Legion size

[Lord Antharis]

In the third dex it was stated that the legions were 10k strong. It also still says it in the heresy novels. But in the new chaos dex "Numbering hundreds of thousands of genetically-enhanced warriors, with fearsome weapons and starships to carry them to battle, each space marine legion was powerful enough to conquer worlds." which is it?

[Legatus]

That is open for debate. As you have noticed, there are conflicting accounts in various sources. Personally, I like the 10k-20k version more, since that is what was stated by the Index Astartes articles and fits more with the number of successor chapters formed out of the original loyalist legions (on average 3-4 chapters per legion, with the Ultramariners as the largest and mostly unharmed by the heresy having 23). I think the 100k numbers first came up in the horus heresy artbooks. Perhaps they thought 10k were not epic enough?

[Silent Shadow]

I would say it's more in the 100k plus region. Just because otherwise the amount of losses taken at Istavaan and at the seige of the emperors palace means that 10k legion sizes just doesn't add up, unless it was a really small palace :rolleyes: .

[Sons of Horus]

i'd say over hundreds of thousands in number. i mean there is no way that 20 legions of 10k astartes only could pacify star systems more so the entire galaxy >.<

[Legatus]

I would say it's more in the 100k plus region. Just because otherwise the amount of losses taken at Istavaan and at the seige of the emperors palace means that 10k legion sizes just doesn't add up

So, concidering IF, BA and WS had about 10K to start with, and ended up with 3k-5k after the siege, 50-70% casualties is not enough for you? It has to be 97% casualty rate?

 

i'd say over hundreds of thousands in number. i mean there is no way that 20 legions of 10k astartes only could pacify star systems more so the entire galaxy

There was a nice introductory story in the 3rd Edition Codex Space Marines about how a single chapter (3 companies, actually) took down a separatist worlds military within a few days of fighting. In the first two armageddon wars there were only 1-2 chapters involved on the loyalist side (that was cranked up to a bazillion chapters for the 3rd war, perhaps so that everyone could participate with their chapter).

 

I made a calculation about the number of worlds 20 legions of 10k Marines might have liberated during the great crusade:

Mathhammer time.

 

We have a story about 300 White Panthers taking a world within a couple of days. For our example, let's say you need an average of 1000 Marines to take 1 world within 1 month. That is far below the example given by the 3rd Edition Codex Space Marines. It is also disregarding any participation by Imperial Guard or Navy. For this, I will also not take into account the worlds that willingly integrated into the Imperium upon encountering them.

 

Now, let's say we have those low 10,000 marines per Legion. 10,000 times 20 Legions, so 200,000 Marines in total.

 

Within 1 month, those 200k marines would take 200 worlds (since you need 1k for 1 world). Within 1 year that would be 2400 liberated worlds. Not too bad. How long was the crusade going? Codex UM 2nd Ed says something about 200 years, so that would have been 480,000 worlds liberated by Space Marines alone. Not too bad.

 

Now remember that I used an estimated number of Marines higher than in the White Panther example, and a longer time span. If you would only need 500 Marines and only two weeks (still not as good as the White Panther example), that number would increase to 9600 worlds liberated per year and 1,920,000 world liberated after 200 years. By Marines alone, still no Guard or Navy involved, and still not counting worlds that willingly joined the Imperium (by choice or by the mere mentioning of the Night Lords or World Eaters name...). But of course I also did not take into account heavier resistance, casualties, travel time, but still those are impressive numbers.

 

I don't think those numbers make 10,000 Marines per Legion appear implausible.

[Moress]

When they say 100 thousand I think that is including the 10k marines and all their other cronies.

 

Don't forget, even in modern SM "Chapters" for each marine there are maybe 10? (guesstimation) surfs/slaves/workers/whatever working for the chapter. So it's pretty likely that the legions had a LOT of surfs and non marine personel included in their legion.

 

One last thing that I think should be noted. Before the HH the legions not only had the SM legions, but also elements of the modern day IG and Navy, even titan legions. Each legion was litteraly a fighting force to be reconed with.

[Berserker Doug]

i believe that each had to have been over 10000 warriors. By the Ultrasmurfs example alone, they created 23 successors chapters ( on record) and still kept 1000 battle brothers for themselves. thats easily over 10k

[Jiri the Corrupted]

And in the stories about the First War for Armageddon, Angron (may Khorne bless his unholy name) took 50,000 berzerkers with him. And those were only parts of the WE legion, not the whole thing'

[mightygoose]

ultras had 250k marines just prior to heresy....

[Brother Nihm]

There was a discussion on Legion sizes some time ago, let me see if I can dig it up.

 

 

Edit: here we go: discussion topic

[Berserker Doug]

reading the old topic....i personally believe GW will never say how large the legions were. It goes along with the same concept of never telling us who the other 2 primarchs were. It allows them (and new players) to expand with a new chapters (or chaos legions) while simply stating they had been there from the start forged from the the unknown primarchs and their legions.

 

it makes me wonder, do they really need plotholes this big? did they anticipate themselves screwing up fluff and what not (btw they did..... many times)

 

all my 2 cents are belong on this forum

[Billy Butcher]

I've always been of the opinions that most of the legions were 12-17K strong, Alpha Legion probably 7-10K strong and the Smurfs 20-30K strong 'cause there's just so many of them'.

 

Just a gut feeling really - but one that, to me, feels right.

 

Fluffwise Great Crusade era Astartes were a bit awesome.

[TheDarkApostle]

Just figured I should put this down here as food for thought.

 

It's important to remember that back then none of the races we know of today which can put up a fight against Marines interacted with the Imperium.

 

The Eldars (both normal and Dark) were busy trying to get their act together after their Empires fell apart following Slaanesh's birth.

 

The Tau were still isolated and undiscovered.

 

The Necron were still sleeping.

 

The Tyranids hadn't showed up yet.

 

Chaos wasn't around. (At least not in greater numbers, and usually only the odd few "rogue" psykers.)

 

 

And that should sum it up pretty good.

 

This means that the only race we know a greater deal about today that were present back then were the Orks. And even then I don't think a majority of the battles were fought against them.

 

This means that taking a planet would be alot easier since it would mostly be scattered human civilizations they reclaimed. And we all know all to well the old saying "Each Space Marine amounts to 100 normal men".

 

TDA

[Magnus Thane]

I've seen this debate before. Not sure wether it was in a thread here or on Warseer or so. But... you'll never have a definitive answer to it. Only speculation. Fluff is something that'll be constantly reinterpreted, changed, warped or added to.

I was only around from about when the previous edition came out first or so. But i bet if you look at 1st edition era and now... conflicts fluffwise will be huge.

 

So my view on it. Both sides have valid points.

At one side: the 100k'ers make sense with their logic.

At the other side: the 10k'ers make equal sense because the laws of logic and nature don't exactly apply to the setting as it does in the r/l world. Kinda like Star Wars and sound in space being 'real'. (Lucas explicitly said in his galaxy/setting there is sound in space)

 

The fluff of that world being taken by so few Marines. (i even remember even less doing it in some fluff) is not conclusive.

 

Though i myself lean slightly more to 10K legions myself. Though i'd have no problem with it turning out 100K.