Excuse me, Brother-Captain, but how can just 1000 men, however

>>51650598

MY SON YOU ARE LEGION AGAIN

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>>51650598

>>51650598
haha, Marines are just that badass

>>51650598

Wait a minute. People are still doing this shit?

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>>51650598
>excuse me commissar thread
>the year of our Lord 2017

>>51650598
We shoot them with capital weaponry first brother.
We then redact this from all chapter records.
Purging one way is as effective as purging the other way.

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>>51650598
It's not about how many men strike.
But where and how strong.
Have you not read the Codex Astartes, battle-brother? We are not the Hammer of the Emperor, that is what the Imperial Guard is for. We don't hold the line, we attack at where it matters the most, deep striking behind enemy lines.
I believe in ancient times our role would be similar to that of paratroopers, saboteurs or commandos.

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>>51650598
>walk up to opposing commander, shoot him in the head
>Guard comes in, sacrificing millions of men
>"Please tell me again the story how you killed a thousand Orks with your combat knife only, you're making me so horny again Mr. Space Marine sir..."

In all honesty, each chapter of space marines should have been bare minimum 100,000 strong, and probably 1,000,000. Given they already spend most of the time with their forces divided into several conflicts, that's more plausible for a bunch of superhumans actually having some effect on a planetary conflict. GW cannot into scale.

>>51650598
By using half explained warp-based phenomena.

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>>51650598
>how can just 1000 men, however skilled, make a substantial difference in a planetary campaign?
multiple, simultaneous and devastating offensive deep strikes

>>51650598
Fuck off with your gay forced photoshops you fag.

>>51650915
I had thought the Legions used to be something akin to the 50,000-100,000 range, right?

Weren't the Word Bearers absolutely gigantic?

>>51651022
I've seen them listed as starting at 10,000 for the Thousand Sons, with a large gap before the next smallest legion at 70-80,000, and going all the way up to 250,000 for the Ultramarines. I've seen Word Bearers listed as 200,000, so not quite the biggest, but close.

The issue is, in terms of what they were actually doing, it makes more sense for there to be vastly less marines during the Crusade than there are 'now'. Fighting with a huge proportion of the legion's entire strength at once, supported by a better equipped army than they have later on, and for much of it covering significantly less territory than they have to in 40K. Conquering new worlds from a small base and with greater support could be more easily achieved with limited numbers than safeguarding a million worlds.

>>51651022
Most Legions were about 100 000 Marines.

>>51651187
Yeah the decent early horus heresy books describe several legions as having 10 companies of 1 to 2k strength plus combat replacments and armorers and support. So 10k ish on the small side plus the accompanying crusade fleet of guardsmen would be quite a lot larger. Plus any mechanicus groups of trarii(no idea how to spell it) to accompany a titan legion for quite substantially giant ground force.

These threads always have the most cringe-inducing forced discussion.

>>51651504
But now legions are near 100k marines, here some examples:
Emperor's Children 110k
Iron Warriors 150k-180k
Salamanders 89k
Thousand Sons 80k-90k
Word Bearers 140k
Ultramarines 200k

>>51650915
Why assume that every battle involves hundreds of millions of men and one marine?
Why would you always jump to the conclusion that fighting for a planet means fighting on every single spot of ground?

Most planets are controlled by who controls a single spaceport, settlement or research station, which may be the only worthwhile thing on the whole planet, if not the only thing, period.

Most engagements involve either the PDF or the IG to provide raw numbers, marines act as force multipliers. They take the glory, yeah no shit, when's the last time some infantry brigade took credit for doing something in a war?

When bigger wars are dealt with you have many IG regiments (that have no numbers stated) and multiple chapters working on the same planet. even then marines go in and out quickly because they themselves are the first to know well how such an engagement is not what they're made for.

>>51651825
There are umpteen examples of marines being explicitly deployed alone, either as [part of] one chapter or with several companies from different chapters. Sometimes that means they're literally the only imperial fighters mentioned in one side of a conflict, sometimes it means they're holding the line in a specific part of a planet-wide conflict against a force hundreds of times larger, and usually not totally useless foes like cultists.

Pointing out that often they're just part of a much larger imperial force doesn't stop the fact that codices and other GW writing constantly puts them in situations where their stated numbers would mean that their impact would be pitiful. Dorn's quote about how each space marine is worth over ten other troops, in the context where a thousand space marines being committed to a single planet is already far above even a major conflict where the planet itself might fall shows just how small of an impact they ought to have with current numbers.

GW's inability to get their numbers right is a widespread phenomenon is also how we get imperial main battle tanks which would be dunked on by Abrams.

>>51650598
MANY OF OUR BATTLE BROTHERS ARE IN SPESS, READY TO PERFORM MULTIPLE SIMULTANEOUS AND DEVASTATING DEEPSTRIKES

THE CODEX ASTARTES CALLS THIS MANEUVER STEEL RAIN

>>51651538
>forced discussion

Not content to criticise the tenor of the question asked you make an unsubstantiated accusation as to the sincerity and nature of the response.

You have a crippling lack of intellectual integrity and provide no proof for your accusations. Redact them. You will not receive another warning.

>>51650598
Modern special forces are capable of making a difference against a large army by taking out well fortified targets and enemy leaders, I would assume the Space Mehrines fulfill a similar role.

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>>51650598
The Imperial Guard actually do the brunt of the fighting for humanity. Space Marines are basically special forces that sneak behind enemy lines through stuff like steel rain and take out the headquarters of enemy forces. They usually will then withdraw and let the Imperial Guard continue the fight. IG are the real men of the Imperium. Balls of fucking steel compared to Space Marines.

In many ways the Space Marines are just a slower, clunkier, lower iq version of the Eldar. Eldar are also elitist with very small fielding numbers. They often deploy quickly, cause a lot of damage, then disappear.

>>51655600
>muh Guard are real men
I cannot stand this fucking forced meme. To become a Space marine, one must
>pass their initial trials which are always extremely grueling and often also potentially fatal
>survive his initial implants
>survive the training
>survive as a scout
>survive his final implants
Basically, one of a thousand guys who PASS the trial survive to being a Space Marine. THEN, while Guard are often stuck fighting the cannon fodder of the enemy (most guard units never encounter a daemon etc.), the Marines are ALWAYS deployed to fight the enemy's leadership and elites.
In short, fuck off, it's WAY harder being a Space Marine, especially since a lot of Guardsmen don't even have a choice in the matter.

>>51650598
Well that is what space marines do according to lore. They don't bother with conquest, they just do commando and target critical points: leaders, the big weapon, primary production, relics, etc.

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>>51655600
> sneak behind
> steel rain
The subtlest form of infiltration.

>>51655852
It's a nice meme. I like it. It's less I think people claiming the marines are pussies hiding behind their armor and more them being less relatable. You can relate to the guy/gal risking their life fighting alongside comrades and then going of to get drunk, gamble or just hang out. It's harder to relate to the 300 year old warrior monk who spends every free second training or meditating. One is relatable brave, the other is some unreachable, inhuman paragon of hyper-bravery.

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>>51655852
Is it really that much harder, though?

I mean, you just throw a bunch of guys into the meat grinder. Eventually you'll be left with only a few guys as they grind each other into paste, but that doesn't necessarily mean those guys are the best, or the strongest, or even particularly good or strong; they just happened to survive.

Kind of like marching a bunch of guardsmen into campaign into campaign and 1/1000 will survive to retire by pure chance alone without being any better at what he did than most of his fallen buddies.

Heck, if anything, the strongest among the space marines are those LEAST likely to survive, since what always happens in every competitive game ever is the strongest get destroyed by coalitions of weaker opponents, who realize that they'll have a better chance of winning that way.

All that crap is really just a waste of time. They could affix genesseeds and give combat armor and all that shit to random guys plucked from the streets and probably get just as efficient a force.

>>51656256
>you just throw a bunch of guys into the meat grinder. Eventually you'll be left with only a few guys as they grind each other into paste, but that doesn't necessarily mean those guys are the best, or the strongest, or even particularly good or strong; they just happened to survive.
You literally have to be the strongest to survive the process, what are you talking about?
>since what always happens in every competitive game ever is the strongest get destroyed by coalitions of weaker opponents, who realize that they'll have a better chance of winning that way.
Do you actually know how Space Marines are made? Because it's not some Battle Royale style bullshit, which you apparently think.

>>51650598
Because GW can't into numbers.
The same reason that a full crusade has less people involved then the Normandy invasions.

>>51656346
For some chapters it is.

>>51650654
As much as I agree with you, anon.

>2017
Excuse me, anon. Why aren't you using the Imperial Dating System?

>>51656420
Even then, you have to be exceptionally strong to survive the implants. And the trials are usually either one on one combat, or grimdark ninja warrior type shit. So no ganging up.

>>51656256
>Is it really that much harder, though?
Well, yes. The people selected to become space marines live hard lives, and are required to continually prove themselves better than the rest simply to survive. It's not just one grueling battle, it's hundreds of them, every day, for centuries until they ultimately die or become so ruined they get shoved into a walking tank to fight for a few more thousand years as a half-dead zombie.

It's easier to respect joe average of the space army 125th for going through doombattle 25 on the planet apocalypse (because, hey, I'M just a dude and I couldn't do that), but that shit's tuesday for a space marine.

>They could affix genesseeds and give combat armor and all that shit to random guys plucked from the streets
No they couldn't. Like, most recruits have genetic incompatibility and either get removed from the initiation process (to become chapter serfs), or are straight up killed by their bodies going into overdrive and growing too fast or in ways that are ultimately fatal.

That's why they it takes an entire planet's population to handle a relatively small unit. Most recruits die or become invalid before ever getting the black carapace.

>>51652203
SPACE MARINES
WE ARE THE SPACE MARINES
WE ARE THE SPACE MARINES
OUR ENEMIES DIIIIIIIIIIE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hfORh9cFDU8

>>51656420
Are you retarded or have you not read the fluff at all? We know how those "battle royale' things work. It's the most badass fighter who survives. See Damnation Crusade.

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>>51655852
>Space Marines are great because they are lab experiments that have a high failure rate
By this logic Wracks, Grotesques, and Pain Engines are Gods compared to Space Marines.

>>51656179
Pretending "sneaking behind enemy lines" = subtlest form of infiltration. As I said, Space Marines are a garbage version of Eldar at infiltration, but they do employ it. Space Marines are not heroes. They are highly mind-washed war experiments that not only undergo physical alterations, but mental ones. They are no more brave or heroic than Dark Eldar Wracks. A standard guardsman faces the universe as a real man. Knock them all you want but guardsmen are the real heroes of the Imperium.

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Through cunning.

>>51651825
>Most planets are controlled by who controls a single spaceport, settlement or research station

We're hypothesizing realistic planetary subjugation, not the missions of an RTS game

>>51650816
well, i'm convinced

>>51650598
Space Marines rarely do full fledged wars of attrition, they back up the guard by striking critical points hard and fast, taking out key targets or holding key positions.

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>>51650938

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>>51655600
IG are basically russians though. Just drowning the ennemy with corpses until they no longer have bullets

>>51658896
1. No they're not, it varies
2. Russia being a zerg rush army is a meme as it did happen early war 41-42, but was still rare.

>>51658954
They had as much losses than the french Grande Armée during the invasion of Russia by Napoléon, and they were respectively number 2 and number 1 in military losses in WWI and WWII.
Now that doesn't mean they weren't efficient but the numbers are the numbers

>>51650598
It only takes one guy to press the "launch nukes" button, soldier.

>>51658977
yes but you said Just drowning the ennemy with corpses until they no longer have bullets. This is not true, they may have more causalities but post-42 they turned to mechanized infantry and tank support. Post-42 also saw the decrease in military commissars (another soviet meme)

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>>51658896
>twin linked

>>51650598
>but an organized campaign by orkz
lol

I did the sums on this once.*

Space Is An Ocean, right? So Space Marines and the Guard are basically fighting the Pacific island-hopping campaign of WWII, right? Except this: if the Milky Way were the size of the Pacific Ocean, the Solar System would be the size of a single maple leaf floating in the middle of it, and Holy Terra would be the size of a single pollen spore on the knee of a bee riding that maple leaf. The Imperium of Man inhabits a million specks of pollen lost in an ocean the size of the Pacific. From that perspective, GW's obsession with small, elite forces makes a lot more sense, because when you've only got a few soldiers to pitch against the enemy's few soldiers, you're gonna need those few to be really, really good. A squad of SAS troopers can absolutely conquer an island, if that island has only a single village being held hostage by the Spetznaz.

*I Googled it

>>51659012
I exagerated of course, but the death ratio on the eastern front between Germany and USSR is still pretty fucking huge.
They won so we can't argue about the result, it was there, but still...

>>51659040
ok comrade, just checking.

*Blams internally*

>>51659040
The largest part of this death ratio was before they started winning battles, when shit was in disarray. It also includes massive amounts of civilian casualties.

>>51650598
just give me a few good men

>>51659014
Yeah, many people laugh at a notion of organized campaign by orks. Only not for long.

>>51659019
This is some next level fallacy.

Yes, in comparison to the size of the galaxy, a planet is a speck of pollen. But that speck of pollen has billions of people and ten of millions of infantry. That speck of pollen is not some island with twelve Spetznaz in it. That speck of pollen has an entire world worth of military resource.

>>51659060
They lost 8 millions soldiers. Their total losses go up to 20 millions, counting civilians. Germany lost 5 millions soldiers in the whole war

>>51655600
>slower, clunkier, lower iq version of the Eldar
I thought that, though less precise, SM are about as fast as Eldar.

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>>51659019

As for IG regiments, if you apply the frequentist solution to the German Tank Problem, you get some surprising results: based on Lexicanum, there are probably less than 500 Krieg Siege Regiments out there; there are only 70 or so Elysian Drop Troops regiments; and less than 900 Cadian Shock Troops regiments. Statistical analysis suggest the Emperor's legions are not so numberless as the propaganda would suggest.

That's okay though, because the planets they're fighting over are barely inhabited. Divide even the most intense hiveworld by the surface area of the Earth (and you can, because they're all by definition Earth-like unless the writer goes out of their way to show you how different life is), then you still end up with an average population density about the same as the flyover USA, or the farming regions of Australia. Use anything less than a hiveworld, and you end up with a population density below the Sahara.

This is all just a variation on the theme of Writers Cannot Do Scale. And you don't want them to. Just try and tell me you can keep straight all the units engaged on the Russian Front of WWII without your brains trickling out you ears, and I'll call you a liar. And that's a fairly minor war over just a few thousand kilometres of front. Scale up to a whole planet and the numbers get truly unimaginable. Writers can't do scale, and thank the Emperor they can't, or this hobby would be as much fun as actual military history.

>>51651152

I think you got it backwards...

The Empire shrunk after the Betrayal, as the majority of the sectors gained during the great crusades fell into the Traitor's hands.

The forge worlds that weren't sundered and left broken were taken control of by Traitor Legions, leaving something seven forgeworlds in the hands of the Imperium (Mars, Lucius, Agrippnaa, Stygies III, Graia, Metalica and Ryza)

This caused a huge loss in technology as the templates for construction of a lot of things were lost.

The Imperium is now just a decaying husk of it's former glory at the height of the crusades.

>>51659019

SAS and SBS are reconnaissance and tactical strike forces. They are 4 man lone teams who attack key strategic points. Mostly known activities have them destroying aircraft.

A team of SAS on the Folklands war did siege an entrenched group of isolated Argentinians and they completely wiped them all out.

The Commando's and Para's are shock troopers who have in WWII and in the Folklands war fought against massively larger numbers and come out on top.

I mean 74 commando's versus 5000+ Nazi soldiers and some of them managed to fight their way through their lines and get into Spain in their first deployment.

>>51659132
I'd just like to point out that Mars isn't even a hive world and has 14 times the population density of New York City.

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>>51658296
Think of it this way, what if earth lost 100 of the most strategically vital cities, infrastructure points, power plants or governments/leaders overnight?
Then the next 100 the next day, and another 100 the day after that?

Earth would surrender unconditionally with only sparse non-organized resistance and small, easily crushable militia within a few short weeks.

A full chapter can crush a world like ours with contemptible ease if given a month.

now consider that on a planetary scale we have a very decentralized power structure, with separate independent nations scattered all over the globe.

Most Imperial worlds answer to a planetary governor or much more centralized power structure that wouldn't survive the damage from a single strike the likes of which the marines would deal in the first day.

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>>51659209
Does it though? Lexicanum lists Mars' population as 20 billion (which is admittedly a lot). But Mars' surface area is 144.8 million square kilometres. Do some division and it's138 or so people per square km - a long way below New York's 10,431 per square km.

Don't believe the propaganda.

(But don't let me spoil your fun either!)

>>51657750
>implying steel rain is at all subtle
Literally no one is doing that. You're so far down the Imperial Guard hole that you can't even detect sarcasm anymore.

>>51656559
You can't have hundreds of battles every day, there just isn't enough time for that and even if there was, they spend a lot of time in transit.

>>51659367
Most of Mars is an uninhabitable hellscape left over from the Horus Heresy and the Scouring, anon.

>>51657750
>lab experiments that have a high failure rate
I mean sure, if you ignore everything else i said and cherry pick just one part and use semantics, it totally helps your argument.

>>51657750
>A standard guardsman faces the universe as a real man.
A MASSIVE percentage of Guardsmen are literally forced at gunpoint into battle, so fuck off with that shit.

>>51652234
This thread IS just gay forced discussion, and thank you for proving it.

>>51659538
Look at the name. It's just another uncreative troll.

>>51650938
>multiple, simultaneous and devastating offensive deep strikes
My wife loves that

>>51660053

>>51659538

>>51650598
I'm not sure if "planetary" battles in 40k really happen all over the planet at the same time, considering the population a hive city can hold and the population displayed for the overall globe it seems like most planets are wild/wastelands with a pair of densely populated areas.

>>51650930
Fuck off Leandros. Nobody liked you.

>>51650635
>Wait a minute. People are still doing this shit?

I know, it's crazy but people are STILL replying to these threads instead of just ignoring them and not giving OP the upset noises that encourage him to continue.

>>51655600
>Cover is for the weak
>Says the hulkling abomination mutated into a warmachine and enbeded in a 1 ton armor and exoskeleton
Yeah, is so easy to be brave when you are a super hero with a tank for costume, fucking Astartes and their Space Marine entitlement I swear to God Emperor

>>51659076
Comparing raw numbers is never the right way to go anon

>>51655852
This, plus marines are so big they scare away all but the most devout waifus.

Imagine passing the trials of a marine, and undergoing the implantation. You emerge a hulk of a man, no longer human. You stand 8 feet tall and are sterile, the qt's of the imperium flock to the guard for sexual comfort. The life of a marine is truly suffering

>>51659538
>forced discussion

What does that even mean? Can you prove that this is not TRUE DISCUSSION?

>>51661236
>people bumping forced shit and pretending you're not fags

Go back to /r9k/.

>>51661642
I agree.

>All this ass pain over a meme

The fuck is this, Tumblr? If you don't like it, ignore it. Don't act like a screeching infant.

>>51663610
>let me force my gay meme!
>leave me alone, I don't want newfags to know I spammed this gay shit for years now!
>I don't understand that spamming forced memes is only tolerated on the shittiest boards!

Fuck off, faggot

>>51650598
It works because the enemy command structure typically does not survive twenty teleporting terminators to the face, neophyte. Three days in the Pain Glove for you.

>>51663724
Quit bumping your gay thread.

>>51663737
It's not mine

>>51663766
Quit bumping your gay forced shit thread.

>>51650598
Good question, scout! It's all in how you operate in the field.

Space Marines aren't there for a full assault force or the hammer that breaks down the door, nine times out of ten. Occasionally they'll deploy to a major battle in order to win it, and by god they'll win it, but using someone as highly capable as a Space Marine for assault work is kind of... hamfisted. I only reccomend it for quick campaigns and a clean end to an enemy's final force.

Otherwise, you should be using your Space Marines as, what did your backwater planet call them? Paratroopers? Steel Rain, combined with a variety of other tactics from the codex Astartes, allow us to take out key targets, reinforcements, and supply caches in order to cripple the enemy from behind enemy lines while our main forces move (albeit slowly) past the front and into enemy territory.

After that, the Space Marines focus on killing commanders, particularly the most cunning or strong among them, in order to make their chain of command collapse.

After this is fulfilled, you return to the ship and exit the campaign for a new one on another world, possibly light years away, and you can only HOPE that the guardsmen and planetary defense forces on the ground do their job like the Emperor dictates and push the enemy out.

For your ignorance and lack of faith in the Space Marine's capability I'm sentencing you to three days in the pain glove.

~Your Chaplain

>>51664030
Congrats on the gayest post so far.

>>51664234
how is it gay?

>>51655291
This guy gets it.
Also a brother's vast tactical knowledge and centuries of experience can be an invaluable asset even before he joins the fray

>>51651684
And here I thought the Word Bearers had increased their numbers significantly leading up to the Heresy. Granted, I'm also under the assumption that the Ultras are sitting pretty at 250k until Lorgar says 'Fuck Calth'.

See space sharks and what's left of Badab

>>51660053
>Simultaneous
Anon?

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>>51657776
and loyalty