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Perpetuation of the Chapters of the Adeptus Astartes


Brother Tyler

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That's making assumptions on the geneseed though. Progenoid glands take 5 and 10 years respectively to grow to maturity.

In that time we have to factor in loss of the recruit to warfare and corruption or failure of organs impacting the samples in the Progenoids, making them unsuitable.

In addition, there is the failure rate of growing organs from these Progenoid glands and body rejection and loss of recruits in the implantation stage.

As such, whilst getting 2 for 1 out of every recruit means there might be a lot (relatively) of geneseed flying about, the success rate percentage is likely very low.

In universe, Space Marines fight and die to protect geneseed in the stories. Punitive measures are absolute if a Chapter fails to deliver its tithe. This all tells us that the stuff is valuable enough to die for.

If it was so easy to use, everyone would be doing it. There would be loads spare and Chapters could have a permanent supply of recruits ready to join the Chapter every time there's a death.

Which again is only due to GW failing to understand numbers. Veteran Sergeant crunched numbers on DakkaDakka and came to the conclusion that unsurprisingly, GW is full of gak and doesn't know what they're writing. There's also the barely touched on issue of just stuffing gene-seed into vat-grown bodies like what is done for Admech servitors (they aren't all criminals), specifically grown to fit the traits needed for a successful transplant. Stick it in the vat body, grow it for two decades, then harvest it and repeat the process.

 

Sorry, another assumption that we can vat grow the additional organs. They have to all be keyed into eachother and the Progenoid glands so how can we just grow replacement organs? We don't know.

 

Regarding numbers; if there's about 1500 Space Marines per Chapter, each producing 2 Progenoids, that's 3000 right? Well, after all the variables I mentioned, what if there is 50% failure rate? As in, the Progenoid is unusable, the subject dies or the recruit dies - all variables.

 

Such a failure rate amounts to just barely replacing the Chapter losses.

 

It would be interesting to know what the failure rates are.

 

You don't vat grow the organs. You vat grow a body using stem cells (minus the brain, not really important and not heretical either), stuff the gene-seed in like you would with a neophyte, then harvest everything a decade or two later, get another vat grown body grown to necessary specifications, and rinse and repeat.

 

-snip-

It is an urban myth. The Missing Legions were made purely because GW liked the mystery of the missing roman legions, struck from history for failures or betrayals so great that they did not deserve to be immortalized like the others. It was never meant for people to create their own legions.

 

-snip-

I would argue that it was both. GW can't have failed to realize that by leaving open a few missing legions (and specifying fully half fell in many editions, therefore one loyal and one traitor, although that is now up for debate) they were leaving open a massive creative avenue for their players. They may have originally been inspired by the missing Roman legions, but that creative opportunity means that touching those legions by GW in a definitive way would be like touching a live wire. I think the reason they have stayed so resolutely shrouded in mystery is at least in part due to that creative option.

 

 

As for not using slave/vat grown organs, I always chocked that up more to superstition than actual limitations (although perhaps such organs are of a slightly lower quality). Same reason they don't harvest one of the glands from living marines, generally speaking.

There's a bit of fluff in the 3rd edition Codex Space Marines that describes the day in the life of a Space Marine. It talks about how they (Space Marines) are examined and samples taken from geneseed after a certain amount of practical heavy combat training, as their geneseed has been sufficiently stimulated by the activities.

 

This indicates that it is not possible to do what you have suggested with vat farming the farms.

There's a bit of fluff in the 3rd edition Codex Space Marines that describes the day in the life of a Space Marine. It talks about how they (Space Marines) are examined and samples taken from geneseed after a certain amount of practical heavy combat training, as their geneseed has been sufficiently stimulated by the activities.

 

This indicates that it is not possible to do what you have suggested with vat farming the farms.

There are also examples of test slave growing organs as well though (iirc). Although as far as I understand, that doesn't really save much time, it just means that you don't need to be so selective in recruitment and you don't risk losing them to combat. You also aren't worried about the actual training portion of time that marines normally go through before harvesting.

I don't have the fluff on the slave growing an organ as replacement etc but don't doubt the concept at all. Logically though, it's not the same as geneseed and likely the organs are useless without the geneseed (or unstable most probably) or else they wouldn't need geneseed. ;)

Regarding the founding of a chapter and the growing of geneseed...

 

The gene-seed used to create new chapters is stored by the Adeptus Mechanicus, originally tithed from existing chapters. New progenoids are created using human test-slaves. Zygotes are grown from gene-seed and implanted into the slaves; these then develop into progenoid organs and are removed. A single slave is used in this way to create two progenoids, which are then implanted into two more slaves, and so on. One thousand sets of organs - the notional number of Marines in a chapter - are created, after more than half a century of constant reproduction. Some chapters's geneseed is mutated in a way the zygotes grow in faster rate and therefore are able to recover faster from heavy loss of marines within their chapter.

I don't have the fluff on the slave growing an organ as replacement etc but don't doubt the concept at all. Logically though, it's not the same as geneseed and likely the organs are useless without the geneseed (or unstable most probably) or else they wouldn't need geneseed. msn-wink.gif

As Mordray points out above, it is the geneseed being grown, unclear if it is any of the other stuff.

That neatly brings us back on topic!

 

If it is possible to use slaves to grow progenoids, why are the Imperial Fists replaced?

 

We have several possiblities here:

 

1) they needed the Imperial Fists to be active much sooner.

 

2) The difference in geneseed is negligible and as a direct Successor Chapter they would have "used to be" Imperial Fists anyway.

 

3) there are too many weaknesses inherent in this process that impacts the efficiency and accurate replication of the geneseed to be deem appropriate on a large scale for an existing Chapter (remember that Successor Chapters are often deemed inferior copies to the originals).

That neatly brings us back on topic!

 

If it is possible to use slaves to grow progenoids, why are the Imperial Fists replaced?

 

We have several possiblities here:

 

1) they needed the Imperial Fists to be active much sooner.

 

2) The difference in geneseed is negligible and as a direct Successor Chapter they would have "used to be" Imperial Fists anyway.

 

3) there are too many weaknesses inherent in this process that impacts the efficiency and accurate replication of the geneseed to be deem appropriate on a large scale for an existing Chapter (remember that Successor Chapters are often deemed inferior copies to the originals).

You are forgetting 4) The Imperial Fist culture would be completely lost that way, rather than mostly retained with 2) type reasoning.

Yeah, but I don't think it would be. That chapter used to literally be part of the legion. Their culture would probably be almost identical.

Much like a diaspora has an identical culture to its homeland?

 

It's an overly simplistic view? And one that routinely bugs me in 40k. Sure they're super human, but if Ultramarines can become Mortifactors then with distance and the passage of time anyone can be anything.

 

By TBA times, the Imperial Fists have operated as a Chapter far longer than they ever operated as a Legion. That's like saying everyone who was at school together age 8 will find their children basically interchangeable when their children become adults... despite being scattered around the world before the parents even finished school...

 

 

Clunky analogy, I know.

 

That said, the Iron Hands, Salamanders and Raven Guard were close to fully formed in a 40k sense by the end of the Heresy (with not much changing in the next ten millennia), so maybe I'm out of touch with one of the fun, fantastic bits of the setting.

And the personal opinions/preferences of the first couple of chapter masters. For example the flesh tearers were significantly different from the blood angels almost as soon as amit was free to stamp his own personality further on them once they had split from the original legion.

Is there really any such culture that would exist either way if the Imperial Fists had been eliminated wholly?

 

There'd be more culture of the Imperial Fists in the 7th Chapter becoming the new 1st Chapter, which is basically what happened.

 

 

(remember that Successor Chapters are often deemed inferior copies to the originals).

 

 

I was unaware of this point in the fluff.  Where do I read about this?

Chapter's Due references it to the renegades who had joined the Iron Warriors.

 

Codex Chaos Space Marines (3.5?) Has a short story where a Black Legionaire remarks on the poor copies that are the Successor Chapters, though if I am right it was a Crimson Fist which shouldn't be the case.

 

Pretty sure there are other references.

'Deemed' might not be accurate - but as humans (ish), Marines will have their own versions of celebrity and fashion and 'trendy'.

 

Inferior copy might not be quite right, but 'living in the shadow of' immediately resonates as an idea.

 

That said, there's so many chapters who just aren't First Founding that I think it's terribly sad that they're not celebrities, with the First Founding more often a crumbling aristocracy- they still hold the ear of the High Lords and command the lion's share of the resources, but are still outnumbered 991:9...

I think that they are deemed inferior out of spite and only from one particular group within the lore (although references to other points of view are welcome). You'll find that the ones with the low opinion of loyalist space marines, I believe, are chaos space marines. They have every motive to slight, belittle, insult and generally bad-mouth the descendants of the Legions that they fought and lost to in the Horus Heresy. 

Yeah, but I don't think it would be. That chapter used to literally be part of the legion. Their culture would probably be almost identical.

 

Is there really any such culture that would exist either way if the Imperial Fists had been eliminated wholly?

 

There'd be more culture of the Imperial Fists in the 7th Chapter becoming the new 1st Chapter, which is basically what happened.

 

-snip-

 

Sorry, I wasn't terribly clear. I was saying that if you just created a new chapter from test slaves it would lose the culture, where most of it would be preserved if the other Fists chapter took over.

 

Yeah, but I don't think it would be. That chapter used to literally be part of the legion. Their culture would probably be almost identical.

 

 

Is there really any such culture that would exist either way if the Imperial Fists had been eliminated wholly?

There'd be more culture of the Imperial Fists in the 7th Chapter becoming the new 1st Chapter, which is basically what happened.

 

 

-snip-

Sorry, I wasn't terribly clear. I was saying that if you just created a new chapter from test slaves it would lose the culture, where most of it would be preserved if the other Fists chapter took over.

Now, speculatively speaking...

 

Even after thirteen centuries? I'm not convinced. It might be original of the Legion (though we know original legionaries are rare/mostly dreadnoughts, if at all), but that's 1300 years as 100% of a Chapter versus 200 as 1-2% of a Legion, give or take.

 

There's proximity to that original that, absolutely right, would be lost if wholly taken from slaves - but it's not really 'the same' as the IF chapter's culture that has been lost, either way.

 

More similar, but likely markedly different too.

 

That 1300 year history that was unique to the IF Chapter is irrevocably lost (on a personal level), as well as most of what was drawn from the 200 years being part of the IF Legion (though it's much more closely related to the 200yr from the replacementsl), they instead get 200 years of their replacements' version of being part of the legion, with 1300 years of development as a different chapter...

 

It's a terribly sad thing. Not angering sad, but morose. Morbid.

 

Compelling though. Feels kinda... real. This sort of thing happens.

But keep in mind, space marines are heavily indoctrinated.

 

Not to mention they can live for centuries, meaning they were probably only one or two generations down.

 

We also don't know how long it took, and what happened in their past to cause it, for the Mortifacors to become the way they did.

1300 years, probably 4 generations for most marines, maybe the odd exception here or there or dreadnought. Consider how your own country has changed since the 1920s... now apply that level of potential change to a marine chapter.

But keep in mind, space marines are heavily indoctrinated.

Not to mention they can live for centuries, meaning they were probably only one or two generations down.

We also don't know how long it took, and what happened in their past to cause it, for the Mortifacors to become the way they did.

Absolutely. I think you're spot on with 'one or two generations', but even then: that's a very long time to do your own thing, for single individuals to shape the minds of the next people to come along. It won't be too many steps removed, but the depth of the removal might carry quite far.

 

Hell, TBA character spoilers:

 

Zerberyn, First (?) Captain of the Fists Exemplar has already gone a fantastic distance leading his people down a deviant path indeed... and he's barely been separated from his compatriots for half a year.

 

That I suppose, is the compelling argument against my position that everyone else already sees - that all the variation and change happens, but being Marines it happens so fast and of such great magnitude that they're immediately exiled or executed for heresy or otherwise ostracised and not allowed to spread their deviance. Ergo it happens, but much more rarely takes root. So difference must be small, but with great momentum.

 

So you'd have a very powerful undercurrent of acceptable movement away from the original norms, but the difference between them might be very small indeed compared to an equivalent generation or two of terribly indoctrinated, intolerant humans.

 

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