I thought that it may help us to understand nature of the Imperium and modus operation of the Rogue Traders in its service if we could imagine this unlikely event (and warning: I am big fan of the original BSG ending) .

So, imagine that there is a world out there in the vastness of 40k universe that is exact copy of our own XXI century Earth. Now imagine it is rediscovered by rogue trader Joff Zuckerman, hero of the Kynblax Genocide, in his huuuuuuuuge ship.

What happens? How does he approach our world? What he could want from us? Would he trade or just take what he wanted? What would the process of re-integration of this world into the Imperium look like? How Earth governments react? How all religions on Earth react when imperial missionaries flock in? Do they fight back? What happens?

Read Horus Rising. Sure, it doesnt have a Rogue Trader, but it does have a "earth like" world being rediscovered, and the aftermath.

Otherwise, watch Galactica 1980 and imagine Starbuck and Apollo not being so "nice" to earthlings.

My guess (using history and human nature as a background) is you could replace the title Rogue Trader with Conquistador. All humans who didnt embrace the new faith would be dealt with as usual for heretics. The ship would be unreachable for a conventional attack. The only hope for the Earth type planet would be to fly up to the ship and infect its computers with a virus .

Can you elaborate a little bit on Horus Rising?I probably wont read it just for the this kind of info. I hope that I am not asking you too much.

Necronis: Computer virus could just work but only if Will Smith is somehow involved.

Cat that Walked by Himself said:

Full scale military invasion "for the good of humanity" followed by the arrival of legions professional propagandists/missionaries to re-educate the population.

Cat that Walked by Himself said:

IMO, it would really depend on the personality of the Rogue Trader. They given an incredible (especially by Imperium standards) amount of freedom.

Possibility 1) Earth is a gold mine of technology, especially computer technology, some of which is argueably more advanced that the commonly available cogitators produced by the Mechanicus. So, the Rogue Trader arranges trade relations and returns to the Imperium with a hold full of laptops. He keeps the source of his newfound treasures a secret for as long as he can.

Possibility 2) Earth is rich world, but filled with heretical and dangerous beliefs and practices. Start with laser lance and torpedo strikes against large targets and follow by deploying our regiments of Guardsmen and allied Space Marine squads to seize key strategic locations. That could prove an interesting scenario, as the Rogue Trader ship would be unreachable and, with void shields, virtually impervious to Earths weapons, but the rank and file of the invading ground forces are (IMO) actually weaker than your average US army soldiers.

Think Haliburton and KBR if you must.

A Rogue Trader being first of all a Rogue Trader would most probably start by trying to trade valuable stuff like certain technology and precious materials all the while looking out for and evaluating military capabilities and for signs of obvious heresy (AI, Jehovah's Witnesses, freedom of expression, Grey's Anatomy in TV etc.). What happens from the on depends. Missionary advances by the Rogue Trader fleet or any follow up by the Ecclesiarchy would certainly lead to problems as I doubt the population of earth could be somehow converted to Imperial faith and herer the first hostilties would certainly ensue (most powerful nations on earth do not like any religion to arrogate any political authority). Maybe (or maybe not) Initiated by the Adeptus Ministorum a full scale invasion (of a sector wide degree) would follow within a couple of years. In this process scores of Imperial Guard regiments would land everywhere on ervery continent or at least were seats of bigger planetary authority is presumed, these would furthermore be backed up by a few thousand Adeptus Soroitas and orbital strikes from the Imperial Navy (taking out certain miltary and governmental targets). The invasion would last as long as it would last and would leave swathes of scorched earth During the invasion on shortly thereafter hundreds of Tech-Priests and Ministorum preachers would follow to do their 'duty'. I suppose it would only take a month or two from the first planetray landings of the Imperial Guard to the more or less 'complete pacification' of planet earth.

LuciusT said:

I doubt it. While you maybe right that the average US army soldier would be en par or better trained than most PDF troopers, a Cadian Shock Trooper and probably all other Guardsmen (ie. those from the Imperial Guard) would be better trained and equipped than any earth equivalent. (I hope I do not start one of these dreaded 'comparison-' or 'versus'-threads...though then Chuck Norris would round-house-kick the Rogue Trader out of orbit...).

I agree a regular guardsman is probably better trained than a regular US soldier. Especially on Cadia and quite alot of other worlds where they start a very young ages and stay in the Guard for most of their lives fighting enemies much greater than any the US army is going to fight, they have an excessive amount of combat experiance. Also fighting humans from outer space with laser guns and ships in orbit capable of anihalating anyone that puts up to much of a resistance would likely have a pretty devistating effect on moral.

Kaihlik

Luthor Harkon said:

As am American Soldier Id like to chime in here (he heh). We are very well trained, so well trained it can be scary. Course we make mistakes but at the pressures we work at, and the tempo of missions, what do you expect.

But most US Soldiers do it for 4-6 years and then move on. That was my problem with the IG TT army, very few units of real vets allowed. No real special tactics, and stat lines that make you think a guardsman has the worst marksmanship in the world.

Trust be told, all IG would be so well trained its sickening. Those that live for more then one "deployment" would rack in the "XP" in game terms. They would become hardened, jaded, death machines (still weak humans, but great skills) after several years of duty and action.

Tell me a Sergeant (according to the Dark Heresy rank/career system) isnt a bad ass. Now remember, there should be 1-2 Sergeants per squad. Thats about 1 Sergeant per 7-10 Guardsmen.

Thats scary.

Now they land on earth, and a earth sergeant isnt that high in rank (trust me, Im a earth sergeant).

Not pretty.

If IG heavy infantry in carapce armor were deployed they would be near to unstopable against most infantry weapons in service today.

The IG Armor(tanks) have yet to be mentioned. The weapons mounted on the armor of the IG are going to shred anyhting that gets in their way.

Then there are the Titans.

What would seeing even a tiny Warhound charging out of the smoke and fog of a battlefield do to the moral of any modern earth forces? Few weapons if any would be able to do any real damage. I could imagine some cities and even countries surrendering at the sight of one of the big Titans.

While I do believe that if Earth was confronted by the full might of an Imperial Crusade it would quickly fall, it seems very unlikely for several reasons. When the Rogue Trader discovers Earth he will likely be beyond Imperium Space and so the access to resources such as Titans or Space Marines will be zilch. this is because even if Earth is a litteral gold mine for untold riches, the conquistador in question will have a very hard time convincing the Administrum to pull large amounts of military hardware from the worlds they're defending just so he can claim one planet.

Now with no back up from the Empire, this so called conqueror will have to resort to his own most likely large band of miliary forces to claim Earth for his own. They'll probably be better equiped and trained than your average Imperial Guardsmen but he'll only have at most a several million being the max ground forces transportable by the largest ships in the Imperial Navy. He could have more ships with more forces, however the likelyhood of having more than a few warp capable vessels in a Rogue Trader's possesion is small. Still the number of enemies earth faces in a worst case scenario is less than a dozen million.

When discussing the so called to technological superiority of the invaders, you have to realize that the average tech ability of the Imperium is equal to our own barring obvious capabilities such as warp or teleportation. In some fields we're actually better. The most important of Earth's advantage would be electronic warfare as the Imperium has little to no defenses or experience against it. The Earth Military Forces could have easy access to Imperial formations and tactics, perhaps even neutralizing many of their automations from afar. Basic Rogue Trader infantry is most likely equipped with light carapace or worse, fielding a laser rifle as their main armament. While they would have better protection against indigenous projectile weapons and their energy weapons would cut through any modern armor, that does not make them invincible. Some things like armor piercing rounds and rocket propelled grenades would undoubtedly create harm, not even considering heavy weapons which would down right obliterate. Add to this the faction that they'll like be facing around a billion soldiers and many governments prepped for the seemingly inevitable nuclear conflict of the Cold War, and the situation for the Rogue Trader looks increasingly grim. Hell they might not be even able to land ground forces if the worlds air forces have anything to say about it.

This is all assuming the Rogue Trader immediately commences hostilities. If he tries to trade with Earth it gets even more favorable for Terra. By the time he decides Earth is beyond redemption as a civilization and seeks to conquer it, the various governments around the world will have most likely organized their forces it tandem and adapted their nuclear stockpiles for interplanetary strikes.

To cater to the story aspect of this all, it would be an interesting find by the Imperium to discover a planets of Nulls, perhaps to result of scientist during the Age of Strife seeking to eliminate the dangerous psychic gene.

One thing that makes it difficult to decide how it would work is that in comparison with the 40K universe ours is a calm sea of tranquility - ie no screaming ork or tryanid hordes, no extra dimenesional threats manifesting through the bodies of pyskers.

now if our world starting suffering one or more of these events then the arrival of a vast ship who has ways of protecting us maybe greated with open arms. Yet as each element of protection is matched with a requirement for,

laws on dealing with the awakened and dangerous psykers
payment in precious goods
a tithe of warriors to learn the skills so that might defend their world (and others)

so the world slips more and more into the compliant Imperial World.

maybe.......................

Da Boss said:

If our world was suffering these ills, they we would have been suffering them for a very long time indeed due to the 40k timeline. With such dangerous incursion our civilization would have fallen long before the Rogue Trader discovered us. If we are however discovered with the abilities the OP describes, then one can assume that we've long dealt with such issues as to prosper as a people.

Our world would most likely be one of many isolated worlds advanced enough to defend themselves and survive in an unfriendly universe. We'd quite plainly be too much of hassle to conquer.

LordMunchkin said:

Actually, lasguns are roughly equal to the autoguns our troops carry, apart from being more reliable. My understanding (and I admit I could be dead wrong) is that US army body armor (when our boys have it) is roughly equal to carapace. So, in personal weapons and body armor our troops and their are about equal.

LuciusT said:

Just to chime in on this debate about Imperial Guard vs Earth military, I would guess that in general, IG infantry troops are likely to have an edge against human forces of roughly the same size.

Remember, IG regiments are the elite regiments of their homeworld's military. They are the equivalent of the SAS, Spetznaz, Navy SEALS etc. Thus if you had 100,000 US army troops (to pick a nation at random) it's very unlikely that ALL 100,000 of them would be of the same calibre as all 100,000 Imperial Guardsmen in an equivalent size army. All IG regiments are elite compared to a relatively small number of elite forces on Earth at the moment.

Conversely, I would say most IG armoured regiments don't seem to have quite the same quality of equipment as modern world equivalents. Leman Russ tanks would appear to be inferior to just about every modern main battle tank in terms of speed, armour, armament, based on the Forge World books specs for them... they may have the edge in terms of reliability, though.

The same goes for aircraft: Imperial Navy Thunderbolts and Lightnings can operate from space (no modern aircraft can) but they don't seem to have markedly different performance capabilities to modern fighter aircraft.

However, I'd have to say it would have to be a VERY well equipped Rogue Trader who could afford to take on the equivalent of a modern planet Earth. I'd guess he'd need a full chapter of marines, 500-1000 regiments of Imperial Guard, a full Titan Legion and at least 5 or six substantial carrier craft to handle all the air support that would be required.

Lightbringer said:

I'm pretty sure no Rogue Trader has access to the materials that you've stated. The forces your talking about would make up a signifigant part of an Imperial crusade. In the 41st century I doubt the Imperium will want to invest so much in one single planet when they're dealing with awakening Necrons and a Tyranid invasion. The average Rogue Trader will have one ancient vessel of cruiser class and a thousand armsmen tops.

A few things to remember.

1) Rogue Trader resources vary tremendously. The most powerful have full fleets with contingents of Space Marines, Arbites, Inquisition and so on and basically a warrant to conquer for the Imperium. The weakest have a single small ship.

2) Game play numbers are massaged for fun games. The novels and the background material is where we get the real "in universe" performance of the gear. Lasguns deliver multiple megajoules with each shot. Bolters can shoot through steel walls. IG autoguns often use high caliber shells that are simply impossible for modern technology to use as an assault rifle. And so on and so forth.

Modern armour isn't equal to carapace. It's not even equal to IG flak. Cadian pattern flak uses ceramite insert plates and ceramite is a super material. Nor is Earth's computer technology anything comparable to the higher level of the Imperium's. Don't confuse their taboo against artificial intelligence with the inability to produce advance computer systems. Just because they call it a "machine spirit" doesn't make it any less capable.

3) 40K space weaponry is usually in the megaton and gigaton range. Execution Hour has megaton level flak bursts from defensive turrets. While that leaves open resistance movements, guerrilla warfare, and so on any large scale gathering of military force can be but on the receiving end of Death from Above.

Cynical Cat said:

1) Yes the very, most powerful have small fleets though I highly doubt they have one comparable to a sector fleet with hundreds of vessels. Most Rogue Traders have only several small cruiser class starships at their dispossal. This means they have less than a hundred thousand souls under their command, hardly enough to occupy a planet of Earth's tier for even a short amount of time. I don't know we're your getting the Inquisition and Arbites from, but yes they'll a contingent and not a full regiment of Imperial Guardsmen aboard their ship. Very rarely do they have anything else, god forbid Space Marines. Especially if they trafic xenos or their products because just can't see Space Marines serving with a Rogue Trader that isn't as pious as them.

This all means that Earth will be facing a few thousand Imperial Guardsmen on average, not the mini-crusade you're suggesting.

2) I have to agree somewhat with the armor issue but I still believe Earth Miltary Body Armor is far from the paper you describe it as. Many of the newer types such as Dragonskin are recorded stoping high caliber sniper rounds and even direct hits from grenades. While they may be of little use against energy weapons such as the las rifle, they stand a decent chance of stoping Imperium autogun rounds.

Also I believe the computer systems of the Imperium are very primitive and they're systems easily compromised. In fact many of their enemies such as the Enoulins in the Creatures Anaethma take advantage of this to even the odds against the Imperiums numbers. They're technology is needlessly complex do to their failure in many cases to understand it, meaning they have miniturization capabilities of an early industrial society. I think Earth's Military would have little to none difficulty in cracking their systems and causing untold amounts of damage.

Just to prove they are misguided in their understanding of technology is the fact that they refer to even non-powered technology as having a machine spirit. To them cleaning the barrel of a gun is appeasing some entity within the item.

3) The Imperium is a slow beast, easy to misdirect and outmanuvere. Hell they self load they're starship batteries through massive amounts of slaves. By the time they level the guns against a target, they'll have been struct ten fold by they're enemies. Not even the admantium hull of an ironclad can withstand the might of nuclear warheads in mass.

Another thing you're forgetting is the stealth aspect of many of today's militarys. The Imperium is used to open, brutal combat and when they are hit hard by enemies who have experience with mass stealth warfare, they tend to respond with more force. Only this time it is but a Rogue Trader in control and he does not have infinite forces and he cannot just request more soldiers from the Imperium which might I remind is in it's death throes by the 41st century.

I think a lot depends on the individual charter held by the Rogue Trader.

If their charter says "Go forth into the unknown and reclaim or conquer planets for the Imperium of Man, in the name of the Emperor!" I would imagine they have, at minimum, a full battlefleet under their command. How else could they possibly be expected to be successful in bringing the Emperers Holy Light to the dark reaches of the void?

Modern Earth body armor is designed to stop solid projectiles not las gun rounds.

The Imperiums computer systems are all organic based. Every cogitator has human bits or liquids in it somewhere. I have a feeling that the organic components could cause a few issues with Earth programmers understanding what they are seeing and doing. It's not going to be like Star Trek where everyone instantly understands how an unknown alien species ship controls work.

The nukes would have to get through the void shields before hitting the hull of any ship.

Stealth could be argued in favor of Earth. You can also argue that the Imperium and their enemies tech is so advanced that they rendered themselves back to brutal meat grinder tactics because only the most advance stealth tech and warp sorceries work against their auspex. For all we know a rhino could be invisible to Earth radar even though they show up easily on the most basic of auspex units.

I guess it really boils down to how quickly you want the Earth to get rolled by the Imperium.

ItsUncertainWho said:

The average Rogue Trader only controls one ancient cruiser class vessel and several small ships. Most cruisers in the Imperium have five thousand to twenty-five thousand crew plus the capability to hold half as much passengers. They don't just go into the wild and start wars with advanced civilizations. What many people don't realize is that they are conquering nay some would call it civilizing small isolated bits of humanity, mostly feral worlds with some feudal mixed in. With any other worlds, they simply don't have the resources. They are not admirals in the Imperial Navy and they can't just warp to a fleet base and request an armada to conquer some half assed world in the middle of nowhere.

Also their tech doesn't have some magical quality that allows makes it impervious to damage. The Imperial Guard Lemann Reuss are primitive if reliable pieces of equipment, not super war machines more akin to the Dark Age of Technology. Keep in mind that the Imperium is in a state of regression and though have many wondrous machines, these examples are very rare, cannot be replicated, and are slowely being lost to the wear of time.

Mass stealth warfare is an enigma to the blunt forces of the Imperium. Indeed during the war of Armageddon, it was a relatively new concept to fly specially fitted Thunderhawks on nightruns against the Orks. Instead their reliance on the near limitless human elements of their military has stagnated their tactics to point of 18th century equiviliants.

Finally on the issue of organically controlled technology, most vessels of the Imperial Navy are not run by built in servitors but by crewmen. These so called "advanced ships" might be likened to nothing but floating rowboats in space, most basic function presided over by humans thus leading to their enormous crew demands. What little advanced technology they have the ship will be primitive in nature relying on a constant human prescence. This weakness of course leads to many flaws such as low reaction time and inefficiancy.

Nukes damage void shields and deplete them. Let's not get carried away and start thinking their impervius to damage.

Cynical Cat said:

Out of curiousity, where are you getting this because it bears no resemblance at all to what I get out of the background material.

LuciusT said:

It doesn't say that anywhere I know. In fact it the fluff says autoguns are quite primitive, being easily reproduced on frontier worlds. Even if IG autoguns are as ridiculous as he says they are, modern body armor such as Dragonskin can negate high caliber rounds such as those. With modern materials you could even build a las resistent vest. Also while a bolter can obliterate a man, so can a RPG. Doesn't seem so powerful now eh?

Another thing I'd like to talk on is the tactical inferiority of regular IG troops compared to Earths. In the Imperial Guard, soldiers aren't encouraged to think creatively and that even can sometimes kill them if it's seen as cowardice by the commissars. Modern armies woul have much more sense and wouldn't rely on spam to win the day.

LordMunchkin said:

All over the place. Autoguns are primitive . . . .by the standards of the far future. Third edition Codex lists one with 12mm rounds. I'm sure I don't have to explain how that requires tech better than we have now in an assualt rifle. Body armour doesn't "negate" high caliber rounds. Dragonskin is impressive in what it can stop, but the momentum of the round is still passed to the body and can cause injury and death despite it not penetrating the armour (best exemplefied by the mace versus mail effect). As for bolters, you don't think a man portable autofiring RPG with ammo around the size of your finger is impressive?

Rogue Trader specifically mentions numbers and stats are generated with the interest of having fun gameplay, not "in world" accuracy.

Storm bolter penetration through six inches of steel is from "Space Hulk" fluff.

The City fight game specifically says standard weapons can shoot through walls, but rules for that aren't included to keep game play simple and fun.

Lasgun damage is calculated from a number of novels, mostly vaporization incidents.

Imperial Armour, volume five, mentions an .825 caliber autogun with a cyclic rate of 650 rounds a minute and a 30 round magazine.

Caves of Ice has a nice vaporization incident which means a melta gun puts out at least 25 gigajoules of energy.

I could go on and on. Here's a link to a grand quantification thread and the math that goes with it.

http://bbs.stardestroyer.net/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=123079

As for IG regiments, they vary greatly in skill and training. Gaunt's Ghosts, for example, are long service veterans used ot independant actions. Cadians are trained since childhood. And on the other end of the spectrum you have pressganged hiver scum. The Cadians and Ghosts are equal to or superior than just about any fighting force when it comes to skill. The hiver scum are at least under Commissariat discipline so skill and discipline wise they nicest thing you can say is that their better than Third World Armies.

LordMunchkin said:

It should be remembered that the Leman Russ is "primitive, if reliable" compared to the standards of the 41st Millennium, not compared to us. The Imperium may be in technological decline... but their technology is still often built using an understanding of physical laws that dwarfs our own. It might be simplistic, but the Leman Russ can operate in any environment with little difficulty (and by any environment, I include environments that aren't present on Earth), run using essentially any fuel with minimal variation in performance, can be constructed swiftly and in great numbers in a wide range of armament configurations, and has served as an effective main battle tank for more than ten thousand years of conflict (it's an STC design; it predates the Imperium and originated during the Age of Technology, much as the Chimera, Rhino and Land Raider all do), in billions, even trillions of campaigns across the galaxy, against enemies the likes of which there are no contemporary comparisons.

I think, by any standards, the Leman Russ is a solid, dependable and entirely functional main battle tank...

LordMunchkin said:

Yet, on the other side of it, the Imperial Guard regularly employ stealth tactics with scout/light infantry regiments and recon forces, as do the Astartes with their scout squads. The armed forces of the Imperium are vast and diverse... if there's a tactic that encompasses it, the Imperium probably uses it somewhere.

LordMunchkin said:

All that in mind, however, a Lunar Class Cruiser is still a 3 mile long warship capable of laying waste to cities with minimal effort.

As for primitive... yes, because artificial gravity, 300m long plasma torpedoes, directed weapons capable of punching through several metres of void shielded armoured hull, void shields, the tools required for interstellar travel are all so crude and beneath the consideration of our early 21st century civilisation... primitive is definately relative here.

LordMunchkin said:

Yeah... thing is, any machine of war large enough to warrant void shields is generally well-armed enough to flatten their opposition, and tend to be equipped with multiple redundant layers of void shielding.

You want to fire nukes at an Imperator Titan? Be my guest - you'll just make it angry. And they're small and lightly armed and armoured compared to, say, a Cobra-class Destroyer.

Beyond all that, the Imperium has one very significant advantage - they don't play nice. We have all sorts of treaties and agreements and international laws regarding warfare... the Imperium doesn't. The Imperium of Man regularly contends with enemies who are far deadlier individually than human beings, who are entirely merciless and not at all adverse to the idea of human extinction... consequently, the armed forces of the Imperium tend to be that little bit more ruthless than contemporary armed forces... and that's putting it lightly. If you think the Imperium is ruthless towards its own men, consider how utterly without pity it'll be towards the enemy, even if those enemies are other humans. Earth is, afterall, populated by a mere six and a half billion heathens with an improper familiarity towards technology and a disgustingly tolerant mindset, when considered by the standards of the Imperium.