Napoleonic Tactics in 40k

[fluffstalker]

Well I use Napoleonic as more of a catch phrase since most people don't really know much about the wars of the end of Pike and Shot through to Peter the Great and the Great Northern War through to the Prussian wars, etc. Most people just know Napoeleon. And yes artillery will always cause the most casualties, barring extreme disease in the army of course. You could also attribute Wellington's victory at waterloo to the inability of the massed french guns to do anything to the majority of British troops behind the reverse slope. I guess you could say the topic refers to 1700- 1940, when tactics that used to be the domain of pure skirmirshers become the tactics of the infantry as a whole.

[Commissar Vaughn]

It also seems that many people don't actually have any idea what 'Napolenic tactics' were, and seem to be mixing them up with those of Frederick the Great of Prussia, around 50 years earlier, who did turn volley fire of muzzle loading muskets into a science.

If we take Napoleon as an example of Napoleonic tactics, then it is beyond dispute that he was an artillery general. Standardised, relativity light ( mainly 12 pounder) cannon, that were mobile and quick to operate had range, power and versatilit caused far more casualties than the infantry or cavalry. Watlerloo was won/lost as the French cavalry, when they charged and took the British guns, they had lost all the equipment to sabotage the guns ( basically hammer and headless nails), which cavalry usually carried.

Similarly, co-ordinated volley fire did not die out with muskets. Rorkes Drift, 1885, using breech loading rifles used it heavily.

TLDR- come up with a proper definition of Napoleonic tactics.

I understand your pedantry but it is unnecessary: whilst posters may or may not be aware that they are actually alluding to tactics developed from the beginning of linear battlelines designed to maximise the firepower of the musket right up to the development of the machinegun designed to rip lines to shreds it is perfectly ok to refer to such tactics as "Napoleonic" given that the Napoleonic Wars fell right in the middle of this period and saw such tactics used. It is a handy short hand that everyone understands without to much TLDR rubbish that is really only of interest to complete grognards.

BTW you missed out the importance of bricoles.

EDIT beaten to it by Fluffstalker though Id move that date of 1940 forward a bit: The basis of modern infantry tactics and combined arms had been worked out by the end of WW1, only problem was that only the Germans were taking notes so everyone else had to relearn it in 1940 onwards...

[MvS]

I think the more obvious answer is that the background in this case is a mirror to the formations used in the game. Unit coherence and the close combat phase require troops to be placed in closer proximity than necessary in the real world because to do otherwise can mean a very quick end to your unit.

I like to imagine that the Guardsmen in the 'real' 40K universe are as related to their game counterparts as Space Marines are in the setting and the game. Neither operate in the game as they should or would have to in 'real' terms.

[Jim Bowen]

I think the more obvious answer is that the background in this case is a mirror to the formations used in the game. Unit coherence and the close combat phase require troops to be placed in closer proximity than necessary in the real world because to do otherwise can mean a very quick end to your unit.

I like to imagine that the Guardsmen in the 'real' 40K universe are as related to their game counterparts as Space Marines in the setting and the game. Neither operate in the game as they should or would have to in 'real' terms.

Well said and let that be the end of the matter really enjoyed reading this thread

[Konovalev]

Knowing that any bush, patch of trees, or rocky buildup could very well contain or in fact BE some nightmarish xenos, I'd stand out in the open huddled together with all my buddies too!

[RBLFunk]

Anyway, what I meant with "a hit is a kill" is that a hitting shot has a very high possibility of incapacitating a target, even if he is armoured,

Of course. Same goes for a flak armoured guardsman.

be it by actual killing, wounding, rib-breaking under the vest, etc.

If you hit a soldier in the hard component of his body armour with small arms fire you won't do much. I've seen numerous pieces of footage of US soldiers taking a 7.62mm to the SAPI plate, falling over (from surprise, not impact force) then hopping straight back up to run off and take cover.
Not sure about the weight difference but I'd say a modern body armour like the Interceptor system is about equivalent to flak armour.

Of course, if we analyse it technically, a SA80 has enough firepower to tear any living thing to shreeds. But let´s assume for a moment the in-universe stablished idea that Orks are really, really tough. For any reason, be it a stupidly sturd metabolism, the metal plates riveted on their skin, thicker bones and denser muscles, their capacity of loosing parts and still "working" or whatever. Be it so, incapacitating an Ork means killing it dead.

I haven't heard any objection to modern assault rifles being regarded as on par with lasguns. Lasguns kill Orks. Therefore assault rifles would kill Orks.

In good logic, achieving such thing with small arms fire will require a lot of accurate and rapid shooting.

Guess what modern soldiers are pretty good at?

First, the Orks will be firing back and, even if not accurate, Ork's fire should be horrible to sustain. Shootas F4 means very big bullets, equivalent to modern .50 cal. or so.

.50 calibre as in half-inch slugs for certain, I'd believe even bigger, but not as in .50 heavy machine gun rounds, 12.7x99mm. They'd tear through flak armour, which sluggas and shootas don't. Not meaning to conflate rules with background but that's how it's depicted as far as I can tell.
Sustained accurate automatic fire is what effectively suppresses enemies. I don't envision Orks being very good at it.

Stikkbombz and any crazy platoon weapon they wear would contribute to diminish the effectivity of the Royal Marines fire (I cannot believe yet that I am taking this so seriously. Damn' internet ). Cover being blasted away, plasma, fire and explosions all around and so on. Discipline of fire would suffer.

If we're still talking about the same 'what if?' scenario of Royal Marines besieging Ork Nobs instead of Iraqis in the battle of Fallujah, the Marines will have more and better support, put to better use.

Secondly, fast ammo consumption in modern automatic weapons wont help. For how long can our Marines platoon keep their fire rate without recieving supplies? Shooting very fast is not always a good thing, specially if you cannot produce enough damage to break the enemy.

I had some great information a couple years back about the trials different or upgraded versions of the SA80 was put through to evaluate its reliability, simulating the conditions and duration of engagements, number of rounds fired over a given time, resupply, all rounds fired, field strip, resupply, etc. I wish I still had it, but I vaguely recall that a soldier's 300 rounds of ammunition may have only been expected to last him 15 minutes in a serious engagement. Which is why resupply is important, and why 'just chuck your power packs in the camp fire' would not be an option for Imperial Guard.
Guardsmen come in hoards every bit as endless as Orks', in the given scenario the Royal Marines have a logistical advantage, and they should have no problem inflicting casualties on the Orks even armed only with SA80s.

Thirdly (for now, I'll think more about it), psichology. Orks are fearsome things. Watching how they survive hits that would down a tough human doesn't help. No modern soldier is trained to fight hordes of monsters. I´m afraid of monsters and I assume that so are Royal Marines, too (maybe a bit less than me). Will some of them loose their nerve and flee or stop shooting for a while, thus breaking fire discipline again? Hmmm, probably...
Fourth and last: Taktikz. Orks, specially Morkers (or was it Gorkers?), know well all this things. They would cunningly use terror, concentrated highly destructive fire, natural resilience, cover and, finally, choppas, to overcome the modern regular soldiers. Would they prevail? Crom doesn't and doesn't care, but he'll be watching the show.

I don't accept that modern soldiers would have many problems with inflicting casualties on the Orks. If the Orks behave as they are depicted in 40K background, let alone in game, the Royal Marines are presented with the same challenge as hosing the lawn. They are used to engaging elusive enemies at long, medium and short range, taking cover, repositioning, that shoot about as effectively as they do, that intelligently defend themselves. When huge green things with atrocious marksmanship jump from cover and come charging at them firing wildly and swinging axes, the Royal Marines are presented with an almost comical shooting gallery scenario.

Moreover, they are inmune to rare gravity conditions, an important thing for a galaxy spread army. What happens when you shoot autoguns in space, on the Moon or on an asteroid? Nothing killy.

Not sure what you mean by 'nothing killy'. In low gravity and vacuum an autogun/assault rifle has less gravity to contend with so will have a flatter trajectory, and less or no friction so the projectile will not lose velocity over range. In low gravity and vacuum the autogun would hit just as hard at a kilometre as it would at 10 metres, and will be more accurate.

[Roberkhan]

Ugh, this is getting diluted...

First, let's fix the concept. Bunnahabhain, even if already explained by someone else: I believe "napoleonic tactics" to be here a loose way of designating the kind of counter-modern things we see the Guard performing in pictures and background. This things that look silly because they are not what modern soldiers do.
Call them "napoleonic", "victorian", "ancient", "verdunian" or whatever fits better. Maybe just "unmodern" will fit. You know: infantry close formations, fire in volleys, big units with little firepower per person, massive use of unspecialized infantrymen, use of tanks in primarily infantry-support roles, lack of coordination between artillery and small infantry units, sub-use of airpower, etc.

RBLFunk, I'm afraid the Fallujah example is being taken too far. Allow me to expose my point in another way. The main idea is:
Topic Imperial Guard (Cadians, Mordians, Valhallans and similars) doesn't fight like modern first world soldiers do because modern tactics don't satisfy their needs and because they could not, even if they wanted to.

First, which are those needs? They vary a lot, of course, but the Guard is mainly fighting a desperate total war everywhere and against everyone else in the galaxy. "Total war" is the goebbelsian way to say that victory equals racial survival in an extermination conflict and that overstretched resources have to be stretched a bit more. In 1944, this was wrong. In M41 it's true.
In total war, there is the need of urgently filling the gaps in the front. Filling it with Royal Marines proxies (Stormtroopers) is not possible, as it takes too much time. The Imperium has plenty of people, but not plenty of time. So, people with unoptimized gear (flak, lasgun, Leman Russ) substitute what should be extreme elite soldiers with optimized gear (carapace or power armour, hellgun, Land Raider). Moreover, modern first world soldiers are not so easy to "produce". In fact, only the biggest powers in our world can do this: USA, China, Russia and Europe to an extent... most of the countries out there still relly on Cold War era armies or worst.

This sounds a bit stupid, as the Imperium has enough resources, hinterland and knowledge to train gargantuan armies of Royal Marines' proxies. Entire worlds could be used to train bazillions of non-Astartes elites every year without threatening the output of regular Guards. Systems like Maccragge could do this without doubt. Why don't they? Probably, because mankind's worst enemy until Tyranids showed up was mankind itself. Hundred armies of Imperial Guard are less dangerous for the Imperium than ten armies of Super Imperial Guard and can achieve the same objectives. So, why taking risks?

But let us go back to tiny tactical things. Back to Fallujah. My point was that a modern elite unit (a company of RM, to constrain variables a bit) would not be as good as it's rough imperial (from the Imperium, not from the Empire as in "imperial meassure system" ) equivalent (a company of Cadians) in fighting an Ork horde in an enclosed enviroment. I know realize that it is a bit of an stupid example as there are many contextual aspects we do not contemplate properly: support? day or night? what means "enclosed enviroment"? But let´s try:
- Imperial and british soldiers are roughly equally protected by flak/tactical vests. At best, it is a protection at vital areas (not head) against the big Ork bullets, which have a brutal stopping power but are not so good at penetrating, and shrapnel. I think both of us agree here.
- SA80's and semiautomatic (don't remember pattern) lasgun's fire are, on average, equivallently killy against Orks. A well placed burst from the first or a well place shot from the second can stop an Ork dead. A not so well placed one can not. Incapacitating injuries are not so desirable, as Ork's don't get as easily incapacitated as humans. Even humans on drugs.
- Lasgun fire is more accurate. It's not affected by wind, recoil or gravity and, by definition, every shot is a tracer shot (that´s not so good sometimes ).
- Lasgun fire lasts longer. Semiautomatic fire, bigger magazine (battery) capacity (acording to Inquisitor, could search stats if you need me to) and, probably, lighter batteries (more batteries per soldier). We can assume no supply lines for the units or equivalent supply lines for both. It´s the same.
- Lasgun fire is semiautomatic, so the potential fire output of each Guard is less than that of each Marine. However, Marines are not expected to fire on full auto except as last resource, so things are even here, too.
- Could we assume similar fire disciplines for both, too? IMHO, Guards are not soviet conscripts from 1941, but a mix of 20th century well trained regular soldiers. I have no reason to think they would not cover sectors, coordinate actions, direct fire and combine fields of fire as good as RM. At least, as good as any serious soldier in Rommel's Infantry attacks.
- Unit size and flexibility. Marines seem to have the upper hand here, as they don't use 10 men squads, have a higher proportion of support weapons per "rifleman" and do probably act with more individual and groupal creativity than Guards. However, having extra bodies to loose before loosing combat effectivity could be a good idea in an "all or nothing" scenario like this orkish one. Even more, more guns per squad mean more chances of downing the green brutes in high numbers, the kind of numbers you need to stop green tides. This brings us back to the gun's capability for killing Orks. Obviously, lasguns and autoguns can and do kill Orks. The problem is, can they kill them fast enough to break the assault? Ruleswise, one in every three hits will be incapacitating. How much would that be in reality, one in two?
Moreover, Imperial support weapons are, by far, more effective against insensible green monsters than british ones (Heavy bolter vs. any 5.56 o 7.62 machine gun). Plasma guns or meltaguns are also way more interesting than machine guns against 'eavy armoured nobz or Meganobz. This supperiority could make for the lower proportion of organic support at platoon-company level.
- Balls. Guards have a good chance of fighting longer even if they start to loose. Indoctrination, the Emperor protects, crusader ideology, preachers, confessors, knowing and hating your green enemy and the always vigilant Comissar make of every guardsman a potential japanese banzai soldier. That doesn't win battles against automatic fire, but makes them last longer. Until the next regiment can join in. Imperial regiments are endless. British ones are not.

Of course, none of this arguments supports the idea of Guardsmen ranked and volley shooting as in Gettysburg. I'm afraid I went a bit off topic XD.

Lastly, as I should work or something: physics lesson by a historian who doesn't know **** about physics (if there is a true physicist in the forum, please, don't yet die from lough-stroke and correct me in a not excesively insulting manner, please):
When you shoot a gun, you create a force between two bodies (the explosion between the bullet and the combination of case, gun and shooter). On Earth, the second body is hold to the ground by it's weight, which is the result of a calculation involving the mass of the body and the gravity of the Earth or something like this . The first one, the bullet, is propelled because the pushing force is bigger than it´s weight. As you say, in zero-gravity conditions, the bullet could fly endlessly, as it weights zero. The problem is, the shooter also weights zero. He would be propelled as fast and as far as the bullet , but in the opposite direction.
With a lasgun, you shoot energy beams, not bodies with mass, so, you don't have to create expanding forces between masses. So, there is no recoil and you wont be reverse shooted!

Cheers!
Roberkhan

[Oots]

He would be propelled as fast and as far as the bullet , but in the opposite direction.

Not as fast, but with equal momentum (= mass x velocity).

[RBLFunk]

RBLFunk, I'm afraid the Fallujah example is being taken too far.

It's your scenario, you're free to move the goalposts.

In total war, there is the need of urgently filling the gaps in the front. Filling it with Royal Marines proxies (Stormtroopers) is not possible, as it takes too much time.

I do not agree that Royal Marines are equivalent to Storm Troopers. Royal Marines are quality combat troops, but they are not special forces. Storm Troopers are the equivalent of special forces.
Royal Marines would be the equivalent of an elite regiment of Guardsmen, like Cadians. SAS would be the equivalent of an elite unit, like Kasrkins or Storm Troopers.

Moreover, modern first world soldiers are not so easy to "produce". In fact, only the biggest powers in our world can do this: USA, China, Russia and Europe to an extent... most of the countries out there still relly on Cold War era armies or worst.

Modern, first world soldiers would, by definition, only be produced by modernised 'first world' countries, whatever they are exactly. Most countries have no problem producing well trained well equipped soldiers. Most countries can't do so in huge numbers.

My point was that a modern elite unit (a company of RM, to constrain variables a bit) would not be as good as it's rough imperial (from the Imperium, not from the Empire as in "imperial meassure system" ) equivalent (a company of Cadians) in fighting an Ork horde in an enclosed enviroment.

I've explained in detail why I think they would perform just as well, if not better.

- Lasgun fire is more accurate. It's not affected by wind, recoil or gravity and, by definition, every shot is a tracer shot (that´s not so good sometimes ).

The differences in accuracy should be negligible at actual combat distances, and at least compensated for by the SA80's increased rate of fire. With a quality rifle, the difficulty in hitting a target at longer ranges is a function of the precision of your optics and the technique of the shooter more than anything else.
I don't know if it's ever addressed in-universe but a lasgun would also have atmospheric attenuation to deal with at longer ranges. In short, it wouldn't hit as hard at long range.

- Lasgun fire lasts longer. Semiautomatic fire, bigger magazine (battery) capacity (acording to Inquisitor, could search stats if you need me to) and, probably, lighter batteries (more batteries per soldier). We can assume no supply lines for the units or equivalent supply lines for both. It´s the same.

Lasgun fire would also be correspondingly less effective. 8 guys with 5.56x45mm assault rifles will out-shoot 11 guys with 7.62x51mm battle rifles, even though the 11 guys have far more powerful guns shot for shot. I don't know what a typical lasgun powerpack weighs in-universe, but more shots for the same weight of ammunition is a definite advantage. Shooting slower is a disadvantage.

- Lasgun fire is semiautomatic, so the potential fire output of each Guard is less than that of each Marine. However, Marines are not expected to fire on full auto except as last resource, so things are even here, too.

What makes you say that? Did you make it up?
SA80 has two fire modes, semiauto and automatic. Royal Marines routinely fire in bursts on automatic mode, as I understand most/all British military are trained to do. You can see them doing so in this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=snG8kBGOEzY
They are all quite good at firing three round bursts with their weapon set to automatic.

However, having extra bodies to loose before loosing combat effectivity could be a good idea in an "all or nothing" scenario like this orkish one. Even more, more guns per squad mean more chances of downing the green brutes in high numbers, the kind of numbers you need to stop green tides.

I would have assumed an even numbered comparison. I.e. 8 squads of 10 Guardsmen compared to 10 squads of 8 Royal Marines, or what have you.

This brings us back to the gun's capability for killing Orks. Obviously, lasguns and autoguns can and do kill Orks. The problem is, can they kill them fast enough to break the assault?

I thought this had already been addressed adequately, the answer being yes.

Moreover, Imperial support weapons are, by far, more effective against insensible green monsters than british ones

I would not make that assumption.

(Heavy bolter vs. any 5.56 o 7.62 machine gun). Plasma guns or meltaguns are also way more interesting than machine guns against 'eavy armoured nobz or Meganobz.

A heavy bolter is more comparable to a 12.7x99mm heavy machinegun or a 40x53mm automatic grenade launcher, which the British army uses. They also have mortars, LAW80s, MBT LAWs, FGM-148 Javelins, 40mm auxiliary grenade launchers, amongst other bits and pieces. I'd feel much more comfortable with an 84mm anti-tank missile launcher in my squad than a plasma or meltagun, since it means we don't have to get within a suicidal range to use it.

- Balls. Guards have a good chance of fighting longer even if they start to loose. Indoctrination, the Emperor protects, crusader ideology, preachers, confessors, knowing and hating your green enemy and the always vigilant Comissar make of every guardsman a potential japanese banzai soldier. That doesn't win battles against automatic fire, but makes them last longer. Until the next regiment can join in.

Quality training > fanaticism.

Imperial regiments are endless. British ones are not.

Again, I have assumed a soldier-for-soldier comparison. There's no point in discussing The Imperium Of Man vs. The UK.

Lastly, as I should work or something: physics lesson by a historian who doesn't know **** about physics (if there is a true physicist in the forum, please, don't yet die from lough-stroke and correct me in a not excesively insulting manner, please):
When you shoot a gun, you create a force between two bodies (the explosion between the bullet and the combination of case, gun and shooter).

There are several moveable bodies in play, but primarily the bullet, the gun's bolt, the gun, and the shooter.

As you say, in zero-gravity conditions, the bullet could fly endlessly, as it weights zero.

It's not because it weighs nothing, it's because it is put in motion and there is no force of gravity or friction to stop it.

The problem is, the shooter also weights zero.

In conditions of weightlessness the shooter is weightless, but he still retains all of his mass. Mass provides resistance to forces acting upon it.

He would be propelled as fast and as far as the bullet , but in the opposite direction.

That's not how it works.
When you shoot a 5.56x45mm assault rifle, the bullet goes out one end carrying about 1700 joules of kinetic energy, and at the other end of the gun the shooter gets hit in the shoulder with about 6.4 joules of recoil. The energy imparted to the shooter is much less than that imparted to the bullet.
In the example of fighting in low or no gravity environments, if you don't have any ability to manoeuvre (change the direction you happen to be floating in) you're screwed regardless of whether or not your gun is going to nudge you.

[tsz52]

Roberkhan: Few points about your last post. Obviously it's futile trying to properly nail any of this down definitively (too much contradiction and official stuff written by folks who don't know beans about physics, weapons or tactics) but just for the craic....

Folks have already explained momentum and the inertial properties of mass to you. As a fellow lover of wholesome spacey stuff, I've found few things more useful than getting weight and mass straight in my head, and schooling myself to use the terms correctly (plus the basic Newtonian stuff re motion; pays off big time!).

I've already mentioned the bit in Annihilation Squad re weight of fire trumping hit placement vs orks; re autogun vs lasgun. I'll type out the paragraph (from the novel) later if anyone's fussed.

More or less, for brutal close-in firefights where supply and maintenance aren't problems the SA80 wins - but it's the lasgun that wins you the endless total war.

Your GPMG is the 40k Heavy Stubber - as mentioned by RBLFunk, the Heavy Bolter's the next step up.

Fluff varies but ideally you don't want your lasers to be tracers - you want their energy hitting the target not going out in all directions so you can see them. The beam should be invisible - I tend to put the ruby beams down to there being a lot of dust etc in the air in battle.

For the infantryman who survives long enough 'for the weapon to become part of him', then the lasgun is superior - as you say - when fighting in lots of different environments; the beam goes more or less where you point it regardless (though atmospheric effects can cause some problems), where bullets are more affected by gravity and wind variations etc. Also massive benefits in not having to lead the target.

Your main advantage to your lasgun is in vacuum or where other extreme temperatures are concerned (assuming that dumping waste heat cancels for both weapon types).

The lasgun should be pretty solid-state with few moving parts. The autogun has more moving parts which must all function perfectly with a violent chemical/mechanical process going on. Main problems are lubricants boiling off, vacuum-welding, and structural failure due to the immense temperature variations found where there's no atmosphere to even things out (assuming you're about Earth distance from your local star).

Just a few things to ponder if you like.

[agurus1]

wouldn't a weapon firing bullets fail to shoot in a zero oxygen environment? I don't know I'm just spit balling here.

as for massed guard tactics, perhaps one reason is communications and discipline. if you read Gaunt's Ghosts, the vox is constantly going on the fritz, especially when ordinance is landing or being fired close by. Keeping guardsmen together in the open environments that massed formations (and therefore massed artillery is likely being used) would make sense from a pure command and control and organizational point of view.

think about it though, where else do you see guard using mass wave tactics outside of going over the top in trench warfare (including sieges)? Everywhere else they are either city fighting or in small skirmishes. I haven't heard of anything talking about guard advancing over open terrain in parade formation outside of Creed and the 8th's assault on those traitor leviathans. Even so he did have sentinel, armoured, and titan support in his advance, and it was a special scenario where they actually WERE on a parade ground essentially and had little option other than to advance or die.

[tsz52]

wouldn't a weapon firing bullets fail to shoot in a zero oxygen environment? I don't know I'm just spit balling here.

It's pretty much all conjecture really but the IoM's pretty big on its core weapons systems being fairly 'go anywhere', so I'd imagine that there's an oxidiser in the propellant mix. Maybe the cases are filled in a low-atmosphere environment, or the air in there might cause pressure problems if taken into 'vacuum'... dunno.

I'd also assume that whatever system is used to delay the blowback is pretty self contained so variations upon the air-resistance/pressure in the barrel before the bullet don't mess up autoguns' cycling. Can't see them using different springs and whatnot for different environments or ammo types.

Shrug....

[RBLFunk]

Firearm propellants contain an oxidiser that provides them with the oxygen they need to combust, which is why firearms can work (with varying degrees of success) underwater.

[fluffstalker]

Actually didn't know that Mr. Funk. Science lesson imbedded in this thread ..lol.

@Agurus1, I see what your saying about the parade ground. But I'm guessing that had it been a modern style attack, the infantry would have been deployed further back, and used the tanks and chimeras for cover, only dismounting and boarding the Leviathans when they are so close they can't get hosed down by defensive weaponry.

On a separate note, since we have been covering armaments. Do you think that psychologically, the religious fervor and fanatical rhetoric of the Imperium has something to do with their formations and battle tactics? In modern conflict, most troops have the training and determination to fight with or without their squads, in loose or tight groups. Easy access to radio contact makes this easier. But then again, they are fighting human beings, not things which are so alien they boggle the imagination. Would a charge of roaring daemons cause the average modern soldier to run if they weren't glued to their comrades in ranks? Obviously this depends on the psychology of individual men or women, but in general, would the training take over and allow them to function as normal in squads?

[agurus1]

Well I figured that since the 8th wasn't prepared for conflict there was not time to requisition chimeras to carry the entire regiment. It was either get caught in the open parade/landing field or advance and charge for the glory of the Immortal Emperor of Man! Remember that the traitor leviathans were at first busy taking out the former Castellan of Cadia, and one assumes that the loyalist titans succeeded in dismantling most of the defensive weaponry. Even so we know that many men died in that charge.

The story is poignant because Creed won despite his tactically inferior position. An infantry charge was his only option, and we know from his background that Creed openly criticizes such tactics so we can assume it was a last resort. That and the fact that he carried the day speaks volumes to us on how he could motivate his men to persevere in the face of nigh on insurmountable odds. In a situation like that, I can see the group-think of having all the men advancing in ranks under their banners to be the best possible motivational factor. Creed couldn't go about telling the that titans were on the way, ect, ext. he had to whip them into a cohesive offensive unit immediately.

As far as the religious fervor argument goes in the Iran Iraq war, Iranian human wave tactics were costly but proved effective, the only lost because of their lack of air superiority.

But I'll point this out again, human wave tactics and napoleonic firing lines are something I have personally only encountered rarely in the fluff outside of artwork which has been pointed out to be most likely imperial propaganda lol. Mostly we see the guard acting on a platoon level and with a great deal of respect for cover and conventional infantry tactics. Of you can find more sources than the Cadian 8th's leviathan charge, or trench warfare we might have something to talk about, but as it stands I don't see the human wave being used extensively except by inept commanders.

[Polaria]

Maybe its because of psykers.

Every Imperial commander is foremost trained to fight against mutants, heretics, eldars, orks... You know, stuff that has powerfull sorcery and weirdboys and all sorts of wicked crap that can melt your brain. Now the only protection against the psykers are:
- Your own psykers can block enemy psykers... but they have limited range
- Your priests can supposedly save your soul even if you mind gets fired... but can't be everywhere
- Your comissars can at least kill you and save you friends if you get eldarmindshagged... but can't be everywhere

So what is the best way to secure you body, soul and mind against Emperor knows what wile sorcery? Yep, clump as close to your own command squads, priests and comissars as possible. Besides, with so many OTHERS around maybe the filthy xeno will pick the OTHER guy to eldarmindshag and spare you...
-

[Easy E]

You forgot one.

Your own buddies could frag you, and save your soul from tarnish.

[Firaxin]

Real word physics and logic are only ever applied to the Imperial Guard in 40k. This has been joked about many times over the ages in the IG tactics threads. Someone on here even has it as their signature, I think.
*sigh*
I will end this.

The reason that soldiers from the 1600-1800 period clumped together and fired in unison is to enforce battlefield discipline...

What makes you think that isn't the reason the Imperial Guard do it?

Whoever tries to compare Imperial Guard to modern infantry one v one, squad v squad, company v company, regiment v regiment, or army v army is a *****. (no offense, not trying to flame).

Let's take your Royal Marines. Nay, let's take the combined might of Her Majesty's Armed Forces. All ~400,000 of them. They are defending their home from an invasion of inconsolable foes that will not bargain or reason with them, giving them an incalculable morale boost. They are on their home turf, they know the lay of the land, logistics are not stretched but at their best.

Now, 'realistically' this isn't a far cry from your average 40k invasion. Most worlds seem to have all the vital things worth guarding clustered within an area the size of Belgium (or the UK in this case). Excluding of course the key to victory which is located somewhere entirely else for the sake of plot. Here, that's Northern Ireland (but there's no deus ex machina waiting there for the Brits). Consequently, as far as the royal defenders of the crown are concerned, the rest of the world but their island may as well be one endless ocean.

So the Brits are ready, their defenses prepared. A storm cloud gathers overhead... Long before any actual fighting begins, key officers, political figures, media icons, and those just plain unlucky enough to get in the way are butchered by assassins literally invisible to any current sensors or the human eye. The only warning of these lethal lictors are dogs barking after a directionless pheromone trail. Guard dogs are quickly stationed everywhere of importance as an early warning system, attached to even individual trooper squads. But the damage is already done.

Around the same time, the clouds break overhead. Soldiers squirm, fidget, and scream as any exposed inch of skin is slowly dissolved over a period of hours by toxins in the air. Their lungs hemorrhage and collapse over a period of days. NBC suits are quickly issued and worn, but it is largely too late for those already infected or affected. No cure can be found against the rapidly mutating phage cells... at least not in time. Simultaneously, corrosive acids rapidly eat through aircraft and armored vehicles alike--the roofs of hangars not prepared to stand up against anything more than rain. Only vehicles housed in hardened underground hangars are safe. But the general infrastructure above them lies in ruins, everything from roads and telephone lines to shallowly buried waste pipes.

That's the first week. For the sake of argument, we'll pretend only 10% of the British soldiers, armored pieces, and vehicles are taken out of commission before countermeasures are employed. The material loss isn't the important thing, it's the blow to morale. How would the average soldier feel after being told that he can't call in air support because of inclement weather, after watching some of his friends die in agony with their flesh sloughing off before a shot is even fired, knowing that there weren't nearly enough NBC suits to go around so his civilian family members and friends are more likely dead than alive, and with public works out of commission, no way of checking for sure?

No, of course he's not going to run away. Where would he even run to? That's not the meaning of discipline; desertion or breaking and running are merely the worst-case-scenario possibilities.

Finally, a chance to go face to face with the enemy. Huge cloud banks roll in from the sea, blotting out the sky and the light. But this is no cloud--this a million (literally) gargoyles attacking but 1 of Britain's defense posts. Shoot up and you can't miss... but at the same time viscous living maggots fall from the sky like rain, too numerous to take cover from outside. They splat into body armor and flak vest alike, before wriggling their way under each soldier's uniform to the weak point around the armpits and burrowing through the flesh and painfully thrashing and chewing their way to the target's nervous system--resulting in paralyzation and more commonly, death. Individual gargoyles swoop low and fast into the garrison, beheading troopers with their scything tails faster than a body can pivot and track them, or belching bio-plasma from their mouths that chews through the side of an IFV's roof in seconds.

As ever, the Brits adapt quickly with redeployed forces, submunition-equipped SAMs, air-bursting rockets and mortars. Even though the garrison suffers crippling casualties, the million gargoyles are killed in a day. A kill ratio more than worthy of such a well-trained and equipped military.

But the Brits can't cheer for long, because they haven't really repelled the first wave. Mere hours after the first, another million gargoyles attack an installation further north up the cost. Hours after that another million attacks still farther south down the coast. For days this goes on. Days that turn into weeks. The Gargoyles were never meant to take and hold anything. They're merely a scouting force, feeding precious tactical data to the Hive Mind before their meaningless lives are cut short, testing England's defenses.

The men can barely sleep with the Hive Mind so close; a constant buzzing disrupts their dreams, and a pressure builds between their eyes into a migraine during the day. In the night, bunkers spotted out by the gargoyles are penetrated by 4 and 5-meter long Raveners burrowing up from underground, twisting writhing serpents whose thoraxes burst open like a frag grenade in the enclosed close quarters, their six bladed limbs a blur as they scythe through flesh and body armor alike.

Skittering hordes of gaunts equal in number to the gargoyles begin their own assaults. Here the individual soldier's attention begins to waver. With the battlenet a constant drone of barked orders and frantic questions, does he shoot at the inexorably approaching gaunts down the hill, or at the gargoyles who just lifted his squad sergeant into the air kicking and screaming?

By the end of the first month, fixed positions become mandatory as they only safeguard against those flying monsters and the still-toxic atmosphere; the bunkers ravener-proofed with seismographs and buried mines. Making yourself like a rock is the only way to withstand such endless numbers. The "home turf" advantage is meaningless now, as the accelerated growth of local flora changes the landscape into something unrecognizable, blocks lines of sight & fire, and shields heat signatures. The enemy has complete air-superiority by now. Even with careful limitations on the duration Britain's fighters and bombers are aloft and constant maintenance, the planes are brought down by gargoyles sucked into their engines' intake valves, or by massive Harridans and Harpies the size of planes but not warm enough to lock onto with heat seekers before they burst forth from the fog rippling off the jungles below into the cold northern air and grapple each plane to the ground.

And then the real assaults begin, led by 3-meter tall Warriors and floating brain-bags that carve through tanks with War of the Worlds-style death rays. Spores fall in an endless barrage of artillery, making even a mad dash from one bunker to the next unconnected by underground tunnels a near-suicidal proposition. The average foe at this stage has carapace too thick to be penetrated by LA80s while their heads have three sets of compound eyes and accompanying antennae to root out royal marines hidden or lying in wait.

Falling back is necessary. Shrink the vulnerable supply lines, concentrate the defenses in the capital. Few are left now. Only the most bad-ass emotionally bereft sociopathic trained killers survive. Every soldier left replaces their automatic rifles for automatic grenade launchers. There is no longer any point in saving equipment for 'specialists' and no expense is spared.

Challenger tanks defend every street with withering fire from behind hastily erected sandbag and steel berms. AA guns crown every roof, keeping gargoyles out of the hair of the soldiers below. Blind-firing artillery create a virtual wall of death around the city's perimeter to prevent the gaunts and warriors, and other gribblies from getting in. Bridges are blown and buildings strategically sapped and collapsed to form critical choke points. Mines, C4, and trip-wires are laid in abundance.

NOW.

YOU are next to a Challenger defending one of the city's intersections. Things seem to be going well according to the 'net. You're keeping the little ones bottled at the far end of the street.

But then everything changes in a thunderous clap that leaves you shell-shocked, disoriented, and deaf. A spore pod larger than any you've seen yet has landed on the Challenger, crushing it flat into the pavement... and rising up out of the spore's leathery exterior is a titanic monster the size of a small building. Instinctively, you fire a 40mm grenade round into its chest, with absolutely no effect.

Now what? You're on the opposite side of the thing from your squad mates. Behind you the gaunts and warriors are bounding up the alley unchecked. What do you do as it leans towards you? If you're creative enough, you might think to try shooting a round into its gaping mouth as it opens to swallow you whole. If you have the hand-eye coordination, you might try shooting the joint of the arm scything toward you and bisecting it. You could try rolling between its legs and dashing for your friends. You could retreat into the storefront next to you and climb to a higher level, where you might have a better vantage point.

No matter what you choose, you're dead. You were dead no matter what from the beginning. Its long reach and surprising agility allow it to carve through you or crush you in a fraction of a second. But how did you die? Did you get a last shot off? Did it count? Probably not. You could've, but you didn't. You failed to make your death meaningful.

That is the breakdown in discipline. That's what sells your life short when you could have been worth more.

TL;DR -- Guardsmen don't stand in lines because they'll be better able to withstand a charge, have better accuracy, or be less likely to flee (even though forming lights might have some of those effects). Fleeing isn't even a choice, there's a commissar right behind them. They stand in lines because of the perceived safety in numbers. Lasers might be dead accurate, they may fire on full ammo, and each clip might house 300 shots, but that isn't worth a damn if you're separated and alone and your hands are shaking too hard to even drink from your canteen. Discipline is mainly about making the right decision and satisfactorily executing it in the fraction of a second you have available, and doing it without thinking about it.

When you're standing in a line and you can see your friends around and infront of you, and you can see where they're shooting and what they're doing and what they're concentrating fire on, you're more likely to follow suit than waste a second thinking about it. You're all benefiting from a sort of behavioral gestalt. Can you honestly tell me that you'd be more calm and methodical crouching behind a rock with none of your squad mates within eye shot as an immortal ethereal daemon, some indestructible Necron, innumerable 3-meter tall Orks with blood-stained cleavers, some alien with a thousand years more combat experience than you and magic armor, or worse is leaping at you from only 10 feet away and gaining?

The Imperium doesn't care about protecting individual soldiers, all it cares is that they don't. Stop. Firing. Before they die against an enemy they could never beat without plot armor in the first place. Protect that temple to your last breath, don't split up and fall back and let it be defiled. Don't retreat into the hills, stay and protect the Planetary Governor, whose life is more valuable than your whole regiment's and who is too arrogant to relocate himself. Etc.


And now because that was longer than I expected, I will sleep.

[TheDoctor]

Firaxin, if I could put that entire story in my sig, I would

[Roberkhan]

Hi, people, this is getting increasingly interesting. I'm in a hurry now, but I promise a proper answer during this weekend. The Fallujah incident is not yet cleared, although I've learnt some valuable ideas.

Firaxin, I really liked your point and the story supporting it, except the part in which you call me a *****. You ***** (no offense).

Cheers!
Roberkhan