The Covenant (Halo) vs The Grand Imperium of Man (Warhammer 40k)

[ChaosLord29]

This is more to settle an argument between some me and a mutual friend, who for some reason doesn't understand that this would be a complete blowout. Admittedly, he's a huge Halo fanboy, and I doubt he's delved even a little into the Warhammer material I've provided him, but seeing as I'm almost an equally huge WH40k fan (I have played all the Halo games, including the RTS), I want to make sure I'm not being totally unreasonable here.

Do the Covenant, the alien menace of the Halo Franchise, even stand a chance against the arrayed forces of the God Emperor of Mankind?

I think it's at least an interesting question given how many parallels can be drawn between Halo and WH40k (I think you can even make an argument that the Adeptus Astartes more or less inspired the Spartans, as much as any other games space marines). I maintain however that in any armed conflicts, the filthy xenos worshiping their alien gods do not stand a chance against the Imperium's finest.

Why?

Sheer overwhelming logistical strength on the part of the humans. It's true that the ungainly Imperium stretches thousands of worlds and faces so many threats that it's combined might cannot ever be brought to bear against a single foe, but assuming the Covenant ever launched a major campaign against an Imperial sector, they'd be facing down forces in a scale we've never seen in the Halo universe (even the books).

Again though, I want some opinions from the Halo supporters our there in the Playground. What are the largest feats of military might we've ever seen the Covenant launch (Reach is the greatest battle I can think of) and can they even hold a candle to the deeds of a single Space Marine Chapter?

[Emperor Ing]

The Imperium has over 10,000 years of experience in fighting every known alien threat....yeah. They're good at it. I mean, we can look at their most basic weapons. The Lasgun. It is a laser rifle that, with a single shot, can punch through armor, decimate modern armors, leave head-sized holes in concrete, and leave targets a particularly bloody and cauterized mess, all in one shot. Doing about the equivalent of a modern-day .50 cal rifle with almost no recoil, and as a medium-long range semi-automatic assault rifle.

And that's among the Imperium's weakest weapons, hell, the weakest gun in the setting, arguably, having earned the moniker "flashlight."

So what do the Covenant have? Essentially extremely scaled-down versions of Laspistols, with the only troops able to do anything of importance against a squad of Guardsmen being deployed as special forces or squad leaders. Effectively, we have 10 grunts, 1 elite, and maybe 2 or 3 jackals against a squad of Imperial Guardsmen armed with the equivalent of rapid-fire UNSC Sniper Rifles. Now whether or not Flak Armor is any better than UNSC Trooper armor is open to argument.

Now consider the fact that Guardsmen are considered expendable, and it is the tactic of Guard commanders to drown their opponents in bodies. Also consider the fact that the Guard has access to the best tanks in the setting.
Essentially, what the Covenant are up against are a rampaging tidal-wave of humans who are, individually, actually more potent than their opponents, and ABSOLUTELY HATE THE COVENANT'S GUTS backed up by vehicles and tanks the Covenant has no defense against. Bolters, AKA Automatic Rocket Launchers, are standard-issue mountings for the Omnissiah's vehicles. And that's only a secondary/sponson mounting.

Now this is for the ground war only, but I seriously doubt it'd be at all different in space, with ships that can fire shells that 40k novels have literally described as "apartment-building-sized."

TL;DR, yeah. TOTAL blowout. Honestly I think all the Imperium needs to wipe out the Covvies are a Battlefleet and a few Guard regiments. If the Astartes get involved, let's just say Khorne will be pleased.

[HandofShadows]

The Imperium from Warhammer 40k would win and probably not have to work to hard to do it. That is of course Chaos or the Tyranids, Orks or Necrons didn't eat the Convent first. :smalleek:

[ChaosLord29]

Now consider the fact that Guardsmen are considered expendable, and it is the tactic of Guard commanders to drown their opponents in bodies. Also consider the fact that the Guard has access to the best tanks in the setting.

I think that's a point worth considering right there.

Everyone here has played Halo right? Remember how you are pretty much invincible every time you hop in a Scorpion? That's why the levels with them are so few and far between, because as long as you're in the tank, the only thing that's even remotely a threat to you is a Scarab.

Now consider that the Scorpion looks like the equivalent of those early WWI rolling canons compared to the Leman Russ, whole fleets of which can be deployed by even modest Imperial Guard Legions.

So, if Master Chief in a Scorpion can plow through entire Covenant battalions, I think it's pretty safe to say that a lone Baneblade could wade through a Covenant army like so much shallow water.



TL;DR, yeah. TOTAL blowout. Honestly I think all the Imperium needs to wipe out the Covvies are a Battlefleet and a few Guard regiments. If the Astartes get involved, let's just say Khorne will be pleased.

If I'm crunching the numbers right, a couple of Imperial Guard regiments should work out to at least a 100,000 soldiers, and upwards of half a million if the planetary governors and sector commanders deem such numbers necessary. Complimented by a Battlefleet of between 50 and 75 capital and support ships . . . You know, I could be convinced that the Covenant could maybe take an Imperial Sector if they caught them unprepared or under-strength.

But as you said, it is at that point that the Adeptus Astartes will almost certainly be called in, and with them comes death on swift wings.

[Starbuck_II]

Covenant has Shields. And I mean all there troops have shields (as in Force Shields surrounding body), remember, Legendary is the true setting.

40K has armor, but not shields, so I think Covenant stands a chance.

[Lord_Gareth]

Covenant has Shields. And I mean all there troops have shields (as in Force Shields surrounding body), remember, Legendary is the true setting.

40K has armor, but not shields, so I think Covenant stands a chance.

Those shields can be blown through or worn down by modern-equivalent weapons (slug-throwers and automatics) and are essentially wholly ignored by armor-piercing rounds (Sniper Rifles). The Imperium of Man doesn't use modern slugs. They use high-concentration lasers and bolters (miniature, fully automatic rocket launchers). Those aren't shields as far as the IoM is concerned. They're fashion statements.

[ChaosLord29]

Covenant has Shields. And I mean all there troops have shields (as in Force Shields surrounding body), remember, Legendary is the true setting.

40K has armor, but not shields, so I think Covenant stands a chance.

Ummm, only the Brutes and the Elites are equipped with shield generators, and even those are clearly vulnerable to standard solid slug munitions. The standard weapons of the Imperium are energy weapons (which are more effective against shields, as per the Halo universe), and miniature, full-auto, rocket propelled grenades. If a standard Halo caliber machine pistol or battle rifle can take down shields in a matter of seconds, I'm pretty sure the 40k weaponry should be able to do the same, if not better.

That's not counting the special or heavy weapons that Space Marines and Imperial Guard units have access too. The Halo Plasma rifle is the equivalent of an energy based uzi. The 40k Plasma rifle can melt through tank armor and vaporize individual soldiers.

Also, 40k Imperial troops do have access to shield technology. It's not generally considered battlefield portable, and is generally only used on ships, but Terminator armor has a built in void shield generator, and IG commanders have access to personal shield generators as well.

Edit:
I was wondering why we don't really seem to see shield generators mounted on vehicles in either Halo or 40k but then I realized that 40k at least does have ground based vehicles equipped with void shields: Titans.

The smallest Imperial Titans are the size of Scarabs, and while they're not generally found amongst IG Regiments or Astartes Chapters, you can bet any Imperial Sector worth its salt will have a few Titan Legions to throw at any xenos threat sufficient to warrant their intervention.

So you figure the Imperium should be able to throw together maybe a few dozen Titan class walkers at the Covenant. Warhound Titans (http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Warhound_Scout_Titan#.UFD3-Y1lQf4) are comparable to Scarab's in size, but they're considered the scout class of Titan, the standard troops of a Titan Legion being the Reaver and Warlord class Titans, which have no equal in size or scale or potential for destruction within the Halo Universe.

[Emperor Ing]

. . . You know, I could be convinced that the Covenant could maybe take an Imperial Sector if they caught them unprepared or under-strength.

I really think that might be a stretch, unless they bring their entire force into it, this means High Charity and all their various armadas, and the stars must align in their favor. That means the Planetary Defense Force for all those worlds are totally useless (as they usually are,) Guard regiments are either off-system or underpowered, and there are no Spess Mahreen homeworlds in that sector. At best they MIGHT be able to take a subsector, but it wouldn't be long before, say, the Mordians or Catachans come in to curb-stomp some Elites.

Really the only vehicle of note that the Covenant have is the Scarab, but let's face it. It's only got one serious weapon, and against a moving target it's not that effective. Compare that to our favorite mac-mansion sized tank and it's 11 barrels of hell. Using a Warhound Titan against a scarab would be serious overkill, i'd say a Leman Russ or possibly even a Sentinel with a Lascannon and a bit of patience is all that's necessary to take those things down.

[ChaosLord29]

I really think that might be a stretch, unless they bring their entire force into it, this means High Charity and all their various armadas, and the stars must align in their favor. That means the Planetary Defense Force for all those worlds are totally useless (as they usually are,) Guard regiments are either off-system or underpowered, and there are no Spess Mahreen homeworlds in that sector. At best they MIGHT be able to take a subsector, but it wouldn't be long before, say, the Mordians or Catachans come in to curb-stomp some Elites.


For the sake of argument, let's assume we're dealing with two comparable forces at their best possible strength. So, that would be the entire Covenant Fleet assembled around High Charity invading an Imperial Sector with a dozen or so full strength IG Regiments, a few Battlefleets who have been tasked with the repulsion of the Xenos threat, and at least one Space Marine chapter with the majority of it's companies assembled. Oh, and of course an Inquisitor of the Ordo Xenos witih his retinue.


Really the only vehicle of note that the Covenant have is the Scarab, but let's face it. It's only got one serious weapon, and against a moving target it's not that effective. Compare that to our favorite mac-mansion sized tank and it's 11 barrels of hell. Using a Warhound Titan against a scarab would be serious overkill, i'd say a Leman Russ or possibly even a Sentinel with a Lascannon and a bit of patience is all that's necessary to take those things down.

I'm willing to cut the Covenant a little slack where Scarab's are concerned. I played the Halo RTS and let me tell you a Scarab Walkers tear their way through UNSC vehicles like tissue paper. Considering that 40k is basically the Dark Ages with Super Science technology, I'm willing to say the Scarab could pose a serious threat even to most of standard Imperial vehicles.

Problem is, it's the only serious threat I can think of, and Scarabs are pretty rare. Focus fire from a trio of Leman Russ Battle Tanks would be more than enough to take it down I'm sure (that much faster if they've got Basilisk support, which they will). It's maybe a match for a lone Warhound Titan, but seeing as how they're employed in scouting pairs and supported by the larger titans . . . it doesn't look good.

The Covenant Ghosts and Banshees might do a lot to harass an IG regiment's flanks, but seeing as how they can be gunned down with concentrated small arms fire . . . Well, they're basically open topped vehicles with an armor value of 7 or 8 (lower than even the lightest vehicles in 40k).

[Emperor Ing]

I'm willing to cut the Covenant a little slack where Scarab's are concerned. I played the Halo RTS and let me tell you a Scarab Walkers tear their way through UNSC vehicles like tissue paper. Considering that 40k is basically the Dark Ages with Super Science technology, I'm willing to say the Scarab could pose a serious threat even to most of standard Imperial vehicles.

Problem is, it's the only serious threat I can think of, and Scarabs are pretty rare. Focus fire from a trio of Leman Russ Battle Tanks would be more than enough to take it down I'm sure (that much faster if they've got Basilisk support, which they will). It's maybe a match for a lone Warhound Titan, but seeing as how they're employed in scouting pairs and supported by the larger titans . . . it doesn't look good.

The Covenant Ghosts and Banshees might do a lot to harass an IG regiment's flanks, but seeing as how they can be gunned down with concentrated small arms fire . . . Well, they're basically open topped vehicles with an armor value of 7 or 8 (lower than even the lightest vehicles in 40k).

Concentrated Slug fire in Halo can kill a Banshee. A few shots from the Sniper Rifle, say...3, can outright destroy a banshee. I seriously don't think they'll be able to do much other than make extremely quick hit-and-run tactics. All the Guard would need to do is get a few solid Lasgun hits and BOOM! Instant dead banshees. The same can be said for ghosts, though they're in an even worse situation since they aren't airborne. I have far more confidence in Phantoms and Spirits being able to harass guard lines, of course this is assuming that there aren't any tanks, Heavy Weapons Teams, Sanctioned Psykers, or someone with a Bolter immediately available.

As for Scarabs, I can see its main gun being able to destroy a Leman Russ, but let's be honest: The projectile is slow-moving and easy to avoid, with a dissapointing lack of AOE to compensate. Guard and Tank commanders will eventually catch on to this, and learn to fire their tanks on the move. A Warhound Titan is redundant, all that's needed is concentrated Battle Cannon fire, Demolisher Cannon fire from a Baneblade, or a Basilisk/Manticore bombardment.

And I think you're forgetting the sheer over-the-top-edness of 40k. The Imperial Guard is NOT the UNSC forces. Each Guardsman is zealously devoted to the omnicide of all non-human sentient races, and equipped with weapons that put half of the UNSC arsenal to shame...and that's just standard issue. I have no doubt a single guardsmen could gun down an Elite without much difficulty (though the energy uzi might do some hurtin' too)

You are right in the OP when you said it's a blowout, but i'm not sure you truly appreciate how massive a blowout it would truly be. With the scenario provided, it's pretty easy how the battle goes. The IG holds the planet without much difficulty, the Marines send a single company, possibly a Terminator Boarding Squad in to destroy High Charity from within, and they succeed with the Covenant being powerless to stop them, and their fleet is decimated by a huge Imperial armada of ships that are built to deal with threats of far greater magnitude than the Covenant could ever hope to bring.

[ChaosLord29]

You are right in the OP when you said it's a blowout, but i'm not sure you truly appreciate how massive a blowout it would truly be. With the scenario provided, it's pretty easy how the battle goes. The IG holds the planet without much difficulty, the Marines send a single company, possibly a Terminator Boarding Squad in to destroy High Charity from within, and they succeed with the Covenant being powerless to stop them, and their fleet is decimated by a huge Imperial armada of ships that are built to deal with threats of far greater magnitude than the Covenant could ever hope to bring.

Yeah, I thought I'd play xeno's advocate here for a while and take up the conservative view, but at this point it's hard to argue the Covenant could take on a single planet, let alone face down the combined might of a single sub-sector brought to bare.

I don't give much for the odds of IG surviving, but they're so numerous and their weapons vastly outstrip those of even the Covenant themselves, it's difficult to think of the Covenant having much luck with an offensive. If Spartan IIs and IIIs are any indicator of how effective Space Marines would be, I think you're right. A single Chapter's Terminantor Company could more or less obliterate anything the Covenant threw at them, and seize or destroy any ship or craft they happened to teleport inside of an hour.

Factor in the the Covenant likely have no way to defend against the attacks of Sanctioned Psykers and Space Marine Librarians and they're really just completely outmatched in every category.

As a final testament to the sheer scale by which WH40k overwhelms the covenant, and to settle the matter of ship superiority once and for all, I post this comparison. A Covenant capital class ship is about the size of a small city and crewed by a few thousand Covenant. That's about the size of a small frigate or system defense ship in 40k terms. Imperial Capital Ships have crews upwards of half a million and are the size of small states. Any sector's battlefleet is comprised of at least a dozen or so of such craft, and their support ships.

Victor:
http://theshellcase.files.wordpress.com/2012/04/the-god-emperor-cant-be-wr.jpg

[GeekGirl]

Those shields can be blown through or worn down by modern-equivalent weapons (slug-throwers and automatics) and are essentially wholly ignored by armor-piercing rounds (Sniper Rifles). The Imperium of Man doesn't use modern slugs. They use high-concentration lasers and bolters (miniature, fully automatic rocket launchers). Those aren't shields as far as the IoM is concerned. They're fashion statements.

I've never played Halo, so forgive me if this stupid question. The shields seem pretty useless again slug throwers, but how do they hold up to energy weapon? Just as bad, better?

[ChaosLord29]

I've never played Halo, so forgive me if this stupid question. The shields seem pretty useless again slug throwers, but how do they hold up to energy weapon? Just as bad, better?

Worse actually. Energy weapons are more effective at taking down shields and slug weapons are better at penetrating armor/health.

[shadow_archmagi]

What about the space battle? 40k infantry have bigger guns and more men, but their space side, if I remember right, is not great.

[Emperor Ing]

What about the space battle

Goes to the Imperium. Their ships are built to fend off or destroy threats of far greater magnitude than the Covenant. If you want something more concrete, consider that orbital bombardments have been described as ships dropping warheads the size of apartment buildings.

Now imagine that hitting a covvie ship.

[Lord_Gareth]

What about the space battle? 40k infantry have bigger guns and more men, but their space side, if I remember right, is not great.

Well, that depends on how you really want to factor it. Compared to its contemporaries, the IoM does indeed somewhat lack in the space combat department, though this is only really if you compare them to the nimbleness of the Eldar or the unstoppable horror of the Necron tomb-ships. Compared to the Covenant's stated engagement ranges, though, they've got a massive and overwhelming advantage in terms of range and firing power, with maneuverability and FTL travel being roughly equal.

[The Glyphstone]

What about the space battle? 40k infantry have bigger guns and more men, but their space side, if I remember right, is not great.

Their space side is as absurdly over-the-top as their infantry forces. Sure, some of their ships load their cannons by chain-gang labor, but as mentioned above, the shells they're firing are the size of small apartment buildings. The mainstay Imperial Navy ship, the Lunar Cruiser, is 5 kilometers long, and their battleships are 8km. If Halo Nation is correct, the Covenant Assault Carrier, the second-largest ship in their fleet, is 5.3km long, only the 28km supercarriers are bigger.

[ChaosLord29]

Their space side is as absurdly over-the-top as their infantry forces. Sure, some of their ships load their cannons by chain-gang labor, but as mentioned above, the shells they're firing are the size of small apartment buildings. The mainstay Imperial Navy ship, the Lunar Cruiser, is 5 kilometers long, and their battleships are 8km. If Halo Nation is correct, the Covenant Assault Carrier, the second-largest ship in their fleet, is 5.3km long, only the 28km supercarriers are bigger.

Always nice to see modposts even in an unofficial capacity :smallbiggrin:

And yeah, I mentioned it a little earlier, but where it comes to space combat, the Imperium has the Covenant beat in all categories but one: weight of numbers.

From what I've read, standard Covenant Naval groups consist of several dozen ships (capital, cruisers, and frigates), whereas the Battlefleet for any given Imperial subsector is generally going to number no more than a score of capital ships, cruisers and frigates. The Covenant fleet that took the Battle of Reach was 300+ ships, and while that was a substantial engagement, it's only reasonable to assume that this would be a conflict on a similar scale. That means even supplemented by non-ftl support and system defense craft, the Imperials are likely to be outnumbered 10 to 1.

All that said, Glyphstone's point still stands and then some. An Imperial Retribution class Battlecruiser is almost twice the size of the largest covenant ships, and moreover it boasts over 5 times the raw tonnage, and practically 10 times the firepower.

It's like comparing a P-51 Mustang to an A-10 Thunderbolt. The A-10 is only about twice as big, but it's in a completely different scale (and era) in terms of firepower and durability.

[Emperor Ing]

the Imperials are likely to be outnumbered 10 to 1.

Then it is an even fight. All cruisers, fire at will. Burn their xenos hides!

[The Glyphstone]

Lexicanum says a battlefleet is usually between 50 and 75 ships, up or down depending on the relative threat level. So it's only, at worst, a 6-1 margin without local support ships. Though I understand the Battle of Reach did have at least one Supercarrier there, so the largest Covenant ship in play will outclass the largest Imperial ship in play if they each get a full fleet to play with. The average Imperial ship size is far larger than the average Covenant ship size, though, even with a supercarrier dragging the median up - the Lunar cruiser's apparent opposite number is the 1.7km CCS Battlecruiser, and the smallest ship the Imperial Navy deploys are escort-class destroyers at 1.5km.

[Misery Esquire]

What about the space battle? 40k infantry have bigger guns and more men, but their space side, if I remember right, is not great.

Really, the problem in Space is that the Covenant Ships are shown to be hurt by UNSC MAC Cannons. A Imperial Frigate will mount whole broadsides of cannons larger in size, if not quite the same projectile velocity, with armour-ignoring Lance** projectors prow mounted. And while they only have somewhat more than the 10-30 meters of armour plating that the UNSC ships mount, they also have at least a kilometer of hull to anything vital. And Void Shields, which autoblock nearly everything if they come in one shot (per one Void Shield projector) at a time. Cruisers, are bigger, more heavily armoured and be-weaponed. And Cruisers are the IoM's Ship-of-the-Line.

While the Covenant may manuever faster due to the Slipspace-short-jump capabilities, with it's obvious drawbacks ignored for a moment, it doesn't help them too much, as the Imperium outranges them by... Well, Imperial Standard Armament (Macrocannons, Laser Batteries, etc) Extreme Range is in the 70,000 - 100,000 km, with 30-60,000 km being optimal range. ...The Covenant engage, at most, around 10,000 km, with a few rare exceptions like the Sniper Flagship/Battlecruiser that shows up in The Fall of Reach that has a range of (approximated) 100,000 km. (1 in the 314 ship strong invasion force that they pointed at Reach, the assumed Human Homeworld. They have another 2000-3000 ships with High Charity, so they could have (going by that ratio) a whole... 10? More, if you assume they keep the better ships at home.)

Covenant Fighters might be superior to Imperial, but it's difficult to tell, as all they ever fight is Longswords, and go about even against them. :smallconfused:

And all the Reclaimers help them if there's an "outdated*" Nova Cannon on a cruiser. Fires rounds at >.75C, that implode hard enough to hurt Imperium-sized/armoured ships when they miss by a few hundred kilometers. There are a variety of Nova Cannons in fluff, as usual for 40K, some hilariously weaker than this, some hilariously stronger.

*Technically, it's still a marvel of engineering for the Imperium, they just consider it outdated in the Military Tactic sense, having moved Prow-Shooting > Horde of Fighters > Broadsides > ???, depending on Sector.

** Lances, while blocked by Imperium Void Shields, have the descriptor Ignores Armour. These buggers can lance straight through ships if they don't have Void Shields up.

[ChaosLord29]

Lexicanum says a battlefleet is usually between 50 and 75 ships, up or down depending on the relative threat level. So it's only, at worst, a 6-1 margin without local support ships. Though I understand the Battle of Reach did have at least one Supercarrier there, so the largest Covenant ship in play will outclass the largest Imperial ship in play if they each get a full fleet to play with. The average Imperial ship size is far larger than the average Covenant ship size, though, even with a supercarrier dragging the median up - the Lunar cruiser's apparent opposite number is the 1.7km CCS Battlecruiser, and the smallest ship the Imperial Navy deploys are escort-class destroyers at 1.5km.

Thought for sure I had read a Battlefleet consisted of only a dozen ships or so. Maybe that was for individual systems, not subsectors.


Kinslayer brings up some good points too, and I think it'd be worth probing the issue of fighter craft a little more, or rather more pertinently, boarding craft.

As mentioned, the optimum Covenant engagement range is less than a quarter of that of IoM cruisers and capital ships, which means that any covenant craft which actually make it into firing range, are also well within the range of any smaller Imperial Craft to board either by teleportation or the various range of assault craft the Imperium has access to.

Once you've got Imperial boarding parties on Covenant craft (whether that's Cadian Shock Troopers or Space Marine Terminators) they are sure to carve a bloody swathe through the Covenant crew, as we've previously established that standard Covenant forces (grunts and jackals) just aren't going to be a match for battle hardened IG assault troops, let along the Emperor's chosen harbingers of destruction.

[Chess435]

Another question to note: From what point in the timeline are we yoinking the covenant? In my personal opinion, we should probably go from early Halo 2, before Regret got sacked. It'd be the latest period during which they where a cohesive whole and had both Elites and Brutes in command positions.

[ChaosLord29]

Another question to note: From what point in the timeline are we yoinking the covenant? In my personal opinion, we should probably go from early Halo 2, before Regret got sacked. It'd be the latest period during which they where a cohesive whole and had both Elites and Brutes in command positions.

I like to assume for debate purposes we're dealing with the Covenant at the height of their power, which I should think would be prior to the Fall of Reach. Also we're assuming the full strength of Covenant forces not just the expeditionary force which was primarily composed of Sangheii. So that's the combined might of the Covenant Empire, Brutes and Elites as they were never assembled during the Halo series.

[Misery Esquire]

Kinslayer brings up some good points too, and I think it'd be worth probing the issue of fighter craft a little more, or rather more pertinently, boarding craft.

Well, the Covenant do have an advantage over almost every 40K faction against Boarding Pods, that being thier highly accurate Pulse Lasers that can pick off swathes of UNSC missles. On the other hand, no defence against the ill-loved Teleportarium. The only issue will be finding anyone willing to use it that doesn't begin and end with Adeptus Astartes. (And Inquisitors.)

[ChaosLord29]

Well, the Covenant do have an advantage over almost every 40K faction against Boarding Pods, that being thier highly accurate Pulse Lasers that can pick off swathes of UNSC missles. On the other hand, no defence against the ill-loved Teleportarium. The only issue will be finding anyone willing to use it that doesn't begin and end with Adeptus Astartes. (And Inquisitors.)

Is that an issue? I mean, we're sure to see at least some provisional Space Marines thrown at this thing, if not a Chapter's core companies. Master Chief and a contingent of marines all but walk onto a Covenant cruiser and proceeds to wade through the crew and security forces to rescue Cpt. Keyes in Halo I.

Granted, we're talking about the greatest hero of the war, but every Adeptus Astartes company commander is a veteran of hundreds of years of war and dozens of campaigns, having proved their worth and mettle a thousand times over. I don't know if it's much of stretch to say a Terminator Commander and his retinue could teleport onto High Charity itself and personally slay every last Covenant on board.

[Chess435]

Is that an issue? I mean, we're sure to see at least some provisional Space Marines thrown at this thing, if not a Chapter's core companies. Master Chief and a contingent of marines all but walk onto a Covenant cruiser and proceeds to wade through the crew and security forces to rescue Cpt. Keyes in Halo I.

Granted, we're talking about the greatest hero of the war, but every Adeptus Astartes company commander is a veteran of hundreds of years of war and dozens of campaigns, having proved their worth and mettle a thousand times over. I don't know if it's much of stretch to say a Terminator Commander and his retinue could teleport onto High Charity itself and personally slay every last Covenant on board.

I'd give anything up to and possibly including a super-carrier to a a well-prepared Terminator squad, but High Charity itself is stretching things a bit. Mostly because the thousands of Ship Masters, Fleet Masters, Honor Guards, and even the High Council itself in a species where military rankings are based on combat prowess. Although I would like to see the chaos unfold if they popped right into a High Council meeting. :smallbiggrin: Obviously, the solution is to teleport in more than one squad. :smalltongue:

[ChaosLord29]

I'd give anything up to and possibly including a super-carrier to a a well-prepared Terminator squad, but High Charity itself is stretching things a bit. Mostly because the thousands of Ship Masters, Fleet Masters, Honor Guards, and even the High Council itself in a species where military rankings are based on combat prowess. Although I would like to see the chaos unfold if they popped right into a High Council meeting. :smallbiggrin: Obviously, the solution is to teleport in more than one squad. :smalltongue:

Ah, yeah I see where you got confused. I used retinue not in the 'Commander + Squad' sense, but rather the Terminator Commander of the Chapter, and the assembled might of it's 2nd Company.

So that'd be, what? The Commander, a dozen or so terminator veterans, plus a few more squads of 'run-of-the-mill' nigh invulnerable, champions of raw zealous fury and hatred for all things alien, armed with tank crushing gauntlets, twin-linked auto-fire rpgs, plus an assortment of heavy weapons.

[Misery Esquire]

Although I would like to see the chaos unfold if they popped right into a High Council meeting. :smallbiggrin:

And the last sound that Truth ever heard was the whirr of the Assault Cannon winding up. :smalltongue:

@CL29 ; 1st Company is normally the Veteran/Terminator Company.

[ChaosLord29]

And the last sound that Truth ever heard was the whirr of the Assault Cannon winding up. :smalltongue:

@CL29 ; 1st Company is normally the Veteran/Terminator Company.

Have things changed since I built a Black Templar Drop Pod Assault force? Or maybe I'm remembering it wrong and I was basing my army off the 2nd Company . . . Oh well, thanks for the tip Kinslayer.

[Misery Esquire]

Have things changed since I built a Black Templar Drop Pod Assault force? Or maybe I'm remembering it wrong and I was basing my army off the 2nd Company . . . Oh well, thanks for the tip Kinslayer.

Hm. Well, Black Templar might be one of the exceptions to the First Company Has Terminators rule. Especially since they edge around the Codex Astartes as it is, already.

"1000 Space Marines per Chapter? Oh, sure. These guys are just... Power Armoured Scouts. Yeah. Also, the 1000 guys you saw over on the other end of the galaxy, these are the same bunch. D'you wanna argue with my sword about it?"

- After some research, it seems that it isn't mentioned if BTs use Terminator Armour any differently. It is possible, however, for other companies to borrow the Terminator plate, or to be assigned Terminator Marines for a mission.

[ChaosLord29]

Hm. Well, Black Templar might be one of the exceptions to the First Company Has Terminators rule. Especially since they edge around the Codex Astartes as it is, already.

"1000 Space Marines per Chapter? Oh, sure. These guys are just... Power Armoured Scouts. Yeah. Also, the 1000 guys you saw over on the other end of the galaxy, these are the same bunch. D'you wanna argue with my sword about it?"

- After some research, it seems that it isn't mentioned if BTs use Terminator Armour any differently. It is possible, however, for other companies to borrow the Terminator plate, or to be assigned Terminator Marines for a mission.

God how I would love to see the Emperor's Champion hacking a bloody swathe through a whole platoon of brutes, only to be confronted by a pair of hunters . . . who he proceeds to defeat in close quarters, single handed.

[Soras Teva Gee]

The Imperium has over 10,000 years of experience in fighting every known alien threat....yeah. They're good at it. I mean, we can look at their most basic weapons. The Lasgun. It is a laser rifle that, with a single shot, can punch through armor, decimate modern armors, leave head-sized holes in concrete, and leave targets a particularly bloody and cauterized mess, all in one shot. Doing about the equivalent of a modern-day .50 cal rifle with almost no recoil, and as a medium-long range semi-automatic assault rifle.

Yeah I've heard this before and I don't buy it.

I can point you off the top of my to Dark Heresy and (in at least one version) the 40k core rulebook which make a lasgun more to less equivalent to a modern assault rifle. Which also holds more or less with what I remember of them in the Gaunt's Ghosts and Caiphas Cain books. The latter hero of the Imperium at least once, probably more then once actually states a preference for being shot at by las weapons because they tend to cauterize their own wounds so you don't bleed to death.

The lasgun is the weapon of the Imperial Guard not for its performance but for its reliablity and easy logistics. As your typical guardmen can carry a few power packs and recharge them practically anywhere, thus logistically speaking has unlimited ammo. A true Gift from the Emperor to a universe where it any given shipment as only a moderate chance of arriving within the year of its need, if the request didn't just get loss in the bureaucracy and shows up a century later.

THAT SAID

Well if the IG at its broadest best is like a modern force minus integrated air support.... the UNSC is also essentially a modern force. Guns are still the order of the day, quite realistically since the tech has nowhere to go really. Armor is perhaps arguably better for the UNSC but then I remember unarmored NPCs being comparable to marines in Halo 1. At any rate while given nice coats of futurness most UNSC weapons have fairly clear IRL analogues.

And while the UNSC faced a broadly uphill and slowly degrading war against the Covenant we can also make a fair guess that the Covenant was a much larger power something the Imperium can correct for.

With this in mind and accounting for the nature of the weapon a lasgun is probably somewhere around a Covenant carbine or plasma rifle in business end performance. Your typical Guardmen is probably more then a match for a Grunt while being more numerous then Elites. From there it gets trickier, while I doubt the Covenant has a match for a Space Marine, they have simply more of all their more higher-end infantry.

Covenant vehicles though I think leave something be desired. Unless Scarabs are actually pretty common. Nothing on a Titan except by swarming them, but then Titans have are less frequent then Space Marines right?

Really all a numbers game. In theory the Imperium can win like it always can win, stripping its decaying corpse of flesh (manpower) to fling at a problem until the problem stops. And yet just as often though not as commonly talked about the Imperium bugs out and doesn't mobilize the whole damn galaxy against any particular threat.

Oh and the space end, but I don't really have much to go on there. I think the Covenant is said to have 'glassed' planets in the past so the weapons should arguably be on the proper tier. Which would make it another numbers game. On the other hand the Covenant is arguably more mobile in the FTL department since they so help me move about the galaxy on a days/weeks scale not months/years scale.

[Tebryn]

Lexicanum says a battlefleet is usually between 50 and 75 ships, up or down depending on the relative threat level. So it's only, at worst, a 6-1 margin without local support ships. Though I understand the Battle of Reach did have at least one Supercarrier there, so the largest Covenant ship in play will outclass the largest Imperial ship in play if they each get a full fleet to play with. The average Imperial ship size is far larger than the average Covenant ship size, though, even with a supercarrier dragging the median up - the Lunar cruiser's apparent opposite number is the 1.7km CCS Battlecruiser, and the smallest ship the Imperial Navy deploys are escort-class destroyers at 1.5km.

Their ships have shields as well. That can repel Necron weapons. Just to keep in mind here.

[Misery Esquire]

Yeah I've heard this before and I don't buy it. ~

I avoid getting caught up in the Power Of The Lasgun debates, mostly because of the various sources being different. I personally believe that it's a better weapon than modern assault rifles, if only because there's no recoil in a Lasgun. (And the infinite Logisitics of Wonderfulness.)



Your typical Guardmen is probably more then a match for a Grunt while being more numerous then Elites. From there it gets trickier, while I doubt the Covenant has a match for a Space Marine, they have simply more of all their more higher-end infantry.

I would argue that the Imperium Ground War has less requirement for Space Marines to fight the High-End Covenant than the UNSC needed the Spartans. Mostly because IG carry a lot of deadly Heavy Weapons with them as a matter of course. A pair of Hunters won't stand up long against support Lascannons, any better than they stand up against the much-rarer Spartan Laser.



Covenant vehicles though I think leave something be desired. Unless Scarabs are actually pretty common. Nothing on a Titan except by swarming them, but then Titans have are less frequent then Space Marines right?

Titans are rarer than Space Marines, but the IoM doesn't really need them in this case, as a Baneblade can probably solo Scarabs. An Armoured Company of Leman Russ can take out more than thier weight in Covvie' vechicles, and the Antivechicle weapons that the Guardsmen cart around are good enough to kill everything smaller than the Scarabs.



Really all a numbers game. In theory the Imperium can win like it always can win, stripping its decaying corpse of flesh (manpower) to fling at a problem until the problem stops. And yet just as often though not as commonly talked about the Imperium bugs out and doesn't mobilize the whole damn galaxy against any particular threat.

Yeah, it really depends on if you remove one of the Imperium's current foes and replace them with the Versus Race, or just stick yet another enemy into the endless lineup.



Oh and the space end, but I don't really have much to go on there. I think the Covenant is said to have 'glassed' planets in the past so the weapons should arguably be on the proper tier. Which would make it another numbers game. On the other hand the Covenant is arguably more mobile in the FTL department since they so help me move about the galaxy on a days/weeks scale not months/years scale.

It takes them a while to glass a planet... Might just have more to do with not having a wide enough AoE, though. Doesn't really matter when they don't have range to engage properly.

Also, I think they're moving around a piece of the galaxy, not the entire thing. I've never looked into that part of the Halo Universe, to be honest. Will investigate.

-- Ah, so they are moving around the entire galaxy, at a rate of... 912 Lightyears Travelled Per 24 hours, according to one wiki. Which is... Yeah. 20 times faster than the Imperium's standard estimates allow.

[Tavar]

Pretty sure Cain is saying that, if given a wound of similar size or in a vital area, the la's gun is better due to the cauterizing nature of the weapon. It is still a mission kill, but with proper treatment you can survive.


Covenant FTL is likely superior, as it would seem to be about as fast if I am remembering things correctly, but it lacks daemons eating your face, as well as being much more tactically flexible, being able to go at least into planetary orbits, if not into the atmosphere itself.

[WitchSlayer]

Considering the damage a single Spartan can do to the Covenant, I would like to see a mid-to-high level Rogue Trader crew go up against them for a while.

Edit: Also, in the RPGs while the SP weapons SEEM equivalent to our modern world guns, they're not really as most of them do use caseless ammunition, I think we can assume that things just operate on a different scale.

[ChaosLord29]

I can point you off the top of my to Dark Heresy and (in at least one version) the 40k core rulebook which make a lasgun more to less equivalent to a modern assault rifle. Which also holds more or less with what I remember of them in the Gaunt's Ghosts and Caiphas Cain books. The latter hero of the Imperium at least once, probably more then once actually states a preference for being shot at by las weapons because they tend to cauterize their own wounds so you don't bleed to death.

The lasgun is the weapon of the Imperial Guard not for its performance but for its reliablity and easy logistics. As your typical guardmen can carry a few power packs and recharge them practically anywhere, thus logistically speaking has unlimited ammo. A true Gift from the Emperor to a universe where it any given shipment as only a moderate chance of arriving within the year of its need, if the request didn't just get loss in the bureaucracy and shows up a century later.

Well if the IG at its broadest best is like a modern force minus integrated air support.... the UNSC is also essentially a modern force. Guns are still the order of the day, quite realistically since the tech has nowhere to go really. Armor is perhaps arguably better for the UNSC but then I remember unarmored NPCs being comparable to marines in Halo 1. At any rate while given nice coats of futurness most UNSC weapons have fairly clear IRL analogues.

And while the UNSC faced a broadly uphill and slowly degrading war against the Covenant we can also make a fair guess that the Covenant was a much larger power something the Imperium can correct for.

With this in mind and accounting for the nature of the weapon a lasgun is probably somewhere around a Covenant carbine or plasma rifle in business end performance. Your typical Guardmen is probably more then a match for a Grunt while being more numerous then Elites. From there it gets trickier, while I doubt the Covenant has a match for a Space Marine, they have simply more of all their more higher-end infantry.

I'm inclined to agree more your estimation of the standard Lasgun. I think the Beam Carbine is probably the best analogue, with the exception that we know Lasrifles can be fired at full automatic speeds and have a standardized clip size of 30.

All in all, I'd say it's a little bit of an edge over anything you see in the Halo games and given the numbers of the IG makes them more of a match for anything the Covenant can throw at them in terms of ranged combat.

Part of this I believe is a function of Warhammer being a mass combat game system and Halo an FPS. You're not going to find anything in Halo that truly approximates what it's like for platoons of men to be trading automatic rifle fire behind cover, because it's an FPS. Grunts are designed to be killed in droves, Jackals are meant to harass players, and the Elites are meant to be the real challenge to be dealt with. The Covenant military structure is laughable in terms of long ranged mass squad based tactics, but perfect for providing a lone supersoldier with an interesting challenge.





THAT SAID

Covenant vehicles though I think leave something be desired. Unless Scarabs are actually pretty common. Nothing on a Titan except by swarming them, but then Titans have are less frequent then Space Marines right?


Herein lies the rub. Covenant vehicular support is laughably underpowered compared to the armored fist which is most Imperial Guard Regiments. I mean the standard covenant vehicles are nothing but light, open topped, skimmers with twin linked plasma rifles (Halo Plasma Rifles, not 40k plasma rifles). They're vulnerable to small arms fire from even standard assault rifles and sub machine guns, so I think it's safe to say that concentrated lasfire could bring them down, and the vast array of Imperial heavy weapons would annihilate any Banshees, Ghosts, Choppers or Prowlers they choose to commit to any sortie.

Wraiths, Locusts, Specters and the like wouldn't fair much better I'd wager. Given that these two can be fairly easily brought down with grenades or just punching them (if your a Spartan), I doubt their armor is anything comparable to a Landraider or a Leman Russ, which I think puts them firmly in the Medium Vehicle Category of 40k terms and thus still very much soft targets for Krack Missiles, Melta Weapons, and Lascannons.

As for the Scarab, they're pretty few and far between if Halo 3 and Halo Wars are any indication. A covenant task force really only ever seem to deploy them in pairs, maybe 3 or 4 tops, which is about half as many Titans as you'd find in a standard sized Legion. True, Titans aren't very common, but if the Imperials see vehicles like Scarabs, you can bet they're going to request aid from the Sectors Adeptus Titanicus Legions (yes plural) which means you're likely to see at least a dozen heavy Titans in the largest engagements of any conflict.


Really all a numbers game. In theory the Imperium can win like it always can win, stripping its decaying corpse of flesh (manpower) to fling at a problem until the problem stops. And yet just as often though not as commonly talked about the Imperium bugs out and doesn't mobilize the whole damn galaxy against any particular threat.

As for it being a numbers game, I would say the higher end Covenant Infantry really aren't a match for the Adeptus Astartes unless they have overwhelming numbers. I mean, if the Spartans are any indicator, that's exactly how it shakes down. I think it's pretty well indicated that a squad of Spartans is at least worth a squad of elites, and since Elites are deployed in squads composed entirely of Sangheii, it generally works out that the Spartans get to wade through a full platoon of grunts, Jackals and a dozen or so Elites before a concentrated effort is made by the Brutes, Elites, Hunters, etc. to take them down.

While their armor may be more advanced (especially if they all have shield generators) the Spartan IIs and IIIs are really only the equivalent of Space Marine Scouts, in terms of combat ability, size, strength, genetic enhancements, weaponry, combat experience and all around grit. The biggest advantage the Covenant enjoy over the Spartans is their superior numbers and technology, but the Adeptus Astartes are in a league above and beyond the Spartans. They are the Emperor's Angels, and monsters by any other name. Give them armor which can stand up to their own weapons (Nothing short of a 40k Plasma Rifle will ignore Space Marine Power Armor) and I don't think the Covenant are going to have much that can truly pose a threat to them.


Oh and the space end, but I don't really have much to go on there. I think the Covenant is said to have 'glassed' planets in the past so the weapons should arguably be on the proper tier. Which would make it another numbers game. On the other hand the Covenant is arguably more mobile in the FTL department since they so help me move about the galaxy on a days/weeks scale not months/years scale.

The big point in space combat is again scale. Covenant ships are in a different class of tonnage than 40k spacecraft. Combine that with the fact that Covenant ships engagement range is about 10,000 km, and 40k is 45,000km, and you've got the makings of a real massacre.

Now the FTL bit is interesting though. As I understand it, Covenant (and UNSC) slipspace technology is pretty much the same, except the Covenant are better at it. Essentially, the ship enters a subspace dimension which cuts both travel distance and relative time in order to arrive at a destination. Now, this is more or less exactly how 40k ships travel as well, except when they enter the subspace dimension (that is, The Warp) they must contend with roiling eddies, storms, and horrific eldritch daemons and forces of sheer madness. Now, I like to think that if the Covenant ever invaded the Imperium in the 41st Millenium, they'd have to contend with all the same maladies, and would be woefully ill prepared for them. Vice Versa, if the Imperium were defending in Halo Universe, the simplicity and safety of Warp travel would be a blessed relief.

Why do I purport this you ask? Simple, because the Warp is Slipspace, and Slipspace is the Warp. It's just that in Halo timeline, humanity and other alien races have not sufficiently developed so as to give rise to the forces of Chaos as they are known in the 41st Millenium. Imagine a single cohesive timeline, in which the events of Halo predate the events of WH40k by 38,000 years. Is it so hard to imagine that Spartans the ancient ancestors of the Adeptus Astartes? That use of Covenant and Forerunner technology is what sparks what the IoM will refer to as the Golden Age of Mankind? The advent of which will cause humanity to blossom and all the woes and vices to grow with it, causing them to manifest as personified deities in their own right?!?

Sorry, getting a little off track at the end there. :smallredface:

[Soras Teva Gee]

I avoid getting caught up in the Power Of The Lasgun debates, mostly because of the various sources being different. I personally believe that it's a better weapon than modern assault rifles, if only because there's no recoil in a Lasgun. (And the infinite Logisitics of Wonderfulness.)

I once pinned a guy down for a text quote and the best offered was a description of concrete being "boiled" by heavy las fire. However I called and still called hyperbole on that, you fire a normal bullet into concrete and its going to leave marks and so forth. I'm going with the more coherent version, personally.


I would argue that the Imperium Ground War has less requirement for Space Marines to fight the High-End Covenant than the UNSC needed the Spartans. Mostly because IG carry a lot of deadly Heavy Weapons with them as a matter of course. A pair of Hunters won't stand up long against support Lascannons, any better than they stand up against the much-rarer Spartan Laser.

Quite possibly and I don't think the Imperium have a choice anyways, there just aren't going to be enough to go around.

Though on those heavy weapons. Well I the most common are various bolters which are easily the most overrated 40k weapon. Yes its large caliber and it explodes, it doesn't however act like a grenade or rocket so that puts a definite ceiling on its power.

Lascannon though should punch right through. Eveything else should be too rare, and melta's are short range anyways.

Both for the IG though are static, the Covenant isn't above a certain tactical acumen so I'd totally see say sending a Hunter or two out to flank the position with Fuel Rod Canons. Or say an Elite with active-camo and sword.

If this was purely infantry then I'd say for a reasonable parity of force Covenant should win there. (Given well the Reasonable Marine's joke this can even apply to the 1000 or so Spess Mehruns around)


Titans are rarer than Space Marines, but the IoM doesn't really need them in this case, as a Baneblade can probably solo Scarabs. An Armoured Company of Leman Russ can take out more than thier weight in Covvie' vechicles, and the Antivechicle weapons that the Guardsmen cart around are good enough to kill everything smaller than the Scarabs.

Baneblades aren't exactly common either, but I think I loosely agree here on the overall assessment. Outside Scarbs you go all the way down to the Wraith which seem more a glorified fireworks van. It can tank rockets sure, but its offense is terrible for that. I can make a Banshee or Ghost dance a fine jig and kill about anything, but I don't presume that to be normal performance either.

I always figure the Covenant must have sabotaged Scorpion production or something. Or some strong special interest boondoggled the project or something. Or like the Halo 1 pistol game and "reality" just don't match up.

Either way yeah I do consider Imperium tanks a pretty decent showing (given how rare air support is in 40k) and well, they seem to actually have them in numbers.


It takes them a while to glass a planet... Might just have more to do with not having a wide enough AoE, though. Doesn't really matter when they don't have range to engage properly.

There isn't really range in space, just how accurately it get portrayed. Arbitrary silliness can be arbitrary though. :smalltongue:

And taking awhile is actually establishing some parity. Doing it slowly suggests the longer sort of massive orbital strikes taking out a planet at the nuke scale. Which matches with what I've seen of lance battery strikes from Imperium ships when not breaking out the big Exterminatus weapons.


Edit: Also, in the RPGs while the SP weapons SEEM equivalent to our modern world guns, they're not really as most of them do use caseless ammunition, I think we can assume that things just operate on a different scale.

Here's the thing, projectile weapons have essentially nowhere to go as technology. They are trapped by Newton, you can't get more powerful and not make recoil too massive for a human. So anything propelling slugs has certain limits. I'd not be suprised if the AK-47 was in use a couple hundred years from now in much the fashion it is to day: common, rugged, and all the gun you really need.

Sure one can do things that play around with the formula, but not all that much. Guns seemed to have reached a point of diminishing returns, sure one might be more accurate but even a less accurate rifle is still good enough for the non-sharpshooter. For what you mentioned Caseless ammo assault rifles (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heckler_%26_Koch_G11) already exist. If they are somehow cheap/reliable enough in 40k to be stand will be the only meaningful difference in my book.

The great secret of 40k is that its really isn't super advanced at all. Certainly not enough to justify the distressingly common attitude that everything must be so much epically more powerful and advanced because its the year 40k.

Yes with specific exceptions, all of which tend towards being irreplaceable relics of a bygone age that were thankfully Raganrok proof. Simply remembered by rote or prayed out of an STC at best. And probably for every plasma rifle you probably have 10 billion citizens that don't enjoy developed world standards of living and have never even seen one.



All in all, I'd say it's a little bit of an edge over anything you see in the Halo games and given the numbers of the IG makes them more of a match for anything the Covenant can throw at them in terms of ranged combat.

In FPS multiplayer sure, but in open battle I think these differences sorta disappear. At least compared to terrain and tactics.


As for it being a numbers game, I would say the higher end Covenant Infantry really aren't a match for the Adeptus Astartes unless they have overwhelming numbers.

I don't want to get too deep into Spartan versus Astartes but they have a similar strategic weakness, there just aren't enough of them. Or we shouldn't really expect more then like a thousand or so spread across the entire campaign.

And its worth remembering for every feat of badass by a Space Marine there's some ignoble defeat where they did go down. Might require some special tactics but the Covenant does have weapons that should crack power armor.


The big point in space combat is again scale. Covenant ships are in a different class of tonnage than 40k spacecraft. Combine that with the fact that Covenant ships engagement range is about 10,000 km, and 40k is 45,000km, and you've got the makings of a real massacre.

Tonnage is irrelevant, it means nothing other then how compressed your tech is.

And if your ranges are on the money I remain a touch unimpressed unless there's a reason either can't go at longer or shorter ranges. Its space unless something stops it or there's a special reason why not then your weapon range is unlimited. Unless you go all Honor Harrington and point out lightspeed delay its all pretty short range stuff relatively speaking. Between that once you reach orbital bombardment capable I tend to assume some level of parity.

Also whatever the Imperium's numbers seems the Covenant has serious ship amounts to consider. One of the EU space battles list a human Admiral pulling a pure Star Trek solution and using a bunch of nukes to make a gas giant go nova to destroy 300 Covenant ships... and this is the war where humanity steadily lost with no hope in sight so it didn't make even make a dent.


Now, this is more or less exactly how 40k ships travel as well, except when they enter the subspace dimension (that is, The Warp) they must contend with roiling eddies, storms, and horrific eldritch daemons and forces of sheer madness. Now, I like to think that if the Covenant ever invaded the Imperium in the 41st Millenium, they'd have to contend with all the same maladies, and would be woefully ill prepared for them. Vice Versa, if the Imperium were defending in Halo Universe, the simplicity and safety of Warp travel would be a blessed relief.

This is not general practice for these sort of threads.

Also. The answer is that if they had to enter the Warp without proper tech every Covenant ship would die, or worse -not-, since only particular shields render the Warp as unsafe as it is. That's just plain unfair, beside different realms would demand completely new navigation methodology.

Also being the psychic reflection of everything the Warp is quite different. Hyperspaces do tend to be pretty distinct ideas on the whole.

It much simpler to have two unrelated dimensions for different tech. And its broadly assumed in these threads factions can move around about as well as they can natively, often the idea being they suddenly are sharing a single galaxy.

[Killer Angel]

Yeah I've heard this before and I don't buy it.


I don't want to bash 40k (I like it!), but what I generally don't buy is the "10,000 years of fighting experience and cumulative military knowledge, that makes them masters in tactical combat"... when the typical WH40K battle's tactic, recalls a random WWI scenario.
I know it's cooler, but, to me, it's hard to buy.

[The_Final_Stand]

Yeah, 40K Vanilla Space Marines do not have 10,000 years combat experience. The oldest one of them still in active service, I believe, is Dante, at about 1,100 years. You could, supposedly, make a case for Bjorn the Fell Handed, but he's a Dreadnought who only rarely actually gets to fight, and has spent much of the intervening time asleep.

You could also make an argument for some Chaos Marines, but time gets funny in the Eye of Terror, so there's no guarantee they've had 10,000 years.

[Soras Teva Gee]

I don't want to bash 40k (I like it!), but what I generally don't buy is the "10,000 years of fighting experience and cumulative military knowledge, that makes them masters in tactical combat"... when the typical WH40K battle's tactic, recalls a random WWI scenario.
I know it's cooler, but, to me, it's hard to buy.

The mere fact that the Reasonable Marines chapter "exists" kinda gives the lie to any great tactical acumen for the Imperium as a whole and Space Marines in particular.

And if you need ten thousand years to fight you clearly aren't doing something right.


Yeah, 40K Vanilla Space Marines do not have 10,000 years combat experience. The oldest one of them still in active service, I believe, is Dante, at about 1,100 years. You could, supposedly, make a case for Bjorn the Fell Handed, but he's a Dreadnought who only rarely actually gets to fight, and has spent much of the intervening time asleep.

You could also make an argument for some Chaos Marines, but time gets funny in the Eye of Terror, so there's no guarantee they've had 10,000 years.

Well Failbbadon has 10,000 years of failed Black Crusades under his belt but he's not exactly vanilla even for Chaos

[shadow_archmagi]

So. I'm not going to get caught up in the lasgun power debate, but it's roughly the same as a Carbine, maybe a little better, certainly better in having full auto and no ammo requirements.

Carbine < Lasgun

So then, if I recall my Halo days correctly, the Carbine is among the better weapons of the Covenant- Even amongst Elites, the majority of them will carry Halo Plasma Rifles, which are pretty crummy weapons, as I recall.

So basic infantry vs basic infantry, the guardsmen are way, way better armed?

I can see myself blitzing through Halo 2 even on Legendary if I had a Carbine that fired like an SMG and never needed to reload.

Vehicle-wise, does the covenant have anything that can really beat Sentinels, the 40k analogue to Ghosts? Sentinels are fast-moving lightly armored bipedal mecha (Similar in design to AT-STs in starwars, but smaller and less prone to falling over) that can equip a wide variety of powerful weapons.

A wraith's main cannon might be able to destroy one, but a good Sentinel pilot should be able to destroy the wraith and then just walk away from the oncoming wad of energy that moves very slowly in a ridiculous arc. I don't see the covenant being able to argue with what amounts to Ghosts with Spartan Lasers.

[Misery Esquire]

Though on those heavy weapons. Well I the most common are various bolters which are easily the most overrated 40k weapon. Yes its large caliber and it explodes, it doesn't however act like a grenade or rocket so that puts a definite ceiling on its power.

Really, the most common Heavy they cart around would be the Autocannon. Which is enough to shatter all of the Covenant Light-to-Medium, and going by the Warhog Chaingun, enough to break a Wraith from the sides or behind.



Lascannon though should punch right through. Eveything else should be too rare, and melta's are short range anyways.

Lascannons are what the IG will really be resting on in this campaign to fight Scarabs. Even if they aren't 100% effective, the Lascannon has a chance at hurting the heaviest 40k plating, and while it might not go through the armour of the Scarab, the Scarab does have... Well, crab legs, that they can cut off.



Both for the IG though are static, the Covenant isn't above a certain tactical acumen so I'd totally see say sending a Hunter or two out to flank the position with Fuel Rod Canons. Or say an Elite with active-camo and sword.

They are static, but also behind the front lines of Guardsmen, and as long as it isn't Orks that they're fighting, the IG seem willing to move, setup, fire, and then move again when nessecary. Or just get some guardsmen to sacrifice thier lives and go hose the Hunters down with grenades and flamers until they stop moving. And Elites... Well, thier Camo is Optical Only, which means the Auspex should pick them up. It's not Standard Issue to every Guardsman, but it's not exactly uncommon, either.




I don't want to get too deep into Spartan versus Astartes but they have a similar strategic weakness, there just aren't enough of them. Or we shouldn't really expect more then like a thousand or so spread across the entire campaign.

Probably less, depending on which Sector the Covenant crash into. On the other hand, they might run face-first into somewhere near the Eye of Terror where there's 3000+ Space Marines hanging out, so eh. 1000 Space Marines is still more Spartans (IIs) than they ever had on the battlefield. (75) And Space Marines come with thier own heavy support, rather than jacking the IG's. Land Raider v. Scarab, I'm thinking the LR wins. (Land Raiders are rare as well, I just wanted to make the comparison in advance)



And if your ranges are on the money I remain a touch unimpressed unless there's a reason either can't go at longer or shorter ranges. Its space unless something stops it or there's a special reason why not then your weapon range is unlimited. Unless you go all Honor Harrington and point out lightspeed delay its all pretty short range stuff relatively speaking. Between that once you reach orbital bombardment capable I tend to assume some level of parity.

The Covenant try to engage at <10,000 km, because that's near the maximum range that they can control thier plasma... torpedoes?... manually.
40k, the ranges indicate how far out the Imperial Admirals believe thier weapons will be accurate to.



Also whatever the Imperium's numbers seems the Covenant has serious ship amounts to consider. One of the EU space battles list a human Admiral pulling a pure Star Trek solution and using a bunch of nukes to make a gas giant go nova to destroy 300 Covenant ships... and this is the war where humanity steadily lost with no hope in sight so it didn't make even make a dent.

Eh. Either we have to free the Imperium from the other dozen alien/Chaos factions that it's bogged down under, or have the Covenant attacked by them as well. IoM, Orks, Tyranids, Necrons, and Chaos all have Attack On Sight activated, Eldar/Dark Eldar are Attack As Planned... Tau are the only talkers, but they're surrounded by Tyranids and Space Marine worlds right now. (Including the penultimate in Xeno-hating, Black Templars)

[The Glyphstone]

Well Failbbadon has 10,000 years of failed Black Crusades under his belt but he's not exactly vanilla even for Chaos

Every time this meme comes up, I feel obligated to point out that 'Failbaddon' technically has a 50%+ win record in terms of the objectives he was actually aiming for in each respective crusade. "Utterly Crush The Imperium In the Name Of Chaos" was only the primary goal of the first and maybe second Crusades, the rest it was just treated as a bonus objective.

[Forum Explorer]

Imperium has got this. The guard alone are more then a match for the Covenant as they have insane numbers and weaponry that's a little bit superior to the standard weapons of the Covenant. For anti-tank the krack missiles will be pretty devastating against the Covenant vehicles except for the Scarab which they might be able to whittle down. The Imperial tanks will be devastating as the Covenant has almost no counter to them. Finally the Guard do have air-support in the Valkyries and Vendettas. The Vendettas are devastating tank hunters while the Valkyries are more in between. Both are capable of carrying a squad of specialists to either air drop in or land and manually off-load. They aren't exactly rare either so we would almost certainly show up.

The space battle is pretty much one-sided as well. Contrary to what Soras claims the size of the ship is a factor as it means that a hit will be less likely to hit something important in a larger ship. The shielding and armor on Imperial ships are very strong and the weapons are more powerful then anything the Covenant has faced before.

Space Marines are just death for the Covenant. I would put a single Space Marine Sargent on the level of Master Chief who pretty much defeated the Covenant by himself. A single terminator squad could wipe out whatever ship it boarded easily.

So yeah, unless the Covenant hits only unimportant planets they are utterly doomed.

[ChaosLord29]

I once pinned a guy down for a text quote and the best offered was a description of concrete being "boiled" by heavy las fire. However I called and still called hyperbole on that, you fire a normal bullet into concrete and its going to leave marks and so forth. I'm going with the more coherent version, personally.

So we're agreed then, the Lasgun is basically just a Beam Carbine with an expanded magazine capacity.

@shadow_archmagi
Afraid the Lasgun doesn't have unlimited ammo, it's just that the clips can be recharged using batteries, outlets, solar power, or even by throwing them into the heart of a fire. They provide logistically unlimited ammo, not practically unlimited.


Quite possibly and I don't think the Imperium have a choice anyways, there just aren't going to be enough to go around.

Though on those heavy weapons. Well I the most common are various bolters which are easily the most overrated 40k weapon. Yes its large caliber and it explodes, it doesn't however act like a grenade or rocket so that puts a definite ceiling on its power.

Lascannon though should punch right through. Eveything else should be too rare, and melta's are short range anyways.

Both for the IG though are static, the Covenant isn't above a certain tactical acumen so I'd totally see say sending a Hunter or two out to flank the position with Fuel Rod Canons. Or say an Elite with active-camo and sword.

To your quips regarding bolters being overrated, they are indeed explosive, but they are also rocket propelled. The blasting cap on the rear of the casing of the 'bolt' ignites a miniature rocket which is what accelerates the explosive round out of the barrel and maintains it's flight through the air. They don't lose force the further they travel, until the rocket is expended, and when they impact with something, it's why they keep going rather than simply expending their kinetic energy. That's why 'bolts' have such raw kinetic force, penetrating power, and let's not forget, they explode once they are inside you :smallbiggrin:

Heavy and special weapons are not at all uncommon (even Lascannons and Plasma Canons) even amongst the IG (assuming they come from a somewhat 'civilized' subsector). There's a reason when you build an army there's no limit to the number of Lascannons you can field in your army, as opposed to any other heavy weapon. If you want every single heavy weapon carried by every guard support squad or vehicle to be a Lascannon, you can do that (even if it's a little tactically unsound). Suppose you've got a good mix of Las and Auto-cannons, then just about any IG force is going to be well prepared to shred both Covenant Infantry
and Vehicles in no time flat.


Baneblades aren't exactly common either, but I think I loosely agree here on the overall assessment. Outside Scarbs you go all the way down to the Wraith which seem more a glorified fireworks van. It can tank rockets sure, but its offense is terrible for that. I can make a Banshee or Ghost dance a fine jig and kill about anything, but I don't presume that to be normal performance either.

I always figure the Covenant must have sabotaged Scorpion production or something. Or some strong special interest boondoggled the project or something. Or like the Halo 1 pistol game and "reality" just don't match up.

Either way yeah I do consider Imperium tanks a pretty decent showing (given how rare air support is in 40k) and well, they seem to actually have them in numbers.


Air support is rare in actual gameplay, but in the books, video games, and other sources it's pretty well documented that any IG or Space Marine force is going to have tactical air support as well (there's even an official minigame released by White Dwarf on conducting air battles). There's rules for flyers for almost every race, it's just that people don't generally use them (rarely legal in tournament play) because they're expensive and the whole point of the game is you are commanding the ground forces.

Not that the Halo flyers are particuarly impressive either. Banshees remind me more of WWI Biplanes than any sort of impressive aerial combat craft, and Hornets definitely leave something lacking where speed is concerned. They seem like the anologue of 40k Skimmers (which admittedly, only Space Marines have access to), but a couple of Thunderhawk Gunships and Landspeeders should be more than a match for any force of Banshees and Covvie aircraft.



There isn't really range in space, just how accurately it get portrayed. Arbitrary silliness can be arbitrary though. :smalltongue:

And taking awhile is actually establishing some parity. Doing it slowly suggests the longer sort of massive orbital strikes taking out a planet at the nuke scale. Which matches with what I've seen of lance battery strikes from Imperium ships when not breaking out the big Exterminatus weapons.

But there is range in spaced based on how well you can create a containment field for your Plasma Projectiles or a confinement beam for your other particle projection based weaponry. Otherwise they'll just disperse into space after a set amount of time.

Imperial Lance weaponry have overcome that range limitation by sheer size (it takes longer for the lance 'bolt' to disperse given the raw amount of energy), and their broadsides fire like old fashioned cannons so the only range limit is how well they are aimed from the start.

Covenant ships are used to a smaller engagement range because they are smaller ships. Maybe if they built ships or had the technology to enhance the range of their energy based weapons they would build them bigger.


Here's the thing, projectile weapons have essentially nowhere to go as technology. They are trapped by Newton, you can't get more powerful and not make recoil too massive for a human. So anything propelling slugs has certain limits. I'd not be suprised if the AK-47 was in use a couple hundred years from now in much the fashion it is to day: common, rugged, and all the gun you really need.

Sure one can do things that play around with the formula, but not all that much. Guns seemed to have reached a point of diminishing returns, sure one might be more accurate but even a less accurate rifle is still good enough for the non-sharpshooter. For what you mentioned Caseless ammo assault rifles (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heckler_%26_Koch_G11) already exist. If they are somehow cheap/reliable enough in 40k to be stand will be the only meaningful difference in my book.

The great secret of 40k is that its really isn't super advanced at all. Certainly not enough to justify the distressingly common attitude that everything must be so much epically more powerful and advanced because its the year 40k.

Yes with specific exceptions, all of which tend towards being irreplaceable relics of a bygone age that were thankfully Raganrok proof. Simply remembered by rote or prayed out of an STC at best. And probably for every plasma rifle you probably have 10 billion citizens that don't enjoy developed world standards of living and have never even seen one.


It's no great secret lol. Hell, the Orks pretty much do use primarily WWII era technology (to great effect, I might add. The only real technological heavyweights are the Tau and the Eldar (and depending on how you look at it, the Necrons), but the point isn't that IoM weaponry is more advanced simply by virtue of it being from the future, it's more advanced because it has to deal with greater threats and allows more in the way of acceptable losses.

As it's mentioned, Lasguns have a greatly reduced recoil because they are directed energy weapons, and never run out of ammo. 40k does provide rules for slugthrowers in their games and they're basically the same, but with a slightly lessened armor penetrative power. Bolters are the real heavyweight future weapons, and they are primarily wielded by not humans (as you pointed out, human arms and bodies can only withstand so much recoil). If anything, the problem the UNSC is dealing with is that their chemical propellant slug weapons have reached a point of diminishing returns, which is why the Covenant trounce them so readily throughout much of the war.

The Imperium of Man has been combating threats from empires larger, more technologically advanced, and downright more bloody minded than the Covenant for thousands of years, and in many cases has done more than just hold it's own. I'll agree that 40k isn't terribly more advanced (certainly not what you would imagine given 38,000 years of technological development) but in terms of using what technology they have available to them, they put both the UNSC and the Covenant to shame.


I don't want to get too deep into Spartan versus Astartes but they have a similar strategic weakness, there just aren't enough of them. Or we shouldn't really expect more then like a thousand or so spread across the entire campaign.

And its worth remembering for every feat of badass by a Space Marine there's some ignoble defeat where they did go down. Might require some special tactics but the Covenant does have weapons that should crack power armor.

Astartes are 8ft tall giants with three hearts, two sets of lungs, and a dozen other crazy ass genetic modifications that make them lethal killing machines. They have left humanity behind and are now monsters loyal only to the Emperor. Spartans seem to have crossed into the uncanny valley a bit (and the unbreakable bones are cool) but I don't think it's fair to say they are in the same league as the Astartes.

On the note of power armor though, let's try and put this into some mechanics. Covenant weaponry more or less burns it's way through standard UNSC body armor, and Spartan Armor offers a degree more protection (without shields that is). I think it's safe to say that Imperial Flak armor isn't much better, but the Spartan Armor looks more like Carapace armor and provides marginally more protection, so I think that's a good analogue. Space Marine Power Armor is a cut above all that. If we're using the Beam Carbine as our Analogue of the Lasgun and assume they have similar armor piercing power, then Power Armor will deflect, absorb or shake off 2 in 3 shot from it (In Warhammer terms a 3+ Armor Save). Assuming it has similar 'punch' and lethality, a Space Marine, by sheer hardy constitution should again be able to shake off 2 in 3 shots (A strength 3 weapon vs toughness 4 Space Marines), so all in all you're looking at overall effectiveness of about 1 in 10. We are talking about Elites here, so lets assume they make pretty good marksman and will be hitting the Astartes 2 in 3 times (Ballistic Skill 4) so that gives us an overall effectiveness of about 7 in 100 shots killing space marines.

There's a reason that Lasguns are referred to in genre as 'flashlights'.


Tonnage is irrelevant, it means nothing other then how compressed your tech is.

And if your ranges are on the money I remain a touch unimpressed unless there's a reason either can't go at longer or shorter ranges. Its space unless something stops it or there's a special reason why not then your weapon range is unlimited. Unless you go all Honor Harrington and point out lightspeed delay its all pretty short range stuff relatively speaking. Between that once you reach orbital bombardment capable I tend to assume some level of parity.

Also whatever the Imperium's numbers seems the Covenant has serious ship amounts to consider. One of the EU space battles list a human Admiral pulling a pure Star Trek solution and using a bunch of nukes to make a gas giant go nova to destroy 300 Covenant ships... and this is the war where humanity steadily lost with no hope in sight so it didn't make even make a dent.

I was using Tonnage in the the old fashioned Man-o-War sense (seems appropriate since that's how Imperial ships more or less operate). So it's relevant in that any given Imperial ship boasts 5-10 times the amount of fire power than any Covenant ship of comparable class (not size, since as we established, standard Imperial Ships are as large as the largest Covvie craft).

As I pointed out above, range limits do apply to directed energy weapons, since they have a tendency to disperse in space without sufficient confinement beams or fields to contain them. The Covenant use Plasma weapons to their range limits are likely based on the range at which their magnetic confinement beams or fields can keep the plasma in a coherent mass capable of causing damage. Their missiles seem to possess a similar limitation based on guidance, but that could only be because that's the engagement range that they are used to. Whatever the science fiction behind it, the point is that Covenant ships, in genre have an effective engagement range of about a quarter of that of Imperial ships.

For perspective, that's like trying to get decent sized outboard boat into firing range of small caliber pistols against a modern day Cruiser or Destroyer. The weight in firepower matches up pretty well too.


This is not general practice for these sort of threads.

Also. The answer is that if they had to enter the Warp without proper tech every Covenant ship would die, or worse -not-, since only particular shields render the Warp as unsafe as it is. That's just plain unfair, beside different realms would demand completely new navigation methodology.

Also being the psychic reflection of everything the Warp is quite different. Hyperspaces do tend to be pretty distinct ideas on the whole.

It much simpler to have two unrelated dimensions for different tech. And its broadly assumed in these threads factions can move around about as well as they can natively, often the idea being they suddenly are sharing a single galaxy.

Yeah I know XD

It's kind of fun to think about, and as the guy who started the thread I thought I'd indulge a little bit.

What about psykers though? Are the Covenant in any way prepared for the psychic assault of a Librarian or an Inquisitorial Sanctioned Psyker? Given that they're a brand new and pretty significant xenos threat you can bet their will be a cadre from the Ordo Xenos on the scene with all due haste and that they'll have some psykers with them. Imagine if the Prophets quasi religious control over Covenant forces could be overturned by psykers who display real spiritual power. Might spark the Sangheii to rebel all over again.

[thorgrim29]

I think you might be underestimating the covenant a bit there, they'll still die, but I think they could put up a good fight. Sure, the blue elites are idiotic, underequipped and will die in droves to the guard, but that comes with the territory of being religious nuts and rookies. However, I think that the red ones are probably on the level of a marine scout, and the zealots might give a terminator a run for his money. Not to mention that needler and needle rifle fire would be devastating to the marines as they have no energy sheilds. Finally, a brute pack is probably on the level of a bunch of ork nobz (with worse equipment) and the chieftains are beasts, so they would murder the guard. It's easy to forget that the protagonists in the halo games are extraordinary. The Chief is by far the best spartan, and is canonically almost supernaturally lucky, and Noble 6 is a more subtle version of him. The ODSTs in general are good, and those in the game are pretty much the best of the bunch.

So I think that while the covenant would get demolished in large scale combat it could do pretty well in skirmishes.

[Misery Esquire]

Astartes are 8ft tall giants with three hearts, two sets of lungs, and a dozen other crazy ass genetic modifications that make them lethal killing machines. They have left humanity behind and are now monsters loyal only to the Emperor. Spartans seem to have crossed into the uncanny valley a bit (and the unbreakable bones are cool) but I don't think it's fair to say they are in the same league as the Astartes.

True.



On the note of power armor though, let's try and put this into some mechanics...

This is going about it the wrong way ; you're using the Tabletop idea to try and justify the reality of thier armour.

In the 40k Literature, a Space Marine can stand up in a fusillade of full auto lasfire, get hit by frag grenades, and torched with a flamer, and thier armour will still be in one piece. The only time ordinary rifle-weapons (Ie; machineguns, lasguns, etc) are a threat is when the Astartes are silly enough to take off thier helmet, or there's a hell of a lot of it, and it eventually manages to hit the joints enough to remove a limb. And even then they'll probably keep trying to fight through the handicap.

Covvie Plasma Rifles, Pistols and Carbines are effectively non-threats, as Space Marines do take cover, and thier armour is good enough so that they can move from cover-to-cover even if hit between. Fuel Rod Guns are the real threat, and if a Covvie somehow manages to get a Needler full of spikes into a joint, as they'll likely skip off anything else. Sort of like firing them at Hunters.

...Acutally, yeah. Space Marines are more fully armoured, more manueverable, faster, stronger, overall deadlier Hunters, in effect. Maybe not harder to kill, because Hunters never technically die from the more conventional weapons, but they are harder to incapacitate.

[ChaosLord29]

I think you might be underestimating the covenant a bit there, they'll still die, but I think they could put up a good fight. Sure, the blue elites are idiotic, underequipped and will die in droves to the guard, but that comes with the territory of being religious nuts and rookies. However, I think that the red ones are probably on the level of a marine scout, and the zealots might give a terminator a run for his money. Not to mention that needler and needle rifle fire would be devastating to the marines as they have no energy sheilds. Finally, a brute pack is probably on the level of a bunch of ork nobz (with worse equipment) and the chieftains are beasts, so they would murder the guard. It's easy to forget that the protagonists in the halo games are extraordinary. The Chief is by far the best spartan, and is canonically almost supernaturally lucky, and Noble 6 is a more subtle version of him. The ODSTs in general are good, and those in the game are pretty much the best of the bunch.

So I think that while the covenant would get demolished in large scale combat it could do pretty well in skirmishes.

Honestly I don't think you give the blue Elites enough credit and you give the Zealots a little too much. Blue Elites are just that, Elite. While they'd fall to concentrated las fire, they generally aren't deployed in squads, but as the leaders of Grunt and Jackal platoons and battalions. It's more or less like having a Space Marine or two with every IG Unit, and the effect would be that they'd help score some kills on the guardsman until their underlings were cut down.

I'd say Master Chief is more the equivalent of a Space Marine Special Character, though I don't think he's the equal of Marneus Calgar, more like The Emperors Champion or Captain Tycho (from the Blood Angels). That said, pretty much every chapter has a handful of these Master Chief level heroes running around, so I think it's fair to say that once the Adeptus Astartes intervene, the fight is over for the Covenant. If Master Chief is The Demon, just imagine how they might react facing down nearly a 500 or more such figures, better armed and better armored.

Which dovetails nicely into the point about Needlers. I don't think there's any reason to presume they'd be at all effective against power armored troops. I mean, they're still shrugged off by standard cover, so if the Space Marine is covered head to toe in inches thick plate armor, I think they'll be fine.

I think your best point though are the Brutes. Any brute pack is going to be at least the equivalent of a rowdy mob of orks and an assortment of nobz, which do pose a threat even to the Astartes in large numbers (and Brutes do seem more numerous than Elites even without the civil war). Still though, under armed and under armored, I can't believe there would be enough of them to truly threaten the Astartes, only challenge them.




...Acutally, yeah. Space Marines are more fully armoured, more manueverable, faster, stronger, overall deadlier Hunters, in effect. Maybe not harder to kill, because Hunters never technically die from the more conventional weapons, but they are harder to incapacitate.

I think that's a pretty fair comparison too, actually. A Hunter standing at full height is 12 feet tall, but hunched and covering themselves as you see in the game they are only 8 feet, the same height as a Space Marine. Admittedly they're bulkier, but just let that sink in in terms of how truly badass the Adeptus Astartes are.

Literally the only thing comparable to them in size and scale are the most rare and powerful members of the Covenant Military. They dwarf Brutes and Elites and are equipped head to toe in armor not even scratched by conventional Covenant or UNSC weaponry. They're faster, more numerous, and carry automatic weapons capable of downing most Covenant Vehicles under sustained fire.

[Squark]

Just a note on the lasgun thing- The closest thing we have to a definitive source (The back of the 6th edition Rulebook contains an in universe guide on field dressing las wounds), the lasgun is cited as blasting off arms and fully penetrating humans (granted, I suspect this is more probable when dealing with a civilian insurrection than proper flak armor). One note on the fatality of lasgun wounds; Specifically, if the lasgun only glances you, or misses all the vital organs, you've got pretty good odds of survival compared to a bullet because there's no risk of bleeding to death. If it hits a vital organ, the book points out the swelling to said organ is likely to cause death (This being 40k, the book helpfully instructs you to dress the wound as fast as possible for morale purposes, instead of the more labored, thorough process recommended for those with survivable wounds.)

@ChaosLord: I wouldn't compare an elite directing troops to a space marine doing the same. For one I'm not sure about the combat differences, and secondly, you're underestimating the morale effects fighting alongside marines has for guardsmen- The appearance of marines in a battle, at least for soldiers who haven't worked along side them for an extended period of time, is pretty close to divine intervention- They aren't called the angels of death just because they kill things really well. On Master Chief... I'd say he might be around the level of a company champion, maybe a decorated but not exceptional captain. I'd say more like the effect a commissar has on a squad.

[Tiki Snakes]

Brutes are a pretty good comparison to orks perhaps, yeah. Thing is, whilst they are more numerous than Elites, they're not really more numerous than the Orks and the Imperial Guard are quite capable of taking Orks on.

[Squark]

Yeah, remember, Orks outnumber guardsmen in most engagements, and they still lose many of those.

[ChaosLord29]

Brutes are a pretty good comparison to orks perhaps, yeah. Thing is, whilst they are more numerous than Elites, they're not really more numerous than the Orks and the Imperial Guard are quite capable of taking Orks on.

Well, an Ork infestation is a pretty serious threat, and generally requires a concerted effort by more than just planetary defense forces (Other Regiments or Space Marines have to be called in).

The point remains though, that this is primarily due to their numbers, and Brutes are not nearly so numerous as the greenskins. The other aspect of the Ork threat being that they're so damned hard to exterminate, and if you even leave a small number alive they can repopulate with such speed and plenty as to put to shame even the most prolific of rabbit populations.

[Tavar]

Example of the stress Power Armor can go through is found in The Traitor's Hand, one of the Cain books. In it, a squad of lasguns firing at the armor appears to do little more than chip the paint: one suit is only destroyed when Jurgen uses a meltagun(anti-tank weaponry) on it at essentially point blank range. Another suit is destroyed by multiple antivehicular weapons and tanks all blasting it at once, though this is noted as being overkill.

Quite possibly a better example is the rush at the end, where five World Eaters go through several defensive lines located inside a water based ship. It's noted that the positions have heavy weapons such as bolters, and are manned by fanatics. Yet, despite these excellent conditions for defense, the World Eaters tear through them with only one casualty, who was only wounded by a Krak grenade (he is killed when Cain stabs his chainsword into the hole created by the grenade).

Also, Guardsmen tactics aren't exactly a known figure: there is at least one book where the guardsmen are shocked to discover a PDF using what are obviously WW1 tactics(well, the bad kind). And there are others where the human wave approach is used.

[shadow_archmagi]

I still say that even without Lasguns being superior- Even just by virtue of having Carbines as standard equipment for its troops, the IG is hugely ahead.

[Starbuck_II]

To your quips regarding bolters being overrated, they are indeed explosive, but they are also rocket propelled. The blasting cap on the rear of the casing of the 'bolt' ignites a miniature rocket which is what accelerates the explosive round out of the barrel and maintains it's flight through the air. They don't lose force the further they travel, until the rocket is expended, and when they impact with something, it's why they keep going rather than simply expending their kinetic energy. That's why 'bolts' have such raw kinetic force, penetrating power, and let's not forget, they explode once they are inside you :smallbiggrin:

Yeah, Covenants have Needlers.
They ignore armor: only shields block them. Without that protection you kaboom.

[ChaosLord29]

Example of the stress Power Armor can go through is found in The Traitor's Hand, one of the Cain books. In it, a squad of lasguns firing at the armor appears to do little more than chip the paint: one suit is only destroyed when Jurgen uses a meltagun(anti-tank weaponry) on it at essentially point blank range. Another suit is destroyed by multiple antivehicular weapons and tanks all blasting it at once, though this is noted as being overkill.

Quite possibly a better example is the rush at the end, where five World Eaters go through several defensive lines located inside a water based ship. It's noted that the positions have heavy weapons such as bolters, and are manned by fanatics. Yet, despite these excellent conditions for defense, the World Eaters tear through them with only one casualty, who was only wounded by a Krak grenade (he is killed when Cain stabs his chainsword into the hole created by the grenade).

Also, Guardsmen tactics aren't exactly a known figure: there is at least one book where the guardsmen are shocked to discover a PDF using what are obviously WW1 tactics(well, the bad kind). And there are others where the human wave approach is used.

I agree on both counts. In Storm of Iron and Lord of Night, the lasfire is illustrated to do little more than scratch Power Armor, and even concentrated shotgun fire from a platoon of troops is only effective when it manages to hit a joint. Only artillery fire or the bolters of other Space Marines demonstrate a general effectiveness against either heretic or loyalist Space Marines.

As for Imperial Guard tactics, it's unfair to assume they are the equivalent of WWI commanders ordering their troops over the top to be mowed down by incoming fire. They are more or less organized like a modern military, with the exception that they have a much greater tolerance and threshold for what are considered 'acceptable losses'. I think the most apt comparison would be the Wehrmacht during the Second World War, who had some of the best soldiers in the war, but were constrained administratively by a totalitarian regime (which also tolerated greater losses in the field).

[Tiki Snakes]

Yeah, Covenants have Needlers.
They ignore armor: only shields block them. Without that protection you kaboom.

IF you get hit by a whole clip at once, otherwise it's pretty safe to ignore, really.

[shadow_archmagi]

Are the properties of the needler ever explained? I always felt like the "If you land six shots it's an instakill, if less it's no damage" thing was always more a gameplay mechanism.

[ChaosLord29]

Yeah, Covenants have Needlers.
They ignore armor: only shields block them. Without that protection you kaboom.

Where is that ever demonstrated? I remember suffering needler wounds without shields countless times throughout the Halo series. I mean sure, the UNSC Marines didn't fair as well (I doubt Guardsman would either) but Needler fire doesn't clearly doesn't penetrate the cover provided in game by the terrain (even trees and rocks in a lot of cases).

In game terms, I would give it an armor penetration value of 4 (at most) which would allow it to penetrate anything just short of Power Armor. So it would tear through any IG troops.

After some research:
"The crystalline projectiles are slow and ineffective to even light armor and will simply bounce off of them."
-From Halo Nation

[Squark]

It'd probably be more accurate to say that there are hundreds of thousands of guard regiments, and within that multitude there are commanders who favor all sorts of tactics.

On the topic of the needler- Honestly, from the performance I've seen of it, I'd compare it to a bolter in terms of functionality. It doesn't perform well against vehicular armor or solid cover as I understand, which suggests that the Ceramite coating of a Space Marine's armor would probably stop the needle, althought it would probably penetrate the more lightly armored joints. Guardsmen of course are going to die horribly against it, but then, that's the same thing that happens when they're up against boltguns.

And terminator armor... Well, terminator armor requires you to have weapons that operate on absurdly high temperatures, Mono-molecular blades or their equivalent, Or, a really, really, really, really fast moving projectile (That is, a proper railgun, which are only used by the Tau and on some Leman Russ variants). Needler crystals are just going to bounce off the armor.

[Chess435]

Since the general consensus in that the Covies get stomped, what skulls can the Imperium get away with turning on and still pull out a win? :smallbiggrin:

[Starbuck_II]

Are the properties of the needler ever explained? I always felt like the "If you land six shots it's an instakill, if less it's no damage" thing was always more a gameplay mechanism.

http://halo.wikia.com/wiki/Type-33_Guided_Munitions_Launcher

Needlers cause two types of damage: penetration, injuries caused by the impact of the crystalline needles, and explosive, explosion of needles wedged in the body and splash damage to surrounding units. A crystalline projectile can cause fatal damage to its victim — a single shard can cause internal bleeding or strike a vital organ, with untreated wounds resulting in death. Depending on the impact area and angle, several crystalline shards can cause amputation of limbs, and impacts to the chest are in most cases always fatal; the explosive properties can easily crack ribs, damage the lungs or heart, and cause severe tissue damage that can be very difficult to repair.

Pro:
Homing (sort of)
Two types of damage
Causes internal damage if no kill
Area damage


Con:
Meduim range at most
Amount of needles to cause explosion changes by game


The Heavy Needler is a ship to ship needler that will blow up ships (used in Halo Wars).

[Tiki Snakes]

The needles always explode, it's just that they explode significantly better after a certain density. Some kind of sympathetic reaction?

They are also very slow moving, very obvious projectiles.

edit - Grunt Birthday Party would be amazing.

[Soras Teva Gee]

To your quips regarding bolters being overrated, they are indeed explosive, but they are also rocket propelled. The blasting cap on the rear of the casing of the 'bolt' ignites a miniature rocket which is what accelerates the explosive round out of the barrel and maintains it's flight through the air. They don't lose force the further they travel, until the rocket is expended, and when they impact with something, it's why they keep going rather than simply expending their kinetic energy. That's why 'bolts' have such raw kinetic force, penetrating power, and let's not forget, they explode once they are inside you :smallbiggrin:

Here's the thing... it doesn't mean all that much. Its not like concepts (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gyrojet) similar to a bolter (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milkor_MGL) don't exist (http://world.guns.ru/grenade/ch/qlz-7-w7-e.html). On the business end it still plays like a super-heavy machine gun, which I DO have a lot of respect for. A giant man carrying a Ma-Deuce on 'roids is a scary thought, but still within certain limits. Bolters don't have the blast radius though for their explosives to take them out of being guns though.

And now this is more my opinion but the rocket-propelled part... honestly not sure that it should help much beyond extending an accurate range. A normal .50 BMG is serious overkill on penetrating infantry armor so you are already into vehicle armor. That leaves range. Only fun fact I've come across, that the M16 is "less accurate" then some of its predecessor rifles. So what gives USA? Well the military took a look and realized that when it comes down to it infantry hardly ever engages at more then a couple hundred meters. Ergo all that extra "accurate to X distance" is a non-issue for an assault rifle.

Now let me be clear I don't entirely disparage the bolter. It makes sense as a weapon for super-heavy infantry which is a niche modern militaries don't have. But its not the war changing unbeatable death machine its hype would leave you to believe either.



Air support is rare in actual gameplay, but in the books, video games, and other sources it's pretty well documented that any IG or Space Marine force is going to have tactical air support as well (there's even an official minigame released by White Dwarf on conducting air battles). There's rules for flyers for almost every race, it's just that people don't generally use them (rarely legal in tournament play) because they're expensive and the whole point of the game is you are commanding the ground forces.

Yeah I've looked around and while I don't dispute it exists, I make the important distinction is does not come standard. Its still the minority case.

Mind you I perfectly understand the exclusion, actual air power is just patently unfair to ground forces. And would make for a boring mechanic as it would be something like every 1d6 rounds remove one enemy vehicle or formation from the field.

And its not like 40k is alone in this most military themed settings handwave airpower.



Not that the Halo flyers are particuarly impressive either. Banshees remind me more of WWI Biplanes than any sort of impressive aerial combat craft, and Hornets definitely leave something lacking where speed is concerned. They seem like the anologue of 40k Skimmers (which admittedly, only Space Marines have access to), but a couple of Thunderhawk Gunships and Landspeeders should be more than a match for any force of Banshees and Covvie aircraft.


Oh I agree. A Banshee is not an aircraft, its an armed motorcycle like the Ghost. It maybe has the slightest case for there being things we don't see (like fighting versions of drop ships) in universe, but I don't know them.

In general Covenant vehicles are still why they loose. Which we can probably blame on Halo being generally an FPS. Actual vehicles render infantry not... irrelevant... but suddenly limited to only certain terrain and tactics. A Warthog is probably about the only thing loosely well portrayed in the Halo games.


But there is range in spaced based on how well you can create a containment field for your Plasma Projectiles or a confinement beam for your other particle projection based weaponry. Otherwise they'll just disperse into space after a set amount of time.

Is that official somewhere or just speculation? Either way it is arguably a little silly from a physics perspective. In a vacuum there are after all fewer immediate causes for entropy.

Not nessecarily untrue mind you.

I just as a general rule keep my comparisons for space battles far more open-ended. I tend to file off ranges because they really, really, really shouldn't mean much in space and file off depiction as artistic license. Unless there's some good reason otherwise. If you can shoot from orbit to a planets surface without your weapons breaking down from the atmosphere, you should be able to achieve actual astronomical ranges, which makes a mere difference of thirty thousand... not all that meaningful.

I need a particular reason to limit ranges in space, namely that the writers actually had a sense of scale and specifically accounted for it in limiting ranges.



Covenant ships are used to a smaller engagement range because they are smaller ships. Maybe if they built ships or had the technology to enhance the range of their energy based weapons they would build them bigger.

I unfortunately don't think you can understand how scale doesn't mean much naval combat without actually looking at an Arleigh Burke next to a container or cruise ship. Even super-carriers don't have that sort of bulk to them.

Imperial ships? Imperial ships are big because they need a thousand slaves to drag the mammoth shells into the cannons to reload them. Or something like that. They are big because there is one thing the Imperium never, ever, never has been and that is efficient.

Now the Necrons, they have the right idea. (Unless their ships have been retconned too now)



but in terms of using what technology they have available to them, they put both the UNSC and the Covenant to shame.


Which is a testament to the Dark Age of Technology and nothing else. The Imperium reflects really the Emperor's own condition. By all sane measures it is dead, we're just waiting for the life signs to cease.


There's a reason that Lasguns are referred to in genre as 'flashlights'.

Which is quite sensible really. However I was referring to the heavier weapons starting with plasma grenades and Jackal snipers.



What about psykers though? Are the Covenant in any way prepared for the psychic assault of a Librarian or an Inquisitorial Sanctioned Psyker? Given that they're a brand new and pretty significant xenos threat you can bet their will be a cadre from the Ordo Xenos on the scene with all due haste and that they'll have some psykers with them. Imagine if the Prophets quasi religious control over Covenant forces could be overturned by psykers who display real spiritual power. Might spark the Sangheii to rebel all over again.

No but like most of the far end things I tend to go with it not being numerous enough to matter. While it gets into true opinion I tend thing the PDFs and the IG do all the real work of the Imperium. The rest is so much propaganda.

So the real thing that matters is the weakness of displayed vehicles, the question of numbers, and the space end of things. These are what matters.

Realized I forgot to mention that putting aside direct conflicts on the offense a reasonably decent commander could run rings around the Imperium with superior FTL. There's one battlefleet, strike the ten planets its NOT around and force the fleet to spend all its time in the Warp or destroy the barely functional logistics of the Imperium by glassing agricultural worlds and the like.

[Tvtyrant]

The Covenant also has fairly widespread use of cloaking devices, and energy blades that are insta-gibs. A large group of elites or brutes who are all invisibled up could do horrific things to the enemy, like setting mines in their encampments or killing every officer in the imperial guard (which if I recall does a great job teaching their troops not to think for themselves).

The other covenant troops are going to be fairly useless; I would suggest a series of holding actions and ambushes until the imperial guard has been decimated by your assassin squads.

[shadow_archmagi]

The Covenant also has fairly widespread use of cloaking devices, and energy blades that are insta-gibs. A large group of elites or brutes who are all invisibled up could do horrific things to the enemy, like setting mines in their encampments or killing every officer in the imperial guard (which if I recall does a great job teaching their troops not to think for themselves).

The other covenant troops are going to be fairly useless; I would suggest a series of holding actions and ambushes until the imperial guard has been decimated by your assassin squads.

To be fair, Power Swords are comparable to Energy Blades.

[The Glyphstone]

Cloaking devices are far from unknown for the Imperium, though - that's what Auspexes are for, typically one to a squad, since as mentioned Covenant cloaking is primarily or solely in the optical spectrum. So they're beneficial, but far from beatable, and it is absolutely within Imperial tactical doctrine to send in a few squads to an area where people are dying to invisible enemies, get the invisible enemies busy butchering Guardsmen, then call down a full artillery barrage on the area.

And yeah, energy blades are pretty much the same as power weapons, both in visual/technical functionality and the fact that they're logically instant death if you get stabbed with them.

[Misery Esquire]

and it is absolutely within Imperial tactical doctrine to send in a few squads to an area where people are dying to invisible enemies, get the invisible enemies busy butchering Guardsmen, then call down a full artillery barrage on the area.

It's always so convient when your doctrine includes a section on "The Best Ways To Kill Your Own Troops, And Benefit."

[ChaosLord29]

http://halo.wikia.com/wiki/Type-33_Guided_Munitions_Launcher

Needlers cause two types of damage: penetration, injuries caused by the impact of the crystalline needles, and explosive, explosion of needles wedged in the body and splash damage to surrounding units. A crystalline projectile can cause fatal damage to its victim — a single shard can cause internal bleeding or strike a vital organ, with untreated wounds resulting in death. Depending on the impact area and angle, several crystalline shards can cause amputation of limbs, and impacts to the chest are in most cases always fatal; the explosive properties can easily crack ribs, damage the lungs or heart, and cause severe tissue damage that can be very difficult to repair.

Pro:
Homing (sort of)
Two types of damage
Causes internal damage if no kill
Area damage


Con:
Meduim range at most
Amount of needles to cause explosion changes by game


The Heavy Needler is a ship to ship needler that will blow up ships (used in Halo Wars).

Your quoting from the same page I am friend, and that page clearly stated:
"The crystalline projectiles are slow and ineffective to even light armor and will simply bounce off of them. The Needler is also limited to medium range combat situations and even at that range is not as effective, as the projectile travels it loses velocity and thus loses altitude, reducing the chances of impacting a target."

The point being that while the Needler is very effective at decimating soft targets, flesh and causing lots of collateral damage, they are generally, totally ineffectual at anything more than medium range, have very limited 'punch' or stopping power and do not fair well against even a lightly armored target.

The standard for Space Marines is a hulking 8ft behemoth in power armor that puts even Spartan II armor to shame:
"It is a completely enclosed suit of combat armour composed of shaped Adamantium and Plasteel plates, encased in a Ceramite ablative layer."
-http://warhammer40k.wikia.com/wiki/Power_Armour

@Sorvas Teva Gee

Is that official somewhere or just speculation? Either way it is arguably a little silly from a physics perspective. In a vacuum there are after all fewer immediate causes for entropy.

Not nessecarily untrue mind you.

I just as a general rule keep my comparisons for space battles far more open-ended. I tend to file off ranges because they really, really, really shouldn't mean much in space and file off depiction as artistic license. Unless there's some good reason otherwise. If you can shoot from orbit to a planets surface without your weapons breaking down from the atmosphere, you should be able to achieve actual astronomical ranges, which makes a mere difference of thirty thousand... not all that meaningful.

I need a particular reason to limit ranges in space, namely that the writers actually had a sense of scale and specifically accounted for it in limiting ranges.

That one I may have to give you, in 40k I think they have a somewhat better understanding of the astronomical ranges possible in actual space combat, whereas in halo, I'm pretty sure it's just a convenience thing.

The only thing I can think of is that Covenant Plasma weapons don't actually travel at light speeds, and maybe the effective range of their weapons is depicted as such because any further and their targeting capabilities would not be nearly so effective (after all, the further away a target is, the more maneuvering options they have). This would be moot against the large IoM Capital ships since they make exceptionally large targets. It was however pointed out that these ships are built to withstand a whole different scale of punishment than Covenant ships.


I unfortunately don't think you can understand how scale doesn't mean much naval combat without actually looking at an Arleigh Burke next to a container or cruise ship. Even super-carriers don't have that sort of bulk to them.

Imperial ships? Imperial ships are big because they need a thousand slaves to drag the mammoth shells into the cannons to reload them. Or something like that. They are big because there is one thing the Imperium never, ever, never has been and that is efficient.

Now the Necrons, they have the right idea. (Unless their ships have been retconned too now)


Afraid they mostly have friend. The old days of small piratey necron raiders are long gone. They're still have them, but they're not nearly as powerful and instead they rely on lumbering Tomb Ship/Planet/Hulks which make even Imperial Capital ships look downright agile.


Realized I forgot to mention that putting aside direct conflicts on the offense a reasonably decent commander could run rings around the Imperium with superior FTL. There's one battlefleet, strike the ten planets its NOT around and force the fleet to spend all its time in the Warp or destroy the barely functional logistics of the Imperium by glassing agricultural worlds and the like.

Now that is an exceptionally viable strategy, but involves factoring in a new meta level into our consideration. Are the Covenant likely to think of it? Or will their zealous and doctrinal nature cause them to take a more conventional approach, ultimately doomed to failure.

I tend to think to that while they could cause a lot of destruction this way, they just don't have the staying power to be a real threat to the Imperium, and eventually High Charity is going to find itself looking down the business end of a Space Marine Battlebarge with the assembled might of an entire Chapter of Space Marines hell bent on purging every trace of this xenos threat from existence. I think the consensus is that a Terminator Company could do just that too.

@tvtyrant

The Covenant also has fairly widespread use of cloaking devices, and energy blades that are insta-gibs. A large group of elites or brutes who are all invisibled up could do horrific things to the enemy, like setting mines in their encampments or killing every officer in the imperial guard (which if I recall does a great job teaching their troops not to think for themselves).

I'm afraid that in 40k energy blades (called power weapons) are vastly more widespread than in the Halo franchise. They operate in very much the same manner, and you can expect even IG sergeants and lieutenants to be walking around waving them them encouragingly. I'll give you that if they are comparable, they'll scythe right through Space Marine armor, but the problem is that for every Zealot armed with an Energy Sword you've got 3-5 Imperial troops with the same deal (at least a number of whom are going to be Astartes).

As for the Active Camouflage units . . . well I suppose it's already been covered. They're nothing new to the Imperium, even if they can't (readily) replicate the technology, and every guard platoon and Space Marine company is going to have more than a few ways of combating such tactics on the battlefield.

[Urist]

Any discussion of ground tactics is rather redundant. The IoM basic scout cruisers could tank entire fleets of Covenant ships fire, and murder them in return. A single lance shot would core even a Supercarrier. I love Halo, and I love the Covenant to death, but this is just cruel.

[ChaosLord29]

Any discussion of ground tactics is rather redundant. The IoM basic scout cruisers could tank entire fleets of Covenant ships fire, and murder them in return. A single lance shot would core even a Supercarrier. I love Halo, and I love the Covenant to death, but this is just cruel.

I'm rather of the same opinion and haven't seen sufficient evidence offered in response to think otherwise.

I bet a Covenant fleet might be able to outmaneuver them (and FTL wise they're much handier), but eventually they're going to have to get within range of the Imperial's broadside and then they're going to be shredded. Or else, pass in front of their prow Lance batteries and then be incinerated.

I mean the Lance Battery on a standard IoM Ship of the Line is about as big as a small covenant Frigate!

[The Glyphstone]

Your quoting from the same page I am friend, and that page clearly stated:
"The crystalline projectiles are slow and ineffective to even light armor and will simply bounce off of them.


Taking that quote in context, though, it's clearly talking about how bad they are against vehicles, so 'light armor' doesn't appear to mean the same thing. Now, this doesn't change the fact that Space Marines would almost certainly be needler-proof, since they are encased in ceramite which is at least as physically tough as light vehicle armor, but needlers would do a painful number on rank-and-file Guardsmen in their flak vests, despite that also being 'light armor'.

[ChaosLord29]

Taking that quote in context, though, it's clearly talking about how bad they are against vehicles, so 'light armor' doesn't appear to mean the same thing. Now, this doesn't change the fact that Space Marines would almost certainly be needler-proof, since they are encased in ceramite which is at least as physically tough as light vehicle armor, but needlers would do a painful number on rank-and-file Guardsmen in their flak vests, despite that also being 'light armor'.

Agreed, I suppose the overall point I was trying to make is that Space Marines are wearing something a little heavier than 'Light Armor' even if you're talking about vehicle plating.

[The Glyphstone]

Agreed, I suppose the overall point I was trying to make is that Space Marines are wearing something a little heavier than 'Light Armor' even if you're talking about vehicle plating.

Maybe, maybe not - bolters are the go-to weapon for actually injuring a Space Marine, and they're also the minimum-grade weapon for causing noticeable damage to light vehicles in-setting, even discounting game mechanics (which also match up, if not quite as well). So while it's possible that Marine armor is heavier than 'light vehicle armor', that's the minimum level it'd apply as.

[ChaosLord29]

Maybe, maybe not - bolters are the go-to weapon for actually injuring a Space Marine, and they're also the minimum-grade weapon for causing noticeable damage to light vehicles in-setting, even discounting game mechanics (which also match up, if not quite as well). So while it's possible that Marine armor is heavier than 'light vehicle armor', that's the minimum level it'd apply as.

Right, but for the Bolter that's a function of both it's rocket propelled stopping power and it's explosive payload. The Needler projectiles can be tracked by the naked eye and even avoided with basic human agility and a little luck. Their greatest advantages are their homing capability and the fact that they are in fact needles, and penetrate armor akin to the way flechette ammunition does, and cause internal damage like a knife or a blade, rather than a bullet (also they have their own explosive capacity).

What if we actually did put this into 40k game mechanic terms?

The Needler is a medium range rapid fire with a somewhat limited clip size. It's not relatively ineffective against vehicle grade armor, doesn't punch so much as it stabs and has the capacity to kill most mansized targets with a combined payload.

I'd say it's an 18" Strength 4 AP 6 Assault 1 weapon which can reroll to hit rolls within 12" and automatically wounds any target or glances any vehicles on a roll of 6.

Is that fair?

[Tvtyrant]

If my military was that outclassed in attack output, I would simply have my ships come out of FTL within atmosphere and have the fusion reactor go off in atmosphere. At least in the books the Halo cores are capable of shattering a planet, which would pretty much finish of the imperium's manufacturing.

[Misery Esquire]

If my military was that outclassed in attack output, I would simply have my ships come out of FTL within atmosphere and have the fusion reactor go off in atmosphere. At least in the books the Halo cores are capable of shattering a planet, which would pretty much finish of the imperium's manufacturing.

Except, the Covenant have no way to find human worlds in the Haloverse, and have to try and steal Human Stellar Cartography computer data to find them at a decent rate. The IoM... Well, I don't know if they even have anything written down, or if they just colour in big chunks of the galactic map where the Navigators say they are.

Plus, the Imperium has a hell of a lot of Forge Worlds. Less than the Covenant has ships, but still a few thousand at least. And Forge Worlds have the most powerful defences that the AdMech can rig up around them, including filling the entire gravity well with smart mines, giant doom lasers, and AdMech ships. The Covenant Ships, after commiting a Slipspace Jump are entirely offline and defenceless if they do it intrasystem, and not accurate enough if they try to interstellar-ly jump into a Planet Atmosphere.

[ChaosLord29]

If my military was that outclassed in attack output, I would simply have my ships come out of FTL within atmosphere and have the fusion reactor go off in atmosphere. At least in the books the Halo cores are capable of shattering a planet, which would pretty much finish of the imperium's manufacturing.

Except every Imperial Forgeworld and manufacturing centers are the singularly best protected planets in the Imperium.

It's not like Reach where the Covenant can just overwhelm the UNSC military stronghold and base of operations by sheer numbers (a tactic that cost them a third of their fleet). You'd have carve your way through outlying sectors, defeat whatever counterattack was launched (Obviously a combined force of several sectors' Battlefleets plus IG Regiments and at that point likely support from a Chapter of Space Marines) and the punch a hole through the real defenses of the Imperium. That means getting past fortress worlds and battling multiple Space Marine Chapters not to mention the combined might of the most decorated and elite IG Regiments in the Galaxy.

Even the Forge Worlds themselves are fortresses in their own rights. They also happen to be the headquarters of the Adeptus Titanicus, the Imperial Titan Legions, so even if they haven't face Titans yet, you can bet they'll be facing down a whole Legion if they arrive.

Not likely.

I think Soras had the best plan:

Realized I forgot to mention that putting aside direct conflicts on the offense a reasonably decent commander could run rings around the Imperium with superior FTL. There's one battlefleet, strike the ten planets its NOT around and force the fleet to spend all its time in the Warp or destroy the barely functional logistics of the Imperium by glassing agricultural worlds and the like.

[WitchSlayer]

Yes but that requires knowing what planets are well armed enough and which aren't, also knowing which ones are agricultural planets, which aren't forge worlds, which aren't Space Marine worlds etc etc

[Forum Explorer]

Yes but that requires knowing what planets are well armed enough and which aren't, also knowing which ones are agricultural planets, which aren't forge worlds, which aren't Space Marine worlds etc etc

agreed. Plus most systems also have some sort of System only fleet of a few frigates. Really only a delay against 40K opponents but against the Covenant it would mean fighting even the weakest world would be costly in terms of ships.

[The Glyphstone]

Yes but that requires knowing what planets are well armed enough and which aren't, also knowing which ones are agricultural planets, which aren't forge worlds, which aren't Space Marine worlds etc etc

And knowing ahead of time which planets the battlefleet isn't at. This is a relatively minor difficulty, since their superior speed can also be used for scouting and rapid retreat if they guess wrong, but still an issue.

[Forum Explorer]

Oh and it does nothing to prevent a counter attack from the Imperium.

[ChaosLord29]

Oh and it does nothing to prevent a counter attack from the Imperium.

It would only help them in terms of retreat, and it's worth noting that Covenant ships are more or less in a state of unpreparedness once they've finished a slipspace jump. Imperial Ships are disoriented, but can finish a Warp Jump at full battle stations, guns loaded and shields up.

Then there's High Carity itself, which does not boast a comparable FTL and sublight speed maneuverability. Assuming the Imperials manage to follow a Covenant ship back to it at any point, I'd say we're looking at the Terminator Company teleporting into the High Council scenario outlined earlier.

Obviously not right into a meeting or anything, but the point is, less than all the Prophets are likely to survive the experience.

[Klose_the_Sith]

Similar to this topic, are there any serious attempts at chronicling operation numbers the Imperial Guard will deploy in? I recognise that the PDF are the most numerous, but so many people seem happy to tell me that 10,000 or 20,000 will be enough to go pacify a planet which is incredibly ridiculous. That many Space Marines wouldn't pacify an earth-sized planet, let alone a Hive World or similar.

What sort of numbers do Imperial Guard actually deploy in? Because even sending 10,000,000 soldiers isn't impressive if waging total war on a galactic scale.

[ChaosLord29]

Similar to this topic, are there any serious attempts at chronicling operation numbers the Imperial Guard will deploy in? I recognise that the PDF are the most numerous, but so many people seem happy to tell me that 10,000 or 20,000 will be enough to go pacify a planet which is incredibly ridiculous. That many Space Marines wouldn't pacify an earth-sized planet, let alone a Hive World or similar.

What sort of numbers do Imperial Guard actually deploy in? Because even sending 10,000,000 soldiers isn't impressive if waging total war on a galactic scale.

This is from Lexicanum which in turn cites the 5th Edition Rulebook:
"The size and composition of Imperial Guard regiments is not standardised across the Imperium; the number of individual Guardsmen alone can vary enormously between regiments, with some only a few hundred strong at founding-strength, whilst others possess tens of thousands of fighting troops.1 The root of this non-standardisation is the fact that every world that produces Imperial Guard regiments has its own martial traditions, practices and experiences which all combine to dictate the manner in which its inhabitants choose to wage war."

I know in Storm of Iron, the Jouran Dragoons are defending a citadel containing Space Marine gene seed, and their forces numbered upwards of half a million (plus a Titan Legion and Adeptus Mechanicus support staff).

Suffice to say that it depends on the planet they are raised on, and the need for their raising and deployment. Say you had a planet like earth, with about 7 Billion, and instituted a regular draft with every able bodied man and woman on the planet as candidates; Approximately how many soldiers would that be, do you think?

I don't think it's unfair to assume a 'standard' infantry IG Regiment raised from a populated and 'civilized' world for the purpose of combating a major alien menace would total upwards of hundreds of thousands of soldiers, assuming the Planetary Governors and Sector Commanders deemed such numbers necessary.

Of course, what's more likely is that they will simply deploy several other IG Regiments that have already been raised that total around those same numbers.

[Killer Angel]

Yes but that requires knowing what planets are well armed enough and which aren't, also knowing which ones are agricultural planets, which aren't forge worlds, which aren't Space Marine worlds etc etc

True, but when your only advantage is a superior speed, the best thing you can do is a hit-and-run tactic, against the weak points. And if the point isn't weak, just run.

[Soras Teva Gee]

Did some poking and if this is accurate (http://halo.wikia.com/wiki/Slipstream_Space):


The Covenant have a very finely tuned version of this technology, far superior to the UNSC Shaw-Fujikawa Translight Engine. Instead of simply tearing a hole into Slipspace, Covenant Slipspace drives cut a very fine hole in the fabric of space-time and slips into Slipspace with precision (much like a scalpel compared to a butcher knife). It exits with the same pinpoint accuracy, takes less time during travel, and is able to plot a course with error not exceeding an atom. This is why in battle Covenant ships are able to slip by human defenses by using slipspace. Standard Covenant tactics include using short Slipstream jumps to gain positional advantage and surprise other ships, in addition to avoiding incoming ordnance. The Covenant's superiority in drive technology (combined with differing weapon technology) allows a small number of Covenant ships to effectively engage a much larger UNSC force. Missiles, especially, can be defeated by a brief Slipstream jump, as they cannot track through Slipstream space.

I'm now going with the Imperium being screwed in space save by weight of numbers committed.

At least without some kind of verifiable massive advantage. Both factions are capable of orbital strikes, what does the Imperium have that puts them on a higher scale? It needs to be pretty big seeing as I'm getting numbers in the hundreds for individual Covenant fleets. Sure the Imperium has more but short of Holy Terra where do they them with that density?


EDIT: Also fun fact apparently Covenant ships are as big to even bigger then Imperium ones. Apparently Covenant supercarriers go up to 28 kilometers in length, while the battleships of the Imperium are pegged at 8 kilometers.

[WitchSlayer]

True, but when your only advantage is a superior speed, the best thing you can do is a hit-and-run tactic, against the weak points. And if the point isn't weak, just run.

Ah, but the covenant ships are out of comission shorty after jumping. Thus you can't immediately run.

[Brother Oni]

Assuming the Imperials manage to follow a Covenant ship back to it at any point, I'd say we're looking at the Terminator Company teleporting into the High Council scenario outlined earlier.

That's assuming an Inquisitor or some other psyker doesn't do a reading of the Imperial Tarot and says "they are here".

With regard to defences, does the Halo-verse have ground based anti-orbital defences? A quick check on the wiki indicates they have space stations, but 40K also has signifiant ground based defences (the Space Marine game has a good example of one) that's powerful enough and has sufficient range to prevent Imperial ships from getting close enough to bombard it or start large scale landing of reinforcements.

I'm also fairly sure the larger titans also double well as anti-orbital weapon platforms.

[Misery Esquire]

EDIT: Also fun fact apparently Covenant ships are as big to even bigger then Imperium ones. Apparently Covenant supercarriers go up to 28 kilometers in length, while the battleships of the Imperium are pegged at 8 kilometers.

We already checked this one, the Covvie Supercarrier at 28km is more of an anomaly, with the rest of thier CSS-Cruisers (The larger battlecruisers) being 1.8km, thier Assault Carriers 5.1km, and everything else is smaller.

[Squark]

Did some poking and if this is accurate (http://halo.wikia.com/wiki/Slipstream_Space):



I'm now going with the Imperium being screwed in space save by weight of numbers committed.

The problem is the durability difference. The general consensus is that most Imperial ships can take the initial salvo from a Covenant ship, but the same can't be said of the covenant. Given that the Covenant ship, after jumping in and firing it's weapons, can't use it's drive again for at least a small amount of time, there's a very good chance you're left in range of the ship's broadsides or lance batteries long enough for them to fire.

[ChaosLord29]

Did some poking and if this is accurate (http://halo.wikia.com/wiki/Slipstream_Space):



I'm now going with the Imperium being screwed in space save by weight of numbers committed.

At least without some kind of verifiable massive advantage. Both factions are capable of orbital strikes, what does the Imperium have that puts them on a higher scale? It needs to be pretty big seeing as I'm getting numbers in the hundreds for individual Covenant fleets. Sure the Imperium has more but short of Holy Terra where do they them with that density?


EDIT: Also fun fact apparently Covenant ships are as big to even bigger then Imperium ones. Apparently Covenant supercarriers go up to 28 kilometers in length, while the battleships of the Imperium are pegged at 8 kilometers.

A lot of those facts seem to conflict with the other information in the series, particularly what you see in the video games and at least what I have read from the novels (Fall of Reach, Halo, The Flood). Not once during the Battle of Reach or any of the other space battles described do the Covenant use slipspace jumps to evade UNSC Missiles, and they make it very clear that after Slipstream jumps ships are more or less vulnerable while their primary combat systems power up (even the Covenant, though somewhat less so than the UNSC).

This is somewhat distressing as the cited source in the article is a book by the same author who wrote Fall of Reach! The exact same source I am relying upon for my knowledge of Space Travel and combat in Halo.

It seems that Supercarriers are indeed larger than anything save Imperial Orbital Defense Platforms or Ramiles Class Starforts (which are roughly the size of High Charity itself).

Now, I can't presume that a Starfort would indeed be deployed at any time during the conflict, since they are fairly rare, but it is safe to say that if the Covenant do attempt to a massive invasion of any well defended Imperial Sector, they will be facing the full might of the Imperial Navy that can be deployed against them. That means Space Marine Battle Barges, Emperor Class Battleships, and almost certainly a Starfort (especially if they choose to engage a Forge World or other Adeptus Mechanicus Planets).

I believe this is once again though a moot point, since we've established a boarding party of Terminators would more than likely cripple or outright destroy any Covenant Craft they boarded.



That's assuming an Inquisitor or some other psyker doesn't do a reading of the Imperial Tarot and says "they are here".

With regard to defences, does the Halo-verse have ground based anti-orbital defences? A quick check on the wiki indicates they have space stations, but 40K also has signifiant ground based defences (the Space Marine game has a good example of one) that's powerful enough and has sufficient range to prevent Imperial ships from getting close enough to bombard it or start large scale landing of reinforcements.

I'm also fairly sure the larger titans also double well as anti-orbital weapon platforms.
Both excellent points.

If I recall, one of the primary advantages the Covenant have against the UNSC is that they could strike without warning by jumping in past UNSC defenses unpredictably (in part because they were more interested in Forerunner technology and artifacts). Any significant engagement by the Covenant is likely to be predicted by Imperial Psykers (Like Hive Fleet Leviathan, or the Black Crusades, or any number of Ork Waaaghs).

And you're absolutely right, any Imperial World of sufficient development is going to have planetary defenses capable of targeting orbiting space craft. Laser Canon Batteries, Orbital Missile Launchers, the whole shabang of the larger and badder Imperial arsenal (including Titans) is going to be directed upward towards any Covenant Craft who even thinks about trying to glass a Forge World.

[Tvtyrant]

As I pointed out earlier, the slipstream makes orbital defenses null if you are running suicide attacks. Mines in the atmosphere do not matter, since you are going to reappear in the atmosphere itself. You could jump out 2ft above the ground if you didn't mind just crashing, but it would be better to drop out about a mile up and go off like a sun.

[ChaosLord29]

As I pointed out earlier, the slipstream makes orbital defenses null if you are running suicide attacks. Mines in the atmosphere do not matter, since you are going to reappear in the atmosphere itself. You could jump out 2ft above the ground if you didn't mind just crashing, but it would be better to drop out about a mile up and go off like a sun.

Well, if the Covenant use their entire fleet up in suicide attacks, it's not going to be much use to their long term victory is it?

And as I pointed out, any suicide attack against a worthwhile target would require a campaign in and of itself. So you'd have to expend all the resources you normally would on a planetary invasion, only to lose one of your ships in the process and have less than nothing to show for it, since to really cripple a sector you're going to have to destroy more than a few of these worlds.

And then, once you have demonstrated this willingness and ability to destroy Forge worlds with suicide runs, you can damn well bet the Covenant are going to be upgraded to an Alpha or Beta Threat level, and the destruction of the Covenant will now take precedent above everything but the forces of Chaos themselves.

[Brother Oni]

As I pointed out earlier, the slipstream makes orbital defenses null if you are running suicide attacks. Mines in the atmosphere do not matter, since you are going to reappear in the atmosphere itself. You could jump out 2ft above the ground if you didn't mind just crashing, but it would be better to drop out about a mile up and go off like a sun.

Has the Covenant ever used suicide attacks like this in Halo? I'm not aware of any instance in the games that they've sacrificed ships like this.

[ChaosLord29]

Has the Covenant ever used suicide attacks like this in Halo? I'm not aware of any instance in the games that they've sacrificed ships like this.

I believe there are cases where Covenant Cruisers and Assault craft had made suicide runs, and they are after all, religious zealots so if the Prophets ordered them to, it's likely they would.

The thing is, it was rarely if ever necessary against the UNSC, and the overarching point is that it really doesn't serve their long term goal if what they need to do is defeat the Imperium. Sacrificing ships is only worthwhile if you have a logistical advantage over your opponent, and we know very well that the Covenant do not.

[Tvtyrant]

The Covenant was always winning in Halo, so them not using it while they are crushing a significantly weaker species is hardly evidence of their willingness to. Then they had a major civil war and the flood incursion, and at the end of that the series is over. We have no idea what a desperate covenant would have looked like, because it fell apart from the inside.

And if the options are being obliterated by enemy ships to no end, or being obliterated while taking out enemy planets, I would take the latter. You are going to lose this war and probably go extinct anyways, you might as well cripple the enemy while doing it.

[Squark]

The problem is if they didn't use it much, we don't have the material to study, and therefore can't get a clear analysis. Most Imperial defenses need to be concentrated fairly close to a planet (Because 40k authors have a slightly better concept of how large a solar system is that some authors, so defenses in a static orbit need to be in such a place that they can't be bypassed simply by taking a day to go above them). On the other hand, enemies who can sneak up on them aren't totally unknown- Eldar (Both varieties) and Necrons (new fluff)* can both use the webway to pop up unexpectedly, and their vessels tend to actually have something vaguely capable of stealth (Such that if you know the vessel is there, you can track it, but difficult to spot if you don't know what to look for). So, it's not unreasonable to assume the Imperium does have defenses against forces that can surprise them.

So the primary question is how close can a covenant suicide ship get to an Imperial planet undetected; Within a planet's gravity well? Within a planet's outer atmosphere? Inner atmosphere?


*The old fluff for necron space vehicles had them stay in the material universe during FTL by making their ships inertia-less, which, combined with the fact that their ships had a negligible power signature when not firing weapons, made them by far the stealthiest of the 40k factions in space. The new codex instead says the Necrons eventually managed to create their own webway portals, removing the Old One's primary advantage. It doesn't say anything about Necron ship classes anymore, so in the absence of new data, it makes the most sense to assume necron ships still have roughly the same stealth, weapons, and self-repair capability they used to.

[ChaosLord29]

The Covenant was always winning in Halo, so them not using it while they are crushing a significantly weaker species is hardly evidence of their willingness to. Then they had a major civil war and the flood incursion, and at the end of that the series is over. We have no idea what a desperate covenant would have looked like, because it fell apart from the inside.

And if the options are being obliterated by enemy ships to no end, or being obliterated while taking out enemy planets, I would take the latter. You are going to lose this war and probably go extinct anyways, you might as well cripple the enemy while doing it.

I think we're in perfect agreement then. The Covenant loses but they make the Imperium potentially pay for it with suicide attacks.

[Soras Teva Gee]

A lot of those facts seem to conflict with the other information in the series, particularly what you see in the video games and at least what I have read from the novels (Fall of Reach, Halo, The Flood). Not once during the Battle of Reach or any of the other space battles described do the Covenant use slipspace jumps to evade UNSC Missiles, and they make it very clear that after Slipstream jumps ships are more or less vulnerable while their primary combat systems power up (even the Covenant, though somewhat less so than the UNSC).

This is somewhat distressing as the cited source in the article is a book by the same author who wrote Fall of Reach! The exact same source I am relying upon for my knowledge of Space Travel and combat in Halo.

Well they apparently even got a UNSC ship jump inside High Charity. So the precision is clearly there.

Now what exactly establishes this vulnerability? Because I went to that article looking for it specifically and didn't find it. This makes me suspicous of the claim and wondering about the context. For example a Covenant ship coming out into an ambush wouldn't be ready to fight for reasons that have nothing to do with Slipstream systems.


Now, I can't presume that a Starfort would indeed be deployed at any time during the conflict, since they are fairly rare, but it is safe to say that if the Covenant do attempt to a massive invasion of any well defended Imperial Sector, they will be facing the full might of the Imperial Navy that can be deployed against them. That means Space Marine Battle Barges, Emperor Class Battleships, and almost certainly a Starfort (especially if they choose to engage a Forge World or other Adeptus Mechanicus Planets).

Its significant that the Battleships themselves are considered pretty rare themselves. Likewise you would expect one or maybe two Battle Barges in an entire campaign. And by every indication I'm getting you don't need the Imperium to be simply comparable you need them to be seriously better because the Covenant fields fleets in the hundreds as a matter of course so they will have weight of numbers.

Sure in theory the Imperium has unlimited resources so could have a big a fleet as it ever wants... but that would require years of coordination. Even massing what they have takes weeks where not months for just parts of the galaxy depending on how many evil-o's the Warp had for breakfast. Now some places yeah, but I'm not exactly putting sacking Terra and Mars as the threshold for Covenant victory either. If they can in essence become another full fledged faction of 40k then that's victory enough.

At present the only reason I can see Imperial aggression holding up is a vast gap in raw power and durablity... which I'm not seeing the justification for other then the same old blind assumption that everything 40k is automatically a 1000 times more epic.


I believe this is once again though a moot point, since we've established a boarding party of Terminators would more than likely cripple or outright destroy any Covenant Craft they boarded.

Too rare in my book.

Heck the Covenant want to take a page from the Imperium playbook they can absorb the Terminators by having a standing order that ships so boarded that are about to be lost take a jump into a star. They've got more ships the Imperium has Terminator squads.

Though this does remind me of the 40k/ST discussion where there was a question of what sort of shields are needed to stop teleporters. Apparently there was some precedent on the 40k end for that working but I don't recall it.

[Starbuck_II]

Can the Covanent release the flood? Yes, I know the flood kills everyone, but the Prophets seem insane enough to do it.

[Lord_Gareth]

Can the Covanent release the flood? Yes, I know the flood kills everyone, but the Prophets seem insane enough to do it.

Better question - will the Flood actually do anything to affect the outcome? Tyranids are essentially the scaled-up version of the Flood and the IoM battles them on a daily basis - and is furthermore not afraid to simply pull its live troops off a planet and Exterminatus the sucker in order to halt the contagion.

[Jayngfet]

It really comes down to who wins in space.

In the novels it's mentioned that Spartan II's in the very earliest non-shielded armor were able to consistently beat the covenant on the ground, even if they did take a lot of casualties to the point of only having one active member by the very first game.

However, they still lost because the covenant would just blow the entire planet to hell from orbit and that would be the end of that conflict.

[ChaosLord29]

Well they apparently even got a UNSC ship jump inside High Charity. So the precision is clearly there.

Now what exactly establishes this vulnerability? Because I went to that article looking for it specifically and didn't find it. This makes me suspicous of the claim and wondering about the context. For example a Covenant ship coming out into an ambush wouldn't be ready to fight for reasons that have nothing to do with Slipstream systems.

I believe it's the power requirements necessary for Slipspace jumps, but it doesn't seem firmly established. We do know that weapons can't be fired in Slipspace, and shields can't be raised (or at least, aren't), and Ships that exit long term slipspace jumps have to be awakened from Cryo sleep in order to be fully combat ready.

The overarching point however, will be addressed next.


Its significant that the Battleships themselves are considered pretty rare themselves. Likewise you would expect one or maybe two Battle Barges in an entire campaign. And by every indication I'm getting you don't need the Imperium to be simply comparable you need them to be seriously better because the Covenant fields fleets in the hundreds as a matter of course so they will have weight of numbers.

Sure in theory the Imperium has unlimited resources so could have a big a fleet as it ever wants... but that would require years of coordination. Even massing what they have takes weeks where not months for just parts of the galaxy depending on how many evil-o's the Warp had for breakfast. Now some places yeah, but I'm not exactly putting sacking Terra and Mars as the threshold for Covenant victory either. If they can in essence become another full fledged faction of 40k then that's victory enough.

At present the only reason I can see Imperial aggression holding up is a vast gap in raw power and durablity... which I'm not seeing the justification for other then the same old blind assumption that everything 40k is automatically a 1000 times more epic.

It occurs to me that you forget the time frame in which the Imperium wages war. Decades to build new ships, years to coordinate them into a fleet to rival the size of the Covenant, months to track down the position of High Charity, and then just a matter of hours as every last Covenant is massacred by a force the likes of which they have never known or faced. Sure it might take a century, millions of lives, and billions of logistical hours and resources, but that's a price the Imperium is willing to pay and had paid before to annihilate whole alien races, civilizations and defeat incursions, invasions and fleets twice as large and powerful than the Covenant.

The way I see it, even the entire Covenant Civilization assembled in all it's might is the equivalent of a fair sized ork Waaagh! and comparably belligerent and zealous. Ork Waaaghs! often cause a lot of Desctruction, but are in 99% of cases ultimately unsuccessful and crushed, defeated or scattered due to the overwhelming logistical might, nigh inexhaustible resources, and tectonic patience of the Imperium.

The only reason the Orks remain a threat is because they reproduce by space-born spores (it's true!) and as long as a few spores remain on a planet, asteroid, or space hulk somewhere, the potential for billions of ork to spring up like daises is still there and start a whole new Waaagh.

The Covenant lack that ability. Their ability to recoup losses and construct new weapons and ships is on par with most other sentient, technologically developed races, and all it would really take is one back breaking defeat, one crushing victory for the IoM it'd only be a matter of time before they were finished. The assassination of the Prophets (By Terminators, the Officio Assassinorium), the destruction of High Charity (by combined Imperial Fleet Strength, Titans, etc.) or simply the destruction of a fleet the size of the one that attacked Reach, and the Covenant will crumble.


Too rare in my book.

Heck the Covenant want to take a page from the Imperium playbook they can absorb the Terminators by having a standing order that ships so boarded that are about to be lost take a jump into a star. They've got more ships the Imperium has Terminator squads.

Though this does remind me of the 40k/ST discussion where there was a question of what sort of shields are needed to stop teleporters. Apparently there was some precedent on the 40k end for that working but I don't recall it.

Too rare? The whole point is that once the Covenant are a big enough threat they are sure to encounter Terminators, and every Chapter of Space Marines has at least one Terminator Company.

Terminators are rare compared to IG, but when you decide to field an army in 40k, the only limit on the number of Terminators you can field is the number of Elite Slots you have available in your army composition (at least 3). Beyond that, there the Dark Angels Deathwing Companies, which are entirely composed of Terminators.

You say that we're assuming that everything in 40k is better simply by virtue of it being in the future, well I say you're assuming everything in 40k is too rare to be encountered is equally baseless.

If the Covenant's threshold for victory is establishing themselves as another major player on the galactic stage within the 40k Universe, then they have to be able to take on the same threats as everyone else, and that is simply not the case. You can't be a galactic threat or major faction while counting on the fact that your opponents greatest soldiers and weapons (the ones that will utterly decimate you if you face them) are too rare to be encountered.

The Eldar are elusive, evasive and have greater maneuverability and agility than the Empire, and also drastically fewer numbers. But, when the going gets tough, they also have the troops and the technology and the military might to face down the Legions of Chaos, Tyranid Hive Fleets, Ork Waaagghs!, and Necron Tombeships, and oh yeah Space Marine Chapters. Your whole argument is predicated on this notion that everything the IoM can throw at the Covenant can be either evaded or is too rare to matter. That makes them a second rate power who can never really stand up against the heavy hitters, just more or less festers because the Imperium can't be bothered at present to annihilate them piecemeal.

[ChaosLord29]

It really comes down to who wins in space.

In the novels it's mentioned that Spartan II's in the very earliest non-shielded armor were able to consistently beat the covenant on the ground, even if they did take a lot of casualties to the point of only having one active member by the very first game.

However, they still lost because the covenant would just blow the entire planet to hell from orbit and that would be the end of that conflict.

See the difference between the UNSC and the Imperium, is that if the Imperium start losing on the ground, they do the same thing. Their ships execute Exterminatus or Virusbomb the planet and destroy every living thing on the surface. The Imperials also have planetary defenses to stop other factions from doing exactly the same thing, so just imagine how different the war in Halo would have gone if the UNSC had ships and defense systems to deal with that.

[Brother Oni]

Tyranids are essentially the scaled-up version of the Flood and the IoM battles them on a daily basis - and is furthermore not afraid to simply pull its live troops off a planet and Exterminatus the sucker in order to halt the contagion.

As it's 40K, it should be noted that sometimes the retreat of friendlies is optional before commencing Exterminatus.



That makes them a second rate power who can never really stand up against the heavy hitters, just more or less festers because the Imperium can't be bothered at present to annihilate them piecemeal.

So kinda like the Tau then? :smalltongue:

[An Enemy Spy]

Will people please stop bringing 40k into these vs. threads. I don't think there is a single franchise more inconsistantly written or with as as many magic "I Win" buttons. It's the Sci-Fi equivalant of "No, you can't shoot me because I have bulletproof armor." "Well I have bullets that go through bulletproof armor." "Well I have a magic helmet that makes your bullets not work." "You're stupid." "No you're stupid."
And it's awesome, but it doesn't work if you compare it to other franchises.

[ChaosLord29]

As it's 40K, it should be noted that sometimes the retreat of friendlies is optional before commencing Exterminatus.



So kinda like the Tau then? :smalltongue:

Actually, kind of exactly like the Tau. Except, you know, the Tau are content to kind of tease at the edges of Imperial Space, flaunting that fact.

The Covenant on the other hand are possessed of a religious zealotry to rival the Adeptus Sororitas and the same xenocidal furor to boot.

I'd say they have all the worst aspects of the Tau and the Orks, a recipe that is likely to get them all killed inside of a decade of combat with the Imperium.

[Tvtyrant]

Will people please stop bringing 40k into these vs. threads. I don't think there is a single franchise more inconsistantly written or with as as many magic "I Win" buttons. It's the Sci-Fi equivalant of "No, you can't shoot me because I have bulletproof armor." "Well I have bullets that go through bulletproof armor." "Well I have a magic helmet that makes your bullets not work." "You're stupid." "No you're stupid."
And it's awesome, but it doesn't work if you compare it to other franchises.

Well, it is still better than using Gurren Lagaan or DBZ. "That's right, the character in question destroys the entire galaxy in a few seconds, completely ignoring that their attacks are still limited by the speed of light and would take thousands of years to reach that far."

[The_Final_Stand]

Imperials can't board Covenant, tonnage concerns.
And Imperial Task Forces, on seeing a ship with valuable boarding troops vanish, will issue orders to the effect of "Don't board the Xenos".

Alternatively, one of the first targets will be the drive bays so that the ship can't do that. Or they'll jump in, wreck the place, and possibly jump out again.

Anyway, that's something of a moot point. Slipspace is warped in the presence of strong gravity wells, and a star definitely qualifies. The Covenant weren't aware that their tech could even do jumps in atmosphere until someone using their own ships did it for them, and this event happened after Reach.


As far as durability/raw power goes, a basic Lunar Cruiser, the mainstay of the Imperial Fleet, one of the most common ships, is 5 Km long, weighs in at 28 Megatonnes. Front facing torpedo bays, reasonable broadsides.

A Covenant Assault Carrier, so one of the largest ships in their navy, by comparison, is also about 5 Km long. Significant point defence, an Energy Projector, which in 40K terms appear to be long ranged high power Lances, plasma torpedoes and so on.

If nothing else, sizewise, one of the Covenants largest ships is equalled by a ship of the line in 40K. And actual Battleships are much bigger and far more heavily armed/armoured.

I'll grant you, nothing commonly used in the Imperial Fleet can stand up to a Covenant Supercarrier (29Km) individually, but again, that's probably the sort of thing that Terminators actually get used for, boarding supercarriers. The corridor nature of spacecraft would limit the amount of firepower that could be used against the Terminators. And I doubt that the Covenant would sacrifice a Supercarrier so readily, even if they could.

EDIT: Oh wow, a lot of people posted in the time I wrote this.

[WitchSlayer]

Also, why are we going to assume the IoM is going to be on the defensive this whole time? What if they just start attacking Covenant planets? Hell, they could probably pull off a Space version of Sherman's March to the Sea.

[darksolitaire]

Am I the one who thinks that Hunters will give Terminators their moneys' worth in closed environment, making it impossible for Terminators just sweep trough Covenant ships? Also, did they change the fluff of teleportation being dangerous, scattering effect making it night impossible to teleport inside a space ship?

[ChaosLord29]

And Imperial Task Forces, on seeing a ship with valuable boarding troops vanish, will issue orders to the effect of "Don't board the Xenos".

Alternatively, one of the first targets will be the drive bays so that the ship can't do that. Or they'll jump in, wreck the place, and possibly jump out again.

Anyway, that's something of a moot point. Slipspace is warped in the presence of strong gravity wells, and a star definitely qualifies. The Covenant weren't aware that their tech could even do jumps in atmosphere until someone using their own ships did it for them, and this event happened after Reach.


As far as durability/raw power goes, a basic Lunar Cruiser, the mainstay of the Imperial Fleet, one of the most common ships, is 5 Km long, weighs in at 28 Megatonnes. Front facing torpedo bays, reasonable broadsides.

A Covenant Assault Carrier, so one of the largest ships in their navy, by comparison, is also about 5 Km long. Significant point defence, an Energy Projector, which in 40K terms appear to be long ranged high power Lances, plasma torpedoes and so on.

If nothing else, sizewise, one of the Covenants largest ships is equalled by a ship of the line in 40K. And actual Battleships are much bigger and far more heavily armed/armoured.

I'll grant you, nothing commonly used in the Imperial Fleet can stand up to a Covenant Supercarrier (29Km) individually, but again, that's probably the sort of thing that Terminators actually get used for, boarding supercarriers. The corridor nature of spacecraft would limit the amount of firepower that could be used against the Terminators. And I doubt that the Covenant would sacrifice a Supercarrier so readily, even if they could.

EDIT: Oh wow, a lot of people posted in the time I wrote this.

All Excellent points, but don't forget that the Covenant Assault Carriers can only stand up to a couple of MAC canon shots before their shields are downed, and Covenant ships without their shields are every bit as vulnerable to conventional weapons as UNSC craft.

Imperial Lunar Cruisers have banks of Void Shields designed to absorb multiple broadsides or Lance attacks, and fortified armor underneath built to absorb missiles, torpedos, and broadside salvos on a scale the Covenant can scarce conceive of. Now, I'm willing to concede that if Covenant energy weapons function more or less like Lance fire, then that armor is going to be worth a lot less (seeing as Lances ignore armor), but the fact that 40k lances are energy projectors that rung the length of the ship, and Covenant energy weapons operate in banks . . .

Actually, if we look at the Super Carrier's energy projectors, we know it supports 5-7 and that they don't take up the entire length of the ship (or else it wouldn't be able to mount that many or direct them at multiple angles). Imperial Battlships and Cruisers mount Lance batteries that run the entire length of their ships, but can only fire in one direction. That would seem to suggest that the Imperial Battleships standard Lance armament is comparable to at least one of the energy projectors mounted on Covenant Super Carriers, or perhaps even several being fired in the same direction.


Am I the one who thinks that Hunters will give Terminators their moneys' worth in closed environment, making it impossible for Terminators just sweep trough Covenant ships? Also, did they change the fluff of teleportation being dangerous, scattering effect making it night impossible to teleport inside a space ship?

I'd say you're alone there, since the consensus a page or two ago was that regular Space Marines are comparable in size and armor (8 feet tall, clad in inches thick Adamantium super armor that ignores conventional weapons fire, etc.). Terminators are more heavily armed and armored versions, and are deployed in squads outnumbering Hunter more than 2 to 1 (actually exactly 5 to 2).

Also that Fluff has generally stayed the same, except teleportation onto ships has always been part of the lore. One of the whole points about Terminator armor is that they are equipped with teleport homers and thus can be more readily and accurately teleported for boarding actions and the like.

[darksolitaire]

I'd say you're alone there, since the consensus a page or two ago was that regular Space Marines are comparable in size and armor (8 feet tall, clad in inches thick Adamantium super armor that ignores conventional weapons fire, etc.). Terminators are more heavily armed and armored versions, and are deployed in squads outnumbering Hunter more than 2 to 1 (actually exactly 5 to 2).

Do'h, that consensus is just wrong. Standard space marine is 7-7,5 feet tall (Elites are taller) and according to one source weights 700 pounds (twice as much as Elites). Hunter (http://halo.wikia.com/wiki/Mgalekgolo) is 12 feet tall and weights 10,500 pounds. I'll see if I can make good post debunking that consensus in the morning.

[ChaosLord29]

Do'h, that consensus is just wrong. Standard space marine is 7-7,5 feet tall (Elites are taller) and according to one source weights 700 pounds (twice as much as Elites). Hunter (http://halo.wikia.com/wiki/Mgalekgolo) is 12 feet tall and weights 10,500 pounds. I'll see if I can make good post debunking that consensus in the morning.

The Hunter is 12 feet tall standing straight up, it's 8 feet tall hunched over as it generally is in the game, which is how most of us are familiar with them. Also, the point that they are slower, and less agile is going to be difficult to debunk, and the Space Marine's reduced mass is . . .

Wait a second, 10,500 pounds?! How do those ****ers even move? That's more than 5 tons . . . You're telling me hunters way as much M939 Transport trucks? Jesus, those things are like armored T. Rexes . . . pretty comparable in height and relative strength even . . .

Still, I'm not going to give it to the Hunters just yet. A Space Marine is still faster, more agile, and has a comparable strength thanks to their powered armor. They are also far more numerous (even if still relatively few compared to the ranks of the IG) and on average have a century or more of combat experience. Power Weapons, Heavy Bolters, Plasma Weapons (in 40k even plasma rifles and pistols can ignore armor and vaporize troops), are all weapons more than readily available to the average space Marine for taking on a hunter, and if we're talking about Terminators, then they'll be armed with Power Fists, Lightning Claws, Chain Fists, Assault Cannons and other mobile heavy weapons.

If a Squad of Spartans is a match for a pair of Hunters, you can bet your ass a Squad of the Emperors finest are as well.

[Tiki Snakes]

Generally, regardless of difficulty setting, a hunter will go down if you're packing something like the minigun or a rocket launcher. You know, the kind of weapons Terminators come equipped with in one hand?

That's assuming you don't just punch them repeatedly in their massive squishy weak-spots.

[Starbuck_II]

If a Squad of Spartans is a match for a pair of Hunters, you can bet your ass a Squad of the Emperors finest are as well.

Even spartans have trouble, you can't shoot them in the front with lasers. You have to fire in the back. Marines aren't going to know this right away.

Heck, it says some Hunters come in Wraith size.
Their shield: This shield protects them from almost every form of plasma-based or ballistic weaponry available to Covenant and human infantry alike.

■In Halo Wars, a Hunter can deflect many projectiles that would kill them in Halo 3. Like a Wraith Mortar or a Scorpion main cannon shot.
You can't headshot them.


Generally, regardless of difficulty setting, a hunter will go down if you're packing something like the minigun or a rocket launcher. You know, the kind of weapons Terminators come equipped with in one hand?

That's assuming you don't just punch them repeatedly in their massive squishy weak-spots.

No, it says only in the back. If you hit them in the front they will laugh it off (or deflect it like the Minigun).

[Tiki Snakes]

Even spartans have trouble, you can't shoot them in the front with lasers. You have to fire in the back. Marines aren't going to know this right away.

Heck, it says some Hunters come in Wraith size.
Their shield: This shield protects them from almost every form of plasma-based or ballistic weaponry available to Covenant and human infantry alike.

■In Halo Wars, a Hunter can deflect many projectiles that would kill them in Halo 3. Like a Wraith Mortar or a Scorpion main cannon shot.
You can't headshot them.


No, it says only in the back. If you hit them in the front they will laugh it off (or deflect it like the Minigun).


Their face is unprotected too, actually. With a sniper rifle, they go down in one.

[Soras Teva Gee]

I believe it's the power requirements necessary for Slipspace jumps, but it doesn't seem firmly established. We do know that weapons can't be fired in Slipspace, and shields can't be raised (or at least, aren't), and Ships that exit long term slipspace jumps have to be awakened from Cryo sleep in order to be fully combat ready.

The overarching point however, will be addressed next.

I'm asking you to source that. That same page mentions for example that Slipspace tends to put out dangerous radiation and speculates that the Covenant uses their shields to stop that. That may well be a wrong speculation but it points out what I'm not seeing: information that supports your claim.

So I'm looking for what you have arrived at the conclusion from. In particular what spells it out as a weakness of the Covenant. Because its sounds to me more like you are deriving something on your own here.




It occurs to me that you forget the time frame in which the Imperium wages war. Decades to build new ships, years to coordinate them into a fleet to rival the size of the Covenant, months to track down the position of High Charity, and then just a matter of hours as every last Covenant is massacred by a force the likes of which they have never known or faced. Sure it might take a century, millions of lives, and billions of logistical hours and resources, but that's a price the Imperium is willing to pay and had paid before to annihilate whole alien races, civilizations and defeat incursions, invasions and fleets twice as large and powerful than the Covenant.

If we establish parity with the factions of 40k through initial survival it becomes it only raises the question of why they haven't done this to any of the other factions.

Answer: because they can't

Oh sure on paper they perhaps can, but its not ever going to actually happen.


The Covenant lack that ability. Their ability to recoup losses and construct new weapons and ships is on par with most other sentient, technologically developed races, and all it would really take is one back breaking defeat, one crushing victory for the IoM it'd only be a matter of time before they were finished. The assassination of the Prophets (By Terminators, the Officio Assassinorium), the destruction of High Charity (by combined Imperial Fleet Strength, Titans, etc.) or simply the destruction of a fleet the size of the one that attacked Reach, and the Covenant will crumble.

That's all easier said then done. You can't just kill a few Prophets, and like casting the Ring into Mount Doom the entire Covenant will kill itself for you. Nor is it a trivial task to learn enough to actually be able to learn about, find, infilitrate and kill one of the Prophets. At the first sign of trouble the others are going to bug out. And that's not even getting into how you eliminate a few High Prophets, other San 'Shyuum will step up. And there's an entire council of 200 Prophets and Elites leading the Covenant.

You want to write that story, I've got simpler one. The Covenant learns from any number of Imperial sources that the entire Imperium revolves around the Astronomicon on Earth. This is how Imperial navigation works, its not concealable info. The location of Terra in hand they jump in a few of those super carriers right low above the planet on a suicide mission crewed by martyrs and perform a colony drop on all the biggest things they can find. With the size of those things that is a Cretaceous Event. Best of all if it doesn't work there FTL tech means they can keep trying it. No Astronomicon, no Golden Throne, no Imperium. The Imperium has an actual keystone that can take down the entire civilization rendering a million factional areas unable to support one another. Certainly not organize a major war.

Also the Covenant DID (http://halo.wikia.com/wiki/Battle_of_Psi_Serpentis) loose a fleet of comparable size to the one at Reach. This was in the war they steadily won despite efforts like this.



Too rare? The whole point is that once the Covenant are a big enough threat they are sure to encounter Terminators, and every Chapter of Space Marines has at least one Terminator Company.

Yeah too rare.

There are 1000 Chapters of 1000 Marines. Going by this this (http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/mediawiki/images/c/ce/CodexOrganisation.jpg) a Chapter has at most 20 Squads of no more then 10 Terminators. This works out to a mere 200 thousand spread across a galaxy who's planets should number in the trillions.

I consider all Space Marines strategically irrelevant in a galactic conflict to begin with. Maybe if all of them were gathered together they could be put to a singular useful task like defending Cadia. One world for the entire concept. They lack the numbers though to actually matter on anything galactic in scale, especially spread apart.

When you see Space Marine say raiding a Space Hulk... you see idiots that are wasting the Imperium's time and resources so badly its should be positively heretical.

Forming a perfect demonstration of why the Imperium is not actually a functional civilization but the rotting corpse of one. Which looking at the state of the Emperor I think is subtly the intended point.


You say that we're assuming that everything in 40k is better simply by virtue of it being in the future, well I say you're assuming everything in 40k is too rare to be encountered is equally baseless.

Because by the numbers it is. The actual Imperium as far as troops is the IG (and defensively the PDFs) with tanks and lasguns sprinkled with bolters and lascannons. The Leman Russ wins for the Imperium, not the Space Marine.

The space side is better since there is less super-elite whatevers around it seem, but there I'm seeing loose parity in any kind of direct match with the Covenant fielding fleets numbering in the hundreds and superior FTL.

The Imperium can win on ground, but in space unless they are arbitrarily super invincible (by what benchmark?) then the Covenant can take them on two to one with superior moblity and win. Control space and you've half won the battle. Its why the USNC was steadily lost.

[An Enemy Spy]

Their face is unprotected too, actually. With a sniper rifle, they go down in one.

This isw a minor point but Hunters don't actually have faces.

[Forum Explorer]

Am I the one who thinks that Hunters will give Terminators their moneys' worth in closed environment, making it impossible for Terminators just sweep trough Covenant ships? Also, did they change the fluff of teleportation being dangerous, scattering effect making it night impossible to teleport inside a space ship?

I think so. Terminators destroy pretty much everything these days. I don't think the Hunters would even be able to harm a Terminator.


*snip*

The problem about saying that Space Marines are irrelevant is that they really really aren't. Yes they can't be everywhere but they are constantly moving to handle the bigger threats. If the Covenant aren't one of these threats then they aren't relevant at all. Basically if the Guard can handle them then the Imperium has already won.

Plus its also a matter of luck. If they hit someplace important then Space Marines will join the fight. Also consider MC pretty much ripped the Covenant apart and I consider him to be about as strong as a Space Marine officer, well then the Covenant is pretty much dead isn't it?


Now for the suicide attacks; How quickly can they detonate the ship? Because if it takes any time then it sounds like the ground based defenses will be able to shoot the ship down first.

Also I want to bring up psykers. They can pretty much control the crew of a ship and send them into a frenzy of madness to kill everyone on board. Or just cause them to explode. The Covenant have no defenses against them and no forewarning of it happening. It would brutalize them and can form a pretty good defense against the suicide attacks.

[Triscuitable]

I'm rather poorly informed about Warhammer. However, the Covenant's weapons in the game are much weaker than they canonically are (to reduce player frustration). It's been noted that a single plasma pistol burst can vaporize flesh and bone, as well as carry mass. So not only are these superheated balls of ouch, but they have force behind them. The Covenant also has the advantage of numbers. If we're looking at Harvest levels of Covenant, we're talking millions of Jiralhanae (Brutes), billions of Sangheilians (Elites), hundreds of thousands of Mgal'lekgolo colonies (Hunters, which mind you are able to regenerate, and the size of them is dependent on how many Lekgolo worms form into a colony. The covenant has made Mgal'lekgolo that are simply stories tall), and billions more of the Unggoy (Grunts), Kig-Yar (Jackals and Skirmishers), and the ever-helpful Huragok (Engineers).

Considering space battle is pretty much Covenant: 1, Imperium: 0 due to their rather brutal habit of glassing planets with so much plasma that it does exactly that: turns the surface, and all it's inhabitants into a glassy substance (a super-cooled version of the material they heat up into the plasma ammo, like a hot-glue gun).

In great enough numbers, they could win. With lesser numbers, they'd call in the space-high cavalry to glass the planet. Their priority is usually air-support first, everything else second. With air support gone, they can withdraw and start glassing.

Basically, it seems the Imperium has high-tech gear. The Covenant has brutal orbital attacks, numbers, and tactical diversity. They also have this nice habit of dying to lucky individuals named John (whose success is based on exactly that: luck).

I think the most important part of the battle is the Covenant's habit of glassing versus the Imperium's more defensible ships. Of course, the Imperium can't handle several dozen megatons worth of plasma (per shot) hitting their bases on the surface of a planet.

Even more important, the Covenant's previously mentioned population. They have trillions, maybe even quadrillions of aliens across all races, creating this horrific melting pot of culture and technology. Footsoldiers, tacticians, recon, brute force, commanding forces, and some seriously screwed up religion.

Oh yeah, I forgot, the Halos. What happens if we throw a Halo into the mix?

[INSERT ORGANIC LIFE HERE]



Plus its also a matter of luck. If they hit someplace important then Space Marines will join the fight. Also consider MC pretty much ripped the Covenant apart and I consider him to be about as strong as a Space Marine officer, well then the Covenant is pretty much dead isn't it?


He was lucky. Really, really lucky. Cortana, the Chief, Johnson, Jacob and Miranda Keyes, Halsey, Kurt, Sam, Kelly, every Spartan II and III, Thel Vadam, and even the Gravemind acknowledge that he was able to survive only due to his insane luck.

Plus, the Covenant was significantly weakened by the Flood. If you throw them into the fight, it suddenly becomes a game in their favor. Exposed skin? A small crack in the armor? Whatever it is, they'll invade it and turn you into one of them.


This isw a minor point but Hunters don't actually have faces.

It's more like a couple thousand tiny little faces.



Also the Covenant DID (http://halo.wikia.com/wiki/Battle_of_Psi_Serpentis) loose a fleet of comparable size to the one at Reach. This was in the war they steadily won despite efforts like this.


The worst part? Said loss of fleets required that one of the best soldiers the UNSC had fire hundreds of nuclear warheads into a star, creating a micronova. In a sense, the Imperium could win, should they be willing to sacrifice an extreme number of soldiers (totaling well into the billions, I can presume) destroying a star and making a nova (as the star that was destroyed was a Brown Dwarf).

Oh, and Halo: Evolutions is a good read. I highly recommend it. One of the stories (Midnight in the Heart of the Midlothian) is a direct sequel to the Halo: Legends short The Prototype.

[Misery Esquire]

The Covenant also has the advantage of numbers. If we're looking at Harvest levels of Covenant, we're talking millions of Jiralhanae (Brutes), billions of Sangheilians (Elites), hundreds of thousands of Mgal'lekgolo colonies (Hunters, which mind you are able to regenerate, and the size of them is dependent on how many Lekgolo worms form into a colony. The covenant has made Mgal'lekgolo that are simply stories tall), and billions more of the Unggoy (Grunts), Kig-Yar (Jackals and Skirmishers), and the ever-helpful Huragok (Engineers).

And there's trillions without number of humans in the IoM. They're still ahead numerically.



Considering space battle is pretty much Covenant: 1, Imperium: 0 due to their rather brutal habit of glassing planets with so much plasma that it does exactly that: turns the surface, and all it's inhabitants into a glassy substance (a super-cooled version of the material they heat up into the plasma ammo, like a hot-glue gun).

See also ; The Imperium does the same thing with Magma Bombardment Cannons, Lance Strikes, and if they want to blow up the planet instead of slagging it, they fire an Exterminautis missle. The fact that the Covenant occasionally toast planets does not put them in the lead.


Basically, it seems the Imperium has high-tech gear. The Covenant has brutal orbital attacks, numbers, and tactical diversity. They also have this nice habit of dying to lucky individuals named John (whose success is based on exactly that: luck)

The Imperium is beyond the brutality of the Covenant, willing to take the most extreme measures against thier own side, just to make sure. They also have as many different tactical bases as they do generals... which is to say millions.



Plus, the Covenant was significantly weakened by the Flood. If you throw them into the fight, it suddenly becomes a game in their favor. Exposed skin? A small crack in the armor? Whatever it is, they'll invade it and turn you into one of them.

The Flood are... Not incredibly impressive compared to Tyranids who can space travel without an outside source. Also, the Covenant hadn't fought the Flood until the first Halo Ring.



In a sense, the Imperium could win, should they be willing to sacrifice an extreme number of soldiers (totaling well into the billions, I can presume)

The Imperium of Man cares less about the human lives they sacrifice, than the lasguns that the guardsmen happen to be carrying. Throwing more troops at it is thier forte.

[MLai]

I'm rather poorly informed about Warhammer.
You don't have to be specifically knowledgeable about W40K to know that in a universe where every major faction has large space navies that carry global-extinction-event level arsenals, the Imperium Of Man will have military defense in place to counter exactly such tactics. In fact, they do and they have done so for tens of thousands of years.

Same logic as for the SW universe, or the ST universe, i.e. ofc the major civilizations have planetary defenses against enemy ships intent on destruction.

I agree with Soras that any "realistic" initial match-up against the IOM is against the IG, not the SM. However, if the Convenant wins handily in the first few engagements with the IG, then they will be facing a SM chapter. That is also a given.

[The Glyphstone]

If we establish parity with the factions of 40k through initial survival it becomes it only raises the question of why they haven't done this to any of the other factions.

Answer: because they can't

Oh sure on paper they perhaps can, but its not ever going to actually happen.


Corrected answer - they have and did. The background material is littered with references to various alien species and empires that the Imperium did devote its resources to wholescale annihilation of. The reason no existing factions have been wiped out (such as the Tau, who would swing hard but still get crushed in the end) is pretty blatantly and cynically because the universe and story exists to sell the wargame, like the most absurdly overpriced 80's cartoon ever. Some they actually can't beat permanently, such as the Tyranids or Orks, but it's most common in the RPG fluff and various other books (Xenology, and some of the older core rulebooks from 3rd and 4th edition) to mention xenos species that did get exterminated.

[Brother Oni]

(such as the Tau, who would swing hard but still get crushed in the end

I think the fluff reason is that the last time the Tau homeworld was visited by an Imperial survey team, it was so primitive that they logged and filed it, then forgot about it.
Cycle forwards a couple thousand years and now the Tau a small player on the galactic stage, which would get crushed by the Imperium, if they ever got to be a major threat/encroached on Imperial territory too much/the Imperium actually finds the time and resources to throw at them.



Some they actually can't beat permanently, such as the Tyranids or Orks, but it's most common in the RPG fluff and various other books (Xenology, and some of the older core rulebooks from 3rd and 4th edition) to mention xenos species that did get exterminated.

*Cough*Squats*Cough*:smalltongue:

Were the old 6 limbed zoats, a separate xenos race, or were they part of the tyranids in 40K?

[Triscuitable]

The Flood are... Not incredibly impressive compared to Tyranids who can space travel without an outside source. Also, the Covenant hadn't fought the Flood until the first Halo Ring.

As I said earlier, the Flood have this awful habit of infecting anything their little spores touch, and using it against them. Even if the Imperium really are as special as you say, both the Tyranids and Imperium wouldn't stand a chance.

[Misery Esquire]

As I said earlier, the Flood have this awful habit of infecting anything their little spores touch, and using it against them. Even if the Imperium really are as special as you say, both the Tyranids and Imperium wouldn't stand a chance.

The thing is, the Flood can't get off a planet by themselves, and the Imperium is willing to burn thier own planets, population, and ships to a crisp. The Flood are a non-issue being entirely dependant on the people it can grab.

[Triscuitable]

The thing is, the Flood can't get off a planet by themselves, and the Imperium is willing to burn thier own planets, population, and ships to a crisp. The Flood are a non-issue being entirely dependant on the people it can grab.

The Flood drift through space. They seperate and reproduce at almost impossible rates, and if they take over a ship, then they're able to use it just as easily as the people they infected.

[The Glyphstone]

I think the fluff reason is that the last time the Tau homeworld was visited by an Imperial survey team, it was so primitive that they logged and filed it, then forgot about it.
Cycle forwards a couple thousand years and now the Tau a small player on the galactic stage, which would get crushed by the Imperium, if they ever got to be a major threat/encroached on Imperial territory too much/the Imperium actually finds the time and resources to throw at them.



*Cough*Squats*Cough*:smalltongue:

Were the old 6 limbed zoats, a separate xenos race, or were they part of the tyranids in 40K?

Mention of 'Squats' has been declared Hereticus Maximumus by the Emperor's Most Holy Inquisition. There are no such thing as 'Squats' and never have been.They were eaten by Tyranids anyways, not wiped out by the Imperium.

[Forum Explorer]

As I said earlier, the Flood have this awful habit of infecting anything their little spores touch, and using it against them. Even if the Imperium really are as special as you say, both the Tyranids and Imperium wouldn't stand a chance.

Flood vs Nids is interesting but I'm ultimately giving it to the Nids since all of their ground forces are reduced to a nutritious gruel in the end and recycled. Not to mention a good portion of the planet's crust.

Also the infection form doesn't instantly infect everything so the Nids would likely just eat them along with everything else on the planet. Plus it's debatable if the individual Nids are setinant enough to even be infected. Finally the Nids can basically redesign each generation in minutes. So they could rewrite themselves to be immune.

[Misery Esquire]

The Flood drift through space. They seperate and reproduce at almost impossible rates, and if they take over a ship, then they're able to use it just as easily as the people they infected.

The Flood have never been shown to drift any distance through space without a ship. Negligable threat. Even if they get to one ship, the Imperium is used to things that take over ships near-instantly, and captains are entirely willing to self-destruct.

[Soras Teva Gee]

The problem about saying that Space Marines are irrelevant is that they really really aren't. Yes they can't be everywhere but they are constantly moving to handle the bigger threats. If the Covenant aren't one of these threats then they aren't relevant at all. Basically if the Guard can handle them then the Imperium has already won.

More like are constantly moving to make big showy spectacles of themselves by kicking ass in one place generating convenient propaganda to hide the fact that while 1 Marine company was busy heroically defending a city from the orks/necrons/tryanids/etc 10 other planets died screaming.

I digress though let's be more practical.

Let's say the Space Marine company deploys on a planet and target the most reinforced Covenant position on the planet. All goes well and they crack it and capture the Elite running the force of the whole planet.

In a story, hooray the heroes have won!

In war they Covenant launches an orbital strike on the position and hands command over the the next senior officer who was busy on the other side of the planet at the time. The Covenant has lost a replaceable (or at least ample) resource while the Imperium has lost something irreplaceable and rare.

That's the difference. That's why you need numbers the Marine don't have.


Plus its also a matter of luck. If they hit someplace important then Space Marines will join the fight. Also consider MC pretty much ripped the Covenant apart and I consider him to be about as strong as a Space Marine officer, well then the Covenant is pretty much dead isn't it?

Here's the thing for all the unstoppable Demon tore apart Covenant forces... he really didn't win the war. The Covenant beat itself, and with many many events that need to work out exactly as they did for the whole thing to happen. Suppose for example the Arbiter had never been made a scapegoat for Halo 1's events?


Now for the suicide attacks; How quickly can they detonate the ship? Because if it takes any time then it sounds like the ground based defenses will be able to shoot the ship down first.

They don't need to do a damn thing, simply appear in an unstable orbit.

Sir Issac Newton is the deadliest SOB in space.

[ChaosLord29]

A lot got posted while I was offline, but I have a few points I'd like to make which I think are pretty telling in the Imperium's favor.


Number 1:
To address the issue of how many Space Marines there are and how relevant they are in galactic conflict, it would seem to me to be self-evident that they are relevant on a galactic scale, given the number of times Space Marines have done what no normal soldiers could have done in order to avert galactic calamities. For references, please see the last 5,000 years of Imperial History.

Every Space Marine is a hero of a dozen battles, has fought in hundreds more, and is a xenocidal zealot to put even the most fanatical Brute or Elite to shame. That the Space Marines have heroes and commanders amongst their ranks who are placed on a pedestal above even these gods among insects speak volumes. Master Chief is the whole reason the Covenant were defeated. Sure, her got really, really lucky and had Cortana backing him up, but the running theme in the Halo series is that maybe it wasn't so much a question of luck with John, but of fate.

Now consider that there are Space Marine heroes out their like Marneus Calagar, Captain Darnath Lysander, Captain Aurellius (a Grey Knight), and perhaps dozens of others, it really doesn't seem fair to say that maybe the Covenant are just the opportunity some Space Marine out their needs to heroically sacrifice himself in an action which decimates a whole Covenant fleet or brings about the death of the High Council.

As for the numbers of the Space Marines, each Space Marine Chapter totals somewhere between 1,000 and 10,000 Space Marines (numbers fluctuate wildly depending on the chapter in question), but not much greater than that since once a Chapter gets that large, it's host is separated and a new Chapter founded (to prevent another Heresy situation). Their were originally 36 Chapters at the time of the Second Founding. Since then, that number has spiraled into the hundreds, so at any given time I'd say their are between hundreds of thousands and a million or so Space Marines at any given time.

Number 2:
It was brought up that if the Imperium has the might to truly crush any of it's foes, it would do so, and that if the Covenant can establish themselves as a threat, they can remain as such as the Imperium will not be able to muster the necessary power at any one time in order to defeat them.

First of all, I would not consider that a sufficient Threshold to consider the Covenant 'victorious' and I don't think the Prophets would either. We're talking about a culture of religious fanatics at least as xenocidal as the Imperium of itself. If you think the Covenant will settle for a dominion a couple of subsectors big when their are still humans ready to wage war against them, you're wrong.

Next, I would like to point out that their are specific reasons for each other faction that prevent their annihilation at the hands of any other faction (reasons not shared by the Covenant), and secondly, the Imperium has more or less built its history on the piecemeal annihilation of smaller alien cultures and species, and that several of these races are referenced as extinct or 'prior threats' in the 4th and 5th edition rule books. Some of these were pre-heresey, but some of them were not.

The point however remains that the other factions in 40k have specific reasons the Imperium of Man cannot just muster a force large enough to exterminate them and then do so:

Chaos Legions- Aside from the fact that there are literally an inexhaustible number of Daemons inhabiting the Warp, the Chaos Space Marines hide in the Eye of Terror and launch period raids and crusades into Imperial Space. They also draw cultist and heretic humans from the Imperium itself.
Eldar- Both Craftworld and Dark Eldar use the Webway to remain hidden and never commit to large scale engagements or campaigns which would endanger the survival of their species.
Necron- The homeworlds of the Necron are unknown to the Empire, and they similarly make us of the webway (like the Eldar). Furthermore, the Necrons are the only truly immortal species as any Necrons who are beyond repair in the battlefield teleport back to their tombworld for full reconstruction. As far as we know, their could only be a few million Necrons in the entire Galaxy, but because you need a Blackstone Fortress to truly kill them, they remain an omnipresent threat.
Tau- Do not openly court hostilities with the Imperials and in fact actively sue for peace and engage in what are at least tenuous diplomatic negotiations with the IoM. These are the best analogue, I think, for the Covenant, since they are a relatively small threat which the Imperium has knowledge of, but has not mustered the resources yet to 'deal' with, largely since they are distracted by the local Ork Waaagh! and the nearby vicinity of Hivefleet Behemoth, which are both radically more pressing matters in that region of space than a largely peaceable socialist 'empire'.


You'll notice that Tyranids and Orks are not themselves on that list, and that is because they have are of a rather unique situation, in that the Imperium has in fact annihilated both factions piecemeal on several occasions (several of which in greater numbers boasted by the Covenant).

Why do they continue to be a major faction then? Because they come back. The orcs are sort of like the flood in that just a couple of ork spores (yes they reproduce like fungus) can take root on a world and grow into a fully fledged Waaaagh! in a matter of months (and they don't even have to infect sentient life to do it!). The Tyranids are similar in that they are the masters of recycling losses and can regurgitate both allied and enemy biomatter into a whole new Hivefleet if given any sort of quarter. It should also be noted that they are an extra galactic invader, and that while Hivefleet Leviathan (which consisted of billions of Tyranid ships and troops) was crushed, Hive Fleet Behemoth has proved a much more insidious foe.

The Covenant are both like the Tau in that they are a relatively small faction (with superior FTL technology I might add), but they are in no way peaceful and are exceedingly likely to begin a crusade into Imperial Space that will earn them top marks in the Ordo Xenos's **** list. Moreover, unlike the Orks or the Tyranids, they cannot recoup losses by mass reproduction, or consumption of planets natural resources. They train soldiers and build ships and weapons at a rate which would seem not drastically faster than the Imperium. In other words, they are at a severe disadvantage logistically, and are just crazy enough to get themselves killed and quickly.

[Triscuitable]

The Flood have never been shown to drift any distance through space without a ship. Negligable threat. Even if they get to one ship, the Imperium is used to things that take over ships near-instantly, and captains are entirely willing to self-destruct.

Did you watch Halo: Legends? Yes, they have. That's how they got into the Milky Way: they just drifted here in open space, and happened to land on the Forerunner homeworld. From there they took them over extremely quickly. This is a race of beings that is known to have been so infuriated with humanity that they outright de-evolved them.

According to Halo canon, humanity was sentient far earlier than what was once believed. They developed incredibly quickly, but rebelled against the Forerunners by allying with the San 'Shyuum (the Prophets' race) to fight the Flood. The Forerunners archived their DNA, mixed their own with the prehistoric DNA, and effectively put humanity into a position where they had no technology, no way to use it, no knowledge of ever achieving sentience, etc. The Halos were fired, and humanity was later reborn.



Also the infection form doesn't instantly infect everything so the Nids would likely just eat them along with everything else on the planet. Plus it's debatable if the individual Nids are sentient enough to even be infected. Finally the Nids can basically redesign each generation in minutes. So they could rewrite themselves to be immune.

But the infection is instantaneous. Not only that, but it affects any sapient being. It takes seconds to infect anything, and the effect is only accelerated by more infection forms.

[ChaosLord29]

Did you watch Halo: Legends? Yes, they have. That's how they got into the Milky Way: they just drifted here in open space, and happened to land on the Forerunner homeworld. From there they took them over extremely quickly. This is a race of beings that is known to have been so infuriated with humanity that they outright de-evolved them.

According to Halo canon, humanity was sentient far earlier than what was once believed. They developed incredibly quickly, but rebelled against the Forerunners by allying with the San 'Shyuum (the Prophets' race) to fight the Flood. The Forerunners archived their DNA, mixed their own with the prehistoric DNA, and effectively put humanity into a position where they had no technology, no way to use it, no knowledge of ever achieving sentience, etc. The Halos were fired, and humanity was later reborn.

But the infection is instantaneous. Not only that, but it affects any sapient being. It takes seconds to infect anything, and the effect is only accelerated by more infection forms.


This is a tangent debate. The Flood are a separate faction and not worthy considering in this discussion any more than the Eldar or the Necrons, that is as comparative material for teasing out specific aspects of either the Covenant or the Imperium.

Please drop it or create a separate thread.

[An Enemy Spy]

The Flood have never been shown to drift any distance through space without a ship. Negligable threat. Even if they get to one ship, the Imperium is used to things that take over ships near-instantly, and captains are entirely willing to self-destruct.

The Flood destroyed a civilization far more powerful than the Imperium, gain all the knowledge of everyone they infect, and can operate and repair spaceships. The Flood you saw in the the games were a weak, not yet evolved version of the Flood's true power. Oh, and they can kill and and infect with billions of airborne spores. Never underestimate the Flood.

[Spamotron]

But the Flood's infection is not absolute. Sgt. Johnson's failed Spartan I enhancements made him immune. The Tyranids are masters of genetic manipulation and bio-warfare and seek to constantly improve and evolve themselves if anyone can develop an immunity they can.

[ChaosLord29]

The Flood destroyed a civilization far more powerful than the Imperium, gain all the knowledge of everyone they infect, and can operate and repair spaceships. The Flood you saw in the the games were a weak, not yet evolved version of the Flood's true power. Oh, and they can kill and and infect with billions of airborne spores. Never underestimate the Flood.

Please see the above post. I would prefer not to entertain any more discussion about the Flood as they are not directly relevant to the Covenant.

Presume that the Flood and the Halo Installations have been destroyed several tens of thousands years prior to the advent of the Imperium.

Or if you like, start a Tyranids vs Flood thread. I'd love to weigh in on that argument so long as it's somewhere not here :smallbiggrin:

[Urist]

Trying to claim the Covenant have any chance in space is laughable. Even low-end calculations for the Imperium puts lances spitting out gigajoules of energy, and Covenant shields go down to megajoules. Void Shields on even the smallest vessels, meanwhile, take hours of lance bombardment and still keep kicking. An Imperium vessel could feasibly tank hundreds of Covenant vessels firing on it indefinitely, and swat them at its leisure.

[Triscuitable]

This is a tangent debate. The Flood are a separate faction and not worthy considering in this discussion any more than the Eldar or the Necrons, that is as comparative material for teasing out specific aspects of either the Covenant or the Imperium.

Please drop it or create a separate thread.

I'd say they are perfectly fine with being here; being just another variable like the Tyranids, we may as well say that this discussion has evolved into a Halo universe versus Warhammer universe battle.

Which the Warhammer 40k universe easily wins, because it has maybe 50 factions of increasing unpleasantry. Besides, this thread has basically been established with the obvious fact that you want the Imperium to win. The Covenant has sheer numbers, all of which are cannon fodder (some with literal cannons). The fact that you claim the Imperium is willing to give up everything to win is the same thing the Covenant would do. The problem is the Covenant is unpredictable, full of viable threats of varying race and skill, and yet you say the Imperium would win because of sheer firepower. That is bias. You have information on the Covenant that you refuse to acknowledge, like how they managed to destroy every single colony in the Milky Way except Earth. That takes:


A lot of soldiers
Devoted followers
Incredible technology
A massive fleet that is equivalent to the population of whatever they plan on destroying


Which means it's quite possible the Covenant and Imperium could very well just kill each other.


But the Flood's infection is not absolute. Sgt. Johnson's failed Spartan I enhancements made him immune. The Tyranids are masters of genetic manipulation and bio-warfare and seek to constantly improve and evolve themselves if anyone can develop an immunity they can.

You make a good argument. Yeah, that'd stop infection, but not the fighting overall.


Please see the above post. I would prefer not to entertain any more discussion about the Flood as they are not directly relevant to the Covenant.

Presume that the Flood and the Halo Installations have been destroyed several tens of thousands years prior to the advent of the Imperium.

Then the Covenant has been disbanded. The Brutes are the slaves of the Sangheili, which defected during the Human Covenant War, the Kig-Yar are back to space piracy, the San 'Shyuum are almost extinct from over-reliance on other races, the Unggoy are just farmers and slaves, like the Brutes, and the Engineers went off to terraform glassed colonies.

Well, there's still the Mgal'lekgolo. Sort of. Hardly a covenant. Without the Installations, there is no point for them to exist. Canonically, once they were destroyed, the Covenant did exactly what I stated above. The only forces they have left are a meager presence on the Forbidden Planet in Halo 4.

[ChaosLord29]

Trying to claim the Covenant have any chance in space is laughable. Even low-end calculations for the Imperium puts lances spitting out gigajoules of energy, and Covenant shields go down to megajoules. Void Shields on even the smallest vessels, meanwhile, take hours of lance bombardment and still keep kicking. An Imperium vessel could feasibly tank hundreds of Covenant vessels firing on it indefinitely, and swat them at its leisure.

You know I was just in the process of crunching those numbers myself? It seems to me that the only comparable weaponry the Covenant have to a standard Imperial Lance battery are the Energy Projectors aboard their Super Carriers. And as you pointed out, Void Shields are designed to prevent those same lances from reaching the soon to be gooey starship exterior hull plating.


I'd say they are perfectly fine with being here; being just another variable like the Tyranids, we may as well say that this discussion has evolved into a Halo universe versus Warhammer universe battle.

Look, I'm trying to be polite here, and while I'd love to weigh in on that discussion, it really is the kind of thing for another thread. I'm much more interested in a conflict specifically between the Imperium of Man and Covenant, sans all other factions in their respective universes actually entering said conflict.

If you like, I'll create that thread for you and we can engage in that discussion there.

[Triscuitable]

You know I was just in the process of crunching those numbers myself? It seems to me that the only comparable weaponry the Covenant have to a standard Imperial Lance battery are the Energy Projectors aboard their Super Carriers. And as you pointed out, Void Shields are designed to prevent those same lances from reaching the soon to be gooey starship exterior hull plating.

So the Covenant had no chance of winning in the first place. Thus my arguments are entirely pointless, and the purpose of this thread is null. The Imperium wins.



Look, I'm trying to be polite here, and while I'd love to weigh in on that discussion, it really is the kind of thing for another thread. I'm much more interested in a conflict specifically between the Imperium of Man and Covenant, sans all other factions in their respective universes actually entering said conflict.

If you like, I'll create that thread for you and we can engage in that discussion there.

It was a joke. Chaos? Magic? Insane technology caused by tens of millenia of development? Put that against three factions, of which two have been functioning for maybe 2k years each, with only one actually being competent for 2k of those years. The other was in power for maybe 100.

Covenant is obliterated.
Humanity is vaporized.
The Flood probably just kind of... Float somewhere. I'm sure they'd do some damage, but not enough.

[ChaosLord29]

So the Covenant had no chance of winning in the first place. Thus my arguments are entirely pointless, and the purpose of this thread is null. The Imperium wins. Hooray.

Call me convinced when I see Soras Teva Gee respond to my long post above (even if I have to repost it tomorrow).

[Forum Explorer]

So the Covenant had no chance of winning in the first place. Thus my arguments are entirely pointless, and the purpose of this thread is null. The Imperium wins. Hooray.

Pretty much. The only tactic that we could come up with was the Covenant using hit and run tactics and suicide ships to destroy worlds. And even that does nothing to prevent the Imperium from taking over Covenant worlds and defending against the suicide ships.


Speaking of the suicide ships I believe that the ground defenses would be enough to reduce them to slag so that the damage is minimized.

Soras your example is silly. The Space Marines would secure orbit first before deploying and could do so easily via boarding torpedoes and teleporters since the Covenant ships have to get well within the Battle Barge's range.

[Triscuitable]

Call me convinced when I see Soras Teva Gee respond to my long post above (even if I have to repost it tomorrow).

Yeah, he makes a good point, which in the end does show that even if they couldn't win, they sure as hell would ruin the Imperium as effectively as possible. Their entire goal in the Halo series is to find the location of Earth and destroy it so they can progress with the Great Journey unopposed. I guess I just kind of threw my hands in the air and said "screw it" when you established that the Halos were destroyed along with the Flood. Post Halo 3, the Covenant is nothing.


Pretty much. The only tactic that we could come up with was the Covenant using hit and run tactics and suicide ships to destroy worlds. And even that does nothing to prevent the Imperium from taking over Covenant worlds and defending against the suicide ships.

The Covenant races abandoned their homeworlds a long time ago. While some end up returning, there's not strategic significance you can gain from blowing them up. You'll just make them madder.


Speaking of the suicide ships I believe that the ground defenses would be enough to reduce them to slag so that the damage is minimized.

Slag carrying active plasma is pretty nasty sounding slag. :smalltongue:


Soras your example is silly. The Space Marines would secure orbit first before deploying and could do so easily via boarding torpedoes and teleporters since the Covenant ships have to get well within the Battle Barge's range.

Could they manage this if they didn't expect a sudden ambush? The Covenant have nasty habits. Among these:


Popping up unexpectedly to ruin everyone's day.
Glassing planets as a hobby, kind of like Warhammer 40k. :smalltongue:
Shooting anything that isn't Covenant.
Glassing planets that aren't Covenant.
Blowing up your base so they can go on and glass more planets.
If all else fails, complete their religious ceremony and activate the Halo Installations.


The Halos are a special little thing. Any of them can fire, causing a chain reaction with all of them, causing all to link up and fire simultaneously. Not only that, but it wipes out all organic life in its entirety. No more Imperium, no more Covenant. The Covenant don't even have to reveal themselves. Once they recognize the Imperium as a threat they can't face, they'll just ahead and blow everyone up.

[Tvtyrant]

Pretty much. The only tactic that we could come up with was the Covenant using hit and run tactics and suicide ships to destroy worlds. And even that does nothing to prevent the Imperium from taking over Covenant worlds and defending against the suicide ships.


Speaking of the suicide ships I believe that the ground defenses would be enough to reduce them to slag so that the damage is minimized.

Soras your example is silly. The Space Marines would secure orbit first before deploying and could do so easily via boarding torpedoes and teleporters since the Covenant ships have to get well within the Battle Barge's range.

Nah, you have your ship appear inside the ocean. Let's see the ground defenses shoot it before it goes off now! :smallamused:

I have no emotional attachment to this argument at all. :P

[Forum Explorer]

Nah, you have your ship appear inside the ocean. Let's see the ground defenses shoot it before it goes off now! :smallamused:

I have no emotional attachment to this argument at all. :P

I thought they couldn't warp within a significant gravity well? :smallconfused:

[ChaosLord29]

Nah, you have your ship appear inside the ocean. Let's see the ground defenses shoot it before it goes off now! :smallamused:

I have no emotional attachment to this argument at all. :P

Ummmm . . . it can't exit make a slipspace jump into an ocean for the same reason it can's exit into solid matter?

I mean seriously, this is a moot point since we have already established that devoting the resources necessary to allow a Covenant ship to make a suicide run at a Forgeworld or the like would make not be worth the cost!



I thought they couldn't warp within a significant gravity well? :smallconfused:

Someone referenced a point at which a UNSC officer uses a Covenant Ship to warp into the atmosphere of a planet (or maybe High Charity) the point being that even the Covenant didn't know their ships could do that until then, and that it required a lot of luck to pull it off.

[Triscuitable]

Because it was lost in the aftermath of a couple posts while I was editing it, here's another note from yours truly (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=13900737&postcount=148).

I think that in the end, despite all these arguments, in order for the Covenant to exist, the Halos need to also be available. It's why they exist. When the Halos are activated, everyone's screwed. Plain and simple. As said in my above post, nobody even needs to be aware of the Covenant's existence. They'll just waltz on over to an Installation, activate it, and bam: everyone dies, the Covenant fulfills their goal, and the Imperium is wiped from the face of existence.

[Forum Explorer]

The Covenant races abandoned their homeworlds a long time ago. While some end up returning, there's not strategic significance you can gain from blowing them up. You'll just make them madder.



Slag carrying active plasma is pretty nasty sounding slag. :smalltongue:



Could they manage this if they didn't expect a sudden ambush? The Covenant have nasty habits. Among these:


Popping up unexpectedly to ruin everyone's day.
Glassing planets as a hobby, kind of like Warhammer 40k. :smalltongue:
Shooting anything that isn't Covenant.
Glassing planets that aren't Covenant.
Blowing up your base so they can go on and glass more planets.
If all else fails, complete their religious ceremony and activate the Halo Installations.


The Halos are a special little thing. Any of them can fire, causing a chain reaction with all of them, causing all to link up and fire simultaneously. Not only that, but it wipes out all organic life in its entirety. No more Imperium, no more Covenant. The Covenant don't even have to reveal themselves. Once they recognize the Imperium as a threat they can't face, they'll just ahead and blow everyone up.

Really? I didn't know that. Well the Imperium would still conquer (not blow up, they aren't that wasteful if they think they can conquer the planet) those planets and wherever the Covenant are getting their resources from.

I honestly have no idea what would happen to the plasma when you blow up a warship. I guess some of it would dissipate into the metal around it? I got no clue. Either way I'm thinking it would be reduced from a planet busting attack to just harmful.

Yeah pretty much. Space Marines can attack demon infested worlds where the demons can literally appear out of nowhere and warp physics to better suit themselves.

Now about the Halo rings. I'm going to say that wouldn't do anything to the Imperium. Why? Simply because the Halo rings aren't in the 40k universe. Just like we aren't saying that the Covenant has to start dealing with the warp or any of the Imperium's rivals, the Imperium doesn't have to worry about the Halo rings.


Regarding warping in atmosphere: If its a tactic the Covenant isn't aware of then they can't use it now can they?

[ChaosLord29]

Because it was lost in the aftermath of a couple posts while I was editing it, here's another note from yours truly (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=13900737&postcount=148).

I think that in the end, despite all these arguments, in order for the Covenant to exist, the Halos need to also be available. It's why they exist. When the Halos are activated, everyone's screwed. Plain and simple. As said in my above post, nobody even needs to be aware of the Covenant's existence. They'll just waltz on over to an Installation, activate it, and bam: everyone dies, the Covenant fulfills their goal, and the Imperium is wiped from the face of existence.

That's not the established threshold for a Covenant victory here though. The idea is whether or not the Covenant are militarily a threat to the Imperium, and if the Halos are activated then everyone dies and there has been no military victory.

Also, if there's about to be a galaxy wide execution of all sentient life, you can damn well bet the Emperor's Tarot is going to reveal something to that effect and that just about every psyker in the galaxy is going to be wracked with visions of prophetic doom indicating the impending annihilation. I'd wager good money that the Emperor's spirit would actively intervene at that point, guiding some lone Space Marine strike force or Inquisitor or other champion of his will to the Halo Station the Covenant are attempting to activate and then we'd see more or less the same scenario in Halo I played out with Covenant and Adeptus Astartes forces (which we've established would definitely work out in favor of the Space Marines).

[Ulm11]

By that argument then with the Imperium comes the rest of 40k universe and all the fun that entails, like Dark Elder raids, Ork Warghs, Chaos Warbands and all that other fun stuff. The point of a verses thread is just to analyse how the various factions would fare against each other in whatever the competition is with no outside help. The Halo weapon system is part of the Halo universe, but not part of the Covenant arsenal, so why should they have access to them. Also the Covenant can not actually activate the Halo's without human assistance, which the Covenant only became aware of at the end of the war.

[ChaosLord29]

*snip snip* Also the Covenant can not actually activate the Halo's without human assistance, which the Covenant only became aware of at the end of the war.

Excellent point.

[Triscuitable]

Really? I didn't know that. Well the Imperium would still conquer (not blow up, they aren't that wasteful if they think they can conquer the planet) those planets and wherever the Covenant are getting their resources from.

I honestly have no idea what would happen to the plasma when you blow up a warship. I guess some of it would dissipate into the metal around it? I got no clue. Either way I'm thinking it would be reduced from a planet busting attack to just harmful.

Yeah pretty much. Space Marines can attack demon infested worlds where the demons can literally appear out of nowhere and warp physics to better suit themselves.

Now about the Halo rings. I'm going to say that wouldn't do anything to the Imperium. Why? Simply because the Halo rings aren't in the 40k universe. Just like we aren't saying that the Covenant has to start dealing with the warp or any of the Imperium's rivals, the Imperium doesn't have to worry about the Halo rings.


Regarding warping in atmosphere: If its a tactic the Covenant isn't aware of then they can't use it now can they?

The Covenant get their resources from Forerunner artifacts that humanity was never able to translate because the Covenant kind of blew them up.

Superheated plasma wouldn't dissipate a ship, rather it would melt it.

If there are no Halo rings, the Covenant won't be present. They have no reason to be there, they are clearly outmatched, and they won't bother. Thus, in order for the battle to occur, the rings must be present.


By that argument then with the Imperium comes the rest of 40k universe and all the fun that entails, like Dark Elder raids, Ork Warghs, Chaos Warbands and all that other fun stuff. The point of a verses thread is just to analyse how the various factions would fare against each other in whatever the competition is with no outside help. The Halo weapon system is part of the Halo universe, but not part of the Covenant arsenal, so why should they have access to them. Also the Covenant can not actually activate the Halo's without human assistance, which the Covenant only became aware of at the end of the war.

The Covenant have no need to be present should the Great Journey not be possible. They'd keep a low profile, to say the least.


Excellent point.

Yup. Completely forgot about that. The Halos still contain, y'know, the Flood though. :smalltongue: Regardless, they have a tendency to explode. A lot.

[An Enemy Spy]

Because it was lost in the aftermath of a couple posts while I was editing it, here's another note from yours truly (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showpost.php?p=13900737&postcount=148).

I think that in the end, despite all these arguments, in order for the Covenant to exist, the Halos need to also be available. It's why they exist. When the Halos are activated, everyone's screwed. Plain and simple. As said in my above post, nobody even needs to be aware of the Covenant's existence. They'll just waltz on over to an Installation, activate it, and bam: everyone dies, the Covenant fulfills their goal, and the Imperium is wiped from the face of existence.

How? The Covenant can't activate Halo. Only a Reclaimer can do that.
I don'tunderstand your assertion that the Covies have enough numbers either. Sure, they have a large portion of the Orion Arm under their control, but the Imperium has practically the entire galaxy. It can lose BILLIONS of soldiers and not even care.
I don't get this thread at all. Halo is my favorite Sci-Fi franchise, but it and 40k just exist on two massively different scales.

[ChaosLord29]

The Covenant get their resources from Forerunner artifacts that humanity was never able to translate because the Covenant kind of blew them up.

Superheated plasma wouldn't dissipate a ship, rather it would melt it.

If there are no Halo rings, the Covenant won't be present. They have no reason to be there, they are clearly outmatched, and they won't bother. Thus, in order for the battle to occur, the rings must be present.



The Covenant have no need to be present should the Great Journey not be possible. They'd keep a low profile, to say the least.



Yup. Completely forgot about that. The Halos still contain, y'know, the Flood though. :smalltongue: Regardless, they have a tendency to explode. A lot.

Are you saying the Halo Installations have a tendency to explode and/or at random? That doesn't seem right to me. And even if it is the Flood who reveal themselves and proceed to envelope the Galaxy, the Covenant still lose, and the way I see it, the Imperium still wins, seeing as they have a much better chance of taking on the Flood (Talk about a threat worthy of the Space Marines).

There's potential there even for a massive psychic conflict between the Gravemind and some psykers and Inquisitors (perhaps even the Spirit of the Emperor himself). Imagine if the telepathic link which connects the Flood were to be broken or shattered by the combined efforts of the Grey Knights and the Ordo Xenos,

[An Enemy Spy]

Are you saying the Halo Installations have a tendency to explode and/or at random? That doesn't seem right to me.

He was joking. Only two Halos have been destroyed, and one was incomplete and was only destroyed because it fired before it had the integrity to withstand the energy blast.

[Triscuitable]

How? The Covenant can't activate Halo. Only a Reclaimer can do that.
I don'tunderstand your assertion that the Covies have enough numbers either. Sure, they have a large portion of the Orion Arm under their control, but the Imperium has practically the entire galaxy. It can lose BILLIONS of soldiers and not even care.
I don't get this thread at all. Halo is my favorite Sci-Fi franchise, but it and 40k just exist on two massively different scales.

I was thinking this earlier. This is a faction that has developed for about 2k years. The Imperium, well, it's had about 40k. The Covenant only ever steamrolled humanity while the Imperium faced off against way too many foes.


He was joking. Only two Halos have been destroyed, and one was incomplete and was only destroyed because it fired before it had the integrity to withstand the energy blast.

Bingo!

[ChaosLord29]

I was thinking this earlier. This is a faction that has developed for about 2k years. The Imperium, well, it's had about 40k. The Covenant only ever steamrolled humanity while the Imperium faced off against way too many foes.



Bingo!

Glad to see we have at least one Halo fan who isn't entirely intractable. I may not be a huge fan of the games, but there's a reason I read Fall of Reach and the Flood, and it's because I like the universe they're set in, or more to the point, the character of Master Chief as he is portrayed in the novels, and of course Cortana.

Really, I like to think that Halo is actually a precursor to 40k. That the Spartans are the distant ancestors of the Adeptus Astartes, and the events of Halo take place in what the Imperium refers to as the Dark Age of Technology (though according to Halo's timeline they take place during the Age of Terra, much earlier).

[Triscuitable]

As awesome as that sounds, there is a serious flaw to that theory: the Halo-verse has no magic.

[ChaosLord29]

As awesome as that sounds, there is a serious flaw to that theory: the Halo-verse has no magic.

The Halo-verse has no magic . . . yet!

Think of it, as humanity expands across the stars a burgeoning young empire just brimming with life and energy and emotion . . . ripe for exploitation for the budding forces of Chaos. Content for thousands of years to exist simply as subcurrents of roiling emotion in a dimension beyond the conceptualization of even the Covenant, the expansion of the humanity and their combined will and emotion is the trigger for the apotheosis of the Gods of Chaos.

Some time in the 8th or 9th millenia, humanity begins to change. Authorities notice a considerable uptick in noticeable mutations amongst human populations. Though initially unconcerned as many of these are treatable with genetic screening or advanced cosmetic surgery, with each successive generation some of the mutations begin to grow stronger, more aberrant, and there is increasing concern that this is a marked change in human evolutionary biology. Humanity however continues to spread and develop it's technology and engage in all of its same vices and sins and the Gods of Chaos grow stronger.

Over the next few centuries, things begin to get a little more strange. Despite advancements in Slipspace technology, the old woes of strange time distortions and other phenomena are becoming increasingly common. Scientific minds begin to develop SlipSpace technology that can generate and preserve fields of real space around crafts, but the idea that slipspace is radically altering is quite a frightening prospect. On top of that, the various mutations humanity experiences have begun to manifest in rudimentary and nascent psychic and telepathic powers. Government programs to control and develop these 'psykers' are established, and they prove to be vastly effective in helping to navigate the new travails of Slipspace, as well as communicating over the vast distances of the far flung human empire.

Little do they realize that humanity's development as a psychically attuned race only further fuels the power of the Chaos Gods, who have now taken on distinct personas and aspects all their own to better manipulate and influence the various races of the Galaxy. Eventually, Daemons begin to manifest by possessing human psykers and humanity struggles to come to grips with the ramifications represented by these creatures apparently from a darker, more superstitious part of human history. Though the new psy development programs do their best to condition psykers against these 'extradimensional psychosomatic anomolies', and reassure the public, some of the daemons are wilier than others. They begin to act as mouthpieces for the Gods of Chaos, forming cults and worshippers, sewing unrest and dividing humanity against itself into various political and cultural factions. Slipspace dimensions are now realms of nightmarish temporal and physical distortion, and have begun to have a visibly 'warping' effect on areas of real space (the first Warp Storms).

Unable to cope with these new trials and terrors, whatever organizational structure that was holding humanity together collapses in on itself and the various regions of the galaxy factionalize, with numerous conflicts and civil struggles erupting everywhere far enough from Earth to resist it's influence. This internal strife on a near galactic scale only causes the Chaos Gods to become stronger, and in their new strength full blown Warp Storms erupt across the galaxy, further dividing the human factions and bringing them face to face with fully manifested Chaos Demons for the first time. The Age of Strife has begun.

From their, we know the rest. The Fall of the Eldar causes the birth of the Chaos God Slaanesh, resulting in the quieting of the warp storms isolating Terra, where the Emperor has been born and now leads his glorious crusade across the galaxy, etc. etc.

[Triscuitable]

Have you considered writing for the expanded Halo-verse?

[ChaosLord29]

Have you considered writing for the expanded Halo-verse?

I've considered writing for just about every game system and universe out there (tabletop and electronic) but have never had the courage to apply anywhere. It's always been a hobby really. I've only submitted a handful of pieces to anything resembling a publishing source, or else campaigns for Pathfinder, M&M, and World of Darkness, and Warhammer (40k and Fantasy) and every other system I've played XD

[The Glyphstone]

I smell crossover fan-fic time!

[MLai]

So Master Chief is the Emperor?

[The Glyphstone]

"No, John....you are a Space Marine."
And then Master Chief was the Emperor.

[hamishspence]

Mention of 'Squats' has been declared Hereticus Maximumus by the Emperor's Most Holy Inquisition. There are no such thing as 'Squats' and never have been.They were eaten by Tyranids anyways, not wiped out by the Imperium.

5th ed has finally clarified that there are abhumans, called homo rotundus, sometimes called squats, still around.

[The Glyphstone]

Clearly, heretics infiltrated the printing offices.

[WitchSlayer]

If anyone is the God Emperor, it's obviously Sergeant Johnson.

I mean come on guys.

[Soras Teva Gee]

You know I was just in the process of crunching those numbers myself? It seems to me that the only comparable weaponry the Covenant have to a standard Imperial Lance battery are the Energy Projectors aboard their Super Carriers. And as you pointed out, Void Shields are designed to prevent those same lances from reaching the soon to be gooey starship exterior hull plating.

But where are you getting these numbers from? What is the benchmark (ie the deed) that a Lance Battery has done.

My benchmark (like admittedly most for 40k) is the Cain books where Imperial Lance Strikes are used like tactical nukes with comparable scale. They could carry out say an Exterminatus order... exactly like the Covenant carries out glassing a planet. Unless the Covenant has special glassing only guns I'm not aware of I'm seeing parity there. And since they can take hits like that I'm seeing a reasonably even direct fight allowing the Covenant's higher deployed numbers and superior mobility to win in space.

Now the Imperium has better weapons out there like the Nova Cannon, which if what I've read is accurate is a big arsed railgun type weapon. The Super MACs on humanity's defense stations seem the analogue there, able to one shot covenant vessels. However much like being on a stable platform Nova Cannons are bow mounted and rare enough that countering them is a basic strategy, flank them with a few ships at once.


Pretty much. The only tactic that we could come up with was the Covenant using hit and run tactics and suicide ships to destroy worlds. And even that does nothing to prevent the Imperium from taking over Covenant worlds and defending against the suicide ships.

I brought it up in response to an elaborate undertaking by the Imperium to disable the Covenant's leadership, pointing out this is in fact easier in reverse.

I'm not talking about Colony Dropping their huge ships on Imperium worlds. but on Terra itself. The Imperium has a lynchpin in that the only way it can navigate as well as it can is because of the Astronomicon, located on Earth and which the Emperor is an integral piece of machinery within. If you ruin Holy Terra its not a just a socio-political problem, but an immediate engineering one across the entire Imperium. Suddenly you've turned the Imperium into the Tau, isolated sections of humanity will hold out but the galactic frays apart at a stroke.

Now I'm not even suggesting this as something that would happen, but as a story its far more reliable and simpler to accomplish then taking out the Covernant's leadership as a way to victory. I don't think either should be considered to happen, because they become stories not assessments of capability.



Speaking of the suicide ships I believe that the ground defenses would be enough to reduce them to slag so that the damage is minimized.

Conservation of Mass + Gravity = Planetary Devastation

There's almost nothing the Imperium can do because you need to prove Nu Gundam isn't just for show stop the mass from falling which could be done with enough range, but the Covenant FTL jumps disallow this method. Blowing it apart could help through dispersal, but for the size I'm not impressed. And the precision achieved suggests that a Covenant could jump in with literally seconds to a high speed impact so no mass is going anywhere.

Mind you for anything BUT Holy Terra and ONLY Holy Terra I'd call it a probable waste of resources. But this is another reason I describe the Imperium as a rotting corpse, its utter fail at technology opens it to this sort of devastation by needing a highly stupid system to operate. Simply intolerable for a major space empire.

Heck if I remember correctly the Golden Throne is known to be living on borrowed time and the Tech-priests can't fix it. The whole Imperium had best hope the Star-Child idea is true after all.


Soras your example is silly. The Space Marines would secure orbit first before deploying and could do so easily via boarding torpedoes and teleporters since the Covenant ships have to get well within the Battle Barge's range.

If they could secure orbit then they aren't operating alone because no single Battle Barge is going to do that. And then you could just lance the target without sending in the Marine to begin with. A different example of how strategically irrelevant they are.

Actually IIRC a Battle Barge implies a pretty heavy commitment from a Chapter to begin with. I understand the norm in-universe is detached squads of a handful of Marines, with even the army list as sort of a contrivance on the part of Games Workshop. Which by points suggests a much larger but far less individually potent force more like the Sisters of Battle then the Space Marines. Ironically I'd probably have higher regard for them that way. If the Marine ran less on nebulous qualities like undescribed heroism and more on being say 5% of Imperial forces (heck 1%) they could actually plausibly be protecting the Imperium as a mighty hammer to work with the IG mighty wall.

[ChaosLord29]

A lot got posted while I was offline, but I have a few points I'd like to make which I think are pretty telling in the Imperium's favor.


Number 1:
To address the issue of how many Space Marines there are and how relevant they are in galactic conflict, it would seem to me to be self-evident that they are relevant on a galactic scale, given the number of times Space Marines have done what no normal soldiers could have done in order to avert galactic calamities. For references, please see the last 5,000 years of Imperial History.

Every Space Marine is a hero of a dozen battles, has fought in hundreds more, and is a xenocidal zealot to put even the most fanatical Brute or Elite to shame. That the Space Marines have heroes and commanders amongst their ranks who are placed on a pedestal above even these gods among insects speak volumes. Master Chief is the whole reason the Covenant were defeated. Sure, her got really, really lucky and had Cortana backing him up, but the running theme in the Halo series is that maybe it wasn't so much a question of luck with John, but of fate.

Now consider that there are Space Marine heroes out their like Marneus Calagar, Captain Darnath Lysander, Captain Aurellius (a Grey Knight), and perhaps dozens of others, it really doesn't seem fair to say that maybe the Covenant are just the opportunity some Space Marine out their needs to heroically sacrifice himself in an action which decimates a whole Covenant fleet or brings about the death of the High Council.

As for the numbers of the Space Marines, each Space Marine Chapter totals somewhere between 1,000 and 10,000 Space Marines (numbers fluctuate wildly depending on the chapter in question), but not much greater than that since once a Chapter gets that large, it's host is separated and a new Chapter founded (to prevent another Heresy situation). Their were originally 36 Chapters at the time of the Second Founding. Since then, that number has spiraled into the hundreds, so at any given time I'd say their are between hundreds of thousands and a million or so Space Marines.

Number 2:
It was brought up that if the Imperium has the might to truly crush any of it's foes, it would do so, and that if the Covenant can establish themselves as a threat, they can remain as such as the Imperium will not be able to muster the necessary power at any one time in order to defeat them.

First of all, I would not consider that a sufficient Threshold to consider the Covenant 'victorious' and I don't think the Prophets would either. We're talking about a culture of religious fanatics at least as xenocidal as the Imperium itself. If you think the Covenant will settle for a dominion a couple of subsectors big when their are still humans ready to wage war against them, you're wrong.

Next, I would like to point out that there are specific reasons for each other faction that prevent their annihilation at the hands of any other faction (reasons not shared by the Covenant), and secondly, the Imperium has more or less built its history on the piecemeal annihilation of smaller alien cultures and species, and that several of these races are referenced as extinct or 'prior threats' in the 2nd, 3rd, 4th and 5th edition rule books. Some of these were pre-heresey, and other have since been eliminated right into the present 41st milleniun.

The point however remains that the other factions in 40k have specific reasons the Imperium of Man cannot just muster a force large enough to exterminate them and then do so:

Chaos Legions- Aside from the fact that there are literally an inexhaustible number of Daemons inhabiting the Warp, the Chaos Space Marines hide in the Eye of Terror and launch period raids and crusades into Imperial Space. They also draw cultist and heretic humans from the Imperium itself.
Eldar- Both Craftworld and Dark Eldar use the Webway to remain hidden and never commit to large scale engagements or campaigns which would endanger the survival of their species.
Necron- The homeworlds of the Necron are unknown to the Empire, and they similarly make us of the webway (like the Eldar). Furthermore, the Necrons are the only truly immortal species as any Necrons who are beyond repair in the battlefield teleport back to their tombworld for full reconstruction. As far as we know, their could only be a few million Necrons in the entire Galaxy, but because you need a Blackstone Fortress to truly kill them, they remain an omnipresent threat.
Tau- Do not openly court hostilities with the Imperials and in fact actively sue for peace and engage in what are at least tenuous diplomatic negotiations with the IoM. These are the best analogue, I think, for the Covenant, since they are a relatively small threat which the Imperium has knowledge of, but has not mustered the resources yet to 'deal' with, largely since they are distracted by the local Ork Waaagh! and the nearby vicinity of Hivefleet Behemoth, which are both radically more pressing matters in that region of space than a largely peaceable socialist 'empire'.


You'll notice that Tyranids and Orks are not themselves on that list, and that is because they have are of a rather unique situation, in that the Imperium has in fact annihilated both factions piecemeal on several occasions (several of which in greater numbers boasted by the Covenant).

Why do they continue to be a major faction then? Because they come back. The orcs are sort of like the flood in that just a couple of ork spores (yes they reproduce like fungus) can take root on a world and grow into a fully fledged Waaaagh! in a matter of months (and they don't even have to infect sentient life to do it!). The Tyranids are similar in that they are the masters of recycling losses and can regurgitate both allied and enemy biomatter into a whole new Hivefleet if given any sort of quarter. It should also be noted that they are an extra galactic invader, and that while Hivefleet Leviathan (which consisted of billions of Tyranid ships and troops) was crushed, Hive Fleet Behemoth has proved a much more insidious foe.

The Covenant are both like the Tau in that they are a relatively small faction (with superior FTL technology I might add), but they are in no way peaceful and are exceedingly likely to begin a crusade into Imperial Space that will earn them top marks in the Ordo Xenos's **** list. Moreover, unlike the Orks or the Tyranids, they cannot recoup losses by mass reproduction, or consumption of planets natural resources. They train soldiers and build ships and weapons at a rate which would seem not drastically faster than the Imperium. In other words, they are at a severe disadvantage logistically, and are just crazy enough to get themselves killed and quickly.

Before you answer ask any more questions Soras, I'd like to direct your attention to this post I had earlier, which believe overwhelmingly demonstrates why the Covenant could never cut it as a major player in the 40k universe.

[Soras Teva Gee]

Before you answer ask any more questions Soras, I'd like to direct your attention to this post I had earlier, which believe overwhelmingly demonstrates why the Covenant could never cut it as a major player in the 40k universe.

Well let's see:

-Space Marines standard is a round 1000 chapters of 1000, that's what I've always heard over a decade of being familiar with 40k. Even in the time of the Empire it wasn't that different just they were organized in the 20 (18) bigger Legions for a single purpose. There's some play, but in the thousands or hundreds of thousands when they need billions or trillions for the whole galaxy basis. There are fewer Space Marines then there are worlds in the Imperium. That's just unacceptable. Like I said at one point, they should ALL be in some unified purpose like defending Cadia or maybe Terra. As is all the real work defending the Imperium is done by the PDFs and IG, in that order.

-I'm not seeing much of a point about the factions. The Imperium is dying little by little. All the other factions ARE killing it. The Imperium holds Maccaggre, that's one world barely held while hundreds (or whatever) more were lost. And guess what happens, those lost worlds are not reclaimed because either the Hive Fleet stripped them bare or the Exterminatus did. Imperial "victories" are all Pyrrhic, they survive but they don't win. This fundamental lack of hope is why its the namer of GRIMDARK, because its not a matter of if but when the Imperium is torn apart and by whom. In the end I'm not seeing anything that obviate the idea that the Imperium doesn't finish its enemies because it can't.

-You are off about spores, spores create periodic Ork problems on worlds defended but they are "feral" orks and the like. They keep the Ork species going because they reduce the need for "civilization" on worlds the Orks have long held. Ork Waaghs come from when the already massive Ork holdings (in excess of the Imperium) decide to expand.

-So the goal post is that the Covenant has to beat the Imperium? Fine they engage in a reasonably well planned centuries long campaign to do that. They fought the UNSC for 28 years, they clearly know long term planning and not being stupid in doing so by say overextending themselves. Keep the Halos unknown or non-existant and then nobody tries to start the Great Journey so it becomes a long range goal of the Covenant appropriate to the scale of the task. Either this goal peters out in the complications of the other concerns of the 40k verse (though parity with the Imperium means parity with them since everyone fights everyone) or becomes another steady force tearing the Imperium apart.

Lots can happen in that time though, I consider galactic conquest a question to big to be meaningful. For example the Covenant have at least a better grasp on science then the Martian Idiot Cult since they've made for example advancements over the years. They may not advance as quickly as they perhaps should, but they aren't outright static and monolithic as their religious basis would normally suggest in a story either. However I don't feel right speculating on where their tech would go or can go. Or maybe they break for internal reasons like happened in story.

Then again maybe five years into the war the Golden Throne breaks (it will by canon on 40k end) and the Astronomicon runs out of fuel as the Emperor is truly gone.

If they can survive what the Imperium is going to actually muster short term then the Covernant can survive long term. If the Imperium show heretofore untold initiative or can magically ignore its own problems (external and internal) then it can turn around and muster the forces it needs to do crush the Covenant sure. That's not victory because that would require it not being what it fundamentally is not in my book. Functional.

[ChaosLord29]

Well let's see:

-Space Marines standard is a round 1000 chapters of 1000, that's what I've always heard over a decade of being familiar with 40k. Even in the time of the Empire it wasn't that different just they were organized in the 20 (18) bigger Legions for a single purpose. There's some play, but in the thousands or hundreds of thousands when they need billions or trillions for the whole galaxy basis. There are fewer Space Marines then there are worlds in the Imperium. That's just unacceptable. Like I said at one point, they should ALL be in some unified purpose like defending Cadia or maybe Terra. As is all the real work defending the Imperium is done by the PDFs and IG, in that order.

-I'm not seeing much of a point about the factions. The Imperium is dying little by little. All the other factions ARE killing it. The Imperium holds Maccaggre, that's one world barely held while hundreds (or whatever) more were lost. And guess what happens, those lost worlds are not reclaimed because either the Hive Fleet stripped them bare or the Exterminatus did. Imperial "victories" are all Pyrrhic, they survive but they don't win. This fundamental lack of hope is why its the namer of GRIMDARK, because its not a matter of if but when the Imperium is torn apart and by whom. In the end I'm not seeing anything that obviate the idea that the Imperium doesn't finish its enemies because it can't.

-You are off about spores, spores create periodic Ork problems on worlds defended but they are "feral" orks and the like. They keep the Ork species going because they reduce the need for "civilization" on worlds the Orks have long held. Ork Waaghs come from when the already massive Ork holdings (in excess of the Imperium) decide to expand.

-So the goal post is that the Covenant has to beat the Imperium? Fine they engage in a reasonably well planned centuries long campaign to do that. They fought the UNSC for 28 years, they clearly know long term planning and not being stupid in doing so by say overextending themselves. Keep the Halos unknown or non-existant and then nobody tries to start the Great Journey so it becomes a long range goal of the Covenant appropriate to the scale of the task. Either this goal peters out in the complications of the other concerns of the 40k verse (though parity with the Imperium means parity with them since everyone fights everyone) or becomes another steady force tearing the Imperium apart.

Lots can happen in that time though, I consider galactic conquest a question to big to be meaningful. For example the Covenant have at least a better grasp on science then the Martian Idiot Cult since they've made for example advancements over the years. They may not advance as quickly as they perhaps should, but they aren't outright static and monolithic as their religious basis would normally suggest in a story either. However I don't feel right speculating on where their tech would go or can go. Or maybe they break for internal reasons like happened in story.

Then again maybe five years into the war the Golden Throne breaks (it will by canon on 40k end) and the Astronomicon runs out of fuel as the Emperor is truly gone.

If they can survive what the Imperium is going to actually muster short term then the Covernant can survive long term. If the Imperium show heretofore untold initiative or can magically ignore its own problems (external and internal) then it can turn around and muster the forces it needs to do crush the Covenant sure. That's not victory because that would require it not being what it fundamentally is not in my book. Functional.

So your argument boils down to the fact that the Imperium is already in a long term state of defeat against the various forces arrayed against it and the Covenant would just be another coffin nail?

[Tiki Snakes]

Honest question; I thought half the thing with the covenant was that they DON'T understand their own tech very well because it's all just reclaimed Forerunner tech and exactly like the imperium, they have a religious taboo or something in actually looking into it?

Wasn't one of their themes specifically a complete lack of critical introspection and understanding of their own technology and goals?

[ChaosLord29]

Honest question; I thought half the thing with the covenant was that they DON'T understand their own tech very well because it's all just reclaimed Forerunner tech and exactly like the imperium, they have a religious taboo or something in actually looking into it?

Wasn't one of their themes specifically a complete lack of critical introspection and understanding of their own technology and goals?

Oh my yes.

[Soras Teva Gee]

So your argument boils down to the fact that the Imperium is already in a long term state of defeat against the various forces arrayed against it and the Covenant would just be another coffin nail?

For the sort of biggest long term picture yes.

The Imperium is doomed, save that the Emperor is really a nascent Chaos God trapped by the Golden Throne that can fix everything once it breaks. Or given the Necron retcon... maybe the 'Nids and Orks stopping being allowed to magically ignore how they shouldn't work at all. Something.

For my money as long as they rely on the Martian Idiot Cult though the outlook of the Imperium is bleak since they can't reclaim what they've lost.

And they are officially going to need to replace the Astronomicon... but watch Games Workshop put that off forever.


Honest question; I thought half the thing with the covenant was that they DON'T understand their own tech very well because it's all just reclaimed Forerunner tech and exactly like the imperium, they have a religious taboo or something in actually looking into it?

Wasn't one of their themes specifically a complete lack of critical introspection and understanding of their own technology and goals?

Yes, my thought on the difference is we know they've made advances over the years. The Arbiter's armor had older, less effective cloaking, ergo the new stuff was improved.

And I can't find signs of say thinking that incense is a nessecary part of the propitiating the machine spirits. So they are better off then the Imperium in this regard

[ChaosLord29]

For the sort of biggest long term picture yes.

The Imperium is doomed, save that the Emperor is really a nascent Chaos God trapped by the Golden Throne that can fix everything once it breaks. Or given the Necron retcon... maybe the 'Nids and Orks stopping being allowed to magically ignore how they shouldn't work at all. Something.

For my money as long as they rely on the Martian Idiot Cult though the outlook of the Imperium is bleak since they can't reclaim what they've lost.

And they are officially going to need to replace the Astronomicon... but watch Games Workshop put that off forever.

Then you're not really engaging in the argument at all are you?

You're not even giving the Imperium a fair chance from the get go. You just assume their doom is inevitable (which canonically speaking it might be) and shape the rest of your deductions about their military capacity against a foe like the Covenant around that core assumption.

To you there's no way the Imperium can beat the Covenant because they are already a defeated power in the Galaxy and just waiting to die (or for some miracle to save them).

Except, that even in their decrepit dying state, the Imperium still regularly musters the might to annihilate Hive Fleets, destroy Waaaaghs! and push the Legions of Chaos back into the Eye of Terror. Even if it's just prolonging their death, the Imperium has demonstrated the ability to thoroughly crush enemy forces twice and triple the size and military might of the Covenant on more than a few occasions since the Horus Heresey, and I see no reason why the Covenant won't go the way of Hive Fleet Kraken, numerous Ork Waaaghs! or the Egarians, the Cimmeriac, the Laer, the Vrakk, the Bale Childer, or the Jorgal or any other of a dozens xenos the Imperium of man has exterminated since the 39th Millennium.

The Covenant engaged in a 30 year Campaign with a technologically inferior force whom they outnumbered at nearly every major engagement and still managed to lose. Do you honestly think they will prevail over a technologically comparable force that vastly outnumbers them?

For that matter, by your own argument, the Covenant are just as likely to lose as the Imperium, since as you pointed out, they sow the seeds of their own destruction in their religious zealotry that sparks a civil war. If the Imperium is engaged in a long term inevitable defeat, the Covenant are nigh suicidal by comparison, given what they are willing to sacrifice in order to pursue the Great Journey.

[Tiki Snakes]

For that matter, by your own argument, the Covenant are just as likely to lose as the Imperium, since as you pointed out, they sow the seeds of their own destruction in their religious zealotry that sparks a civil war. If the Imperium is engaged in a long term inevitable defeat, the Covenant are nigh suicidal by comparison, given what they are willing to sacrifice in order to pursue the Great Journey.

It's more complicated than that, as one faction of the covenant joined up because they'd have kicked it's ass otherwise and the only ones who kind of know what the great journey is are the prophets, the rest pretty much think it's an actual journey.

[ChaosLord29]

It's more complicated than that, as one faction of the covenant joined up because they'd have kicked it's ass otherwise and the only ones who kind of know what the great journey is are the prophets, the rest pretty much think it's an actual journey.

The point being that the Covenant is convoluted and lying to it's own citizens in exactly the same way the Imperium does in order to keep things running smoothly enough for it to function. Except the Imperium seems much more effective at rooting out heresy rather than letting it spiral out of control and bringing about it's eventual defeat (which is pretty sad given how the Imperium is otherwise a bureaucratic ineffectual nightmare). At least the Inquisition can get things done!

Or else, you could say that's what the Horus Heresy was, it's just that it's taking the Imperium thousands of years following that civil war, and it took the Covenant . . . how long after the Sangheili rebelled were they defeated? A matter of months?

[An Enemy Spy]

The point being that the Covenant is convoluted and lying to it's own citizens in exactly the same way the Imperium does in order to keep things running smoothly enough for it to function. Except the Imperium seems much more effective at rooting out heresy rather than letting it spiral out of control and bringing about it's eventual defeat (which is pretty sad given how the Imperium is otherwise a bureaucratic ineffectual nightmare). At least the Inquisition can get things done!

Or else, you could say that's what the Horus Heresy was, it's just that it's taking the Imperium thousands of years following that civil war, and it took the Covenant . . . how long after the Sangheili rebelled were they defeated? A matter of months?

They were facing the Flood and Humans too though. It's not as if the Sangheili just beat the Loyalists all by themselves.

[ChaosLord29]

They were facing the Flood and Humans too though. It's not as if the Sangheili just beat the Loyalists all by themselves.

So, Flood + Sangheili + remaining UNSC forces = Destruction of the Covenant.

Got it.

Are we saying we don't think the Imperium of Man can't muster a force inside of 30 years to rival that combined strength?

[An Enemy Spy]

So, Flood + Sangheili + remaining UNSC forces = Destruction of the Covenant.

Got it.

Are we saying we don't think the Imperium of Man can't muster a force inside of 30 years to rival that combined strength?

Don't get on me. I'm not arguing that the Covenant would win. I'm just trying to demonstrate the facts accurately.

[Tiki Snakes]

I'm not entirely sure how directly relevant the flood even were in the downfall of the covenant, except coincidentally and as part of the reason that the prophets turned on the Elites.

edit - The downfall of the covenant isn't about the elites beating the loyalists. The covenant falls, or rather is broken, when the Sangheli learn about the Prophets betrayal and their new favourites the brutes massacring the elites on earth. (Finding out the truth behind the halo rings and the great journey was a catalyst of this and the cherry on the cake, because they seem to have fallen out of favour at least partly because of the sangheli rebels you take on as the arbiter who seem to suspect the truth of the great journey).

Once Sangeheli turn on Brute/Prophet, the Covenant ceases to meaningfully exist and the only way forward is down. It also almost entirely happens because of the Prophets attitudes to those underneath them and the basic mismatch with the fanatical but essentially honourable Elites. (Despite being as dumb as bricks, the unquestioning and ammoral brutes make much better servants for the Prophets in that regard).

[ChaosLord29]

Don't get on me. I'm not arguing that the Covenant would win. I'm just trying to demonstrate the facts accurately.

Sorry spy, I was agreeing with you, just directing that question more at Soras, who seems to be the primary holdout.

[Soras Teva Gee]

Then you're not really engaging in the argument at all are you?

You're not even giving the Imperium a fair chance from the get go. You just assume their doom is inevitable (which canonically speaking it might be) and shape the rest of your deductions about their military capacity against a foe like the Covenant around that core assumption.

Hardly. But its disingenuous to the setting to make the Imperium functional.

Which means that while their resources on paper are infinite and they have all the cool toys... they simply don't have a lot of the things actually available in any sort of reliable way. And many of the ones they do aren't nessecarily better then modern tech as far as business end destruction goes.

Now yes the Imperium can still muster some pretty overwhelming force numbers but those numbers have limits in and of themselves. That's why the Tau survive and have one of the better outlooks, if you are too tough a nut to crack the Imperium in a strategic since can and will decide you aren't worth the effort and will go back to fighting the rest. Sure probably won't be "peace" but while it may be non functional the Imperium still has the remnants of a full galactic empire. It shouldn't fall outright in pure force to anything but the same.

The Empire or Old Republic of SW fame that's the sort of faction should have the scale to fairly have the condition of actually eliminating the IoM. For lesser powers, if the only thing left is that the Imperium buries them with weight of numbers that's not a victory of any worth for the Imperium because they had no advantage they just had scale


To you there's no way the Imperium can beat the Covenant because they are already a defeated power in the Galaxy and just waiting to die (or for some miracle to save them).

Hardly.

If say the average IG trooper came with power armor and a bolter you'd have a different ballgame entirely as far as infantry goes. The Imperium does have the advantage in mechanized combat as the Leman Russ is a real tank and by all signs I've seen the Wraith is not.

However in perhaps the most important of all I'm not finding that the Imperium actually sends fleets in a hundreds range (dozens maybe) or what puts them as tough and powerful enough to correct this. They are already at a total FTL disadvantage which properly applied only makes thing worse.

Neither side can win a ground battle in the long run without space being at least contested.



The Covenant engaged in a 30 year Campaign with a technologically inferior force whom they outnumbered at nearly every major engagement and still managed to lose. Do you honestly think they will prevail over a technologically comparable force that vastly outnumbers them?

For that matter, by your own argument, the Covenant are just as likely to lose as the Imperium, since as you pointed out, they sow the seeds of their own destruction in their religious zealotry that sparks a civil war. If the Imperium is engaged in a long term inevitable defeat, the Covenant are nigh suicidal by comparison, given what they are willing to sacrifice in order to pursue the Great Journey.

Given that the gap between the different humans on a practical level is very small, and the Covenant didn't loose to the UNSC I don't see it that way at all.

From the looks of it the Covenant's downfall (assuming they aren't recovering in Halo 4) can be traced pretty directly to individual decisions and small story driven turn of events.

Now sure could the same sort of pressures build, yeah. But the Covenant doesn't default to being divided between a morass of a thousand conflicting concerns the way the Imperium does. Now being in the 40k verse they should gain a bunch just like the Tau have, but that's why I don't think the Covenant are going to more then add to the mess on the biggest scale.

Mutual survivial is the net result in my book before it gets to complicated to assess, but given the general attitudes toward absolute Imperium superiority that means in effect a victory for the Covenant. Winning by weight of numbers is meaningless in and of itself, its not a meaningful versus. Congrats, that's the least I would have expected for an ten thousand year old empire, even if it is a rotting corpse.

I mean why not just put the IoM up against Modern Earth and claim victory because there's no space tech at present so one warship equals a loss through orbital bombardment. So what? Or because they the IoM sent a billion troops, yeah woo hoo praise the Golden Throne. I'd agree that Earth would loose but for me the fact that at least the US forces could take on their equivalent number of IG or say some bizzare setup that marooned a SM chapter here is the much more significant result.

40k is massive, but its rating per capita works out to being terrible.

[The Glyphstone]

Now yes the Imperium can still muster some pretty overwhelming force numbers but those numbers have limits in and of themselves. That's why the Tau survive and have one of the better outlooks, if you are too tough a nut to crack the Imperium in a strategic since can and will decide you aren't worth the effort and will go back to fighting the rest. Sure probably won't be "peace" but while it may be non functional the Imperium still has the remnants of a full galactic empire. It shouldn't fall outright in pure force to anything but the same.


The difference is that the Tau are smart enough not to poke the sleeping 500-megaton gorilla more than they have to, instead nibbling away at the edges where they can get away with it. The Covenant aren't that sensible.



The Empire or Old Republic of SW fame that's the sort of faction should have the scale to fairly have the condition of actually eliminating the IoM. For lesser powers, if the only thing left is that the Imperium buries them with weight of numbers that's not a victory of any worth for the Imperium because they had no advantage they just had scale

.

'Quantity has a quality all of its own'. - Not actually said by Joseph Stalin, but attributed to him.

[Triscuitable]

So, Flood + Sangheili + remaining UNSC forces = Destruction of the Covenant.

Got it.

Are we saying we don't think the Imperium of Man can't muster a force inside of 30 years to rival that combined strength?

Keeping in mind that the real destruction of the Covenant was when they lost the Sangheilians. They put so much effort into maintaining the Covenant that once they were lost, the stupid-as-all-hell Brutes had to take over for them.

Let's also consider this: what's the battleground? Did the Covenant board an Imperium ship? Are two fleets battling in space? Did the Imperium land on a Covenant occupied Installation?

What are the Covenant armed with? What soldiers are participating? Are they aware of the threat the Imperium poses? What are the Imperium armed with? How many do they have? Are they aware of the Covenant's presence?

Should this be a faction-vs-faction or squad-vs-squad battle? It's easier to debate when we refine the facts.

[Soras Teva Gee]

The difference is that the Tau are smart enough not to poke the sleeping 500-megaton gorilla more than they have to, instead nibbling away at the edges where they can get away with it. The Covenant aren't that sensible.

Well if we make the mild setting concession that humanity of the IoM origin will not trigger as Reclaimers and threaten the fundamentals of the religion by their Forerunner connections the Covenant should prove a touch more tractable too.

Obviously as filthy xenos and worse an alliance of mixed filthy xenos they'd not get along but given that as I understand it the Covenant only started with the Elite and Prophets they obviously are not actually as inherently xenophobic as the Imperium.

Removing the specific lie from specific Prophets for a specific cause I'd not be surprised to see the Covenant try to absorb Imperials into its ranks.

The Covenant really are a lot like the Tau, enough to almost make me suspicious if this is Starcraft all over again with a different twist or just a convergence of thought.


'Quantity has a quality all of its own'. - Not actually said by Joseph Stalin, but attributed to him.

For a certain comparable scale of resources that is a fair point I must admit.

However if you just take the Imperium at face value as a galatic empire with unlimited resources its meaningless to put it up against anything lacking infinite resources... namely another galactic empire. It does the Imperium no credit when instead of spilling their enemies blood they drown them in a sea of their own.

[ChaosLord29]

Keeping in mind that the real destruction of the Covenant was when they lost the Sangheilians. They put so much effort into maintaining the Covenant that once they were lost, the stupid-as-all-hell Brutes had to take over for them.

Let's also consider this: what's the battleground? Did the Covenant board an Imperium ship? Are two fleets battling in space? Did the Imperium land on a Covenant occupied Installation?

What are the Covenant armed with? What soldiers are participating? Are they aware of the threat the Imperium poses? What are the Imperium armed with? How many do they have? Are they aware of the Covenant's presence?

Should this be a faction-vs-faction or squad-vs-squad battle? It's easier to debate when we refine the facts.

Perhaps I should have quantified all this in the original post.

Let's assume for the sake of the remaining argument that some point prior to the beginning of their war with the UNSC but after the formation of the Covenant, the entirety of their fleets and High Charity itself are swallowed in into Warp Space and spewed out somewhere on the fringes of Imperial Space in the Ultima Segmentum in the 41st Millennium. Say it's some sort of convoluted scheme by Tzeentch to bring about some convoluted and unknowable end.

[Tiki Snakes]

Perhaps I should have quantified all this in the original post.

Let's assume for the sake of the remaining argument that some point prior to the beginning of their war with the UNSC but after the formation of the Covenant, the entirety of their fleets and High Charity itself are swallowed in into Warp Space and spewed out somewhere on the fringes of Imperial Space in the Ultima Segmentum in the 41st Millennium. Say it's some sort of convoluted scheme by Tzeentch to bring about some convoluted and unknowable end.

There's nothing convaluted about it.
He just loves hearing Grunts babble, like the rest of us.

[Misery Esquire]

on the fringes of Imperial Space in the Ultima Segmentum in the 41st Millennium.

Welcome to Ultramarine, Tyranid and Tau central?

Correction, appearntly the Ultima Segementum includes more than I thought. Whole lot of stuff, really.

[Fallen Angel]

This is why this is not a 'debate'. Power levels.

Galactic Empire (SW)
Imperium of Man (WH40k)





UNSC (Halo)



Since UNSC ships can damage Covenant ships - it was retconned in xso the UNSC could win a space battle or two).. there is no way to Covenant has the firepower to match up to the IoM. Nuff said.

[Misery Esquire]

Power levels.
Galactic Empire (SW)
Imperium of Man (WH40k)

Err. There was a hundred-and-fifty pages of thread for SW v. 40k. v. ST. Do not drag that back up as an active debate. Please?

[Soras Teva Gee]

Perhaps I should have quantified all this in the original post.

Let's assume for the sake of the remaining argument that some point prior to the beginning of their war with the UNSC but after the formation of the Covenant, the entirety of their fleets and High Charity itself are swallowed in into Warp Space and spewed out somewhere on the fringes of Imperial Space in the Ultima Segmentum in the 41st Millennium. Say it's some sort of convoluted scheme by Tzeentch to bring about some convoluted and unknowable end.

Lacking the power base for or particular cause no war happens and the Covenant uses its high mobility to find some plump uninhabited and/or isolated planet then slowly rebuild their power base over several generations. Or maybe go a pirating across the galaxy with their superior FTL becoming nomadic. Or both.

Depending on how the politics work out the event is either reconciled with the existing structure or it collapses to be replaced by something new. Either way net action is the same.

Unless they feel the need to be as meddlesome as the Eldar, the Covenant can never even ping the auspex of anyone in the galaxy as important. Heck even if the do doubtful anyone cares for a few generations.

Biggest variable is the production abilities abroad High Charity. Biggest ostensible threat is the if the 'Nids eat everything.


There's nothing convaluted about it.
He just loves hearing Grunts babble, like the rest of us.

I'm thinking birthday party skull how about you? Children cheering for headshots are hilarious.

[The Glyphstone]

Err. There was a hundred-and-fifty pages of thread for SW v. 40k. v. ST. Do not drag that back up as an active debate. Please?

Pretty please with chocolate frosted sugar coated cocoa bombs on top.

[Triscuitable]

Pretty please with chocolate frosted sugar coated cocoa bombs on top.

And sixteen grapefruits, a dozen bran muffins...

[ChaosLord29]

Lacking the power base for or particular cause no war happens and the Covenant uses its high mobility to find some plump uninhabited and/or isolated planet then slowly rebuild their power base over several generations. Or maybe go a pirating across the galaxy with their superior FTL becoming nomadic. Or both.

Depending on how the politics work out the event is either reconciled with the existing structure or it collapses to be replaced by something new. Either way net action is the same.

Unless they feel the need to be as meddlesome as the Eldar, the Covenant can never even ping the auspex of anyone in the galaxy as important. Heck even if the do doubtful anyone cares for a few generations.

Biggest variable is the production abilities abroad High Charity. Biggest ostensible threat is the if the 'Nids eat everything.



I'm thinking birthday party skull how about you? Children cheering for headshots are hilarious.

I think the lore is pretty clear that the Covenant don't just sit around and bide their time. They go on the offensive at the earliest opportunity and either incorporate it into the Covenant or they exterminate it. Again, like the Tau, except the Tau don't pick fights they can't win. The covenant are just the opposite. They pick fights with anything that comes across their path and sacrifice whatever is necessary in order to achieve victory. That is the entire history of the Covenant's great journey prior to the events of Halo, so you can damn well bet that's going to be where and how they start in the 40k universe.

Now, whether they find some pliable xenos species to incorporate is pretty likely, but you can damn well bet it's not going to be before they run across the Imperium or any other great power that they're just not going to be able to beat.

How much more evidence do you need man?

Standard Imperial Lance batteries melt through ships double or triple the size of the average Covenant craft.

Their are hundreds of Space Marine heroes the equal or better of Master Chief who was a key force in bringing about the downfall of the Covenant.

The Covenant have absolutely no defense against the psykers of the Imperium or any other species.

Face it, they're a feather weight in what is a Super Heavy Weight melee. They just don't operate on the same scale as the standard 40k powers even if they have comparable technology.

[An Enemy Spy]

I think the lore is pretty clear that the Covenant don't just sit around and bide their time. They go on the offensive at the earliest opportunity and either incorporate it into the Covenant or they exterminate it. Again, like the Tau, except the Tau don't pick fights they can't win. The covenant are just the opposite. They pick fights with anything that comes across their path and sacrifice whatever is necessary in order to achieve victory. That is the entire history of the Covenant's great journey prior to the events of Halo, so you can damn well bet that's going to be where and how they start in the 40k universe.

Uh, no. The Covenant are not stupidly suicidal. The only time the Covenant ever lose massive amounts of ships are either during battles like Reach where they win anyway, or very rare times when they fall into a trap. They are not omnicidal and they are not willing to fight literally anything no matter the cost. In fact, the reason the Covenant was formed was because the Sangheili and San 'Shyuum realized that their massive bloody war against each other was leading to nowhere except mutual obliteration, and called a cease-fire to end the pointless killing.

[Fallen Angel]

My point is that the covenant is only a single tier above the UNSC, enough that they can smash the latter's ships with ease, but with with effort the latter can kill the ships of the former. (Thank you retconned space battles.)

The Imperium of Man has firepower that is generally agreed upon as one 'tier' lower than the Galactic Empire.

The Galactic Empire is way above the UNSC.

Thus, the Covenant is fairly below the Imperium, let alone Necrons, with the Nids being a Out of Context Problem for the Covenant. (If the Covvies had problems with the flood in space, then they will loathe the Nids.)

The only locals I can accept having trouble with the Covenant is the Tau, and even then the Tau are a few 'tiers' above the covenant.

[Soras Teva Gee]

I think the lore is pretty clear that the Covenant don't just sit around and bide their time. They go on the offensive at the earliest opportunity and either incorporate it into the Covenant or they exterminate it. Again, like the Tau, except the Tau don't pick fights they can't win. The covenant are just the opposite. They pick fights with anything that comes across their path and sacrifice whatever is necessary in order to achieve victory. That is the entire history of the Covenant's great journey prior to the events of Halo, so you can damn well bet that's going to be where and how they start in the 40k universe.

Who's sitting around? Taking steps to restore your resource base is a very active step. Repopulating your species is an active step. Building up a new empire is a very active step. A society place under such pressure is going to look inward first. The greatest threat is a Schism on High Charity and the Covenant but however that plays out you can bet who's left is going to care about surival of their species foremost and rebuilding.

You seem convinced the Covenant must act with suicidal stupidity. Why?



Now, whether they find some pliable xenos species to incorporate is pretty likely, but you can damn well bet it's not going to be before they run across the Imperium or any other great power that they're just not going to be able to beat.

They don't have to beat them when they can out range every ship in the Imperium.

Its not a match up anymore. The Covenant have no reason to take on something as huge as the Imperium with no resources and vastly reduced population. Of course it would likely take a long while before the Imperium even recognized they exist to. Much less do the work of tracking down the y'know FTL-capable High Charity.

How much more evidence do you need man?


Standard Imperial Lance batteries melt through ships double or triple the size of the average Covenant craft.

So they melt through ships of their own size then?

While Imperial ships top out at 8 kms for their big battleships, when into the more common ships you see 4-5 km ranges down to escort frigates I saw quoted at only 750m. While the Covenant has ships below the supercarrier still measuring 5 km, another at 3 km. So yeah as far as scale goes I'm not seeing a size. Maybe the Imperial fleet is reliant on void shields over armor

Of course mass is on its own a very meaningless standard, only some basis after some basis for armor and shield quality is there can it start to be meaningful should they be considered equal.

Do you have something less arbitrary then ships destroying other ships for you baseline? I've said mine before, lance batteries used as tactical orbital strikes in the Cain books on the scale of a nuke. I've not heard you cite what events you are getting your scale from



Their are hundreds of Space Marine heroes the equal or better of Master Chief who was a key force in bringing about the downfall of the Covenant.

Yes and without how many of the supporting cast would the Covenant have... gone on to be scheduled to appear in Halo 4? 343 only know what state they're in but hey not like they're dead. Or that Master Chief killed every last one of them personally.

The Covenant is the only ones really to blame for the Great Schism.


The Covenant have absolutely no defense against the psykers of the Imperium or any other species.


Fair enough but your most common psyker is a blind guy that talks to other blind guys. Well actually most common is the guy who's screams light the cosmos but I digress. Of those that have something useful how many are utterly immune to getting shot?


Face it, they're a feather weight in what is a Super Heavy Weight melee. They just don't operate on the same scale as the standard 40k powers even if they have comparable technology.

Or the Imperium is a barely modern on average force bloated with more that it can ever manage while torn at by all sides and all its neatest toys it generally has fewer of then it has planets to defend them with?

What's not comparable so far? FTL is flat out better, that alone properly used is the most important advantage you can have. Both destroy planets with some semi-regularity so I continue to see some degree of parity in space. IG infantry do at best equal their other reality human counterparts, but the Covenant. The five Space Marines that actually show up at a time are a lot less common then plasma grenades, snipers, fuel rod canons, and even energy swords.

Now that does leave vehicles.... which yeah the Covenant seems to lack a real tank so doesn't have a good answer to the Leman Russ (which actually occurs enmasse) and Scarabs fall into the same problem Space Marines do. This has less to do with serious gaps in their overall tier and the apparent lack of serious mechanized combat in the Haloverse. Also Covenant vehicles also being a case where being more advanced doesn't equal better.

[Forum Explorer]

Doesn't the Covenant have an effective range in space of something like a half or third of the Imperium's? That is a major disadvantage particularly when it doesn't seem like the Covenant ships are any faster when it comes to STL travel. They can't really do FTL combat jumps since it seems like that takes a pretty massive drain on their ship's energy which leaves them pretty vulnerable.

Also the orbital defense stations around were compared to be roughly considered to be one gun in a battery of guns on a Imperial cruiser. Those guns could one shot Covenant ships.

How good is the shielding and armor of Covenant ships? The Imperium's is pretty good, particularly in it's front arc. Also how specialized are the Covenant ships? Imperial ships usually have a fighter contingent or are equipped with devastating torpedoes.

[WitchSlayer]

Actually, Astropaths are also good psykers and have all access to the schools that psykers do. In fact, they're more stable psychic power wise.

[Triscuitable]

Their are hundreds of Space Marine heroes the equal or better of Master Chief who was a key force in bringing about the downfall of the Covenant.


Were they trained to specifically fight the Covenant? Do they know what Covenant weaponry is capable of? Can they recognize the roles of Covenant infantry on sight? Can they pilot Covenant vehicles?

Also note that there were a lot more Spartans than just the Master Chief (not "Master Chief". As awesome as that sounds, it's shorthand for Master Chief Petty Officer). Chief is a Spartan II, though there were Spartan IIIs, and now even IVs. The IIs were trained from the age of six with a very small success rate, the IIIs were trained from adolescence with a higher rate of success, and the IVs are volunteers from the most notable members of squads. No training needed, just give 'em the "upgrades" and send them through UNSC Infinity simulation to teach them how to use MJOLNIR armor.

Also of note, MJOLNIR is lightweight stuff (despite it weighing half a ton) when wielded by a Spartan. It's so effective that it actually enhances body functions while providing incredibly powerful energy shields, seperate implants, and doesn't impede movement at all.

Hell, if this were a Spartan versus a Space Marine, the Spartan would more than likely win. He's got better training, less cumbersome armor, and can quite efficiently goomba-stomp their foe to death, should they try.

They also have a tendency to, y'know, wear their helmet.


Who's sitting around? Taking steps to restore your resource base is a very active step. Repopulating your species is an active step. Building up a new empire is a very active step. A society place under such pressure is going to look inward first. The greatest threat is a Schism on High Charity and the Covenant but however that plays out you can bet who's left is going to care about surival of their species foremost and rebuilding.

You seem convinced the Covenant must act with suicidal stupidity. Why?

Because everyone supporting the Imperium here is basing their views of the Covenant on the games (most likely their experience with Easy/Normal mode), rather than the books, comics, or animated shorts. The stuff that provides insight on their technologies and tactics. The stuff we've read.


They don't have to beat them when they can out range every ship in the Imperium.

Its not a match up anymore. The Covenant have no reason to take on something as huge as the Imperium with no resources and vastly reduced population. Of course it would likely take a long while before the Imperium even recognized they exist to. Much less do the work of tracking down the y'know FTL-capable High Charity.

I'm pretty sure plasma is still more than effective against ships and infantry anyways.


What's not comparable so far? FTL is flat out better, that alone properly used is the most important advantage you can have. Both destroy planets with some semi-regularity so I continue to see some degree of parity in space. IG infantry do at best equal their other reality human counterparts, but the Covenant. The five Space Marines that actually show up at a time are a lot less common then plasma grenades, snipers, fuel rod canons, and even energy swords.

You forgot Gravity Hammers and Brute Shots.


Now that does leave vehicles.... which yeah the Covenant seems to lack a real tank so doesn't have a good answer to the Leman Russ (which actually occurs enmasse) and Scarabs fall into the same problem Space Marines do. This has less to do with serious gaps in their overall tier and the apparent lack of serious mechanized combat in the Haloverse. Also Covenant vehicles also being a case where being more advanced doesn't equal better.

They have the:


Banshee, which functions in air as well as it does in space.
Ghost, which can move at incredible speeds, is cheap to manufacture, and has onboard plasma cannons.
Wraith, a massive plasma mortar tank that can boost like the Banshee and Ghost.
Scarab, which seeing as their other vehicles are made out of the same materials, have only one restriction: size.
Phantom, standard infantry transport as well as an incredibly dangerous air support vehicle. Like the Banshee, is also effective in air and in space.
Other vehicles introduced in Halo Wars (which is canon).



Doesn't the Covenant have an effective range in space of something like a half or third of the Imperium's? That is a major disadvantage particularly when it doesn't seem like the Covenant ships are any faster when it comes to STL travel. They can't really do FTL combat jumps since it seems like that takes a pretty massive drain on their ship's energy which leaves them pretty vulnerable.

Also the orbital defense stations around were compared to be roughly considered to be one gun in a battery of guns on a Imperial cruiser. Those guns could one shot Covenant ships.

How good is the shielding and armor of Covenant ships? The Imperium's is pretty good, particularly in it's front arc. Also how specialized are the Covenant ships? Imperial ships usually have a fighter contingent or are equipped with devastating torpedoes.

Cite your resources rather than making assumptions in the form of rhetorical questions, please.

[Forum Explorer]

Cite your resources rather than making assumptions in the form of rhetorical questions, please.

First you misquoted something and attributed something to me that Soras said. Please fix that. :smallsmile:


Now my sources are vague memories of the games (I played through them once and only to Halo 3. I never touched anything from the Halo-verse since.) and what other people have said in this thread.

For the Imperial stuff I'm going by battlefield gothic fluff and naval battles from the Gaunt's Ghost series.

[Triscuitable]

First you misquoted something and attributed something to me that Soras said. Please fix that. :smallsmile:

:smallannoyed: Cute.


Now my sources are vague memories of the games (I played through them once and only to Halo 3. I never touched anything from the Halo-verse since.) and what other people have said in this thread.

Then you don't really have enough information to make those claims now, do you? :smallamused:

[Forum Explorer]

Then you don't really have enough information to make those claims now, do you? :smallamused:

No but the claims were brought up earlier in thread then never addressed by pro-Halo supporters. Here is the relevant quote.


Really, the problem in Space is that the Covenant Ships are shown to be hurt by UNSC MAC Cannons. A Imperial Frigate will mount whole broadsides of cannons larger in size, if not quite the same projectile velocity, with armour-ignoring Lance** projectors prow mounted. And while they only have somewhat more than the 10-30 meters of armour plating that the UNSC ships mount, they also have at least a kilometer of hull to anything vital. And Void Shields, which autoblock nearly everything if they come in one shot (per one Void Shield projector) at a time. Cruisers, are bigger, more heavily armoured and be-weaponed. And Cruisers are the IoM's Ship-of-the-Line.

While the Covenant may manuever faster due to the Slipspace-short-jump capabilities, with it's obvious drawbacks ignored for a moment, it doesn't help them too much, as the Imperium outranges them by... Well, Imperial Standard Armament (Macrocannons, Laser Batteries, etc) Extreme Range is in the 70,000 - 100,000 km, with 30-60,000 km being optimal range. ...The Covenant engage, at most, around 10,000 km, with a few rare exceptions like the Sniper Flagship/Battlecruiser that shows up in The Fall of Reach that has a range of (approximated) 100,000 km. (1 in the 314 ship strong invasion force that they pointed at Reach, the assumed Human Homeworld. They have another 2000-3000 ships with High Charity, so they could have (going by that ratio) a whole... 10? More, if you assume they keep the better ships at home.)

Covenant Fighters might be superior to Imperial, but it's difficult to tell, as all they ever fight is Longswords, and go about even against them. :smallconfused:

And all the Reclaimers help them if there's an "outdated*" Nova Cannon on a cruiser. Fires rounds at >.75C, that implode hard enough to hurt Imperium-sized/armoured ships when they miss by a few hundred kilometers. There are a variety of Nova Cannons in fluff, as usual for 40K, some hilariously weaker than this, some hilariously stronger.

*Technically, it's still a marvel of engineering for the Imperium, they just consider it outdated in the Military Tactic sense, having moved Prow-Shooting > Horde of Fighters > Broadsides > ???, depending on Sector.

** Lances, while blocked by Imperium Void Shields, have the descriptor Ignores Armour. These buggers can lance straight through ships if they don't have Void Shields up.

[Triscuitable]

And yet you choose to ignore the fact that the Covenant have the quickly-regenerating, reliably defensive energy shields.

[Anecronwashere]

And yet you choose to ignore the fact that the Covenant have the quickly-regenerating, reliably defensive energy shields.

That go down when hit by a few metal slugs...
If I hit someone in Legendary with that big as Beam Weapon will it's shields go down? What happens if they take 2-3 hits?

Lasguns (titled Flashlights due to their being Weak compared to other weapons) are those Beam Cannons on semi-auto/auto.

Or how about Bolters? Which basically Penetrating Rockets. (Rocket-propelled, they explode inside you) Would their armour hold up to that? Even if they do stop the insertion would the Rocket-To-The-Face be protected against?

Your regenerating shield is basically a 1-use Armour save.

[Tiki Snakes]

Also of note, MJOLNIR is lightweight stuff (despite it weighing half a ton) when wielded by a Spartan. It's so effective that it actually enhances body functions while providing incredibly powerful energy shields, seperate implants, and doesn't impede movement at all.

Hell, if this were a Spartan versus a Space Marine, the Spartan would more than likely win. He's got better training, less cumbersome armor, and can quite efficiently goomba-stomp their foe to death, should they try.

They also have a tendency to, y'know, wear their helmet.

Actually, Space Marines have an implant specifically designed to insure that their armour DOESN'T affect their mobility at all. that is specifically what the Black Carapace is for, and it allows them to be just as hard to hit as if they weren't even wearing it, despite them counting as a size bigger whilst they are. It also increases their strength to ridiculous degrees and has a number of fancy tricks that the average spartan would be incredibly jealous about, such as a range of different sensors (which would most likely handily negate the covenants cloaking devices), automatic medical treatments and so on. It's easy to understate how much more impressive Space Marine Armour is that the Mjolnir thing.

[Forum Explorer]

And yet you choose to ignore the fact that the Covenant have the quickly-regenerating, reliably defensive energy shields.

Well I didn't know about them. So I looked it up on the Halo wiki and here is generally what I found.

The shields are decent and actually provide some defense against torpedoes unlike Imperial shields. However they are particularly weak to lance weapons and other energy weapons. They also charge up slower then the Imperial shields. Also they do have an exploitable weakness in that they have to drop shields around fighter bays/torpedo tubes in order to launch their weapons.

I also found that the 'glassing' gun is generally on the three top ships and is about equilvent to a single lance in both range and power. However the glassing itself takes a long time as they go over the entire planet's surface having to actually shoot again and again to cover the entire surface. So their planet destruction abilities are much worse then the Imperium's.

[The Glyphstone]

Well I didn't know about them. So I looked it up on the Halo wiki and here is generally what I found.

The shields are decent and actually provide some defense against torpedoes unlike Imperial shields. However they are particularly weak to lance weapons and other energy weapons. They also charge up slower then the Imperial shields. Also they do have an exploitable weakness in that they have to drop shields around fighter bays/torpedo tubes in order to launch their weapons.

I also found that the 'glassing' gun is generally on the three top ships and is about equilvent to a single lance in both range and power. However the glassing itself takes a long time as they go over the entire planet's surface having to actually shoot again and again to cover the entire surface. So their planet destruction abilities are much worse then the Imperium's.

That could work in the Covenant's favor to a degree then, because it is standard Imperial doctrine to batter down shield with projectile batteries before firing lances so the shields don't get in the way. Until/unless they get some salvage samples, they'd assume shields = shields like every other energy shield in their universe and use standard tactics.

[Forum Explorer]

That could work in the Covenant's favor to a degree then, because it is standard Imperial doctrine to batter down shield with projectile batteries before firing lances so the shields don't get in the way. Until/unless they get some salvage samples, they'd assume shields = shields like every other energy shield in their universe and use standard tactics.

The difference as far as I can tell is that a lance would go through the shields like a bullet through tissue paper and the batteries would have to go through it normally.


Also source? I've never heard that as a standard tactic before. Particularly as some ships only have lances or are just very lance heavy.

I should point out also that some ships do have energy weapon banks that aren't lances. So they'll likely figure it out sooner then you think.

[shadow_archmagi]

The difference as far as I can tell is that a lance would go through the shields like a bullet through tissue paper and the batteries would have to go through it normally.


Also source? I've never heard that as a standard tactic before. Particularly as some ships only have lances or are just very lance heavy.

I should point out also that some ships do have energy weapon banks that aren't lances. So they'll likely figure it out sooner then you think.

The Rogue Trader sourcebook mentions it over and over again- because Lances ignore armor, and Void Shields block anything, they use projectile weapons to soak the shields and then fire lances to ignore the hull armor

[The Glyphstone]

The Rogue Trader sourcebook mentions it over and over again- because Lances ignore armor, and Void Shields block anything, they use projectile weapons to soak the shields and then fire lances to ignore the hull armor

Indeed.

And yes, there do exist energy based non-lance weapons, but they are rare (typically mounted on Adeptus Mechanicus ships who can experiment with the weird stuff, or lost archaeotech ships), and usually shorter-ranged. The exceptions are xeno-tech weapons (Eldar use energy weapon batteries instead of projectiles), but that wouldn't be found on Imperial Navy line vessels.

Ships with lance-only or lance-heavy armament aren't typically standard line vessels either. They're purpose designed that way, to move in concert with other ships carrying a heavy or pure projectile armament.

[Triscuitable]

I also found that the 'glassing' gun is generally on the three top ships and is about equilvent to a single lance in both range and power. However the glassing itself takes a long time as they go over the entire planet's surface having to actually shoot again and again to cover the entire surface. So their planet destruction abilities are much worse then the Imperium's.

So we're not including psychological warfare, and ignoring the fact that they can always target notable areas first for the sake of strategy. Sounds good. They have a lot more capable weapons, but they glass to make humans suffer. They want to remind them of their power by showing them they can just take a few days to completely annihilate the surface of a planet, with no worry of opposition. Should they want to use more efficient methods, they will.

[ChaosLord29]

And yet you choose to ignore the fact that the Covenant have the quickly-regenerating, reliably defensive energy shields.

Quickly regenerating reliable shields that go down reliably against UNSC MAC cannons. We did the math and they can withstand a couple megajoules of energy (enough to defend against their own plasma weapons; but not the energy projectors aboard Super Carriers). Imperial Lance Batteries operate at the level of gigajoules.

How do we know? Because standard Covenant Plasma weapons melt through UNSC ships with relative ease. A standard Lance Battery aboard and Imperial Cruiser does the same thing, only against ships double or triple the size of the Covenant ships. The other difference being that Imperial Ships have Void shielding which can withstand multiple Lance hits (they have to, because Lances melt right through the 10-30 meter thick armor, again nearly twice that of Covenant ship hull plating), and are similarly regenerative (not quite as reliably as the Covenant's, but still).

And based on the Battle of Reach novel and the Halo wiki, the standard engagement range for Covenant craft is 10,000-30,0000km. Again, only half or a third of the standard engagement range established in Battlefleet Gothic (the ship combat game for the 40k universe).

The only thing in the Covenant Fleet capable of giving anything in the Imperial Navy a run for it's money is the Super Carrier. Standard Imperial Frigates and Cruisers should reliably be able to tank dozens of Covenant ships, disabling or destroying them in droves with their broadsides and Torpedos (which Covenant craft point defense systems will be less effective against, seeing as Imperial Torpedos are again twice or three times the size of anything the UNSC or Covenant themselves use).

As for how to deal with the Super Carriers themselves? Boarding actions by Space Marine Terminators should be more than sufficient.

[Soras Teva Gee]

Imperial Lance Batteries operate at the level of gigajoules.

Where does this come from?

No seriously what is this being established from?

And if its JUST a number... well I really don't like to use numbers in arguments like this but. A standard MAC is for its slug and velocity (http://halo.wikia.com/wiki/Magnetic_Accelerator_Cannon#Standard_Magnetic_Acce lerator_Cannon) is rated at 2.7 x 1014 Joules. Rounded off that is a Petajoule but even rounding down to 1014 a Gigajoule's order of magnitude is 109. So help me if remember my scientific notation properly that is along the lines of 100,000 times difference.

That is the standard for a UNSC shipboard MAC, which the wiki goes onto explain a Covenant vessels shields can tank multiple impacts from. Ergo by your own rating Imperial Lances are well within the tolerance level of Covenant shielding being several orders of magnitude weaker then weapons they routinely bear the brunt of.

[The Glyphstone]

I'm also curious where the gigajoules figure comes from, though all this line of argument is proving to me is that science fiction writers (Star Wars, Star Trek, Halo, 40K, whatever) should never be allowed near a number pad, because they have no sense of scale whatsoever.

[deuterio12]

That go down when hit by a few metal slugs...
If I hit someone in Legendary with that big as Beam Weapon will it's shields go down? What happens if they take 2-3 hits?

Lasguns (titled Flashlights due to their being Weak compared to other weapons) are those Beam Cannons on semi-auto/auto

Lasguns are weak, point. When 40K first came out they were claimed to be good as military rifles. Aka our guns from multiple decades ago.

And then when you check Imperial Guard novels, taking cover behind the bodies of unarmored heretics always works to stop lasgun shots. Whereas our real-world hand rifles can easily punch trough multiple human bodies.

[Forum Explorer]

I'm also curious where the gigajoules figure comes from, though all this line of argument is proving to me is that science fiction writers (Star Wars, Star Trek, Halo, 40K, whatever) should never be allowed near a number pad, because they have no sense of scale whatsoever.

Agreed. The more impressive number is the 10-30 meters of Armor ignored anyways. Also with their shields being weak to lances (and other energy weapons) and their shorter engagement ranges it looks like the Imperium would be able to pick off all but the Supercarriers which look to be roughly equivilant to a Space Station with 7 lance shots. Harder to deal with but do-able. Also the sort of thing that would attract Space Marines or Mechanicus ships.

[Triscuitable]

I'm also curious where the gigajoules figure comes from, though all this line of argument is proving to me is that science fiction writers (Star Wars, Star Trek, Halo, 40K, whatever) should never be allowed near a number pad, because they have no sense of scale whatsoever.

Back to the Future, which got time travel right in almost every aspect, failed to represent a gigawatt. 1.21 gigawatts from plutonium? Or recycled matter? That won't work. Especially considering the average nuclear power plant produces about 5 to 6 gigawatts.

Either that, or Doc got his hands on some really, really good plutonium.

[Fallen Angel]

Were they trained to specifically fight the Covenant? Do they know what Covenant weaponry is capable of? Can they recognize the roles of Covenant infantry on sight? Can they pilot Covenant vehicles?

Also note that there were a lot more Spartans than just the Master Chief (not "Master Chief". As awesome as that sounds, it's shorthand for Master Chief Petty Officer). Chief is a Spartan II, though there were Spartan IIIs, and now even IVs. The IIs were trained from the age of six with a very small success rate, the IIIs were trained from adolescence with a higher rate of success, and the IVs are volunteers from the most notable members of squads. No training needed, just give 'em the "upgrades" and send them through UNSC Infinity simulation to teach them how to use MJOLNIR armor.

Also of note, MJOLNIR is lightweight stuff (despite it weighing half a ton) when wielded by a Spartan. It's so effective that it actually enhances body functions while providing incredibly powerful energy shields, seperate implants, and doesn't impede movement at all.

Hell, if this were a Spartan versus a Space Marine, the Spartan would more than likely win. He's got better training, less cumbersome armor, and can quite efficiently goomba-stomp their foe to death, should they try.

They also have a tendency to, y'know, wear their helmet.


{Scrubbed}

[Triscuitable]

Uh, if it's any consolation, or if I hurt your feelings, I'm sorry. I don't know what you posted, but clearly I must have offended you in some manner.

[The Glyphstone]

Oh hey, look what I just found on the Halo Wiki, on the page for Orbital Defense Platforms and their Super MACs:


These cannons fire a 3000-ton ferric-tungsten round at 119916983.2 meters per second,[4] impacting with a massive amount of kinetic energy, equal to approximately 5325 megatons of energy.

So, one of the two numbers we have (either for the basic MAC or the Super MAC) is horribly horribly wrong. Is there a mathematician or physicist in the house?

Ignore me, I got Gigatons and Gigajoules mixed up.

[Triscuitable]

I like how Halo fails in physics just as much as Warhammer.

[The Glyphstone]

Warhammer doesn't really try to pretend its physics is realistic, though, which is a small technical point in its favor.

[ChaosLord29]

Yeah, guess I never should have tried to bring in numbers XD

Anyway, I think the point that Imperial Lance weapons routinely melt through ships double and triple the size of Covenant Cruisers should count for a lot in how any space battles will work out.

[Triscuitable]

Yeah, guess I never should have tried to bring in numbers XD

Anyway, I think the point that Imperial Lance weapons routinely melt through ships double and triple the size of Covenant Cruisers should count for a lot in how any space battles will work out.

Considering it's been previously established that the Covenant isn't outright stupid, they wouldn't engage the Imperium in space combat. If they got put into that position, they'd enter a slipspace jump as quickly as possible to get from one place to the next. While not as efficient, it's still better as an escape plan, as slipspace travel is more akin to teleportation rather than moving unbelievably fast.

You're not going to get a space battle with them, as nice as that sounds :smallwink:. They're going to engage the Imperium where they have the advantage. Namely, where they can set up cannon fodder at the front lines, forcing the Imperium to waste their resources on little punks like Grunts and Skirmishers without knowing of the other, more obvious threats while Jackals take them apart with long-range weaponry, Brutes put on pressure with heavy weaponry, Elites flank and penetrate defenses with effective anti-shield weaponry (plasma is made to take down shields, not armor; however, it's still effective against armor), and of course, the incredibly devastating Gravity Hammer and Energy Sword.

Note: the Energy Sword blocks bullets. The Gravity Hammer displaces gravitational fields at such a rapid pace that the bends would seem like a sneeze in comparison to the pain you'd have to deal with.

[Creed]

Yeah, in my eyes, I, along with a few buddies and a case of energy drinks, kicked the Covenant's butt six ways to Sunday. Four guys basically soloed their entire military power over and over and over. I'd give them almost no odds against the Imperium. Just talking sheer manpower, the Covies are just not capable of doing anything except reaching a draw by wiping out sentient life with a Halo ring, if you even gave them a Halo as a resource and the Imperium didn't just blow it up faster that you can say "Master Chief".

[Starbuck_II]

Yeah, in my eyes, I, along with a few buddies and a case of energy drinks, kicked the Covenant's butt six ways to Sunday. Four guys basically soloed their entire military power over and over and over. I'd give them almost no odds against the Imperium. Just talking sheer manpower, the Covies are just not capable of doing anything except reaching a draw by wiping out sentient life with a Halo ring, if you even gave them a Halo as a resource and the Imperium didn't just blow it up faster that you can say "Master Chief".

What if Covanent had all the spartans on their side (and I mean, every Spartan that ever existed)?

[WitchSlayer]

What if Covanent had all the spartans on their side (and I mean, every Spartan that ever existed)?

Well the Greeks wouldn't help that much, and the supersoldiers are too few in comparison to the Space Marines.

[Brother Oni]

Warhammer doesn't really try to pretend its physics is realistic, though, which is a small technical point in its favor.

Given that there are several places and factions in 40K that treat the laws of physics as minor suggestions, it's understandable.

[Triscuitable]

Yeah, in my eyes, I, along with a few buddies and a case of energy drinks, kicked the Covenant's butt six ways to Sunday. Four guys basically soloed their entire military power over and over and over. I'd give them almost no odds against the Imperium. Just talking sheer manpower, the Covies are just not capable of doing anything except reaching a draw by wiping out sentient life with a Halo ring, if you even gave them a Halo as a resource and the Imperium didn't just blow it up faster that you can say "Master Chief".

Consider this:


The Covenant in the games is not the Covenant we are basing this argument on. Rather, we're paying attention to lore rather than whatever difficulty you played on.
There was only one person fighting the Covenant, not four. And he happened to have extraordinary luck.
He was also trained from six to fight specifically this force.

[Forum Explorer]

Considering it's been previously established that the Covenant isn't outright stupid, they wouldn't engage the Imperium in space combat. If they got put into that position, they'd enter a slipspace jump as quickly as possible to get from one place to the next. While not as efficient, it's still better as an escape plan, as slipspace travel is more akin to teleportation rather than moving unbelievably fast.

You're not going to get a space battle with them, as nice as that sounds :smallwink:. They're going to engage the Imperium where they have the advantage. Namely, where they can set up cannon fodder at the front lines, forcing the Imperium to waste their resources on little punks like Grunts and Skirmishers without knowing of the other, more obvious threats while Jackals take them apart with long-range weaponry, Brutes put on pressure with heavy weaponry, Elites flank and penetrate defenses with effective anti-shield weaponry (plasma is made to take down shields, not armor; however, it's still effective against armor), and of course, the incredibly devastating Gravity Hammer and Energy Sword.

Note: the Energy Sword blocks bullets. The Gravity Hammer displaces gravitational fields at such a rapid pace that the bends would seem like a sneeze in comparison to the pain you'd have to deal with.

The problem being that the Covenant lose even worse on the ground. The Imperial Guard generally have the resources and ability to wipe out anything the Covenant can throw at them. Particularly the tanks. Such as the Leman Russ for front line or the scarily accurate Basilisk. They even have dedicated air corps in Valkyries and Vendettas which drop off more units to help out flank. All of the Imperium's tanks tend to have better armor and weapons then anything seen from the Covenant.

[DaedalusMkV]

He was also trained from six to fight specifically this force.
[/LIST]

Lies!

He was trained from six to fight rebels. The UNSC didn't even know the Covenant existed until after the Spartan IIs first couple of combat missions. Hell, the Mjolnir armour wasn't even developed until years after the war started and the shield generator addition came at basically the end of the war. Not that it matters, because the Covenant's ground forces are not sufficiently different from what the Imperium is used to that Space Marines would have trouble adapting. A single squad of Marines is going to curb-stomp the Covenant's ground forces just as hard as the Spartans do. Which is entirely irrelevent, because this versus is decided entirely in space, just as the UNSC-Covenant war was in every location except on a Halo array, which do not come into play by the stipulations of this versus matchup.

Daedalurker, away!

[Triscuitable]

Lies!

He was trained from six to fight rebels. The UNSC didn't even know the Covenant existed until after the Spartan IIs first couple of combat missions. Hell, the Mjolnir armour wasn't even developed until years after the war started and the shield generator addition came at basically the end of the war. Not that it matters, because the Covenant's ground forces are not sufficiently different from what the Imperium is used to that Space Marines would have trouble adapting. A single squad of Marines is going to curb-stomp the Covenant's ground forces just as hard as the Spartans do. Which is entirely irrelevent, because this versus is decided entirely in space, just as the UNSC-Covenant war was in every location except on a Halo array, which do not come into play by the stipulations of this versus matchup.

Daedalurker, away!

Yeah, I kind of recalled after about five seconds that the Covenant didn't show up until about 2 years after he was deployed. Even then, his training shifted immediately to take them down. Also worthy of note is how the majority of the Spartan IIs and IIIs died.


The problem being that the Covenant lose even worse on the ground. The Imperial Guard generally have the resources and ability to wipe out anything the Covenant can throw at them. Particularly the tanks. Such as the Leman Russ for front line or the scarily accurate Basilisk. They even have dedicated air corps in Valkyries and Vendettas which drop off more units to help out flank. All of the Imperium's tanks tend to have better armor and weapons then anything seen from the Covenant.

Do they have active camo? Or what about the fact that the Covenant could have all their forces on the ground much sooner than the Imperium?

Also, you can't just say "the Imperium can beat the Covenant because they've got better stuff". Explain what weapons they have that are so much better than a bullet blocking sword and gravity field displacing hammer. Y'know, the incredibly easy to manufacture weapons of which the only restriction is whether or not you are allowed to hold one.

[The Glyphstone]

Uh...ordinary metal swords can block bullets, depending on caliber. You just have to get the sword in the way of the bullet, and that's a question of reflexes, not weaponry. You hand a Grunt an energy sword and I doubt he's going to be going anything except dying, regardless of his weapon's bullet-blocking abilities.

[ChaosLord29]

Yeah, I kind of recalled after about five seconds that the Covenant didn't show up until about 2 years after he was deployed. Even then, his training shifted immediately to take them down. Also worthy of note is how the majority of the Spartan IIs and IIIs died.



Do they have active camo? Or what about the fact that the Covenant could have all their forces on the ground much sooner than the Imperium?

Also, you can't just say "the Imperium can beat the Covenant because they've got better stuff". Explain what weapons they have that are so much better than a bullet blocking sword and gravity field displacing hammer. Y'know, the incredibly easy to manufacture weapons of which the only restriction is whether or not you are allowed to hold one.

Well, Terminators and SpaceMarines can teleport and drop pod onto the battlefield just as fast as covenant dropships. Thunderhawk gunships are also comparable to Covenant dropships (Phantoms?), except that they are much more heavily armed with twin banks of Lascannons and Hurricane Bolter arrays.

As for Beamswords and Gravity Hammers, they have analogues in the Imperium: Power Weapons (basically any edge weapon surrounded by an energy field that functions exactly like a Beam Sword) which are much more common than Beam Swords, seeing as they are commonly carried by even IG sergeants and are practically standard issue amongst Space Marine Officers. Power Fists and Thunder Hammers are also standard issue for Terminators (either tactical or assault teams) and available once again to IG and Space Marine officers, working on a similar principle except that the energy field is amplified by an order of magnitude and make even an ordinary soldier capable of crushing tank armor like so much aluminum foil.

I think you'll find there's an analogue of everyone of the Covenant's heaviest weapons to be found in greater abundance in the Imperial Armoury, and remember again that unlike the UNSC, the Imperium has developed defensive equipment to match these threats (even if it isn't available to the standard Guardsman).

So, not only will the Covenant be outnumbered on the ground, they're more than likely be matched or outmatched by Imperium weaponry (particularly Space Marines), and vehicles (if the IG).

[Triscuitable]

I think that the falling out is that the Covenant would have to rely on guerilla tactics to win. And even then, chance of victory is slim. They're not stupid, but the biggest issue is that they're about two-thousand years old while the Imperium is a few dozen times that.

[ChaosLord29]

I think that the falling out is that the Covenant would have to rely on guerilla tactics to win. And even then, chance of victory is slim. They're not stupid, but the biggest issue is that they're about two-thousand years old while the Imperium is a few dozen times that.

Guerilla tactics only win wars when you've got some other kind of leverage working for you or some means of outlasting your opponent. I'm willing to concede Soras's point that the Imperium is a foetid shell of what it once was, maybe even a dying one, but if so it has been dying for thousands of years (since the Horus Heresy) and is likely to continue of in that fashion for perhaps thousands more. When the collapse of an Empire is measured not in years, not in decades, not even in centuries, but in Millennia, there's a lot that can change.

The Covenant may not be stupid, but if they intend to keep the Covenant together, they're going to have to continue the Great Journey, and even if they make it last another thousand years, they are bound to attract the attention of the Imperium in doing so, and the Brutes and Elites won't just accept a retreat from a xenocidal race of heathans, they will sacrifice themselves for the sake of the Great Journey (not to mention thousands of Grunts and Jackals in the process), to preserve the Prophets, who will either be forced to retreat to preserve some semblance of the Covenant, reducing them to the same dying state as the Imperium. Except they aren't nearly as likely yo last another thousand years.

[Forum Explorer]

Do they have active camo? Or what about the fact that the Covenant could have all their forces on the ground much sooner than the Imperium?

Also, you can't just say "the Imperium can beat the Covenant because they've got better stuff". Explain what weapons they have that are so much better than a bullet blocking sword and gravity field displacing hammer. Y'know, the incredibly easy to manufacture weapons of which the only restriction is whether or not you are allowed to hold one.

I would also like to add that they do face off against active camo and while it makes things more difficult the Imperial Guard is still able to defeat those opponents. So it wouldn't be a surprise for them.

Gurilla tactics can only take you so far, particularly when all aliens are killed on sight.

Basically to sum everything up: The Covenant have no advantages over the Imperium in pretty much any way while the Imperium has numbers, better soldiers, and experience on the Covenant.

[Soras Teva Gee]

I'm also curious where the gigajoules figure comes from, though all this line of argument is proving to me is that science fiction writers (Star Wars, Star Trek, Halo, 40K, whatever) should never be allowed near a number pad, because they have no sense of scale whatsoever.

Which is why I don't like to bring them up.

As I broadly speaking don't trust sci-fi writers with numbers I have to sort of ignore them. Even someone who's all about running numbers like David Weber once famously made his ships not quite as dense as cigar smoke.

Admittedly this makes a broad range of realities something I consider difficult to judge against one another. The Imperium is one of them, and now frankly I put the Covenant there too.


Agreed. The more impressive number is the 10-30 meters of Armor ignored anyways. Also with their shields being weak to lances (and other energy weapons) and their shorter engagement ranges it looks like the Imperium would be able to pick off all but the Supercarriers which look to be roughly equivilant to a Space Station with 7 lance shots. Harder to deal with but do-able. Also the sort of thing that would attract Space Marines or Mechanicus ships.

Armor being ignored is less a comment on the weapon and more a comment on the metallurgy. And let it be remember that being weaker against plasma weapons is not exactly a radical thing. Its not like the plasma carbine/rifle depletes Chief's or Elite shields in a shot. The personal weapons only show a fairly narrow difference in game. We've no real reason to suppose it to be particularly significant at ship board levels.

Also ranges in space are easily the most dubious concept relating to sci-fi battles, unless you have something that explicitly limits the range for in-universe technical reasons or there is a true disparity. Is there lag for lightspeed limitations? No? Then the ships are in range. That's my rule anyways.

Also the Covenant has pinpoint accurate FTL, they get to start the battle at any range they please so its even further a non-issue.


Yeah, guess I never should have tried to bring in numbers XD

Anyway, I think the point that Imperial Lance weapons routinely melt through ships double and triple the size of Covenant Cruisers should count for a lot in how any space battles will work out.

And where does this come from.

For one thing I've several times pointed out that the Covenant has more then just its supercarrier that are perfectly with the Imperial scale. Actually considering the Covenant's design philosophy for a relative length their ships seem much more spherical in design so should be more massive for a given length.

Now I have also found some smaller ships with the same typing as much larger ones which is perhaps odd. However I should point out that ship types are actually pretty fluid. IRL every aircraft carrier under USN designations is *technically* a cruiser. That's what the C in CVN stands for. Also for fun Ticonderoga-class, the only "cruisers" in service share their hulls with the now long decommed Spruance-class destroyers. And cruisers and Arleigh Burke destroyers aren't that difference in size, equipment, or armament, the main difference being the destroyers lack a second 5" gun. Whole point of that side bar being that aliens having perhaps counter-intuitive ship designations is not significant by itself.

There a bigger point though. Understand that lance batteries are not "ignoring armor" just because they have that magic ability or whatever. It merely a practical shorthand for saying that in 40k armor is not effective enough to pose a problem for them.

Ship size in particular has nothing to do with it because its only how good the armor is at point of impact. Which thickness helps but also the material construction. A half inch of steel is probably better then a three inch phone book.

So I think you read far too much into a fact (that we still haven seen a source on) that isn't nearly as meaningful as you think. Unless you submit that Covenant ships are not made out of the same material as Imperial ones it doesn't mean anything. The same case applies with shields.

Just because something falls under the same concept does not make them equivalent automatically.

Put aside for a moment Imperial ships blasting other 40k ships, do you have some other measure of their toughness. For example to Imperial ships ever dive into the atmosphere. We know Covenant ones do from among other things the Prophet of Regrets attack on New Mombasa, clearly through either hull or shields they can survive re-entry. Maybe Imperial ships simply lack the hover tech to do that, no problem, but that would be less arbitrary instance of toughness.

Also I'm detecting a sort of totally ignoring the shields vibe which I just don't get. Even putting aside the numbers something like the MAC is respectable space weapon in concept, its flaws lie in its slow rate of fire evidently, and that the UNSC ships next weapon are missiles which the Covenant shields and point defense eat like candy. So I continue to fail to see where this becomes a massacre of the Covenant like has been suggested in so many words more then once.

Will they loose ships, sure thing, but they deploy fleets in the hundred repeatedly where Imperial fleets seem to run more like IRL ones with dozens.

[GloatingSwine]

Also, you can't just say "the Imperium can beat the Covenant because they've got better stuff". Explain what weapons they have that are so much better than a bullet blocking sword and gravity field displacing hammer. Y'know, the incredibly easy to manufacture weapons of which the only restriction is whether or not you are allowed to hold one.

20mm Semiautomatic RPG?

As an infantry weapon?

[Olfgar]

I would like to know where you thought of that? Can you find anywhere that shows how many soldiers the Imperium has versus how many the covenant has, especially since it is multiple races, and not just one.

Also better soldiers how? Ok so they kill aliens on sight. Thats nice. The covenant also kills humans on site, as theyve never had the need to hold mroe than a few important prisoners at a time, and thats only to extract information, after which they are killed.

Id also like to point out, that most Sangheli (Elite) and Jiralhanae (Brutes) are as strong as Spartan 2's, if not stronger, which so far seems to be the most "powerful" of the spartan series, since the Spartan 3's were ment to be cheaper and expendable. The Spartan 4's that were recently revealed in novles (which I havent been able to read yet) along with the multiplayer portion for Halo 4, im not all to familiar with but i'll still assume that the Spartan 2 series (ala Master Chief) are still the best. The Hunter colonies (their actualy race name escapes me, it was something golo) are definatly physicaly stronger than anything that has been seen so far, and even larger colonies of the hunter eeles are what make the Scarab tanks function.

And i cant see how they have more experience in warfare. All of the races would have had their own wars amongst them selves before they developed the technology, or were adopted into the covenant. Hell, the Brutes had numerous brutal inner conflicts that brought them selves from a spac faring species back to pre or early industrial age technology before being adopted into the covenant.

Infact, the Elites, whos ENTIRE culture is a warrior culture, to the point where they even from upon surgeons and doctors, because they cause your blood to be spilled out of the glory of combat. Once they finished their war with the prophets and created the first covenant alliance, they worked on bringing in the grunts, hunters, jackals and brutes intot he fold, along witht he drones (again i forget those buggy bastards real species). Each of the other races may not be as dedicated to warfare that the Elites and brutes dedicate them selves to, but are each well experienced in warfare form their own wars, rebellions formt he early stages of the Covenant being first formed, and now the war witht he humans AND aainst the flood, and the Elite vs Brute Civil war. Id say that they should atleast the same amount of experience, if not more but im willing to not debate this point and compromise with similar experience.

For the active camo front, unless they have a way to completly neutralize the active camo, a couple Sangheli spec ops teams could cause serious damage and disruption to any force, form sabotage, to killing commanding officers, to causing a flank or defensive position to flank.

Im not as well versed in Imperium battle tactics on the ground (ill save space combat for another time) but I have a hard time seeing a Covenant ground force and all it entails being defeated. Squadrons of ghost for scouting/recon along with hit and run attacks along softer areas or a flank after battle has been engaged, Wraith tanks lobbing plasma mortars from 1) A safe distance and 2) they can be behind cover while doing it. Along with a few hunter bond pairs and well placed jackal phalanx teams supporting the Sangheli and Grunt assault teams, or brute packs that are thrown in to act as beserkers, jackals are also excelent marksmen with their sharp eye site.

Toss in a few scarabs and **** will get ruined real fast. The Covenant also makes liberal use of Banshee air support and their Specter transports for extra support fire power, or their extremly heavily armored Phantom troop transports thhat while less armed are nigh indestructible due tot he sheer amount of protection it has.

The onyl space marines i see being able to effectively fight them might be the Angry marines and even then i think it would end in a stalemate for both sides.

[GloatingSwine]

Put aside for a moment Imperial ships blasting other 40k ships, do you have some other measure of their toughness. For example to Imperial ships ever dive into the atmosphere. We know Covenant ones do from among other things the Prophet of Regrets attack on New Mombasa, clearly through either hull or shields they can survive re-entry. Maybe Imperial ships simply lack the hover tech to do that, no problem, but that would be less arbitrary instance of toughness.

We can figure out how powerful their guns are from what they can do to things like planets. It takes far fewer ships and a shorter time for the Imperium's Lunar class cruisers to glass a planet than it does the Covenant, for instance. (Exterminatus on Typhon IV is carried out by five or so Lunar class cruisers, the fleet that glassed Reach had hundreds if not thousands of ships).

From instances like that where a common target is used we can tell that the firepower available to the most common ship of the line in the Imperium is vastly greater than those of the Covenant.

[Forum Explorer]

The problem Soras is that you can't pick and choose your insanity. If it is canon that their effective range is 30 000 km when by logic and known science it should be effectively 300 000km then you have to accept that it is 30 000km regardless. Otherwise you also have to point out how none of the other science makes sense as that tends to be the case in Sci-Fi settings.

[Olfgar]

We can figure out how powerful their guns are from what they can do to things like planets. It takes far fewer ships and a shorter time for the Imperium's Lunar class cruisers to glass a planet than it does the Covenant, for instance. (Exterminatus on Typhon IV is carried out by five or so Lunar class cruisers, the fleet that glassed Reach had hundreds if not thousands of ships).

From instances like that where a common target is used we can tell that the firepower available to the most common ship of the line in the Imperium is vastly greater than those of the Covenant.

Im not as wellversed in warhammer as id like but...doesnt an exterminatus use something along the lines of super powerful nukes? I doubt that they use normal ship board wepaonry such as their cannons and what not, while the covenant do. They take their time, and use the NORMAL wepaons that their ships use in ship to ship combat to also ruin a planet. Ive never heard of the marines using an exterminatus type wepaon in ship to ship combat.

And in regards to fleet size, they usualy bring hundreds for just a regular old attack. If anyone rememberd how many ships were preparing to originaly attack Earth that were gathering around the repair and refit station Unyeilding Heirophant in the First Strike (?) novel. Largest Covie fleet ever seen. If I remeberd correctly the fleet that attacked reach was also on the large side. And their pinpoint accurate FTL is a great advantage to....Also I believe in reach, there was a super carrier that had been stealthed that was over the planet that brought down the UNSC ships after noble team took down the spires. unless of course the super carrier had just did an FTL jump INTO the atmosphere of the palnet, again, showing how accurate it is.