Siege of Terra numbers too small?

[Moonreaper666]

1.5 Loyalist Million Guardsmen and Three Titan Legions is a very small army in what is the largest battle in the Horus Heresy

 

 

 

Should the numbers be vastly expanded in the Horus Heresy Books?

 

 

How many Guardsmen and Loyalist Titans should be on Terra to make it a climatic and the largest battle in the Heresy?

 

 

What other forces should be involved in the Siege of Terra? Eldrad's Eldar and Trazyn's Necron?

[Tyriks]

Definitely not Trazyn. I could see Eldrad trying to muddle with time, but I hope they don't do that. The Siege of Terra should be represented exclusively by humans and their creations.

 

1.5m guardsman does seem way too small. Battlenof Stalingrad (a prolonged battle, but still one 70 years ago) had 2m casualties in total. 3 Titan legions could be a wide range of Titans though so I'm less underwhelmed there. But the presence of hundreds of thousands of Space Marines is also a huge factor that can't be left out. Multiple full legions outweighs any amount of human soliders.

[Marshal Loss]

What other forces should be involved in the Siege of Terra?

 

The Blood Gorgons

[Res Ipsa Loquitur]

Yeah, that's pitiful.

 

1.2m Soviets died at Rzhev, a battle that most have never heard of outside of Germany and the former CCCP.

 

What are they defending, an Imperial Palace made for ants?

[Kinstryfe]

The numbers have always been horribly off, and hopefully it will be massively inflated in the BL retelling. For a world of untold billions that's pretty much 100% occupied, the forces involved and the casualties should be huge. I wouldn't be at all surprised to see it balloon to just ridonkulous numbers, and that would be a good thing.

[karden00]

Would the BL be th strongest legion present? Following Fear to Tread, Sanguinius remarks that the legion, despit it’s losses at Signus, can still fight at more or less full strength (an unavoidably odd thing to say, after at a bare minimum 500 legionaries died) and that is not a claim the Scars or Fists can make.

Come to think of it, haven’t all of th traitor legions bled a fair bit by then as well?

[b1soul]

There would be almost a million SM running around Terra, no?

 

3 loyalist legions and almost all the Traitors. At least 700,000 or 800,000 Astartes, right?

 

1.5 million mortal soldiers would be paltry

[Sothalor]

Where does this 1.5 million figure come from?

[Nuttyer1st]

We know there are the Imperial Fists number  >70,000, a legion of 100,000 - the 30,000 who were in the retribution fleet + whatever they've recruited in the 8 or 9 years garrisoning Terra, Restorer short story states "..whose ranks had swelled over the last four years" since this story is set a couple (I think) years before the siege its possible the Fists are back upto full strength, possibly higher

 

White Scars had (heavy I imagine) losses during their campaign before getting to Terra and began recruiting again on Terra, so I feel approx. 60,000 would be a  reasonable number for them

 

Blood Angels in Ruinstorm set out with 2/3rds of their fleet, plus losses in that book and fear to tread, I'd estimate maybe 65-70,000 on Terra

 

So my estimate puts that at 195-230,000 space marines on Terra

 

 

From Restorer short story we have "In solely numerical terms, almost all the defenders of the Palace would be drawn from baseline human regiments"

 

Considering is the human guardsmen number 1.5 million and legion around 200,000 I wouldn't call that almost all, so I think the human number need to be at minimum 5 million, preferably higher

 

Edit: changed short story name as i used the wrong one

[stuka06]

40k fluff has always had the issue of numbers that, on closer inspection, often don't hold up. 

We'll see how much thought they will put into the scale of the confrontation and if they generate numbers that would then match that scale, but  they have obfuscated certain sizes for good reason. With the wealth of illustrations over the span of decades, there are so many conflicting ressources on "facts" of the universe, that you can just pick and choose which numbers you like.

 

When you get to a scale of planets, relation often falls of a cliff. Think of Star Gate and how they "explored" new planets. Running around a country side in a 5 mile radius and if they find nothing the planet is obviously deserted even though they haven't even scouted the size of London. (Same with the "blockade" in Episode I)

Same thing with 40k and its conflicts. You could evade conflict with an entire chapter of Space Marines, holding down a planet, by just making planetfall 1000 miles a away. :cuss are they gonna do about it? Hike 1000 miles?

 

Sorry, got a bit side tracked. In conclusion: Disregard fluff numbers, aquire more models.

[Preliminary Bombardment]

That's one detail I liked about Gaunts Ghosts. The Sabats worlds crusades is presumably a business as usual one for the Imperium, and there are over a billion guardsmen deployed.

 

I hope they go ridiculously high numbers.

[Sothalor]

There's a bit in The Weakness of Others, where Khârn is ruminating on certain matters while he's burning down Legion shelters on Skalathrax:

 

"Backed into a corner amongst the bodies of our fallen brethren, he speaks of madness and betrayal. He curses me, the berserker champion who would strike down his own Legion once more.

 

Whelp-master. Who are you to doubt me?

 

I was the first to stand upon the walls of the Imperial Palace. I was the last to be borne away from Terra, my body broken by the slaying of one million of the Emperor's lackeys through the breach at Lions Gate. None shall ever surpass my count."

 

 

And bear in mind we have good reason to take this as a literal number: the context of this piece is Khârn watching a kill counter in his visor go up while he's mowing through Legionaries.

[Rolltonotdie]

I'm guessing the1.5 mil comes from the old fluff? The story that was printed in White Dwarf and later Visions of Heresy?  If so that's waaaaay outdated now, I wouldn't be surprised if its up to 10-15 mil mortal soldiers now (including, I'd guess, both Solar Auxilia and the Imperialis Militia).  I also wonder if the Cybernetica/Reductor forces are now going to be present as well? I can well imagine Dorn requisitioning any and all troops he can get his hands on under the logic of "if Terra falls how long will Mars last?" I think Kane would happily relocate troops to Terra with that threat looming, perhaps some Ordinatus Majoris would make it there too?

 

As for the Titan Legions, it could be three big legions with dozens of god machines between them. Perhaps we will see three full Titan Legions and a few Demi-legions, whoever was able to get through the storms? The Titan Legions would also bring their Secutarii hosts with them for more ground troops.

 

Also what about Knight housholds?  Some I would think would be travelling with the Titan Legions but I could maybe see a bunch of houses making it to Terra to fight too.

 

With all that said, the numbers of Horus' forces would also have to be inflated I'd expect although I don't think we were ever given concrete numbers of the troops Horus brought to Terra, its been a while since I read that article.

[StruManChu]

If they mention it at all, they'll likely retcon the 1.5 million guardsmen and 3 Titan Legions to be those present at a single battle during the siege, rather than the whole siege itself. 

[totgeboren]

If Khârn killed 1 million enemies at Lions Gate, I think they need to inflate the numbers massively.
Do we know how long the battle as Lions Gate was? If it lasted for two weeks, Khârn would have needed to kill about one enemy per second, 24/7 during that fighting. It is 40k sure... but that seems rather silly.

 

If they pump up the number of guardsmen to 1.5 billion that would be slightly more plausible, but that Khârn himself would be able to kill 0.1% of all enemies himself is still pretty daft.

[Sandlemad]

If Khârn killed 1 million enemies at Lions Gate, I think they need to inflate the numbers massively.

Do we know how long the battle as Lions Gate was? If it lasted for two weeks, Khârn would have needed to kill about one enemy per second, 24/7 during that fighting. It is 40k sure... but that seems rather silly.

 

If they pump up the number of guardsmen to 1.5 billion that would be slightly more plausible, but that Khârn himself would be able to kill 0.1 of all enemies himself is still pretty daft.

 

The quote does say "through the breach at Lions Gate" so maybe it means 'in all the fighting after the traitor forces took Lion's Gate'. The siege was roughly 7-ish months long and they took Lion's Gate right at the start so if we take this to mean Khârn killed a million dudes throughout (nearly) the entire siege... my numbers put that out as roughly one kill every ten seconds, assuming no sleep, no let up, etc, etc. It's an average so it should account for the times he chewed through an unfortunate army battalion and the times he spent a while dueling IF/BA/WS champions.

 

It's still ridiculous and I doubt it's going to hold up to serious analysis but it we're going to be literal... Say he boards and takes out a titan, which then falls sideways on some loyalists or something, that could put him 'ahead' for a while so to speak. Or seizes an AA battery and shoots down a gunship. Might ruin the point of him doing everything with a chainaxe though and might not count for the helmet tracker. A million kills in seven months is still ridiculous but... less ridiculous than a million kills in two weeks.

 

Those army numbers are definitely going to be boosted though, hopefully a hundredfold.

[Indefragable]

There were 1.5M guardsmen just on the walls of the Imperial Palace itself.

 

Boom! Tastefully retconned.

[Moonreaper666]

The books boosted the number of participants in Tallarn by adding Loyalist Space Marines

 

I thought Terra already has Trillions or over a Quadrillion people before the siege?

 

 

That doesn't include the people of Luna, Saturn, Jupiter, Pluto, Phobos and Deimos

 

 

The Sabbat Worlds Crusade had TRILLIONS of dead by the time it is over

 

(I think that was what engraved on the SWC Memorial/Tombstone)

 

 

 

I expect the Emperor's Children to kill several TRILLIONS on Terra

 

(Only way to traumatize Terrans so much that they still fear any Astartes up to 42nd Millenium)

 

 

Traitor Scout Titans should kill a Trillion Civilians on their own

 

(That is why the Mechanicus reorganized Loyalist Scout Titans, to be in pairs, after the Heresy)

 

 

The number of civilian, Mechanicus and Guardsmen death, collateral damage and numerous atrocities in this ONE battle should eclipse everything else in the Heresy!

[Marshal Rohr]

The place he’s pulling these numbers from has already been said to be retconned.

[MARK0SIAN]

Remember there’s the Titan Death event before the siege that Forgeworld is building up to, depending on where they go with that it could explain why the number of titans on Terra is less than you’d expect.

 

As for the infantry I agree, 1.5 million is way too low. But as others have said, 40k lore has always used numbers that don’t stack up. Like a single Guard regiment garrisoning a planet when realistically a single regiment couldn’t even hold down a small country.

 

I’m positive they’ll up that number in the final BL novels.

[bluntblade]

Would the BL be th strongest legion present? Following Fear to Tread, Sanguinius remarks that the legion, despit it’s losses at Signus, can still fight at more or less full strength (an unavoidably odd thing to say, after at a bare minimum 500 legionaries died) and that is not a claim the Scars or Fists can make.

Come to think of it, haven’t all of th traitor legions bled a fair bit by then as well?

I think you underestimate the extent of the expansion program the Fists implemented. Restorer implies that their numbers had grown massively, whether or not that makes up for the losses sustained during the Heresy.

 

I'm also pretty sure the same short has the Army deploying to Terra in the millions, like tens of thousands in every lander.

[Kizzdougs]

When Black Library started writing the Heresy series the Legions contained approximately 10k marines each... That was quickly changed to approximately 100k per Legion. There is no reason to believe that Black Library/Forgeworld won't do the same with the Siege of Terra. I'd expect at least a billion defenders at the Imperial Palace, probably many more.

[1ncarnadine]

Remember there’s the Titan Death event before the siege that Forgeworld is building up to, depending on where they go with that it could explain why the number of titans on Terra is less than you’d expect.

 

As for the infantry I agree, 1.5 million is way too low. But as others have said, 40k lore has always used numbers that don’t stack up. Like a single Guard regiment garrisoning a planet when realistically a single regiment couldn’t even hold down a small country.

 

I’m positive they’ll up that number in the final BL novels.

 

Beta-Garmon is also apparently a massive meat-grinder where both sides are unwilling to commit Astartes, so huge amounts of human soldiers are sent in. On top of being the Titandeath, this part of that campaign is literally called the "Great Slaughter." I think the Malcador audio released for the 2017 Advent mentions it, and there are a billion casualties a day.

 

So maybe there just isn't a massive supply of human military available for the Siege, as it ended up being eaten up by that terrible event at Beta-Garmon. I still expect you're right and they'll inflate the number from 1.5 million, though.

[bluntblade]

Restorer contradicts that quite bluntly, though that's a nice theory. The Astartes defenders are vastly outnumbered by mortal soldiers.

[Gorgoff]

There were 1.5M guardsmen just on the walls of the Imperial Palace itself.

 

Boom! Tastefully retconned.

Isn't the Himalaya the Imperial Palace?

That'll be at least 1.089.000 km²

So two dudes per square kilometer? Not so much if ya ask me.

Yes I know that you said "on the walls alone" but even that seems to small a number for manning those walls.

 

I hope for a truly massive count.