Does anyone else here think that the Badab War books highlighted a interesting trend among the Astartes: for individual Chapters to become allied (both militarily, politically and culturally) with other Imperial organisations?

Consider:

• The Minotaurs and the High Lords of Terra
• The Sons of Medusa and radical offshoots of the Adeptus Mechanicus
• The Fire Angels and the Ministorum
• The Novamarines and a Rogue Trader dynasty
• The Exorcists and the Ordo Malleus

And then you have examples from other sources:

• The Red Hunters and the Inquisition
• The Iron Hands and the mainstream Adeptus Mechanicus

Now I'm aware of the feudal nature of the Imperium, and the tendency of Marine Chapters to operate in terms of pacts, treaties and the like. Say Forge World x agrees to tithe the Marine Chapter ten million bolt shells per year, and in exchange the Chapter will come to their aid in the event of invasion etc etc. That's pretty straightforward.

But what's interesting about some of the alliances between marine chapters and other Imperial organisations in the Badab war book is the suggestion that their relationship goes beyond mutual defence pacts. In virtually all of the examples from the Badab War books set out above, the Marine Chapters have extremely close ties with their Imperial "sponsor," not only carrying out missions for them, but adopting aspects of their belief system, political allegiance and/or cultural tics.

Bearing in mind that in many ways the Badab War books are among the most detailed examination of a large number of successor chapters produced in 40k so far, it actually seems that about half of all marine chapters have very close cultural and/or political ties to other Imperial bodies.

The normal image of marine chapters is that they are stoic and independent, apolitical organisations. In fact, it would seem that very often, the truth is that marine chapters are often highly political organisations, as prone to extremes of political thought and religious extremism as the rest of humanity.

This shouldn't really be a surprise: marines were originally human after all, and with power comes politics. I suppose that each chapter needs to be viewed not just in the context of its geneseed, military specialty etc, but in terms of its politics and how it intweracts with the wider Imperium. It is gratifying to see that there is another layer of nuance and complexity that can be added to the interaction between players in the game!

Quite so. You might even find that the more independant a chapter the more political it has to be.

There might be a good number that are happy to act upon the whims of the High Lords or the Munitorium in return for a steady supply of wargear.

But if they decide that they're dedication to the Imperium is more of alliance then they'll need to flex their own political muscle to get supplied with massive and varied amount of supplies they need. This might be fine for those who's own world is powerful hiveworld (although they might have trouble getting the more advanced technology) but trade would be an important weapon (a lucky few might have a small empire of their own).

But for Feral or deathworld chapter all they can really offer is defence, and that immediately is going to be called into question if they haven't left sufficient forces within range of the world to answer their call.

And where do the Imperial Fists lie. Do they own Inwit? Have ancient pacts with the Govenors of Necromunda? Do they own part of Earth, or are they strongly tied to the High Lords, or even the Golden throne itself through the Custodes?

Face Eater said:

In the old "Space Marine" book by Ian Watson, I seem to recall that the Imperial Fists had a fairly cosy relationship with the local powers that be on Necromunda; they would use local PDF/Enforcers to assist them in finding likely recruits. This suggests that you're right about the "ancient pact" thing.

As for the Imperial Fists' relationship with Terra, one imagines they proabably have a bit of a love/hate thing going on with the Custodes. The Custodes as a whole probably don't have too much love for the Astartes; after all it was an Astartes -led force which invaded Terra and crippled the Emperor. The Custodes are probably aware that any real future risk to Terra is likely to come (in one form or another) from the Astartes. After all, the only two full scale invasions of Terra (during the assault on Vandire and the Horus Heresy) were led by Astartes. So chances are the Custodes are highly wary of the Astartes. However, the Imperial Fists were probably well regarded (for Astartes) by the Custodes in light of their sterling service during the Horus Heresy.

One imagines that there was probably a fair bit of behind the scenes politicking between the Custodes and the Imperial Fists over the "Defenders of Earth" (Terra Defensor) status. As the Imperial Fists have now departed Earth, one imagines that if there was some sort of shadow war between the two, the Custodes won. I know it sounds odd to think in terms of two Imperial organisations warring over prestige, but...oh no, hold on, it doesn't, they do it all the time!

(There's no source for any secret conflict between the Custodes and Fists, but I think it seems logical that two such elite warrior institutions in one fairly conflined space probably didn't rub along too well together, even given the Fist's loyalty and the Custodes' diplomatic skils.)

EDIT: Or maybe I've got it wrong...after all, we're talking about alliances between Imperial institutions and Marine Chapters. Is there any better fit for a secret alliance than the Imperial Fists and the Custodes?

Lightbringer said:

To be honest I don't see that as being much of a trend and it still seems more like we're talking about exceptions to the norm that Chapters don't invovle themselves with the larger Imperium in this sense. So while there are certain Chapters that do involve themselves with other arms of the God-Emperor's realm I think that you can't really call it a trend since they seem to be in a very limited number but I am of course open to the possibility that I am mistaken.

Lightbringer said:

I haven't read the IA books about the Badab War although when I see what you are writing I become more and more eager to get my hands on those volumes and see what it is all about. Although to be honest Space Marines getting crazy ideas has a fairly long history in the Imperium.

Gurkhal said:

If you like 40k, and you are interested in Marines and how they operate, there really aren't any better books than the Badab War books. All of the Forge World books are good, but the two Badab War books are outstanding.

They're not DW books of course, (so don't expect any 40k RPG rules/crunch) but the writer, Alan Bligh, is a major figure in the 40k RPG scene, so I'm sure there will one day be some crossover between the 40k RPG and the chapters we see in the Badab War books...even though the war takes place nearly a century after the DW timeframe.

I've been tempted so many times to write up full chapter rules for various Badab War chapters for DW, but I struggle finding the time!

Lightbringer said:

This sounds great! Not because of the fluff but also because I won't have to wade through lots of rules to be invoked by players at various obscure times. Thanks for the tip! They're on my (large and growing ) "To get!" list.