Warhammer 30k Great Crusade vs Cyberpunk 2077’s Earth

[Tiresia]

A massive great crusade expeditionary force consisting of ten thousand astartes, a handful of mechanicum taghmata, specialists from the ordo reductor, a few hundred thousand skitarii forces, legio cybernetica, two knight houses worth of knights, a few dozen custodes, a kill-clade or two of imperial assassins, and dozens of full-strength regiments of solar Auxilia and imperial guard, all warp transit into what looks eerily similar, and yet very much different to, the Sol System.

They enter the orbit of this fake Terra and a vanguard force begins making planetfall in the desert outside Night City, with orders to invade and seize the city. The crusade's Archmagos, in typical Mechanicum fashion, studies the local equivalent of the noosphere, and comes the the conclusion that everyone on this entire planet is some sort of heretek, possibly in thrall to some Silica Animus, and that for the sake of these poor wretches' immortal souls his own magpie-like greed for technology, the mechanicum needed to loot forcibly seize as much of this tech-heresy as they can conceivably get their greasy mitts on. Meanwhile, the imperial commanders of the expeditionary force are under orders to conquer the planet while keeping as much infrastructure intact for later use by the imperium, so they can't just rely on orbital bombardment.

In response to this invasion by these weird space-fascists, the megacorps, gangs, law enforcement teams like MaxTac, mercs, nomads, netrunners and edge-runners the world over, for the first time in history, actually agree on something, namely: "yeah, these imperium/mechanicus guys are not good for our continued survival/profitability/independence, and something really needs to be done". Not that all these factions they actually start automatically working side by side as allies against a common foe, but at the very least putting their own conflicts on hold to deal with the invasion, maybe share intelligence about their mutual enemy.

What happens from here? Can the world of Cyberpunk 2077 repel the invasion?

For the purpose of this scenario, let's assume that stuff from the Cyberpunk TTRPG is also canon, even if it does not actually appear in the video game. And let us also assume that the imperium doesn't just bribe their enemies into siding with them, as that more or less defeats the point of the versus scenario.

 

[Tiresia]

Thinking about the matchup, I think one of the big variables is going to be exactly the degree to which cyberpunk hacking can affect machine-spirits or cybernetica battle-automatons, and how difficult it is to do so. I don't know how well a decent net runner would fare trying to hack the machine spirit of an warlord's titan, but the prospect of some dude hiding in the slums being able to, say, cause a warlord's gun to fire on their own allies, or cause their reactor to go critical, is probably the kind of thing that would give most Titan princeps nightmares.

Now, when it comes to a contest of "whose side has the biggest gun", that I think goes to the imperium, because Titan-scale weapons are kinda nuts, however, cyberpunk definitely has weapons that pack enough punch to take out knights or warhounds, and while I don't know if they have titan-scale weapons, it wouldn't surprise me if there's a weapon or vehicle in the cyberpunk universe that could damage a warlord.

And on an infantry scale, cyberpunk outclasses most of the imperium's forces in sheer killing power, given that even random criminals frequently possess fairly heavy ordinance, smart weapons, and cyberware. and forces like MaxTac have access to smart railguns, micro micro-missile launchers and in some cases Sandivistan, in addition to various other miscellaneous cybernetics. And those guys are basically the equivalent of SWAT teams. Really, trying to conquer a place like night city would be a nightmare because of how everyone and their mom is armed and, and full of the sorts of desperate, violent people would happily pick a fight with god for a single corn chip, a few eddies and bragging rights.
A heavily borged out cyberpsycho is basically a less trained/skilled, discount Eversor, except they compensate for lack of bullshit assassin training with cybernetics, sandevistan, etc, that makes them tougher, better armored, and I think might be as fast if not faster than an eversor. And there are way more cyberpsychos than there are eversors.

As far as how imperial troops will fare, Imperial Army will basically be reliant on vehicle and artillery support to actually survive, and even then will take heavy losses, but honestly that is sort of par for the course with Imperial Army. Artillery and tanks are definitely something of an equalizer, as it's one of the things most of the irregular forces like gangers and edgerunners probably don't have access to, but I'm not sure how well imperial army tanks will fare against the heavier weapons such forces in cyberpunk have.

Solar Auxilia will fare slightly better, given their heavier armor, and the elite Solar Auxilia with volkite weapons will likely do fairly well killing more lightly armored enemies, but while they are perfectly capable of killing their enemy, their strength own ability to not be be killed by their foes isn't necessarily going to be sufficient. Solar Auxilia armor is good, but it's not "survive direct hit from extremely high caliber armor piercing rounds and micro-missiles" good. And the Auxilia are a fairly static force. They are known for fighting in formation, using tactics that almost resemble early modern pike and shot warfare, and holding the line. Most of the more elite forces in cyberpunk in comparison can bounce around the battlefield like a pinball on crack.

Idk how skitarii, mechanicum or Astartes forces will do, although I think it's fair to assume they'll do better than imperial army. I don't know enough about the actual military forces of cyberpunk to say how the they'll match up against Astartes or skitarii.

and I cannot emphasize enough how much of an advantage the smart and guided weapons are. Like Tau marker-light shenanigans are a mainstay of the Tau for a reason, and Cyberpunk has its own equivalents to them.

 

[Dlan the Wizard]

What happens from here? Can the world of Cyberpunk 2077 repel the invasion?

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No. Imperium advantage here is ridiculous. With how much stuff you given this expeditionary force, you might had as well given them Emperor himself. A small legion worth of Astartes? Two, whole Knight houses, fucking assassins and dozens of regiments? A few dozen Custodes?! Emperor himself would have commanded such force during the Crusade, at least a few Primarchs would have been presented for such force to be formed in the first place if Emperor isn't around.

If it was average expeditionary force, with only normal Humans, then I can see united Cyberpunk Earth defending themselves with heavy casualties due to Imperium having "no orbital bombardment" rule. But with the setup you presented? This is a stomp, there's no way for such serious force of a interstellar polity, full of warmachines, full of giant very powerful warmachines, super-soldiers, fucking assassins and fully prepared and well-equipped baseline soldiers, to be incapable of conquering a single solar system of a civilization that barely has anything outside of a single planet.

 

[Xealeon]

Thinking about the matchup, I think one of the big variables is going to be exactly the degree to which cyberpunk hacking can affect machine-spirits or cybernetica battle-automatons, and how difficult it is to do so. I don't know how well a decent net runner would fare trying to hack the machine spirit of an warlord's titan, but the prospect of some dude hiding in the slums being able to, say, cause a warlord's gun to fire on their own allies, or cause their reactor to go critical, is probably the kind of thing that would give most Titan princeps nightmares.

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I have doubts that the systems are at all compatible, as in; I don't know if a Cyberpunk hacker's software could even attempt communication with a 30k cogitator or vice-versa. Systems in Cyberpunk are designed to interact with each other so even if they're different they have protocols to communicate with one another and systems in 30k, due to the intervening 28k years of history, have wildly different protocols. They don't even share a common language from which to form a base; Gothic and Lingua Technica are so far removed from modern languages that it would be like trying to talk with someone from the Indus Valley c. 3300BCE.

Also as a note I don't actually see a Titan Legion/Maniple/Etc. in the OOB for the expeditionary force if you meant to include one.

 

[Ford Prefect]

there's no way for such serious force of a interstellar polity, full of warmachines, full of giant very powerful warmachines, super-soldiers, fucking assassins and fully prepared and well-equipped baseline soldiers, to be incapable of conquering a single solar system of a civilization that barely has anything outside of a single planet.

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This is only true if they have limitless resupply, and they don't. They've got this force, which they have to use to capture an entire planet. That's actually pretty hard, even before accounting for the fact that the planet they're invading has piles of cyberpunk nightmare cities where even the street gangs are full of bulletproof Agent Smith bullet dodgers who can carry pistols more powerful than Tau rail rifles.

We can easily spin this around: it's just not possible for a backwards army whose main arm of decision is just guys in flak vests with rifles to beat a setting that is overflowing with highly advanced combat technology, powerful cybernetics, proliferate robot weapons, and an established global logistics systems. Cyberpunk 2077 is full of warmachines, super-soldiers, cyber-ninjas while the concept of the baseline soldier no longer exists, and they dramatically outnumber the invaders.

 

[Xealeon]

This is only true if they have limitless resupply, and they don't.

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It doesn't say they're separated from the wider Imperium just that they have to use this force to win the battle, presumably they're still getting supply shipments as normal for a crusade fleet operating alone.

We can easily spin this around: it's just not possible for a backwards army whose main arm of decision is just guys in flak vests with rifles to beat a setting that is overflowing with highly advanced combat technology, powerful cybernetics, proliferate robot weapons, and an established global logistics systems. Cyberpunk 2077 is full of warmachines, super-soldiers, cyber-ninjas while the concept of the baseline soldier no longer exists, and they dramatically outnumber the invaders.

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Backwards as they definitely are they have an important thing that the Cyberpunk side lacks; cohesion. The defenders aren't fighting each other but they also aren't working together as a unified force per OP.

So, for example, a regular patrol of NCPD officers definitely has better ability to communicate and coordinate with other units and their superiors than even the most comms-focused Astartes unit and nothing on the 30k side is as tactically proficient as the more militant Cyberpunk units but what they don't have is a unified command structure to turn them and the Corpos and the gangs and the runners into an actual army and they're at very high risk of defeat in detail.

 

[Ford Prefect]

It doesn't say they're separated from the wider Imperium just that they have to use this force to win the battle, presumably they're still getting supply shipments as normal for a crusade fleet operating alone.

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I was imprecise there, what I meant is that it's not really the full might of a galactic empire being brought to bare on a single planet.

Backwards as they definitely are they have an important thing that the Cyberpunk side lacks; cohesion. The defenders aren't fighting each other but they also aren't working together as a unified force per OP.

So, for example, a regular patrol of NCPD officers definitely has better ability to communicate and coordinate with other units and their superiors than even the most comms-focused Astartes unit and nothing on the 30k side is as tactically proficient as the more militant Cyberpunk units but what they don't have is a unified command structure to turn them and the Corpos and the gangs and the runners into an actual army and they're at very high risk of defeat in detail.

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While they're not unified unless they're working at cross-purposes I'm not sure it will matter too much. Arasaka and Militech are both big enough to basically hold a globe spanning war together, and each is very closely associated with a state government (Japan and the NUSA) while exerting a lot of influence elsewhere. The Eurotheatre is also hefty, while looking at the Unification War it was possible for the Free States to get enough cooperation going to resist the NUSA, so I think they at least are primed to work together. There's enough large scale organised resistance that I think that the need to spread crusade forces globally will be pretty significant, because once they're down it's much harder for them to go back up.

I mention the cities less because the irregular forces there can be marshalled and more because even if you can defeat the EEC/NUSA/USSR/Japan etc in open combat, this is essentially the COIN op to end all COIN ops. Every time the crusade sends any sort of unit into most cities they are going to experience attrition. It's essentially hostile terrain that they will not be able to move through safely, which will advantage the organised defenders, who can arrange the forces they do control (such as the local MAXTAC unit, at the city level) to protect key infrastructure like power plants, ports, orbital launch facilities, etc.

The lack of unified command and control makes this possible for the crusade (especially if they maintain their own command aboard one of the space vessels they came on), but like a lot of cyberpunk settings it's just a really hard target. Not quite as bad as invading Rifts, but in the ballpark.

 

[alexthealright]

What happens from here? Can the world of Cyberpunk 2077 repel the invasion?

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Unless we're using those stupid "space marines can catch bullets" calculations some people trot out every once in a while I think we can agree that the expensive, high-augmentation cyberpunk people are, at least individually, about as powerful a space marine. Like, to make a comparison…


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YRL74JmhVgk


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JcZ2O4MDkn0

I think we can agree that that's a pretty close showing, maybe favoring the marine if you don't take the crazy super speed thing into account.

They're both casually tanking gunfire and meat blending through normal humans. I am pretty sure the implication of cyberpunk is that mister cyberpsycho got all his augmentations just by being in the army, and I'm pretty sure there are more than ten thousand soldiers in the army. And the mega corps/cyberpunks are going to massively increase that number. Though admittedly they're not all going to be at that level.

And, numbers wise, I think the entire planet can pull together enough superhuman killers (who, admittedly, just might maybe go crazy after a few years but hush) to deal with… well I'm not actually sure how many you're tallying about since I'm pretty sure you meant something a bit bigger when you were talking about the imperial guard. But still, this force might well kill a whole lot of people, but they'd need to break out the orbital bombardment to win.

 

[Xealeon]

While they're not unified unless they're working at cross-purposes I'm not sure it will matter too much. Arasaka and Militech are both big enough to basically hold a globe spanning war together, and each is very closely associated with a state government (Japan and the NUSA) while exerting a lot of influence elsewhere. The Eurotheatre is also hefty, while looking at the Unification War it was possible for the Free States to get enough cooperation going to resist the NUSA, so I think they at least are primed to work together. There's enough large scale organised resistance that I think that the need to spread crusade forces globally will be pretty significant, because once they're down it's much harder for them to go back up.

I mention the cities less because the irregular forces there can be marshalled and more because even if you can defeat the EEC/NUSA/USSR/Japan etc in open combat, this is essentially the COIN op to end all COIN ops. Every time the crusade sends any sort of unit into most cities they are going to experience attrition. It's essentially hostile terrain that they will not be able to move through safely, which will advantage the organised defenders, who can arrange the forces they do control (such as the local MAXTAC unit, at the city level) to protect key infrastructure like power plants, ports, orbital launch facilities, etc.

The lack of unified command and control makes this possible for the crusade (especially if they maintain their own command aboard one of the space vessels they came on), but like a lot of cyberpunk settings it's just a really hard target. Not quite as bad as invading Rifts, but in the ballpark.

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I'm not saying they can't put up a fight, I just don't think the advantages 2077 has in ground warfare are enough to counteract the strategic benefit of uncontested orbital control and centralized command. This is basically the exact kind of fight that the crusade fleets are built around; a world where power is highly concentrated in a number of disconnected urban centers. In fact, I would say it's a dream scenario for them given that not only do their opponents lack a fleet or orbital defenses they lack any kind of doctrinal response to orbital assault.

It doesn't matter that 2077 has the tools to hypothetically field an army against the 30k forces when the first notice they'll get that war is happening is when a very hostile marine chapter (or several given there are 10 chapters worth of Marines here) drops into downtown NC. And by the time they can determine who has the jurisdiction to launch a response, decided who gets to command that response, mustered the response, and sent it the Marines will have accomplished their short term objectives and handed control over to the Auxilia, Army, and Mechanicum while they return to orbit to rearm for the next drop. The Imperium is not at all shy about throwing army grunts or skitarii into attrition and there's 10 crusade fleets worth on hand.

I mean, afaik aside from specialist units like Trauma Team and MAXTAC transport in 2077 is still handled mostly by motor vehicle and train and I assume that holds true for any attempt to muster a significant military response. The Marines are not just completely airmobile but orbitally mobile. And how many of those assaults will it take for people to start saying "wait, if we send our guys over there then what if they do that again over here," which is where the lack of centralized command comes in; there's nobody who can say what objectives to concentrate around to try and fight the kind of decisive battle they could actually win.

On top of that there's the issue that Arasaka and Militech and whatnot are all going to be giving each other the side-eye this whole time because they're still not friends and what if they overcommit to this fight and end up too weak to deal with their competitors in the aftermath.

 

[Ford Prefect]

It doesn't matter that 2077 has the tools to hypothetically field an army against the 30k forces when the first notice they'll get that war is happening is when a very hostile marine chapter (or several given there are 10 chapters worth of Marines here) drops into downtown NC.

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Oh come on, they don't have a space fleet but they have satellites, surface to orbit radar, telescopes, etc. People literally live in orbit in C2077 with O'Neill cylinders at the Lagrange points and cities on the Moon. The idea that they'd get snuck up on by a bunch of highly visible space cathedrals is having it on a little. So is presenting Space Marines as uniquely orbitally mobile, which is both overselling drop pods and Thunderhawks as high tempo outside its own setting, and forgetting that the Cyberpunk setting has had SSTO spaceplanes and scramjet powered aircraft for fifty years at this point. They are just not going to get rings run around them by people who routinely get themselves bogged down as they do in 40k when a) so many of the factions have a high concentrations of force everywhere on the planet and b) their capacity to actually transport troops around is no worse in practice, anyway.

 

[Xealeon]

Oh come on, they don't have a space fleet but they have satellites, surface to orbit radar, telescopes, etc. People literally live in orbit in C2077 with O'Neill cylinders at the Lagrange points and cities on the Moon. The idea that they'd get snuck up on by a bunch of highly visible space cathedrals is having it on a little. So is presenting Space Marines as uniquely orbitally mobile, which is both overselling drop pods and Thunderhawks as high tempo outside its own setting, and forgetting that the Cyberpunk setting has had SSTO spaceplanes and scramjet powered aircraft for fifty years at this point. They are just not going to get rings run around them by people who routinely get themselves bogged down as they do in 40k when a) so many of the factions have a high concentrations of force everywhere on the planet and b) their capacity to actually transport troops around is no worse in practice, anyway.

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Fair enough, I was not aware of all the orbital stuff in 2077. I mean, I was aware there were satellites and such obviously and a lunar colony but not that they were quite so spacefaring.

 

[Ford Prefect]

Fair enough, I was not aware of all the orbital stuff in 2077. I mean, I was aware there were satellites and such obviously and a lunar colony but not that they were quite so spacefaring.

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The USAF started putting EVA troopers in powered armour on orbital battlestations back in one of the expansions for Cyberpunk 2013, but almost as extreme as the space colonies is that there was a mission to Jupiter that was doomed by the Arasaka blowing up Cape Canaveral back during the 4th Corporate War lol

Because it's not a space opera setting a lot of this is relatively realistic so not like it's going to fight off a Luna class cruiser or what have you. But it's not inconceivable for a team of Dragoons to get infiltrated onto a ship from a secret Militech moonbase ...

 

[Xealeon]

Because it's not a space opera setting a lot of this is relatively realistic so not like it's going to fight off a Luna class cruiser or what have you. But it's not inconceivable for a team of Dragoons to get infiltrated onto a ship from a secret Militech moonbase ...

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Wait that sounds rad as hell, damn I really need to pick up some of the Cyberpunk books.

 

[BiopunkOtrera]

Oh come on, they don't have a space fleet but they have satellites, surface to orbit radar, telescopes, etc. People literally live in orbit in C2077 with O'Neill cylinders at the Lagrange points and cities on the Moon. The idea that they'd get snuck up on by a bunch of highly visible space cathedrals is having it on a little. So is presenting Space Marines as uniquely orbitally mobile, which is both overselling drop pods and Thunderhawks as high tempo outside its own setting, and forgetting that the Cyberpunk setting has had SSTO spaceplanes and scramjet powered aircraft for fifty years at this point. They are just not going to get rings run around them by people who routinely get themselves bogged down as they do in 40k when a) so many of the factions have a high concentrations of force everywhere on the planet and b) their capacity to actually transport troops around is no worse in practice, anyway.

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Actually they do have a space fleet. According to the cyberpunk 2020 book on deep space there's like, more than a dozen large space battleships in service IIRC.

I don't think they could stand up to most imperial combat ships but they absolutely do exist.

 

[Zero Gravitas]

I think we can agree that that's a pretty close showing, maybe favoring the marine if you don't take the crazy super speed thing into account.

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I don't think we can agree with that. The Night City cyberpsycho and the MaxTac tanked small arms fire and shotguns.

On the other hand one Space Marine tanked a fairly massive vehicle mounted weapon, another just slammed through an admittedly janky sort of car without appreciably slowing down. There's enough feats to put a geared up Astartes comfortably ahead of anyone who isn't Adam Smasher (who'd still get clowned upon by Custodes).

SMs seems to have a fairly obvious advantage even if not a completely overwhelming one individually: add to that unity of command and training advantages and the balance is heavily Space Marine favoured.

So is presenting Space Marines as uniquely orbitally mobile,

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They'll be uniquely orbitally mobile because the IoM fleet will blow up Cyberpunk space assets and board the orbital structures in short order.

 

[alexthealright]

I don't think we can agree with that. The Night City cyberpsycho and the MaxTac tanked small arms fire and shotguns.

On the other hand one Space Marine tanked a fairly massive vehicle mounted weapon, another just slammed through an admittedly janky sort of car without appreciably slowing down.

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And the Cyberpsycho went into super speed so fast he basically stopped time for a few seconds. There's more nuance here than just each side's durability.

Additionally, those shields they were using against the tank aren't really standard issue gear for space marines, and the fact they used them at all implies they needed them for it.

 

[Ford Prefect]

James Norris is a particularly borged up guy and not wholly representative, but his dermal armour was able to resist multiple close range shots from Achilles rifles, with the MAXTAC operator who killed him getting point blank, which is way beyond just small arms. The Achilles is described in the database as being effective against armoured vehicles and its observed abilities would let it comfortably one shot a Space Marine.

It's hard to overstate how good the protection offered by skin mods and armoured clothing is in C2077. There's some aspects of this we shouldn't take the game seriously on (it's quite possible to have the Omaha pistol shoot through multiple spaced reinforced concrete structures with a total thickness of about 10,000mm and still remaining lethal, which is obviously ridiculous even for this game lmao) but tech weapons in general have eyewatering AP performance and guys who knock over convenience stores for a living can often take that shit to the chest and walk it off. People routinely walk around with pistols with at least antimateriel rifle performance and the Achilles, which could shoot a hole in God, is fairly common at the level of states.

A Maelstrom gangster with a Kerenzikov, a mod you can buy anywhere, and a Satara would be a match for a Space Marine in one on one combat. A NUSA tier one SOF type with Apogee neuralware, Neofiber, nanoplating, optical camouflage, vulnerability analytics and a smart rifle could weave through incoming fire, walk into shots and deflect them, full auto aimbotting weak points and simultaneously shooting grenades out of the air, all while being invisible. I worry about that guy's long term mental health, but those are capabilities that could see an individual wipe out a Space Marine squad, and that's not even the real high end in Cyberpunk.

It goes without saying that large scale wars are not really won by stuff like this. The fact that you can walk into what amounts to a corner store and walk out with the ability to you deflect automatic gunfire with the monomolecular katana you bought next door is much less important than cyber radios and drone MLRS trucks when it comes to warfare. But if you want to take a given city you are going to have to put boots on streets where that kind of thing is common, and the people who can do it are hostile to you.

 

[Tiresia]

Also, unlike the Mechanicum, organizations in Cyberpunk actually are willing to innovate when it comes to technology. If one of the corps got their hands on, say, a power sword or some plasma or volkite weapons (or even something fancier like the neutron cannon used by sicarian venators or graviton weapons) or something like a refractor field, they would absolutely 100% do everything in their power to reverse-engineer it for their own use if at all possible.

 

[CornyBones]

orbital defenses they lack any kind of doctrinal response to orbital assault.

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I think "Orbital Assault" is the key phrase here. An Imperium force this size has a massive advantage in this sort of shock and awe being very much the bread and butter at the core of the combat doctrine. Reading some of the commentary about how advanced 2077 is upgrades this conflict form the Magos going "kick over the sand castle colony please" to something more along the lines of "assault an Eldar Hive World"

There is a degree of warfare that is expected in 40k, that I think 2077 does not have the context or unified experience to recognize or fight at initially. Like countering the context of a orbital asteroid barrage requires both parties to recognize the tactic, and I think the Imperium would land some *really* devastating blows in its opening because everyone else on the planet expects to *live* there afterward.

I would say that, in the *context* of the prompt framing 2077 as a False Earth colony, it would be believable that both settings have some degree of technology overlap, which is *obviously* going to play to Imperium's disadvantage. But Elite Imperium *is used to* fighting opponents with a tech level beyond, or equal to them. Necrons, Eldar, Tau, all have weapons and technology that is superior to 2077 and I can see them pulling from a similar pool of doctrins for 2077

 

[Dlan the Wizard]

Like countering the context of a orbital asteroid barrage requires both parties to recognize the tactic, and I think the Imperium would land some *really* devastating blows in its opening because everyone else on the planet expects to *live* there afterward.

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Any orbital attacks that would cause serious damage to infrastructure and the planet were prohibited for this scenario.

his own magpie-like greed for technology, the mechanicum needed to loot forcibly seize as much of this tech-heresy as they can conceivably get their greasy mitts on. Meanwhile, the imperial commanders of the expeditionary force are under orders to conquer the planet while keeping as much infrastructure intact for later use by the imperium, so they can't just rely on orbital bombardment.

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I do agree that Expeditionary force can use orbital advantage and experience to achieve great victories at the beginning. Space Marines are perfect for ''goint for the head'' type of tactics and by orbital dropping fast enough in the initial stages of the conflict can cause multiple, brutal attacks to hurt Cyberpunk side. However, any orbital attacks that would make the planet uninhabitable is against the basic rules of this scenario.

 

[Ford Prefect]

Like countering the context of a orbital asteroid barrage requires both parties to recognize the tactic, and I think the Imperium would land some *really* devastating blows in its opening because everyone else on the planet expects to *live* there afterward.

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I mean ... the 4th Corporate involved nuclear exchanges and orbital weapon strikes, burning down cities and agriculture zones to such a degree that for two years the sky was red. It took twenty more years for the amount of particulates to drop for sunsets and sunrises to look normal.

They can go pretty hard.

 

[Tiresia]

I would say that, in the *context* of the prompt framing 2077 as a False Earth colony, it would be believable that both settings have some degree of technology overlap, which is *obviously* going to play to Imperium's disadvantage.

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I apologize if I worded things confusingly, but that wasn't actually what I meant when I wrote the prompt. I was sort of trying to imply that the expeditionary force accidentally translated out of the warp wrong, and ended up in the very real Sol System of the cyberpunk setting, and assumed this wasn't actually Terra, just a False Earth, because that made more sense to them than the possibility they somehow ended up in another universe, on top of the fact that the Sol System in 40k looks different than the one in Cyberpunk due to the much longer period of resource harvesting, orbital infrastructure, human habitation beyond earth.

 

[Zero Gravitas]

And the Cyberpsycho went into super speed so fast he basically stopped time for a few seconds. There's more nuance here than just each side's durability.

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SMs have feats like: "No one had even seen him move, such was the prophet's speed, clearing ten metres and vaulting a console table in the time it took a human heart to beat once." (src Void Stalker - pg 93)

Now I'm not going to say that they're all round faster than high end cyberware but their base speed is fairly high and SMs can maintain that constantly for hours or even days - they don't have inconvenient cooldowns after a couple seconds. They're not going to be speed blitzed.

James Norris is a particularly borged up guy and not wholly representative, but his dermal armour was able to resist multiple close range shots from Achilles rifles, with the MAXTAC operator who killed him getting point blank, which is way beyond just small arms. The Achilles is described in the database as being effective against armoured vehicles and its observed abilities would let it comfortably one shot a Space Marine.

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Not sure what in the Achilles description makes it different from a bog standard bolter which don't comfortably one shot an armoured up Space Marine (despite bolter rounds being able to penetrate Guard tier APC armour).

A Maelstrom gangster with a Kerenzikov, a mod you can buy anywhere, and a Satara would be a match for a Space Marine in one on one combat.

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Again I'm very doubtful that the basic Kerenzikov can put someone at the same level as a space marine (see above quote for SM constant speed/reaction time unlike the Kerenzikov that has cooldown). 40k being 40k speed feats are inconsistent but if there's a common thread is that Space Marines are considerably faster than ordinary/not enhanced humans as well as being ridiculously durable and strong.

 

[alexthealright]

SMs have feats like: "No one had even seen him move, such was the prophet's speed, clearing ten metres and vaulting a console table in the time it took a human heart to beat once." (src Void Stalker - pg 93)

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And those guys are all absurd outliers that should not be considered baseline. Since, you know, they're definitely not that anywhere within a thousand miles of being able to fight that fast in any of the video games… or the tabletop… or any of the animated productions made by GW… or anything outside of that sort of purple prose you see in the novels, the ones which are often really dumb and have been written by ten thousand different authors.

Like, we have sources for space marines being killed by normal guardsmen and other really embarrassing shit too, or getting dueled by normal humans, or orcs which normal humans can kill without much difficulty.

 

[Zero Gravitas]

And those guys are all absurd outliers that should not be considered baseline. Since, you know, they're definitely not that anywhere within a thousand miles of being able to fight that fast in any of the video games… or the tabletop… or any of the animated productions made by GW… or anything outside of that sort of purple prose you see in the novels, the ones which are often really dumb and have been written by ten thousand different authors.

Like, we have sources for space marines being killed by normal guardsmen and other really embarrassing shit too, or getting dueled by normal humans, or orcs which normal humans can kill without much difficulty.

Click to shrink...

Well James Norris with the experimental Sandevistan (which is lorewise rarer and better than the already uber-rare and good Apogee) is also in no way your baseline. Even then he couldn't use it for more than a few seconds which is a performance issue that Space Marines (and at an even higher level assassins and Custodes) don't have.

As for speed feats your source has an SM covering tens of meters in a few seconds, going through a car that rammed into him without noticeably slowing and then jumping ~10-15 meters at such a speed that the APCs rotary autocannon could only fire thrice: with nothing indicating that this is an atypical feat for a Space Marine.