Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

May or may not be two distinct topics here, but my mind tends to wander and go on tangents. Really? I do that? Why do I do that? What was I talking about? OH!

So- was wondering if it was just an Administratum clerical problem or if there is another reason the Guard don't also make regiments from Marine Recruiting worlds. Mostly, I'd like a Fenrisian IG regiment, because I can't get this visual out of my head:

But most SM recruiting worlds are such because the populace is already put through rigorous testing and surviving against all manner of Deathworld problems.

Conversely, is there a reason Marines can't recruit from IG deathworlds? We discussed on another thread about other Abhumans taking geneseed, and I'd think the large Catachans are much more closer to the human "norm" genome than, say Ogryns. Them and the Goliaths of Necromunda are almost if not Firstborn size already, so you'd get an army of Tyberos-es! (Not that any "noble" SM chapter should recruit from Necromunda, that's the way to another group of Night Lords)

I'm sure the old "We don't know how Marine indoctrination works" "Can't spare Emperor's holy Geneseed", yada yada applies. But- Cawl (who is definately "NOT" a Heretek) has made a whole new system of the Primarius implants and has even supposedly messed with Traitor primarch DNA. So if anyone (Other than Bile) were to figure out who to make a SM Rambo, it'd be him!

And while on Geneseed, could other Abhumans be turned into marines? If it was just a DNA problem, we've seen that it "takes" with some derivations of humanity, like the Nocturnians, buuuut Ratlings/ Votann/ The Anime Catgirls GW has in Lore but Like One Line? I think there's also the Primarch "Special Sauce"/ Soul/ Warp component that rejects people based on thier mindset or spirit. I can't recall in lore mention of any identical twins who got recruited and one failed and one succeeded. (And no, Aplarius/ Omegon don't count, as they were the SOURCE of the geneseed!)

Lemme know what you think!

The main reason that you don't get Guard regiments from Marine worlds is that the Departmento Munitorum doesn't have the authority to - those worlds are solely under the command of the Chapter. There are some exceptions (Necromunda still raises regiments despite being an IF recruiting world), and some Chapters raise their own regiments (Ultramar Auxilia, for example).

What beast_gts said. Iirc, worlds that are given to marine chapters don't generally pay an imperial tithe, presumably because you don't want marines spending time working out the logistics of exporting enough granola bars and recaf when they should be focusing on fighting. Tithes are how regiments are raised, so the mechanism for getting a tithe from a chapter's homeworld just wouldn't be there unless some exception had been made.

This, if I'm not mistaken, is why a planet that sends some recruits to a chapter (but isn't the homeworld of a chapter) can still raise regiments.

As for a fenrisian regiment... I'm not sure Fenris really has the population to support such a thing. A regiment consists of how many bodies? Life on Fenris seems to mostly be a matter of small villages whose populations number in the dozens. If you went around scooping up thousands of healthy young adults at regular intervals, I'd think you'd end up basically killing off human life on the planet as you remove all the most capable hunters/warriors on a planet that's already really hard to live on.

Planets tithe what they are well-suited to provide. A low-population world like Fenris probably wouldn't be giving up its critically low population easily.

That said, I totally get that Fenris is cool and you want to work a similar aesthetic into your regiment. Consider coming up with your own planet that hits some of the same beats but is more suited to providing lots of bodies to the guard? Or maybe look into the Elysians or even the human servants/house guard of the Fang. (I want to say they're called huscarls, but apparently that term is used for a few things in 40k.)

Well, there’s a difference between a Recruitment World, and a Chapter’s Home World.

The former can be….anything. From “we’re looking a bit low on bods, we best stop off and recruit from wherever we end up stopping off at” to “Only sons of Fenris can be Space Wolves”, and everything in between.

A Chapter World however is exempt from The Tithe, falling entirely under the jurisdiction of the owning Chapter

So, a world like Necromunda has to meet its tithe, and may see some youths taken for Trials. Whereas Fenris provides no tithe, instead providing Astartes and Chapter Serfs to the Space Wolves Chapter - and possibly its spinoff Chapters as well.

What I’m not especially clear on is whether a world, any world, can be off-limits for Space Marine recruitment.

For instance, I can see the denizens of Catachan being desirable recruiting stock, but so far as I’m aware, no Chapter has it pegged for regular recruitment.

Astartes don't have free reign to do what they want.

A world as important as Catachan or Cadia to the wider defence of the Imperium and the Adeptus Munitorum would never allow them to be tithed by the Astartes.

The Astartes also maintain a delicate balance with the rest of the Imperium. Their independence is a blessing and a curse. Free to choose their wars but also free to take every bit of criticism that comes with that.
When powerful lords have to bargain with superhuman warriors like peasants begging for more gruel, it does not breed good vibes. If the Astartes started taking the best and brightest from important Militarum recruiting worlds, there'd be hell to pay.

Not a tithe as such, but a Crusade Fleet passing by may have need of recruits, and take advantage.

Crusades are an exception to the rule. Hence why the Templars get away with so much rulebreaking.

Even during a crusade, a passing Astartes force that tithed from a major Guard recruiting world would need to spend a lot of political capital to avoid too much uproar or have an exceptionally good excuse.

Yeah, and then there's chapters like the Carchadons that swoop in, help the populace then demand all of their young men for aspirants/ serfs/ servitors.
I had thought it was a Political/ Authority issue. After watching Arbiter Ian's vid on the Badab war it made me groan that an issue of tithe could erupt into all out war in a sector... but such is the Grimdark future and we've also seen how one little thing goes wrong and has catastrophic consequences- like Tanith getting destroyed.

But, as to the other issue- is geneseed implantation possible in abhumans? Not that any loyalist chapter would attempt to do so because "Holy Emperor's sacred geneseed" "purge the mutant" and all that. I know there was the Gland Warriors, but to me that's more along the lines of a "Mini-Thunder warrior" vibe. Still- I need Space Frankenstein Bile or Metal Hentai Monster Cawl to fiddle round with Abhuman genes!

Nobody knows.

But. With the Leagues of Votann being a thing, we have new info regarding at least one Abhuman Species.

Not unlike Astartes, Kin/Squats are the result of genetic tinkering - it wasn’t simply a new environment causing their bodies to evolve, but the product of intelligence and selective gene crafting.

Now, that only raises the suggestion all or other stable Abhuman strains are likewise designed that way, it certainly doesn’t confirm it.

But one has to question if they’re now too bio-engineered to accept the organs that make a Marine what they are.

We know tissue rejection is a problem with human aspirants, with Cawlma purification not being a total remedy.

So it seems nobody has seriously tried, either due to standard Imperial Bigotry, or Geneseed just being too rare and precious to risk the wastage, the same reason Chapters are highly selective, when the Crusade era shows resources allowing, pretty much any male of the right age could be elevated.

Worth noting that at least some (if not all?) Chapter worlds do raise PDF regiments to aid with the defense of the planet. Ultramar/Macharius is a good example of a world that has a very large and capable PDF organization that are equipped as though they were guard regiments.

TBF, the Ultramar Auxilia is a bit different and more a legacy of the Great Crusade than just PDF forces.
Guilliman being the hypocrite that he is had to have his own little star realm in the 500 Worlds and obviously had to have troops that weren't just his sons defending it who would totally definitely not be trained in the same academies as potential Ultramarine aspirants.
Benefits of having the only big Legion left at the end of the Heresy I suppose.

I’m not sure there’s any upper limit on how well trained and equipped your PDF can be though?

Certainly they’re trained and equipped at the planet/system’s own expense. And typically the cream of your crop form your Tithe of Guardsmen.

So one could argue Ultramar is again just Being Sensible in ensuring its Home Guard isn’t just sad old gits and spotty Herberts with sharpened sticks.

Now there is still wisdom in a Governor ensuring his household troops remain a cut above the PDF, but there’s still a sliding scale to be applied.

The Ultramar Auxilia aren't just PDF though. They're essentially Guilliman's version of the Tyrants Legion, a direct extension of the Ultramarines and their closest Successors.

The officers that come out of the training academies are essentially failed aspirants who weren't good enough to be Astartes but were still good enough to be trained by them.

I thought it was heavily implied that abhumans couldn't become astartes because their biology was too likely to reject the geneseed which is prone to not being compatible with human hosts even under ideal circumstances? But maybe that's just the story they tell themselves to justify the anti-abhuman bigotry.

I suppose there are some practical reasons not to attempt making an astartes of some of the more common forms of abhumans.

Ogryn: Do seem to universally pretty dumb. Even if you could make them bigger and stronger than they already are, you might not be able get the guy to follow complex tactical orders or ride in a vehicle without freaking out.

Ratlings: Start off a lot smaller than your average human. If the marine-making process went well, you'd presumably end up with a marine roughly the height of a human. Which might be appealing for a faction like the Alpha Legion, but seems like a logistical head ache when you already have to deal ordering a bunch of scaled-up equipment for your legion of giants. So like, an entire chapter of ratlings might make sense, but I can kind of see why you wouldn't be inclined to mix & match them with generic brand astartes.

Skimbleshanks(?) (The tall, skinny guys): If I'm not mistaken, they're canonically more weak and fragile than normal humans. So making them into an astartes would be two steps forward and one step back in terms of physical strength/durability.

Felinids: Hairballs get caught on the acid spitting gland to horrific results.

I definitely agree that under NO circumstances should you try to implant an ogryn. Maaaaybe Nork Deddog, but though his loyalty was unswerving, he was considered the smartest as he could count to 4 and sign his name "N", so not encouraging for his strain.
But I'm thinking there is also the spiritual/ soul component as well as the genetic one. The Raven Guard Raptors had their DNA messed up, but other than being horrific mutants, they didn't seem fully corrupted by Chaos. It stands to reason for me that Cawl can use and make Loyalist chapters with traitor geneseed because he got them before they were corrupted. While some still have tenancies, (for example: the Silver Skulls really liking technology, or the Covenant of Fire "purging heretical writings") none of them have burst out into traitorous CSMs.

 Haighus wrote:
Even during a crusade, a passing Astartes force that tithed from a major Guard recruiting world would need to spend a lot of political capital to avoid too much uproar or have an exceptionally good excuse.

Why so? Taking like 200 dudes away from a population of 1,000,000,000 isn't going to reduce the potential candidates to become Astra Militarum members.

bibotot wrote:

 Haighus wrote:
Even during a crusade, a passing Astartes force that tithed from a major Guard recruiting world would need to spend a lot of political capital to avoid too much uproar or have an exceptionally good excuse.

Why so? Taking like 200 dudes away from a population of 1,000,000,000 isn't going to reduce the potential candidates to become Astra Militarum members.

Politics.

Having said that, those 200 are the survivors of some kind of horrific trial, which are often fatal. The failed survivors are also typically taken as chapter serfs.

Even if 1% pass the trials, your 200 neophytes were 20000 aspirants and now the world has just lost a founding of its best men. I doubt many worlds are happy with that. It could be the difference between making the Administratum tithe that year.

 Haighus wrote:

bibotot wrote:

 Haighus wrote:
Even during a crusade, a passing Astartes force that tithed from a major Guard recruiting world would need to spend a lot of political capital to avoid too much uproar or have an exceptionally good excuse.

Why so? Taking like 200 dudes away from a population of 1,000,000,000 isn't going to reduce the potential candidates to become Astra Militarum members.

Politics.

Having said that, those 200 are the survivors of some kind of horrific trial, which are often fatal. The failed survivors are also typically taken as chapter serfs.

Even if 1% pass the trials, your 200 neophytes were 20000 aspirants and now the world has just lost a founding of its best men. I doubt many worlds are happy with that. It could be the difference between making the Administratum tithe that year.

I think you overestimate the cost of trial failures. The majority who fail in the first trial would just go back to where they are. Written tests, physical examinations, all the things you expect to see from a spec-op recruiting program, will safely weed out like 80% of the candidates, who are now free to join the less prestigious Astra Militarum. Only those who pass the preliminary examinations would go on to Astartes training and implantations where dying becomes an issue.

On geneseed and rejection?

I think it’s important to keep in mind it didn’t seem a particular problem during the Great Crusade, when Legions were as large as they could be, and even included individuals like Kor Phaeron, who weren’t full Astartes.

Now of course, everything has degraded since, both knowledge and geneseed. But, we can’t rule entirely rule out Chapters being strenuous in their trials is because they’re so limited in maximum size.


Consider. If you’re given an unlimited budget for recruiting, training and equipping your troops, you’re naturally going to be less discriminating than a force which can have no more than 1,000 men under arms. In the latter, there’s an inherent bias introduced of wanting each of those limited slots to go only to the absolute cream of the applicant crop.

The difference between anyone who can run 100 metres in under 15 seconds, and anyone who can run 100 metres within 1 second of the current World Record type stuff.


There’s also nothing to stop a given Chapter recruiting One At A Time. Say, a single child each from half a dozen settlements. Because it all ties into their overall state and how many new recruits are needed at a given time.

bibotot wrote:

 Haighus wrote:

bibotot wrote:

 Haighus wrote:
Even during a crusade, a passing Astartes force that tithed from a major Guard recruiting world would need to spend a lot of political capital to avoid too much uproar or have an exceptionally good excuse.

Why so? Taking like 200 dudes away from a population of 1,000,000,000 isn't going to reduce the potential candidates to become Astra Militarum members.

Politics.

Having said that, those 200 are the survivors of some kind of horrific trial, which are often fatal. The failed survivors are also typically taken as chapter serfs.

Even if 1% pass the trials, your 200 neophytes were 20000 aspirants and now the world has just lost a founding of its best men. I doubt many worlds are happy with that. It could be the difference between making the Administratum tithe that year.

I think you overestimate the cost of trial failures. The majority who fail in the first trial would just go back to where they are. Written tests, physical examinations, all the things you expect to see from a spec-op recruiting program, will safely weed out like 80% of the candidates, who are now free to join the less prestigious Astra Militarum. Only those who pass the preliminary examinations would go on to Astartes training and implantations where dying becomes an issue.

I have never gotten the impression that most Astartes trials are like the Ultramarines with their academies. It seems much more common that the aspirants get dumped in a dangerous environment with basic or no equipment and asked to reach a certain point by a certain time, or simply survive. Combat tournaments also seem to be common, where lethal force is permitted or even encouraged. Both can be used as part of the same trial. The Astartes don't want to hang around recruiting if they are doing an emergency recruitment, they will use the (probably brutal) ritual methods of their Chapter cult in way that is expedient to them.

That is why deathworlds and underhives are favoured recruiting grounds for Astartes Chapters- the horrible environment bit is already there, so they only need to test combat prowess and determination and luck. Survivors from a defeated, untained human population are also common for the same reason- they have already proved themselves surviving the Astartes attack.

This isn't even a recent thing. Alexis Pollux, first chapter master of the Crimson Fists, was recruited from Rogal Dorn's homeworld of Inwit. His trial involved surviving on the predator-infested ice plains of that world, which killed his brother during the trial.

Academic capability does not seem a common attribute tested for in Astartes trials. The Ultramarines are the only chapter where I can recall this being an explicit part of selection.

Some worlds that SM Chapters use a feral or death worlds that don’t need their population become soft through the comforts of imperial technology.

I expect plenty of recruitment worlds have the selection of youths for SM recruitment baker into their cultures and rituals. Many SM chapters are cruel and violent and have little respect for life of non Astartes. I doubt they would be above indoctrinating populations for their own gain.

The number of Chapters that use "Civilised" worlds for recruitment are extremely rare. Feral, Feudal, Death, or Hive worlds are the primary choice because the degeneration of the Imperium has led to the Astartes induction process being far less stable than it was during the Crusade.

The brutal and simple reality is that taking backwards savages from worlds where only the strong survive is the better choice for a multitude of reasons:
1 - Nobody will miss them if they do fail the trials because the societies aren't reliant on them to fill difficult or advanced societal roles.
2 - Having savage instincts when you're getting turned into a living weapon is a bonus.
3 - Malnourished or underdeveloped specimens aren't preferable so picking worlds where the strongest mortals survive is a necessity for the brutal ascension process.

Hell, you only need to look at the Legions/First Founding Chapters to see that the majority pick their stock from these kinds of worlds. Baal, Medusa, Chogoris, Nocturne, and Fenris are all one of the above categories while Inwit is a barbaric and harsh world although it has a good grasp of technology. Macragge and Deliverance are the only two worlds that one could consider as "Civilised" while obviously Caliban is kind of exploded.
Sure you could argue that it was "destiny" or whatever that sent the Primarchs to those worlds but with thousand worlds to choose from, why keep choosing from those that breed the harshest climates and brutal lives?

My understanding was that Marine trials are done with kids. Its not about a planet losing 20,000 PDF troopers that were next up for tithing. A relatively small chunk of the next generation of males will get tagged and may become damaged goods, but I'm not sure how that is anything more than noise in the general risk of growing up on a imperial world.

Because it's political as well.

The Astartes live with a precarious balance of power with the wider Imperium. They are largely autonomous, relying on the Imperium for some equipment and worlds to tithe for Aspirants.
They pick their own battles, don't fit into the chain of command and don't pay tithes to the Administratum.
But they can't just do what they want because the Imperium has more stuff than they do.

Push the Imperium too far and you get smacked down. If Astartes Chapters started diverting the best youths of a primary Militarum recruiting world away from their destined lives, the powers that be aren't going to be happy. Space Marines are useful assets but they are not the primary defenders of the Imperium, the Guard is and the Guard are far easier to control.

Still going to depend on their needs.

Wanting a couple of hundred to enter the trials is different from wanting/needing several thousand.

And that’s going to be directly tied to their recruitment needs at that moment in time, and depend upon the overall planet’s populace.

For instance, any given Hive can easily spare a couple of million youths, because the population is well into the billions. More so if the Marines go recruiting in the Underhive.

Hence I don’t think there’s a single answer. Whilst a given planet may well be within its rights to deny a Chapters request to recruit there? I don’t think there’s anything which dictates the Marines can only recruit from pre-declared and agreed historical fiefdoms.

Well yes in a crisis, a Chapter could find a new recruiting source or might pick up the odd stray child in a warzone.

But they aren't exactly forward thinking or even entirely pragmatic. Cultural, and to a lesser extent genetic, purity are big deals for each Chapter and contaminating their confirmed "pure" worlds with "unclean" additions would be abhorrent to some.

Of course there are those like the Carcharadons or Black Templars who recruit from all over due to necessity.

But taking their recruits from a world that has significance, as was stated in the OP, isn't something they're going to do lest the suffer the wrath of Imperial Bureaucracy. The same can be said for the Imperium when it comes to raising Regiments from Astartes home worlds. You don't touch other people's stuff.

I don’t agree the gate swings both ways.

A Chapter Homeworld is explicitly under the jurisdiction of that Chapter.

Whilst still beholden to the Inquisition, the Administratum and even Ecclesiarchy keep their paws off, trusting to the Chapter to maintain standards.

But, that doesn’t necessarily work in reverse. Again me not having read it doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist, but I’ve seen nothing which explicitly prevents any Chapter recruiting from any given world.

Many just won’t, because they have their defined stomping grounds or recruitment worlds (for instance, Dark Angels are fleet based, but if memory serves have specific recruiting worlds).

There’s also “in extremis” recruitment. Say a Chapter World has fallen, but the bulk of the Chapter was abroad in a war zone. In that situation, the standard rules become blurred. The Imperium needs its Astartes, and in that example, the Astartes need The Imperium, not only to provide immediate recruits, but agreed a replacement Chapter World.

Most importantly? Astartes are far enough removed from the usual bureaucracy, arranging such things may be surprisingly (at least in Imperial terms) straight forward. They have their own Astropaths, with specific idents, and so can go straight to the Governor, confirm with Sector Command/Inquisition/Administratum “we’re taking X recruits from this world, unless anyone has objections”.

Now the option to say “no, sod off” remains there. Because unlike an Inquisitor, you do have some discretion in dealing with Astartes. But realistically? Submitting aspirants to any Chapter absolutely is a great honour.

Going back to the beraucracy? Provided the forms are filled out in triplicate and filed appropriately, the Governor may even be able to offset any equipment or recruits given over to a Chapter against their Tithe. But even if not? The recruits and materiel requisitioned/supplied/traded to a Chapter is still going to be a drop in the ocean of a planetary Tithe, because the Marines are so relatively few in number.

But it comes down to scale. There is no possible way that marine recruitment would impact guard recruitment from the same planet, until you get down to really rather sparsely populated feral worlds. Reminds me of the thread on Catachan serving as a primary Guard recruitment world, pumping regiment after regiment out with a population of only 12 million by canon.

Also I would image that the cachet that comes with supporting a chapter would be one of the few acceptable excuses for not meeting tithe anyway

Also In many ways, what works well for Marines doesn’t play nicely with the needs of the Guard in terms of flexibility and the ability to undertake independent action. So those lost to marine recruitment may not even have been in the running.

Regarding recruiting grounds, Dark Angels and Imperial Fists famously have multiple sources of recruits. Blood ravens as well.

Strong, fit, healthy youths remain a resource though. Possibly earmarked for the Governor’s personal guard at a future point. And importantly? Not a resource a Chapter has a particular right to - outside of historical compacts.

Interesting question? What if a Chapter wanted, or needed, to recruit from the Schola Progenium? Again highly situational, but still a possibility.