishes they'd said 10,000 rather than 1,000 in retrospect for sheer replacability issues, the point is that a Space Marine chapter doesn't take a world. They're elite special forces designed to take out key points of leadership/infrastructure or reinforce tactical areas, backed up the Imperial Guard.
AbsolutBro
Member
I think 1000 marines per chapter is fine as long as you remember they wanted essentially infinite chapters (so players could make "their own" chapter).
And yeah Space Marines aren't for holding planets. Space Marines are for subjugating a planet, then moving onto the next conflict.
Also still laughing at mile away like it's some great feat. Yay, we have sniper rifles. So do space marines, only they're baby's first gun for novices (scouts) until they're ready for a bolter.
There's a reason why snipers in real life aren't novices. The entire concept of the elite warriors being the ones who charge into battle at the front of the army is completely nuts!
AbsolutBro
Member
Keep in mind that Space Marine "novices" are still genetically superior to, and at least as well trained as, our modern forces. A Space Marine scout is still a superhuman badass.
Also a tactical squad "charging into battle at the front" isnt the "elite" space marine (at least, in comparison to other space marines other than scouts). That would go to veterans, who usually teleport or drop pod right into the opponent's face. I mean, the elitest of the elite space marines, Grey Knights, wear personal teleporters so they can just jaunt to wherever they need to shred someone's face.
If we had that technology now we wouldn't strap it to soldiers to teleport them next to an enemy - because that's a really dumb way of fighting. We'd strap it to some large explosive devices. Results guaranteed, no loss of life.
Like I said, I love the setting and the lore, but when you look at it as a wider piece huge amounts of it are completely potty. Particularly anything to do with the emperor or space marines.
TheVoidDragon
Member
I don't see how "designed to slice tanks of the 41st millenium into pieces" really make any difference. Is there anything to indicate just how good the W40K Imperial tanks would be compared to modern day vehicles? They have the design sensibilities of WW1 and WW2 tanks, but other than i've not seen anything that suggests how good they'd be against a modern-day MBT 1v1.
manfestival
Member
This is one of those things that cracks me up at. That I'm supposed to believe a giant man in flashy colored armor can be super sneaky and be practically invisible in most scenarios
Yeah, but it doesn't really work because each chapter maintains their own geneseed and can only replace two at a time from each marine who dies. And lots of marines die in ways those will be unrecoverable.
If Progenoid Glands weren't a thing, it might be possible, but the truth is that 1000 is, in retrospect, too small to sustain any realistic battle losses and the chapter to survive.
10k would have been a bit more plausible. And I've spoken to a few people at GW who feel the same over the years.
Haven't we all decided the Emperor is just a flashy psychic projection of
Malcador
AbsolutBro
Member
Depending on what is teleporting from where, they do that. 40k space fleets have teleporters on them used to teleport troops, supplies and sometimes weapons. There isnt much point to putting a smaller teleporter like the grey knights use on a bomb, you just end up destroying your teleporter. Being able to render a sniper almost completely null by teleporting into his face is hardly a poor use of a teleporter.
Like most sci-fi vehicles, the materials are basically made up. "Ceramite" is basically a future ceramic used to disperse directed energy attacks, while "plasteel" (a material as tough as steel, but flexible as plastic) is used as armor on lighter vehicles (such as a Rhino APC). The main battle tank of the Space Marines is the Predator, whose armor is 65mm thick, with another 55mm of hull. Things like Land Raiders are made with adamantium. Lascannons are meant to cut through Land Raiders, although even they admittedly struggle sometimes. Land Raiders are super tough. So the answer is "at least as tough as modern day tanks, often more durable". It is science fiction, after all.
I agree a larger number would have made far more sense, or "1,000 ground troops" so you still have geneseed/progenoids from drivers, pilots and other "support" marines.
Then again, my first army was Space Wolves, so the Codex and it's 1,000 dude limit can go right back up Roboute's backside.
The standard Leman Russ, which lascannons have no issue tearing through, has 3,810mm of armor. The M1 Abrams has effectively 1,300mm against MBT HEAT rounds, but that's only because of sloping, which wouldn't make a difference against the lascannon. The M829 SABOT shell, which is the US Army's standard issue round has an effective penetration of 540mm. Given these values, we can already see that our modern day MBT's are outmatched severely, given the bullshit values that GM spits out because they don't know how tanks work.
Our most effective tankbuster bomb in this situation, the GBU-28, has an effective penetration of 6 meters of concrete, so that could bust a single Leman Russ, but a B-52 can only carry 4 of these things. Given how many Leman Russes a single guard unit can shit out, and the fact that the enemy will have air coverage that won't allow free flights for the B-52's, a single mechanized guard unit could tear shit up.
We're probably going too far if we're bringing real stats into it, heh.
WH40k's weird because in many respects, they're more technologically advanced than us. But they're also way worse in other respects, and are complete trash compared to the Age of Technology. So it's really hard to say who'd win.
WH40k's weird because in many respects, they're more technologically advanced than us. But they're also way worse in other respects, and are complete trash compared to the Age of Technology. So it's really hard to say who'd win.
TheVoidDragon
Member
Where are you getting 3,810mm from? According to Lexicanum the armour values of a leman russ are 180mm superstructure, 150mm on the hull and 100mm on the gun mantlet. 3,810mm seems absurd, i can't find any mention of on Lexicanum. A land raider has 95mm. Even a Baneblade only has 200mm. While the exactly properties of the materials they're made out of aren't known, i doubt a modern MBT would have much trouble against them.
I was looking at 1d4chan, I think they might have misplaced a 0, 318mm seems a lot more likely.
AbsolutBro
Member
Keep in min that those vehicles (or any battle tank) are made from adamantium, which GW bills as "5 times as strong as steel, while lighter" or something like that. So that 180mm for a Leman Russian superstructure is equivalent to 900 mm (almost a meter) of modern steel (or thereabouts)?
TheVoidDragon
Member
Have you got a source for that? That's something i've not seen mentioned before and there's nothing about it on Lexicanum that i can find. Either way though even 900mm is less than a modern MBT.
I might be wrong but i was under the impression that Modern MBTs don't use steel armour, anyway. It seems some of the best armour material we have is already 5 times better than steel according to wikipedia.
ChemicalCutthroat
Member
I love these conversations but they're thirty kinds of silly.
I'd pull further back and look at how the Imperium wages war, rather than the minutiae of Space Marine vs USMC. The Imperium can burn planets, and do so.
We could too, but we live here and can't get anywhere else.
They are a space-faring, technologically superior (if weird) force of strange things and terror. If the Imperium wants to drop a couple Titans on us... there really isn't much we can do short of nuking them. Which is a lose/lose situation anyway.
I'd pull further back and look at how the Imperium wages war, rather than the minutiae of Space Marine vs USMC. The Imperium can burn planets, and do so.
We could too, but we live here and can't get anywhere else.
They are a space-faring, technologically superior (if weird) force of strange things and terror. If the Imperium wants to drop a couple Titans on us... there really isn't much we can do short of nuking them. Which is a lose/lose situation anyway.
To be fair, my original comment which started this was purely about how useless Space Marine chapters are practically. I even said that they could win through Exterminatus straight up... ;-)
Titans though - utterly useless. You would never build one in real life. You turn all your guns into a huge target for the enemy to hit. It's why we haven't built double decker tanks. They also have absolutely no purpose in warfare and are completely useless for occupying anything.
GarthVaderUK
Banned
Characters in 8th edition: https://www.warhammer-community.com...mmer-40000-characters-may9gw-homepage-post-4/
ChemicalCutthroat
Member
Titans as a weapon of domination make sense. They're just difficult to employ on a battlefield quickly. But if you drop on outside of New York it could slag the city with impunity. I'm pretty sure Tomahawks aren't going to be punching through void shields. And Artillery would be like a light rain.
Back to the little stuff though, I wonder fluff-wise what the penetration of a Lasgun compared to any of the .223 rifles that we use. Guard weapons are used as jokes a lot, but I imagine they're actually rather terrifying compared to our modern stuff.
GarthVaderUK
Banned
Some info about the Astra Militarum in the latest 'faction focus': https://www.warhammer-community.com/2017/05/09/warhammer-40000-faction-focus-astra-militarum/
But why not just slag the city by dropping bombs on it. Why instead put an easy to hit, massive target nearby? Even if you couldn't use bombs you're better off with multiple smaller weapons platforms, not one huge giant one.
My point was more about equal tech conflicts though. You just don't build giant mechs like that without a really weird and good reason, they don't make sense in battle.
Rule of cool. You can either drop bombs, or make a giant mecha that slags a city with cool ass weapon names. The second also gives the grunts a lot more confidence when they see a towering mech behind them instead of just orbital bombardment.
TheVoidDragon
Member
I don't understand their reasoning with not being able to target characters. They say they can't join units to stop you using that unit as a way to hide the character...but doesn't their new way just increase the problem? If you can't target them unless they're the closest thing, then aren't players just going to stick either a cheap throwaway unit or a really durable unit just infront of that character at all times? So it's gone from having to take out just the unit they're part of, to having to take out every unit infront of them?
I was under the impression that they could be bought down by conventional weapons (at least, Warlord and lower), it would just take a massive amount of them at once.
That was something about the Tau that made them unique but they decided to just throw that out the window so even they get Titans now. Before they seemed like a more sensible army that would think "Why make a Titan that'll be a huge target when we can stick all those weapons on a ship/flyer and it'll be more useful?" but now they've got titan-sized things like everyone else. The Riptide was alright because it was just as agile and fast as a normal crisis suit but that isn't the case for the even larger suits.
Well it removes things like mixed toughness and armour saves, it stops the over the top death star combinations caused by having multiple characters in a unit, and they did say weapons like sniper rifles can still pick out characters. It also isn't going to save them in close combat where they will be marked for death.