Hellebore said:

It's a strong idea, certainly - and one that I might adopt, as it fits nicely with the "legacy armour" principle I've taken to using with the Astartes (that is, that because any given suit of Astartes power armour is composed of pieces from other suits worn by now-deceased Marines, there's a history behind each component that the armour's new wearer is encouraged to commit to memory and honour; theoretically, the same could and perhaps should apply to any piece of enduring wargear). Together, these ideas work well to strengthen the bonds between warriors within a given chapter, by giving them a whole array of legacies to live up to, a complex web of connections to a previous generation where every individual attempts to honour the examples set by a dozen predecessors.

Hellebore said:

I know Hellebore, realized that the guy I RP with is Hellbrecht (you guys and you're levels of hell...), but is impressive none the less that your RP group took on said carnsoaur, sabre wolves, and arbitrators. That said, if you want to I can get into the biomechanics of cellular degredation, proliferation of G-Quadruplex division markers as per age of an organism increasing, the degredation of DNA as it is constantly copied, and the exponential increase in the chances of mutation (in Chi-Square or Bernoulli Test format if you'd like even!), but suffice to say I have quite a bit of knowledge in this field. Seeing as how you're on the BL boards too (odd that we've never run into each other... you a Fan Fictioner?) I'd recommend Carl M's thesis for reading. He and I came to the same conclusions about the function of Geneseed and are both, to make a horrible pun, biological scientists (well... let me rephrase that... we're both highly educated in biology, he's an Lt in the British Royal Army last time I checked and my day job is Computer Science, but that's besides the point) . That said, care to call it a draw with just a "feasible, though the effeciency is questionable"? .

Xisor said:

I don't make a song and dance of things... unless I'm out late at the pubs having one too many to drink. Have you been stalking me Xisor? I certainly hope not... that would mean you'd see the other things I get into when I've had one too many and that opens a whole new line of discussion ill-suited for this forum. Of course, it would be perfectly on-topic for this thread seeing as how it's about "siring" things and the like, but that's a whole separate issue.

Anywho, if you open the door to considering anything with the B/GW logo on it being canon... well... then all manner of hell breaks loose. See my ability to source things that directly contradict what the current incarnation of Space Marine initiation says. I can also go on a rant about the Emperor's Children possibly having the ability to impregnant via their living cod-piece and phallus daemons (Go go Ian Watson perversion powers!) thereby allowing them to "sire" their own marines, but I doubt anybody wants to go to bed with those images.

Your idea is fundamentally flawed, even if it is "top quality". If there is a "maximum absorbance" to a geneseed, then one of those two geneseeds wouldn't receive any kind of genetic material from its host, which is false according to lore (along with the fact that for there to be a cut-off switch like you propose would require the organ to lack its own DNA or surplant its own DNA, which would mean that it would absorb DNA from the already filled progenoid gland, which would mean that there'd be a process of recombination resulting in the genetic structure of the next generation progenoids to be stronger, which is false seeing as how it's always been noted in all publications and lore that the geneseed is getting weaker as time goes on). Therefore, visa vi, I don't particularly care for your idea and I blow rasberries at you in an annoying Monty Python-esque manner .

Personally, I think the idea of siring is a flawed on a psychological/sociological level as well. Let's say that we have a marine Chapter Master and he chooses some marine named Xisor as his heir because of the fact he likes the look of him. This Xisor though could turn out to be a horrible tactician who should not be allowed to command a sock drawer, much less a chapter, but he'll get command and thereby lead the chapter into horrendous defeat after horrendous defeat until he is mercifully killed or his men murder him in the middle of the night for being that inept. Then, converse side, let's say that there's a marine named Hellebore whose an excellent leader, well-respected, and the like, yet he can't become a leader of anything because his sire was a simple marine. That really hurts the command structure and the chapter's chances of survival.

There's also the wee thing that said Chapter Master would call resources in to save his "sire" Xisor whenever he got himself into trouble by wandering into ambushes and the like (which most likely is going to be a common occurence), which could end up causing whole parts of the line to falter in addition to them losing good marines like Hellebore, whose squad might not have any support to form a firing line when they need to retreat seeing as how Xisor blundered into an ambush and, his father Chapter Master abused his powers and called in all the support to see him safe or Hellebore's squad might be the squad to bail the utterly inept and impotent Xisor out of trouble causing Hellebore to die, since Hellebore, being an examplary marine, would be willing to heroically die protecting his comrades.

Then you have the whole idea of what happens to the "other son" and his geneseed. If you bestow upon their genetics the same privledges (after all, his "sires" and his "sires' sires" will be bearing the genes of a Chapter Master), then things become like the French nobility system where all children inherited the title, which results in there being a chapter filled with Chapter Masters after a while. And that's not even counting the whole idea of what's going to occur if both of the Chapter Master's sires die, genetic drift of negative traits, the chance for rejection, the chance for mutation, and the occasional traitor going over to Chaos.

::EDIT::
And by the way Xisor, before you get on my case about that whole "lacks DNA", what I mean by that is that it functions in the reserve of a virus (i.e. instead of injecting genetic strands into a host cell it instead absorb said host strands seeing as how it is empty on the inside). Also, don't forget you're making the assumption that there's no degradation within the contained DNA; i.e. it is going to statically continue to exist without any worries. You also are making an assumption with that, that, like a virus, it has no capability to inject DNA back into the host (i.e. that it is purely parasitic).

So, feel like paying my retainer now?

The Baron said:

Yes, thats what we call the hereditary feudal system. You owe your allegiance to a man because of who his father was and not due to any skill or individual merit. And while in the very long run, hereditary feudal Marine chapters might suffer in combat, they would be far from the only Imperial force of Lions led by donkeys.

My original point was that, yes the Imperium mostly operates on a hereditary nobility principal. Why shouldnt some of the Astartes too?

SJE

SJE said:

They shouldn't because it goes against the Space Marines' Modus Operandi. They're supposed to the best of the best of the best. They recruit only the greatest of tweens, they force their initiates to go through all sorts of trials that make the tween trials seem easy, and their scouts have to survive some of the worst conditions known to man to be allowed to become full-fledged marines; all of these steps being fatal and filled with dangers (they're tested to the genetic level physically along with being tested spiritually and mentally). There's a wee pattern here that boils down to the strong surviving and the weak being killed and eaten (i.e. natural selection). The whole idea of siring two "child" marines and them just instantly inheriting their position due to the fact that they were the lucky lottery number violates this in the extreme and, as said before, with the way genetic drift works eventually everybody in the chapter would be a Chapter Master sire. Plus if both sires are killed, the original Chapter Master's geneseed proves to be flawed, or said sires go over to Chaos (or really any combination of those)... then the entire Chapter is screwed.

If you proposed something like the Black Templars who pair their initiates with a "Mentor" full-fledged battle-brother marine, then I could see that. Mind you the whole reason that the Black Templars do this is because of the fact it means their initiates are a whole different level of toughness when compared to the other chapters' initiates seeing as how they've seen actual combat before becoming a scout. As can be imagined, the Black Templars go through many initiates lol. Though considering the fact that they're the most numerous chapter, there might be something to be said for that method of training. Also, it should be noted how that again goes to the theme of "strengthen the chapter so that we might defend the Imperium better... by any means necessary!"

If you're going to bring in survival of the fittest, it begs the whole question of sub-lethal effects and genetic drift, as not all competition is fatal. Discuss.

MDMann said:

Well, since I've gone into genetic drift... to put it simply: That's why 5% of the geneseed is tithed off to the Adeptus Mechanicus for testing. This way, if genetic drift produces a non-fatal, but undesireable mutation, they can quickly "deal with it" if you get my drift.

As for sub-lethal effects: With scouts and the like you have bionics and what have you. If you're talking initiates suffering sub-lethal effects... where do you think that the Space Marine chapters get their servitors/servants from?

I was thinking more along the lines of the unexpressed effects, or bioaccumulation of sub lethal effects leading to cascades in the genome. Since Marines probabbly send samples off in batches (requiring transport time, analysis and response [the Imperium beings noted for its glacial response times]) and the high rate of attrittion (at least periodically) within Chapters leading to hig turnover of progenoids; you could get some pretty diverse gene strands within the Astartes. So, what's the incidence of sub-lethal or unexpressed effects within the Astartes? It should be ossibble to work up some reasonable models.

MDMann said:

Finally somebody who speaks my language . MDMann, I think we are going to be best of friends!

How are your coding skills, my new friend? Given an hour or two (after I get done my current project of a Gotoh Algorithm Sequence Aligner) I could probably create us a simulation that would be capable of showing the effects of added genetic strands along with the slighter chance of rejection (remember, they only accept those whose chances of acceptance around >95%) and death (chances of that being... well, let's see... a marine fights in about 3-4 battles a month, those battles lasting from 12 seconds to 12 days... that's 48 battles a year, they have an average life expectancy of 500 years... so that means, on average, they survive 23999/24000 of their battles, which would be a (rounding down) .0001% percent chance of instanteous death, keep in mind this is on average and does not take into account wounded!). Death adding two new Progenoids into the fold, while rejection adding nothing. Ah yes, then there's the chances of fatal mutation, which I would have to dig up Space Marine to get a specific statistic for you on that.

Overall though, if you notice most of these are a chance of between <1% and 5% of something going awry. As for the accumulation of sub lethal genetic strands, which could have your infamous cascade effect, a thought occured to me: Some of those tithed genes are sent to be examined for "purity", while another group of them are sent for storage to be used in founding a new chapter. Whose to say that the First Founding Chapters haven't been sending a few of their good ones for the testing and then giving their barely passables for storage? This would explain how every second founding chapter becomes a bit more unstable than those that came before.

As for the sub-lethal/unexpressed, keep in mind that, as I mentioned before, any genetic traits added to their progenoids eventually is dispersed throughout the entire chapter, therefore bad traits have the potential to get "watered down" as time goes on by the infusion of good DNA or, pending how they handle the biological absorption process (i.e. If progenoids were designed "smart" as opposed to simply being viral agents in glandular form), there could be an overlap mechanism where specific alelles/strands and mutations of said alleles/strands are overwritten. Of course, don't forget about the affects of dominant/co-dominant/recessive alelles, along with the chromosome-specific ones (in this case, seeing as how progenoid glands are keyed to the Y chromosome, we have to worry about things like color-blindness affecting the entire chapter and the like, though I would presume that this would be one of their testing criteria), internal chromosonal phenotypical interactions (i.e. The differing genotypes affecting the phenotype through interaction with each other), and the possibility of the splicing effect possibly causing a total homogenization of the marine's genetic make-up... lots of factors to figure in there lol. Any ideas of yours?

My coding skills are fairly basic, but I'm working on them.

I thought the average life expectancy (baring battle casualties) of Marine was around 400 yrs (IIRC) gving a figue of <.009%, a whole order of magnitude of death! If you think about it though (on a related issue) this would make the Marines incredibbly k selected (more so than Homo sapiens!) which is bound to have some pretty intense societal impacts quite aside from the warior cultue.

It is an interesting idea on just which progenoids the Marines send where and for what. I imagine each Chapter makes its own decision, as the Apothercaries should certainly be able to pick up on most deviance. This would of course lead to some Chapters stacking the deck with what got sent where. Imagine if their was a mix up and the wrong set got sent off... the reprecussions (eventually). Mind you, it depends on whether the samples were segregated before or after the Marines despatched them.

On the chances of expressing colour blindness and other reccessive traits, surely this is less likely (being expressed on the y chromosone) as this would be expressed instantaneously (where it occurs) rather than hiding out reccessively. This would have a deleterious effect on survival in most cases (as colour blindness incresses the perception of shades within a spectrum, particuluarly in low light environments) reducing the survivability of the Marines, particularly given their intense competition. Of course, they still have their host populations to draw upon where this may not be a factor.

One thing that did occur to me is the (possible) incidence of imposex (particularly on Fenris ) with endocrine contamination (through the beer) resulting in secondary sexual characteristics paricularly with the massive tinkering going on (genetically) with the Marines I suspect this would have reprecussions for at least the Black Carapace (and deermal interface) and potentially others. It makes you wonder if it' only the moon those chapsare howling at...

MDMann said:

You know, it's funny thinking of color blindness: I realized that Space Marines are recruiting from Feral Worlds where, if somebody is color blind, they're most likely not going to survive. This probably severely limits the incidences of such things (and those who would survive on said Feral World are *THAT* smart or *THAT* strong that it makes up for it). By the way mate, I know it would express itself and seeing as how the Y chromosome is empty, but I was more using that as an example of the things we don't think of.

As for imposex... see the article about the dogs that go through it on Wikipedia. It tends to be a fatal thing to them as they develop their sex organs, thus we can assume that there'd be an occurence of fatalities before the indoctrination process.

Anyway, all that said... it certainly does have a societal impact. If you ever can track it down (it shows up once every blue moon on e-bay), buy Ian Watson's novel Space Marine. It's one of the greatest reads I've ever found and *THE* best description of Space Marines that the world has ever seen. Remember that this was back in the day before we had idiots in GW who felt the need to market to teens (because they have lots of free capital and we adults don't... oh yes, and teens aren't involved in violent activities, sex, or drug use at all either *rolls eyes*) and when the people who are in charge of Dark Heresy were in the boss seats (well, one of them, the founder of FFG is also one of the three founders of GW) , so therefore it's very different.

How different you ask? There are homosexual overtones in the book, the Tyranids are scarier than you could possible imagine, the Space Marines are genocidal monsters wrapped up in the cloak of "righteousness" and are totally unashamed of it, and they examine just what you have to be/go through to be a Space Marine (which boils down to a survivor who sees the Emperor/Primarch as death and destruction personified). oh yes, and there's actual latin in it! None of this pseudo-Latin that GW/BL force feeds us now adays!

All honesty, the culture differences are why I instantly shot down the whole feudal system idea for the Astrates. They're natural selection and evolution through the most brutal means possible incarnate. Therefore they're not going to go for anything that would possibly force the chapter to take steps back and whatnot.

I was thinking more regards humans and limpets with imposex, as it's fairly common amoungst both and rarely fatal. But what about those Marines who've decided to raise a stein too many, too often with a nont-quite kosha fixing process for the beer, particularly after all the implants (yes I see it being fatal too, at least post Black Carapace, which makes you ponder the Scouts... ). Besides colour blindness has competteive advantage in the right circumstances, much like sickle cells.

MDMann said:

Ah yes, the good old if you carry half a sickle cell gene then you're 100% immune to Malaria. As for imposex, I haven't really studied human cases, but I'll take your word that it's more common. In that case the huge injection of male DNA would either A) Finish the sex-change or B) Kill the person in fatal rejection. Either way, problem solved

In the real world, the church and its orders developed a doctrine of celibacy to avoid family entanglements corrupting church politics. The Church was OUTSIDE of the feudal order. Astartes are not nobility; they are monks. As such IMO hereditary "nobility" is a bad idea for them.

bogi_khaosa said:

... way to point out an obvious argument that we couldn't see bogi