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Rather than clogging up the Necromunda N&R thread, thought I would drop this here.

To what extent do individual regiments and combat specialists get a say in the weapons they are issued with?

In modern times weapon procurement is mired in politics, lobbying and goals that seem to shift every time someone turns around.

In the 41st millenium, weapon development is either glacially slow in terms of developing from existing weapon templates, or lightning quick if a new template is dscovered.

Somewhere in between are the battlefield refits.

The point I was trying to make was that it doesn't really matter what the desires, experience or specific combat needs of a drop troop regiment or the Palanite Enforcers are. They will use the weapons they are given.

So. How much do the front line troops actually get to influence the equipment they are provided with?

Discuss

It seems like specialized regiments seemingly get
equipped based upon their needs while the rest just get stuff based upon locality at the time of procurement and founding.

Seems suitably Industrialised and stable worlds are able to arm and equip their own Regiments. Ref, Vostroyan Firstborn, who if memory serves field heirloom weapons.

Everyone? The Administratum’s Departmento Munitorum sorts you out. They’ll decide what your Regiment is issued with, and it does tend to be largely standardised, nothing too fancy, equipment. This will be the stuff churned out in the millions by Hive and Forgeworlds.

Vostroya is a Forge World if memory serves. The really heavily militarized worlds have Forge Worlds that outfit them.

Sometimes whole systems of them like Cadia did.

A Regiment could certainly request gear and weapons for special purposes.
Whether they would get it is another question. Galactic logistics being what they are the Munitorum simply can't supply all the requests of given Regiments or even combat zones.
So a Regiment will be given the equipment for the role it is designated for i.e. light infantry will have flamers or snipers.

So. How much do the front line troops actually get to influence the equipment they are provided with?

The front line guys? Probably not much at all. ;D

In general, it probably varies based on a lot of factors. If your regiment sees regular action in roughly the same chunk of space and has reliable contact with a nearby forgeworld (or whatever), then you can probably broadly hope to get at least some of your requests fulfilled.

If your commanders have some sway with whomever is in charge of logistics, maybe they can put in a word or call in a favor to get some extra plasma guns or a few new sentinels sent your way.

But aside from that, you're probably generally going to be stuck trying to maintain and repair the fancy toys you were given on the first day until some major shift in whatever war you're involved in finally arrives, and then it's going to be up to the politicing and trickery of your higher-ups to decide how many of the new tanks go to which tank regiments and so forth.

According to the glorious Imperial Infantryman's Uplifting Primer, to a rank-and-file guardsman, special wargears will only be issued when the situation is required, and only then, will training be given to the operators. If there are specialists in the squad, they will be issued with their respected gears as standardised (p.27).

But, given the imperium is basically feudal system in SPEECEEE!, standarisation is not-standarised. The Primer itself states that variations of equipments exist among regiments. Some regiments issue pistols to guardsmen whereas other only issue them to officers; some even allow guardsmen to acquire weapons from spoils of war. (p.21)

In the Imperial Munitorum Manual, the raising of the Cadian 91st was initiated by one Colonel Erasmus Valmaer after successfully petitioned the Departmento Munitorum. Much of the equipment the regiment received were provided by the Imperial Commander himself (and I assume that to be the colonel), so there was much variants in wargears.

The text noted that the Munitorum provided general guidelines so that their equipments may be easily replaced. Many regiments will be raised with only limited artillery or armoured units, and many will have to travel to nearby Forgeworlds to procure more (p.14-15).

The Munitorum Manual also serves to show that, as far as Munitorum itself is concerned, the continued supply of the Imperial Guards across the galaxy is a matter of quantity, not quality. Most of the time they secure only the commonly required supplies across Departmento Supply Worlds. The Departmento only delivers these supplies to the sector command level -- and only after the beaucracy finishes with their scribing, are these outsourced to private captains or navy vessels to deliver to the last known location of their destinated regiments. (23)

The above has nothing to do with OP's question, save to underline why it's hard for regiments to acquire specialised gears through official channels.

When a regiment is trying to requisite additional supplies in active warzones, the manual agrees the official channel is lenghty and full of red tapes (p.24). They offer no alternative solutions.

After a regiment is in between deployments, they had to acquire supplies with alternative means. Regimental commanders can trade "imperial credits" with imperial planetary governors as they pass by for supplies, but these credits are basically worthless as them will be reclaimed in the planet's next tithe.

When imperial control on a planet is less-than-complete, some commanders may, though discouraged, "acquire" local currencies and trade goods with "go-betweens". Any non-imperial planets are considered hostile, and their goods are free to take. (p.29)

All this is to say, a regiment, once raised, will likely be stuck with whatever they were given then for much of their existence. As regiments are raised and equipped by planetary commanders as a part of their tithe and duty, or by individual commanders much on their on dime, their standards of equipment will be very different.

IMO It's possible some regiments have an abundance of specialised gears (whether they were given on their founding or "acquired" through campaigns), and the regimental command is less strict about who gets what, some squads may have the freedom to picking their gears from seniority, and other, "poorer" regiments will have to be very careful with their specialist weapons because replacements will be very difficult to secure

 Gert wrote:
A Regiment could certainly request gear and weapons for special purposes.
Whether they would get it is another question. Galactic logistics being what they are the Munitorum simply can't supply all the requests of given Regiments or even combat zones.
So a Regiment will be given the equipment for the role it is designated for i.e. light infantry will have flamers or snipers.

I think it’s more can’t guarantee to provide it in a timely manner.

Even the more exotic stuff in the Codex is understood as a tech base within the Imperium, and produced in huge numbers. Even if the manufacturing ratio of Lasguns to Plasma Guns is 100-1, that’s still a near unfathomable number of Plasma Guns being made and distributed each production cycle, Imperium Wide.

So the weapons, ammo, tanks and other materiel are all made in staggering numbers - the trick is getting them to the right place at the right time. This is further complicated because again, whilst produced in crazy numbers, stuff like Plasma seems to have quite concentrated points of origin. Whereas the more basic stuff (Leman Russ, Chimera, Lasgun, all Bog Standard Pattern) have wider spread production bases, so requisitions may come from in-system, or a neighbouring one.

Then the state of the Imperium being what it is, the more local your war zone to say, Ryza, you may find any Leman Russ provided being the Executioner pattern, or the delivery containing a greater percentage of that pattern.

Time is certainly a factor but the secretive and hoarding nature of the Mechanicus means that with one lost planet, the entire production of a given weapon could be gone forever. The Leman Russ Vanquisher is an example of one technology that was almost lost due to the destruction of its primary production location, the Forge World of Tigrus, and it is still considered a rarity as one of the newer production hubs, Gryphonne IV, was consumed by the Tyranids. There is now only one planet, Stygies VIII, that produces the Vanquisher in large quantities and it has problems with a shadow war between radical techpriests and the Inquisition.
If Stygies gets atomised by a grumpy Inquisitor then so does the Vanquisher.

Then throw in Munitorum errors. We know that Lasguns have different clip types depending on the make of the weapon and something as simple as the difference between a size 4 and size 5 can mean entire Regiments going without ammunition, such as the Tanith 1st during Operation Larsiel.
Guard veterans often carry backup weapons for this very reason.

lcmiracle's post largely sums this up, but there are some caveats and missed factors.

 lcmiracle wrote:
According to the glorious Imperial Infantryman's Uplifting Primer, to a rank-and-file guardsman, special wargears will only be issued when the situation is required, and only then, will training be given to the operators. If there are specialists in the squad, they will be issued with their respected gears as standardised (p.27).

But, given the imperium is basically feudal system in SPEECEEE!, standarisation is not-standarised. The Primer itself states that variations of equipments exist among regiments. Some regiments issue pistols to guardsmen whereas other only issue them to officers; some even allow guardsmen to acquire weapons from spoils of war. (p.21)

There do seem to be minimum standards though, for which a particular regimental type should meet or the Planetary Governor can be punished (more on this below). You touch on this with the guidelines below, but it is heavily implied there is also a hard line, below which troops are considered inadequate.

In the Imperial Munitorum Manual, the raising of the Cadian 91st was initiated by one Colonel Erasmus Valmaer after successfully petitioned the Departmento Munitorum. Much of the equipment the regiment received were provided by the Imperial Commander himself (and I assume that to be the colonel), so there was much variants in wargears.

An Imperial Commander is a Planetary Governor. They are synonyms. So the Cadian regiment is being equipped by Cadia, as standard for a founding.

The text noted that the Munitorum provided general guidelines so that their equipments may be easily replaced. Many regiments will be raised with only limited artillery or armoured units, and many will have to travel to nearby Forgeworlds to procure more (p.14-15).

There seems to be two broad methods of equipping a founding- the planet equips the troops from their own stockpiles/production, or the founding regiment is equipped by the Departmento Munitorum after leaving the world. As you say, by attending a forge world or supply depot or similar. As troops are supposed to be equipped to a certain standard at founding, I suspect the latter option is agreed in advance and paid for via an increased tithe of something the world can provide (like more bodies).

The Munitorum Manual also serves to show that, as far as Munitorum itself is concerned, the continued supply of the Imperial Guards across the galaxy is a matter of quantity, not quality. Most of the time they secure only the commonly required supplies across Departmento Supply Worlds. The Departmento only delivers these supplies to the sector command level -- and only after the beaucracy finishes with their scribing, are these outsourced to private captains or navy vessels to deliver to the last known location of their destinated regiments. (23)

The above has nothing to do with OP's question, save to underline why it's hard for regiments to acquire specialised gears through official channels.

When a regiment is trying to requisite additional supplies in active warzones, the manual agrees the official channel is lenghty and full of red tapes (p.24). They offer no alternative solutions.

After a regiment is in between deployments, they had to acquire supplies with alternative means. Regimental commanders can trade "imperial credits" with imperial planetary governors as they pass by for supplies, but these credits are basically worthless as them will be reclaimed in the planet's next tithe.

When imperial control on a planet is less-than-complete, some commanders may, though discouraged, "acquire" local currencies and trade goods with "go-betweens". Any non-imperial planets are considered hostile, and their goods are free to take. (p.29)

There is a 4th option, which is supposed to be the standard on Imperial worlds. This is that the world supplies the Guard directly without requiring credits (cutting out the "middle man" of the cost being added to their next tithe).

All this is to say, a regiment, once raised, will likely be stuck with whatever they were given then for much of their existence. As regiments are raised and equipped by planetary commanders as a part of their tithe and duty, or by individual commanders much on their on dime, their standards of equipment will be very different.

IMO It's possible some regiments have an abundance of specialised gears (whether they were given on their founding or "acquired" through campaigns), and the regimental command is less strict about who gets what, some squads may have the freedom to picking their gears from seniority, and other, "poorer" regiments will have to be very careful with their specialist weapons because replacements will be very difficult to secure

I agree that the equipment available of the founding world will define the regimen's equipment stock for their early career. However, the longer they remain active, the more that replacements will be issued from local stockpiles. If operating in the same region this may well be the same patterns of gear, but a distant deployment could see uniforms and gear radically change as equipment is expended and replaced. I think this is most likely for garrison regiments, as they tend to last longer. Amalgamated regiments will also have a mix of gear from the survivors of the two previous formations.

As for requisitioning gear from the Departmento Munitorum whilst on campaign- aside from all the red tape and paperwork, politics plays a huge role. The Imperial Guard is frequently dominated by nobility and corruption, so favoured regiments will get access to the nice toys before those that high command does not like. A regimental commander is a political position as much as a field command. This politicking extends all the way to the top, as every army group and crusade wants more troops than they have and there are only so many troops available.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I think there is an ideal where the Departmento Munitorum issues the supplies and equipment a regiment needs and prefers, and a reality where they usually issue the closest available thing which is good enough, but sometimes mix up the stamps or misfile the form and issue a light infantry regiment promethium when they needed ration packs.

It’s also gonna be partially determined by where your war zone is.

Within the heartlands of the Imperium, where things are relatively stable? You’re likely less dependant on a single supply route.

And if you’re defending an Industrialised World and up? It almost certainly will be producing Lasguns and power cells itself - and will have a high chance of having stockpiles to help them through any production lulls, and still meet their tithe. So an emergency equipping of a regiment or two is probably quite doable, and will have some kind of paper trail type procurement process to show “we delivered 20,000 fewer Lasguns this cycle, because 20,000 Lasguns were requisitioned by and supplied to the Cadian 257th, 264th and 102nd, when they were stationed here to see off Waaagh! Badgrub”

Whether that would necessarily wash in terms of a shortfall in the tithe would probably depend on who’s doing the audit!

Frankly, I think most civilised worlds will be able to produce lasguns, and probably even some agri worlds too, although it wouldn't be massive amounts. Lasguns seem to be pretty straightforward to produce.

Autoguns will be the primary choice for local arms manufacturing.
Local PDF and Militia tend to have those over Lasguns.

 Gert wrote:
Autoguns will be the primary choice for local arms manufacturing.
Local PDF and Militia tend to have those over Lasguns.

Yeah, thats fair. Slug throwers like autoguns definitely seem to be more common for worlds with lower industrial bases.

Only where Las tech isn’t available.

I mean, an Autogun, it’s ammo and maintenance requires greater resources than a Lasgun. And give Las weapons appear really scalable? Any world able to make Las weapons will make Las weapons, from Pistols to Cannon, and sometimes even heavier version. Because they’re a super efficient design.

That is flat-out incorrect.
Autoguns are far easier to produce than Lasguns, which is exactly why they are favoured by irregular forces and worlds with a low industrial base.
Any scum-sucking dreg from the underhive can cobble together parts and scrap to make an Autogun.
Autoguns need metal, that's it. Lasguns need metal, plastic, electronics, and whatever else to make the actual "las" part of the weapon.
If a world can make Autoguns it can make Stubbers, Autocannons, or Mortars and Rocket Launchers because those are all relatively simple weapon concepts for a world with a low-tech industrial base to produce.

The benefit of the Lasgun is that it has multiple firing settings to create a variety of shots. An Autogun can do single fire, bursts, or full auto but the bullets will always be the same. Lasguns can do all of that and have variable strength settings so charge isn't wasted on an enemy that doesn't need it.

You need springs, grease, metal of specific strength, casings, bullets, propellant.

A Lasgun is technologically superior, that’s true. But I’m not arguing anyone can make Lasguns. I’m arguing if you can make Lasguns? You would make Lasguns, because from a logistical point of view, they’re simply the superior weapon.

The power cells, if maintained, can be recharged for an unknown number of discharge cycles. Autoguns? Once a round is fired, you can potentially recycle the casing, but you still need to make or source a new bullet, new propellant, and going off my learns from the Firearms thread? A new firing cap thingy. The bit wot the hammer hits to ignite the propellant.

In the perfect system sure but this is the Imperium. Competing manufactorum owners, cruel Mechanicus overseers, and corrupt officials are all just part of the day-to-day.

Some manufacturers might be allowed to make the blessed Lasgun but others might just have to be content with making anything else to satisfy the Imperial war machine. Those who don't get the best materials from the local mines or imports will have to make do with what they have.

Indeed making weapons for private investors that won't be missed from the Imperial stockpiles might be far more lucrative for a prospective factory owner. Working for the Munitorum buys you nothing but brownie points, but working for a Noble who needs to outfit their private army gets you a lot of money and connections which could then lead you to getting that better technology and superior contracts.

Sorry, but I don’t agree.

The Tithe is the Tithe. It’s set by powers beyond you, and the main job, so far as The Imperium is concerned, for a Planetary Governor, is to meet the Tithe. They have little to no influence or say on what the Tithe requires.

So once again, if your planet can produce Lasguns, the favoured and most abundant firearm in The Imperium? I just don’t see The Powers That Be accepting Autoguns in their stead. Because simply put? That’s not what your Tithe demands.

But dear reader do keep in mind I accept that some worlds can only produce Autoguns due to technological base. And so their Tithe may be different in that regard - even beyond the point where the world develops over centuries to be able to produce Lasguns (it being a surprisingly well understood form of technology within the Imperium, if not the best understood).

And again, that strikes me as being defined by your Tithe. Some regiments, for whatever reason, will prefer the Autogun lineage. And so a certain amount of the various Tithes that exist will ensure there’s a ready supply of said Autoguns. Even if your industry has developed to be able to produce Lasguns? If you’re ordered to make 1 billion Autoguns, and supply 1 billion Lasguns? You’ve not met your tithe. Because the Imperium is really daft.

But for the Governor’s PDF? Which are trained, armed and equipped at the Governor’s own expense? If you can make Lasguns, regardless of what the Tithe stipulates? You…just would. In the utterly insane 40K pantheon of weapons, they are if nothing else reliable, and easy to use and maintain. Far more so than an Autogun.

Autoguns can be sufficiently good that advanced worlds produce them alongside lasguns. Take Necromunda- House Orlock in particular produces vast numbers of high-end autoguns despite Necromunda having the capability to produce great lasgun variants.

Clearly there is a market for autoweapons even when lasguns can be produced. Further, from the quantities produced on Necromunda, it can be inferred that at least some are tithed, probably a large proportion. We also know Armageddon (another heavily-industrialised hive world) and Accatran (a major forge world) produce autoguns. These worlds absolutely can produce lasguns too, yet choose to create autoguns alongside the laser weapons.

Whilst the Guard favours lasguns, the Imperial Navy is known to use autoweapons and shotweapons in much greater numbers. The Ecclesiarchy also purchases autoweapons for its novitiates. Evidently the logistical advantages of lasguns are not enough to outweigh some perceived benefit of autoweapons for these groups.

There's also, lorewise, some high end autogun variations with the kind of specialized kit we've become familiar with. Stuff like suppressors and modified rounds(of which it's sometimes more arcane/esoteric things like blessed or hexagrammatic warded rounds) for specialist Regimental units.

The Tithe is based on the overall planetary production of resources and goods, not leveraged on individual items.

Manufactorums, factories, mines, mega-farms, smelteries, and all other manners of production are not nationalised under the explicit control of the Governor on most worlds. The Tithe is gathered from these industries and the remaining materials are left alone for each producer to do what they want with it.

Not all the producers of these goods/materials are going to be on the same level because that's how capitalism works. Some will have exceptionally advanced facilities capable of producing cogitators or targeting arrays while others will be little better than sweatshops pumping out the low-quality goods used by the common folk.

All supply the Imperial Tithe but outside of that, they follow the Lex in public and do what everyone else does when the Enforcers aren't watching.

The Infantryman's Uplifting Primer quite clearly has requisition forms where you can put in requests for anything, and space to say why you need it and not just what you need. Along with the heavy recommendation to keep all requests reasonable and focused on what you are doing in the current deployment. And that is on the level of individual soldiers. Presumably there are regimental level request forms as well.

So yes, the regiments and soldiers absolutely can make requests regarding their gear. That request may or may not be granted as the narrative demands. And as the FFG RPGs have in their mechanics, you might get something totally different than what you originally asked for. Mixups happen and the tables could give you some interesting results. Might be useless, might be very useful, might be illegal...

 Grey Templar wrote:
The Infantryman's Uplifting Primer quite clearly has requisition forms where you can put in requests for anything, and space to say why you need it and not just what you need. Along with the heavy recommendation to keep all requests reasonable and focused on what you are doing in the current deployment. And that is on the level of individual soldiers. Presumably there are regimental level request forms as well.

So yes, the regiments and soldiers absolutely can make requests regarding their gear. That request may or may not be granted as the narrative demands. And as the FFG RPGs have in their mechanics, you might get something totally different than what you originally asked for. Mixups happen and the tables could give you some interesting results. Might be useless, might be very useful, might be illegal...

I don't think there are any requsition forms in the Primer, there is one in the Munitorum Manual, which is for issuing new kits beyond the original one. There are also forms for reporting loss of a guardman's kit and notification of damage to a kit. Beyond that, a Munitorum supply liason also has to fill their separate forms for supply and ammunition requests.

Most importantly, the flowchart in section two shows that a Guardsman will not be issued a kit beyond that which is appropriate to their rank. What that means, who knows; but since it's also written by Graham McNeil, I'm assuming the part in Primer about Guardsmen not being issued specialist weapons "as standarded" still apply here. So, my take is that, unless the request is filed by a specialist, it will be denied if it's anything outside of the standard kit (with a Lasgun, power packs, frag grenade, gas mask, flak armour and helmet), it's right out.

Of course the same page also cautions the munitorum officers to watch out for misuse of the priviledge of requesting new kits, as guardsmen have been known to request a surplus of commonly requested items to be sold for profit, or even officers who tried to use them to get personal items from home. So, provided their commanding officers collaborate with the requestee, they can probably get something from the requisition form.

For example, the sample Personal Requisition Form in Manual has a commanding officer doubting the requestee's claims that his lasgun was broken while he was cleaning it, while still approving the request, stating that "he does need a lasgun". Of course if such actions are found out, they will receive "extreme punishments".

I hope they do 3 way matching

As much as the Mechanicus/ Munitorum would like to have a more homogenous weapon cache, you always run into the "This is an ancient relic from before the Dark Age, we've no STC, so it's now one of a kind" problem of 40k. That and certain deals are reached with the Ad mech and Guard. For example, Catachan has apparently rich deposits of minerals under all that greenery, so in return for fending off the train sized centipede/scorpions, the Guard regiments are gifted their knives of highest quality.
There's also other regiments that have their own wargear based from their culture or homeworld- the Vitrian Dragoons have glass armor (Vitreous Glass.. b/c GW: "Subtley, what is that?"). And to a lesser extent, the Tanith 1st and only prided themselves on having Nalwood stocks on their lasrifles (Mostly because the aforementioned trees are now extinct).
It seems for all the keeping the knowledge of the machine God, the Ad Mech must have certain politics and internal strife that they don't share with the rest- Or, some STC's are like giant 3d printers and can't be replicated/ moved off of certain worlds, so some guard get Mk III Lasguns instead of Mk V or whatever they're up to now.

Space Marine weaponry is another matter- heck, in Leman Russ's Primarch novel, much is given to the fact a single chain-axe was once wielded by Russ vs El'Jhonson. Of course, the Wolves are always into the whole saga of a weapon and "the name of my weapon is ___".