Ideas to improve upon Primaris Marines lore

[Spaced Hulk]

I can't see GW killing off normal marines (lore-wise) while they're still selling the models for them. And they'll continue to sell the models until (a) people stop buying them in sufficient quantities, and/or (b) the moulds wear out, and not enough people are buying to warrant remaking them. Considering how old some of GWs plastic kits are which they're still selling (Khorne Berserkers, for example), I think we'll still be able to buy classic marines for a very long time yet.

 

That said, I think Primaris are going to be the focal point going forward. By that I mean pretty much all new marine kits will be Primaris, and I can see most old style marines eventually becoming web store exclusive, especially as the Primaris range expands.

 

I'd personally like to see them expand the lore so that some normal Space Marines, but (crucially) not all, can be 'upgraded' with the new Primaris organs. I'd love to see Primaris versions of some of the existing special characters, and possibly a box set of 'Enhanced Chapter Veterans'. It would be a good excuse to make Primaris scaled versions of older armour marks (for example a hybrid suit of Mark III and Mark X) and a wider range of 'relic weapons'.

 

RE: The Space Wolves not receiving Fenris born Primaris marines, perhaps it's a deliberate choice by Guilliman to try to 'tame' the chapter? Alternatively, perhaps by assigning all the Fenrisians to the new Primaris Chapters, he's hoping to ensure that their values and characteristics are enshrined in the new Chapters (making them true SW successors), while assuming any non-Fenrisians attached to the Space Wolves themselves will acquire said attributes by simple osmosis?

[Boldthreat]

I think 200 years is actually a long time, even when it comes to Space Marines.

 

There is an excellent thread where Apologist has an article that tackles the life expectancy and average age of the space marines at every stage of their career. It's fascinating stuff.

 

He also surmises that on average, a space marine army (he figures 250 marines) has 6 casualties a year. That factors to on average the average chapter loses 24 marines a year. 24 x 200 is 4800 casualties. Thats on average! I would argue that the 13th Black Crusade, Great Rift, Terran Crusade and Indomitus Crusade we're not average. Let's not even add the Plague Wars.

 

Codex Ultramarines states the average Astartes goes 3 centuries until he shows signs of extreme aging and retires to non combat roles. That is roughly in line with Apologists article. This makes sense, if you are only limited to 1000 warriors than you need to retire those that are slowing down (if they are lucky enough to survive that long) and replace him with another asset that maximizes your capabilities.

 

Case in point, Pedro Kantor is 350 years old. He has been the Chapter Master for already 100 years. Now we are adding 200 years onto that. Assuming he survives all the wars going on, he is well beyond retirement age.

 

Granted the Blood Angels are a different story. But let's think about this, with the Red Thirst and Black Rage, plus the disastrous war on Baal and who knows how many wars past that point... How many traditional Astartes can actually survive 200 years.

 

This is all just how my brain works out Space Marine lore. I don't begrudge anyone wanting legacy marines to stick around. I just want GW to further define why they are still here and rationalize it to me in a way that makes sense 200 years on.

[Robbienw]

There was probably very few native fenrisian recruits taken for the initial batch when Cawl started the project after the heresy. Over the millenia he would have had to go elsewhere for more lest questions where asked about where all the initiates where disappearing to.

 

Then the initial ones had the were the first into combat and are the least newbish, so gulliman needed to keep them for the indomitus crusade, so he gave the Terran newbs to the chapters to learn.

[FlamingDeth]

For those calling for a wholesale wipe out of characters, GW has already done this - sort of - as over half of the Chapters active when the Rift was formed are either confirmed destroyed or have not been heard from. That's a lot of dead Astartes, along with their characters. Granted, we may not know most of these leading lights as we only knew of a fraction of them from the fluff, but gone or missing they are.

 

~200 years is a blink I the lifespan of an Astartes, especially major figures/veterans who are notoriously hard to kill. Still, until a character is officially name-checked as still going, I'm treating them as gone to the Emperor's side.

That's missing the point a little, in that we all know a big ol' pile of marines are dead. The issue is all these already very old named characters somehow ALL surviving another 200 years of difficult campaigns. You'd think at least one of them would get killed along the way. Also, the space marine codex is already huge, by all accounts they should be removing some old unit entries to make room for new Primaris characters, or the next book is going to be even more ridiculous in size. They don't need to do it all at once, it probably could be done over the next few editions. As a Dark Angels player I volunteer Asmodai and Belial to go first because I hate their models.

[Felix Antipodes]

I'm not arguing they keep all of them; I am a big admirer of Apologist's view on the life expectancy of Astartes. I believe we will see some of the old guard go - when they finally introduce some Primaris characters. I do think most of the casualties will come from non Ultramarines Chapters though (which is ironic since they gave more than any other lol). They did make a step towRds this in the latest C:SM when they had Sicarius lost in the Warp, only for him to be back in Dark Imperium (novel) in what was probably a miscommunication between GW and BL.

[Felix Antipodes]

On the subject of the origin of Primaris SW; maybe Guilliman was aware of the Canis Helix issue and used all the Fenrisian born in the newly formed Chapters (ie Wolfspear) to give them the best chance of survival/avoid the fate of the Wolf Brothers.

 

I will be keeping an eye on whT they do with the new Terran-born SW and whether they ignore that particular elephant in the fluff.

[Panzer]

Realistically, yes, some of the named characters should definitely be dead by now. However killing them off would do nothing for GW and only make people mad. People are invested in named characters and their stories and it's also one of the few things the people who don't look forward to the Primaris future can hold on. Getting rid of them just for the sake of "out with the old and in with the new" is nothing else than spitting fans in the face. Probably not the intend but that's how people would feel. The actual supporters of such a move would be in the minority and the ones eyeing every move in GW in fear of them AoSifying 40k are in the majority for now.

Maybe in a few years when GW introduced new characters with their own stories and when those have been there for a while so people had time to get used to it. Then GW can start killing old characters off one by one. But such things take time and some of the characters are heavily involved in the current story (Dante as leader of the Empire on the other side of the rift while finally properly re-building Baal and being the one who had the Sanguinior appear to multiple times and even speak to him, Mephiston as a truly unique being with a mutated form of the Black rage who's getting soon his next novel where he tries to figure out what's happening to him, and multiple others). Their story is far from over yet.

[BitsHammer]

I apologize in advance if I'm retreading old ground but I'm running on four hours of sleep and couldn't get past page 8 before my eyes started to glaze over. In the interest of fairness I'm going to state that I'm very biased on the "pro-Primaris" side of things. The chunky goodness of the models has been part of it, but there is more I'll get into below as well.

 

I don't think Primaris lore needs "improvement" as much as it needs "expansion". We lack so much on how new Primaris are trained (are they raised as Scouts until they're ready to become full Primaris or at they just pushed into power armour like the legions of old?), how they organize since they don't really fit proper codex rules (I mean old codex, since I'm sure the new one outlines their roles and the like better but we haven't seen that fully expanded on) and more clear cut info on where all these guys came from. Are they all Crusade era recruits? Did Cawl regularly take in people from a wide array of times during the Imperium? How many, if any, were former Legionaries (and I suspect some due to the knowledge base some of the Primaris Ultramarines have about the old 500 worlds and them using it to talk planetary governors back under Guilliman's leadeship)? 

 

I mean it's vague enough (and may stay that way intentionally to allow us to craft our own stories with our armies, something I'm guilty of doing as I'm (until GW corrects me) doing up my Fists Primaris to resemble the old VII Legion and fluffing it as the Captain being a Legionnaire who was pulled out of the Iron Cage on the verge of death by the Ultramarines and covertly given to Cawl and wakes in the modern era fully converted to a Primaris and is running around the galaxy with a growing crusade in a search for Dorn) for people to craft stories with, but not specific enough to give enough to really realize those stories. It's like putting together a bookshelf and finding out half the parts are missing. Sure you have enough components to get something that basically can do the job, but with only some of the shelves there it's never going to do as well as it could do.

 

In the grand scheme of the Imperium I do feel like the Primaris are the next step for the Astartes. We know the Emperor has seen his sons as basically tools, and we definitely know that's his view on his military forces (Thunder Warriors were phased out for Astartes, and knowing the Big E there was likely a new line in the works somewhere as well) as the Astartes were weapons first and everything else second. If Cawl found a way to upgrade the old model into the new model (and some studio folk have mentioned at some cons that they'd like to Primaris some of the classic characters) then it's less of a replacement and more of just an improvement, but failing that we could have a Thunder Warriors 2: Super Murder Boogaloo in the works.

 

I fully understand the Big E was likely not fully involved in the project (assuming he had anything to do with even the concept), but with his track record of upgrading even the Primarchs themselves were likely not completely safe from being replaced, especially if humanity began to make that upgrade to being more like him and less like prey to the things of the warp.

 

Regardless we definitely need the next boot to drop. Be it the Lion or Dorn showing up and punching Guilliman in the gob for making Primaris and screwing up the Imperium with his changes during the Scouring, or be it the Primaris rejecting the Imperium for not being what the Emperor wanted, or any number of things. The story has only begun and while all the pieces are in place we need context to how this moves forward from here, which will likely be more in the hands of the Black Library guys than the studio. They're competing with 30 years of lore and no matter what are going to feel shallow in comparison, but the more fleshed out this all gets the better they'll fit into the setting as a whole.

[Sete]

How about some chaos Primaris marines? It's bound to happen.

[BitsHammer]

How about some chaos Primaris marines? It's bound to happen.

That's like asking if water is wet. I mean, sure, it's going to happen. We should be getting some loyalist renegades out of the mix as well (not a hard thing to have happen when you have hardline Inquisitors who censure chapters right out of the Imperium for rather minor charges most of the time).

 

The thing that shouldn't happen is us getting them because of magic fountains of blood and the like. Bile is a good method for taking Primaris and properly perverting it with daemon blood or who knows what else, and we could definitely see some who fall to Chaos due to the ruinous powers conspiring something (say, trapping them in the warp with a plague and forcing them to accept servitude or die, or gifting them rampant mutations that they're forced to hide only to have them driven out for other events, or the Black Rage coming back but even stronger than before due to their closer ties to Primarchs via the God Maker gland making them declared traitors when they fall to it and a force wipes out citizens and allies so brutally they're declared traitors and forced down a road to Khorne, ect, ect, ect. Yes, this is all me retelling was legions fell but I could see the new kids walking old paths due to their upgrades ultimately causing greater problems for them).

[robofish7591]

I have to agree with Fulkes, I would love it if the fleshed out some more background on the primaris.  I feel like we have so much lore for the old marines that we are a bit spoiled.  I would love it if we could see how a fully primaris chapter is organized and run.

[Ishagu]

Chaos Primaris would be very boring imo. Distinguish the traitors in other ways

[Sete]

Spikes?

[Brother Lunkhead]

I think Fulkes is spot on about filling out the Primaris lore..... we need more back story . I would also like to see more information on the force structure of Primaris chapters as well as how the Primaris are integrated into existing chapters. The force structure as explained in the current C:SM looks clunky and slap dash to me.

 

Some have also brought up the idea of a independent Primaris codex. I can see this happening in the future once the Primaris are more firmly established into the lore and rules, but for now I think C:SM as well as the independent chapters codices is the proper place for them.

 

As far as killing off existing characters goes perhaps it is time for a slow culling This doesn't necessarily mean eliminating them from gameplay.... Tycos of the Blood Angels is dead and I still play him (as company captain and in the Death Company as well). But, if they are killed off, I want it done with style and a good story

[Guest Triszin]

Chaos Primaris would be very boring imo. Distinguish the traitors in other ways

 

 

Spikes?

lets be honest here.

 

they wouldn't be " chaos  primaris"

 

They would end up being the monsters that Corax corvus made.

 

ALpha legion stole some of the data, im sure fabius has it.

 

so the old "emergency astartes" + some " primaris" research, means they could probably make something similar that corax made.

 

yes, those " monsters"

[Brother Lunkhead]

How about some chaos Primaris marines? It's bound to happen.

 

Fabius Bile breaks into Cawl's lab and steals the Primaris "secret recipe".....  ….. 

 

We always see Bile as the mad scientist trying to "improve the breed' with his evil chaosy science resulting in...… SUPRISE...… monsters  I rather liked the depiction of Bile in the HH as a more rational, scientist monster rather than the stereotypical mad scientist. Using traditional SM gene seed coupled with Cawl Primaris tech and chaos indoctrination, he could create proper chaos warbands galore. 

 

Sure, he was splicing and dicing even in the old days.... but after ten thousand years surely he can see that this alone doesn't work. Bile is the perfect foil for creating Primaris CSM's if done properly and with a modicum of imagination.

[Ishagu]

I'd prefer traitors empowered by Chaos and changed through the power of the warp, not just Spikey Primaris.

[Brother Lunkhead]

That too

[Sete]

I'd prefer traitors empowered by Chaos and changed through the power of the warp, not just Spikey Primaris.

So spikes and tentacles

[Guest Triszin]

I want chaos primaris. for emperors children and fulgrim alone.

 

Perfect primaris.

 

Perfect hair

perfect skin.

perfect mirror to look into

[Robbienw]

Are they all Crusade era recruits? Did Cawl regularly take in people from a wide array of times during the Imperium? How many, if any, were former Legionaries

None were crusade era recruits. Gulliman and Cawl formulate the Primaris plan sometime between the end of the heresy/start of the Scouring and gulliman being taken out by fulgrim.

 

None were former space marine legionaries. There is nothing to indicate it’s possible to make an existing marine into a Primaris marine, so at best they would have been legion recruits that were yet to have geneseed implantation.

 

Cawl must have taken recruits from other places, or it would have been noted over the millenia that recruits were being taking from first founding worlds and the project would have been discovered earlier on. Going by the numbers given in dark imperium and the amount of Primaris gulliman gave out to depleted chapters, Cawl must have had something like 100,000 to 150,000 of them on ice.

 

Also it is stated in the new SW codex that the space wolf Primaris marines they received from the indomitus crusade were not fenrisian, none of them. It’s suggested they were terran. I think the dark angel Primaris in the War of Secrets book were Terran as well.

[Robbienw]

How about some chaos Primaris marines? It's bound to happen.

Chaos Primaris will come, it’s inevitable. I don’t think it will be done soon though, give it a few years for things to bed in a bit.

[Panzer]

I don't believe chaos Primaris will happen to be honest.

[Sete]

Are you telling me that none of them will ever turn?

[Bjorn Firewalker]

I think "improved" Chaos Marines should have different stats, compared to the Primaris, e.g., Strength 5 and Attacks 2, but the same Wound 1 they had before- Bile had to sacrifice the "improved" Marines' endurance to improve their Strength, the way increasing an internal combustion engine's horsepower will decrease its mileage. This would force Chaos Space Marines players to use different strategies and tactics, making the game more "diverse" from a gaming POV, and distinguishing the Chaos Space Marines as more than just "Imperial Space Marines, but spiky and evil."