I think you have no idea about what constitutes control, and your grasp of basic human psychology is also sadly lacking. You advocate absolutely no checks or balances whatsoever. This is exactly what lead to the Horus Heresy. According to you there is absolutely nothing the Imperium can do about it either. The SMs are totally immune to anything the Imperium might try to do to curtail their power. You also seem to think that the Imperium wouldn't even try.
I'm suggesting they wouldn't even need to. The only type of control you seem to recognize is the type derived from pressing a gun to someone's head.
Utter rubbish. In a battle, SM should get their arses handed to them by the IN. SM ships should not be a threat to IN warships. This is the control I'm talking about, it is the control I've always talked about and I have never said that I think that the IN should be able to hunt down and catch SM ships.
Except in fluff for the post-heresy division of arms, it IS NOT the SM that IN exists to check, but rather the forces of the IG. It is why *NO* IG commander may command or possess a ship (IN or otherwise) at any time (according to fluff, anyway), but a SM can (technically a commissar can, as they're not *actually* part of IG, but are rather representatives of the Munitorum). The 'check' on SM power was that they were divided into small units.
I have no idea why you keep crapping on about "authority". The Imperium has a bigger stick than the SMs do. That's their authority. That's all the authority that they need to keep. Everything else is just so much waffle. Who cares if the SWs are headstrong, or that the BTs have a few extra men (not anywhere near legion strength btw). These things can be let go by the wayside. It is when SMs start challenging the Imperium in space that the Imperium has to worry.
Wrong. Not only is there an entire ordo of the Inquisition that exists to ensure that various parties authority is limited, but there is an entire imperial organization, the adeptus arbites, that not only enforces Imperial law, but stomps on people who exceed their 'authority'. Even the Inquisition is quick to punish it's own when they exceed their authority in the eyes of their peers (known punishments for this include death and being converted into a servitor).
The Nova fluff outranks you on this one, so no lances for SMs.
The Nova's fluff does not say that SM may not have lances. You've pitched this interpretation before, it's not correct, it hasn't been correct for two editions now, it it grows less correct every new book that comes out.
Nothing outranks sense. It doesn't matter if they go around and say oooh, looky at the nice new SM legion with 10,000,000 men and 300,000 Planet Killers. It's nonsensical so there's no reason to pay it any attention.
Clearly, your opinion seems to, at least in your own mind. GW dictates the fluff. GW dictates what is and is not in the game. I've had plenty of things I didn't like that they did. Guess what, I don't pout and pretend it's not there because it doesn't fit my view of what a given fleet or army 'should be'. Next thing you'll be insisting that SM ships can only be built by squats.
This is a retarded argument. Since "winning" is within the mandate of SMs then they should have direct control over the IN, the IG and greater than legion strength. This would all help them in their goals wouldn't it? Need for control > SM need for tools.
I might point out that at various points the SM have had direct control over both IN and IG, and ironically, it was the Black Templars. So, not greater then legion strength, but way above chapter, there. Again, you keep coming back to control: you do realize that the Imperium is vast enough that any real control is impossible over regular people, let alone the Space Marines. You cannot micromanage, in the way that you seem to think they must, an empire that covers 28,000 sectors. It's so badly done that entire sub-sectors can be lost due to clerical error and not heard from again for thousands of years, if ever. The Imperium does not even know how many space marine chapters there are, where they are, or what they're doing, let alone what they're armed with, or what they're carrying on their space ships.
How, sig, are you going to control, in that manner, a chapter like the space sharks, that disappears for a thousand years at a time?
AND YOU KEEP IGNORING THE FACT THAT THIS IS NOT AN ARGUMENT!!!!! For <EXPUNGED> sake, even a monkey would have gotten this by now. Because some IN commanders also defect is not an argument to INCREASE SM power. It is an argument to DECREASE it. Further, the fact that the SMs need IN commanders to defect is an example of the process working. The division of power means that for a rebellion to be successful there have to multiple failures of individuals. If the SMs had more power then the IN commanders would have 2 choices, surrender or die. That is a bad place to put your commanders!
No, Sig, it's an argument that IN does not serve as a counter to SM, it serves as a counter to IG.
And, again: lances on SM ships are irrelevant to their relative strength against IN.
By way of Comparison: Take two BB, 12 SCs, and four or five squadrons of escorts, give the SCs 8 HP and str 3 lances in place of BCs. Now I bring to the table the approx 80 battleships, BCs, GC, cruisers, and a bakers dozen escort squadrons.
How much will those lances matter? NOT A DAMN BIT.
SM usually either convert the officers or hit the ships in dock, and take them by over running the facility. They do the same thing with IG. This is only on those occasions tehy feel a fleet would be a necessity, ie carving out their own fiefdom from the Imperium. And, and this part will probably horrify you, there are occasions they are actually allowed to do JUST THAT by the Imperium.
The most well known of these fiefs is Ultramar, however, it's been done in other locations, the most infamous of these being Badab. I'll remind you again: The Imperium had no problem with the Astral Claws ruling an entire sector, and having direct control over the IN and IG forces there. What they had a problem with was their refusal to pay taxes on it.
Because this is a poorly written rule, obviously. Armageddons are not legacy vessels. They are not "venerable". SMs should not have access to them. I have no idea what kind of logic you're trying to apply here. "Armageddon's are allowed to be taken as VBBs, but they can't possibly be 'venerable' so the SMs must have access to new lance armed ships therefore other SM ships (SCs) should have lances". Apart from the absurd leaps of logic here, even if we assume the premises to be true and the first conclusion to be also true then this is not an argument for lances on SCs or barges, because they would already have access to lance armed ships in the form of the VBB! Therefore there is no need to alter their other ships, since if they wanted some lances they'd just grab an Armageddon!
So your only defense is that it's a badly written rule? My logic, by the way, was that you insisted that no new VBBs were being built. Since post heresy ships can be taken as VBBs, this is incorrect. The Armageddon was the most blatant one, but point of fact, No current IN BC or GC dates back to the heresy, and most battleships don't either, having been built since then. IIRC a VBB comes about due to it playing a role in the chapter's history. It may be that the ship was gifted to them by the Navy or Inquisition after a particularly intense counter boarding action where it was saved by the chapter in question.
My logic was that if there was, indeed, a prohibition about lances on ships larger then escorts, there would be no exemption. Since there are ships clearly newer then the heresy sailing around with SM colors, then there is likely no prohibition against a specific weapon type, as these could not be grandfathered in.
Wait, what? What the hell has this got to do with anything? How does a Murder having long range and access to lances have any bearing at all whatsoever on the conditions of optimal efficacy of gunnery weapons vs lances?
It has noting to do with it, what it has to do with is that, at the time of the first founding, a single SC could be lance armed with two shields and still be unlikely to defeat an IN cruiser of the period. You went off on a tangent with the WB business, claiming that, effectively, a lance is better then a BC. Which was not the point. The point was that the Murder would run circles around it and chew it up with lances and wbs outside it's effective range. Even with Thawks, it's going to have a hard time closing to engage. This is why both armor 6 and lances would have had little meaning, since in wold, as opposed to on the table top, there's a lot of space to run around in.
Firstly, GW is responsible for many many contradictions to their own fluff and they're also responsible for that travesty that was the death of Eldrad Ulthran. A piece of crap that I reject in its entirety. He's still alive as far as I'm concerned. So we are not talking infallible gods here. We're talking people that don't stop to properly assess the situation. People like you. As for FFG, what the hell would they know? They just bought some rights and set to making crap to squeeze some bucks out of us. Why take crap rules from another game system and bring them across to BFG?
I think I have assessed the situation quite well. You don't like anything changing in 40k/BFG/etc, and nerdrage when it does. As opposed to raging and insisting that events never happened, my approach is to ask 'Ok, how can this make sense now?'
BTW: as far as bringing things from 'another game system' across to BFG: that's already been done, both from FFG's games and from other 40k games.
And, considering that not only were several people on this forum involved in FFG's stuff, but the latest was written by Andy Chambers, who wrote the fluff for some other game, what was it called? Oh, yes, BATTLEFLEET GOTHIC.
As they say in the comic book industry 'Retcon happens.'
No, even then. If they produce pure crap, which they do on occasion, then I, for one, just ignore it and wait for the next iteration of rules that will no doubt be more reasonable (regression to the mean).
*in Bugs Bunny Voice* 'He don't know GW too well, do he?'
If we encounter sucky rules then that's a cause to bemoan the suckiness of the rules, not to bloody well copy them!
Actually, I'll point out that, FFG's rules are extremly well done and surprisingly well thought out, that majority of the time. There are occasional hiccups such as Murder Servitors + teleporter, but on the whole they're quite good, actually.
SMs are not mandated to defeat rebels in space. Boarding is within their mandate, but rebel space ships are an IN concern. However, SMs do board things, and they can board ships as well as stations, so if they want to do this then they can go ahead and do so. There's no reason why the SC should have anti-ship weapons though. How this aids in SMs boarding another ship I don't know. Seems more of an aid for, oh I don't know, fleet engagements maybe.
Because boarding is much more effective after punching big holes in it. Particularly if you're in power armor that acts as a vac suit, and they are not.
What? How does this address what I said?
Quite a bit.
Who gives a rats arse about what their policy is. If they want SMs to have lances then they should retconn the damn Horus Heresy and subsequent division of power out of the fluff. Either that or THEY should<EXPUNGED>write BFG 2.0. Since I don't see them sticking their heads in then I don't care about their opinion. The only thing that matters to me is what makes sense. Lances on SM ships are just inconsistent with the main elements of the fluff. The people who made the damn SM rules knew this and the SMs were given a weapon to compensate them for the lack. Now you want lances on top of that. Fuckin fanbois.
I suppose I should comment here, since this is sort of funny:
Sig, you and the space marine fanboys on dakka please sort out whether applying logic to SM makes me a hater or fanboy. Because I've heard it both ways now, and, frankly, I don't see how one can be both.
On to the rest of that part of the post:
Sig, BTW: they ARE retconning the HH as they go through, but so far no one has addressed that area of the heresy yet. I do not doubt that that there will be some alterations. SM having lances are not main elements of the fluff, they consist of two sentences, and both don't actually say that SM are forbidden lances. SM HAVING lances in fluff occurs with much more regularity then them not.
As far as BFG 2.0, I hear rumors of fall, but we'll see.
The military purpose of the SM is to get onto the ground and quell a rebellion before it gets out of hand. Failing that, in a planetary assault, they would be the spearhead off the Imperium leading a fleet with IN cooperation which will bring an army to said planet to put down the rebellion or exterminate the planet.
The military purpose of the SM is groundside, not topside.
Not correct: See
Star of Damocles,
The Emperor's Finest, the very first Soul Drinkers novel, Codex: Black Templars, Codex: Space Marines... the list goes on.
Typically a SM SC is sent well in advance of IN forces, possibly weeks in advance, eliminates in system defenses between itself and either A) a groundside insertion to shore up resistance around key infrastructure such as landing fields, arsenals, etc, or B) in the event A) is no long practical, begin paving the way for IN, eliminating orbital defenses where possible. Once IN moves into position, if A) has been the case, the SM are pulled back, and are sent to retake outlaying orbitals and space stations, while IN and IG focus on the planet. SM get called back to the planet if IG stalls or some particularly thorny problem comes up. If B) is the case, your spearhead scenario takes place.
The A) scenario is one that will particularly require the use of lances, as the SC will be providing close support via orbital fire and thawks. Since this would be in close proximity to structures needed intact, the more inaccurate BC is not a viable option.
