Geneseed Shenanigans

[ElectricPaladin]

I read in a lot of the fluff stuff about space marines giving each other acolytes, stealing each others' geneseed, and so on. Does this mean that there are, for example, Black Templars who are genetically Ultramarines (more likely the other way around, given how many freaking Black Templars there are)? Or even Black Legion who are made from stolen Blood Angels geneseed, or whatever?

Given that much of a space marine's character comes from his geneseed, what are the consequences of this? Are their chaos marines who feel odd pangs of remorse when they rape, kill, pillage, and burn because they were made with stolen Salamanders geneseed? Could there be Blood Angels who are unusually calm because they were originally Crimson Fists?

And since the apothecaries retrieve the geneseed from fallen space marines to make more space marines, wouldn't such deviations potentially spread over time. One acolyte loaned from an allied chapter can grow up, fight honorably, die, and end up turning into several new marines in the next generation.

So, what gives? Is anything written about this in the fluff? Am I getting something wrong here? Or is this one of those things the GW writers didn't really think all the way through.

[bfmusashi]

It's a curious thing that's never addressed. Each chapter also has different ways of activating the gene-seed so are different methods compatible? Like, if Alpha Legion stole a bunch of Blood Angel GS would it still activate without the sanguination thing?

[DrLove42]

Theres that bit in one of the rule books (a big book, but dont ask me which one) where the Red Corsairs stole a bunch of Gene Seed from one chapter to top up their ranks.

[ElectricPaladin]

Theres that bit in one of the rule books (a big book, but dont ask me which one) where the Red Corsairs stole a bunch of Gene Seed from one chapter to top up their ranks.

I remember that! It was from the Chaos Space Marines chapter in the 5th Edition corebook's fluff section. However, it never explains what the long term consequences might be of introducing uncorrupted marine stock into a renegade Chapter.

[Kevlarshark]

Although nicking geneseed is considered an abomination in the loyal chapters...The Carcharodons are known to steal potential recruits as spoils of war. The Renegade chapters do recover their foes geneseed to create new marines. There is supposed to be a very high fail rate to the process but many of the renegades prefer it this way as it insures that only the strong survive.

Bloodquest makes reference to stealing neophytes to indoctrinate, which may have a higher success rate as implantation is no longer an issue. The process is possible with Fully fledged marines too, but is probably much more difficult. Lord Zuphor the Impaler was originally a Imperial Fist but was psycho surgically altered to become a berserker.

Since many of the Legions have gene seed that is listed as "corrupted beyond redemption" I dont think it would make much difference to their overall gene quality. The Nightlords and Alpha legion (Iron Warriors to a lesser extent) are noted as having "surprisingly pure" geneseed in index astartes which probably means they are more careful with their sources.

[Cursed13]

I'm not saying I have a perfect answer or perfect knowledge on the subject, but I do have a robust collection of fluff stored in my brain. Let me put your concerns to rest. For the loyalist Chapters, it is tantamount to heresy to take and use another chapter's geneseed. It is simply not done, for if they were discovered, it would be considered the greatest act of betrayal a brother chapter could enact on another second only to the Horus Heresy. If a loaned acolyte serves in a loyal brother chapter and dies under their care, the geneseed will most likely be collected and returned to his chapter. So there would be no Black Templar Ultramarines or even Ultramarine Black Templars. When geneseed is extracted, they all get put into separate vials, little spherical containers that hold each set separately. In this case, you're thinking is all mixed up. Geneseed is practically revered as a sacred and holy object, being the last remaining connection to the Primarchs.

For renegades however, this is not such an issue. They do not care where the geneseed comes from. You have to remember, geneseed isn't an infection. It doesn't spread by contact. It's not gonna change the whole chapter over. Only the bearer and his future inheritors will have that specific set of gene-markers. That will only make up a few warriors in the renegade warband. Some geneseed won't properly translate and will not survive the implantation process. It will be unrecoverable at this point.

One of the common rules of geneseed is that if a Neophyte dies in battle with the newly implanted geneseed, it cannot be recovered. The geneseed needs time to mature after implantation in order for it to be extracted. So it takes about the time from implantation to elevation to full Battle Brother for the geneseed to be successfully extracted at death. That is why scouts are such a valuable resource and must be protected at all times. Also, if an apothecary cannot reach the a fallen space marine in time, the geneseed will die in the body after the marine has died. These are the ways that geneseed are most commonly lost. These are also circumstances that will prevent stolen geneseed from spreading too far in a renegade warband.

Since the renegades don't care where the geneseed comes from, they will simply implant whatever geneseed they can into whatever recruits they have. Space marines are like Humans in that they still follow the nature versus nurture argument. Geneseed does not automatically determine your conscience or your "alignment". A recruit with Salamander geneseed can be raised to become a ruthless, bloodthirsty murderer like any Chaos warrior, however he will have the Salamander affectations such as the black skin, red eyes and most likely a penchant for smithy work. This is why all loyalist Space Marines have to go through psycho-indoctrination, so that they are tempered psychologically as loyal and "lawful-good-aligned" warriors. The Red Corsairs for example take in any Space Marine that has shaken off the mantle of a loyal Imperial warrior and who wants to be a mercenary for himself, and they will also take any geneseed to raise into a chaos warrior. It does not matter to them where it comes from, all that matters is that they can produce more Super Human Warriors, which is what the geneseed does allow.

Also it was mentioned that Charcaradons take recruits as spoils of war. This is true. Recruit however means that they have just survived the testing phase, to prove they have the will and determination to become a space marine. Recruits are not yet implanted with any geneseed. Once a recruit has been assessed by the Chaplains and librarians to be sound of mind and of belief, they will become initiates or novitiates, and they will be prepared to receive the geneseed that will make them scouts. As this is the case, the Charcaradons do not take or use outside geneseed. Just to clarify. I hope all this helps.

[Rev. Tiberius Jackhammer]

For the most part the geneseed has a pretty minor effect on how Space Marines think, barring Blood Angels. More nurture than nature. It's just that they're secluded from all cultural influences outside of the Chapter, raised thinking tradition is incredibly important, so the "mindset" of the chapter rarely changes. Still, there are some examples of descendants being "different" - for instance, the Angels of Absolution lack the Dark Angels' angstangstangst, and the Silver Skulls are a lot more into headhunting and violence-for-fun than the Ultramarines.

A Black Legion with Imperial Fist geneseed wouldn't feel remorse or anything, it's dependent on how he was raised. Otherwise, loyalist marines would never go rogue or betray the Imperium (there're a fair few instances of them going anti-Imperial/Emperor without chaotic influences - the Chaos 'dex has an Ultramarines-descendant Chapter Tactical Squad getting grumpy, violently taking over an Imperial World etc).

[DarkDesigner]

And since the apothecaries retrieve the geneseed from fallen space marines to make more space marines, wouldn't such deviations potentially spread over time. One acolyte loaned from an allied chapter can grow up, fight honorably, die, and end up turning into several new marines in the next generation.

I think most of your questions have been pretty definitively answered by others in this thread, much better than I could have put it, but there's one thing that confuses me, pertaining to what Electric Paladin said above. I was under the impression that Space Marines only grow one progenoid gland, although having read up a bit on lexicanum I now know they have 2, however one matures faster than the other.

Given that some gene-seed samples don't take, or may be placed in a neophyte that is killed before it matures, or dies before it is harvested, or one of many other potential hazards that could befall one or both of the new glands, how are there so many space marines? At best their numbers would increase very very gradually, but this assumes that there are more successful implantations of both geneseed for every one Space Marine killed than there are accidents and unsuccessful harvests, something I feel would be quite unlikely!

As a Chaos Space Marine, I consider it my sworn duty to shoot all the Apothecaries.

[Rev. Tiberius Jackhammer]

Given that some gene-seed samples don't take, or may be placed in a neophyte that is killed before it matures, or dies before it is harvested, or one of many other potential hazards that could befall one or both of the new glands, how are there so many space marines?I vaguely recall something about techpriests on Mars "farming" geneseed? Using cloned candidates so the implantation's always successful, leaving it in a vat until it's old enough, harvest, kill, repeat. Maybe they use this to resupply needy chapters.

[ElectricPaladin]

Given that some gene-seed samples don't take, or may be placed in a neophyte that is killed before it matures, or dies before it is harvested, or one of many other potential hazards that could befall one or both of the new glands, how are there so many space marines?


This reminds me of the RPG Exalted. There was this place in Exalted where outcaste Dragon-Blooded (minor formerly-mortal godlings) were trained. In their efforts to make the place a terrible, brutal, heartless ****hole, the developers... exaggerated the numbers a little. Interpreted literally, this place killed more than it took in, resulting in a negative number of new Dragon-Bloods.

I think we may be dealing with the same thing here.

Also, in that context, I find the Space Marines codex a little odd. If recovering geneseed is that important, why is the apothecary a special character you'll only find in a Captain's entourage, not a specialist you'll find in every squad? If I were in charge of a chapter, the first thing I'd do is make sure that one person in each squad was trained to extract geneseed under otherwise uncomplicated combat conditions.

Ok, that said, I think I understand what's going on:

1) Loyalist chapters don't support each other by handing over fully implanted Space Marines, they just give unimplanted neophytes.

2) When members of Chapter A die in combat alongside members of Chapter B (for example, Ultramarines fighting alongside Hawk Lords in order to learn better piloting skills), Chapter B will carefully harvest the dude's geneseed and return it to his original chapter.

3) Traitor chapters have no such compunctions and steel geneseed willy-nilly.

4) I've over-estimated the degree to which geneseed influences a space marine's character. Except for physical traits or common mutations, the stuff really is just magic space marine juice.

[DarkDesigner]

While we're vaguely on the subject I had an answer to the question of new Chaos Legion recruits, considering so many die and it must be harder for them to get geneseed and willing recruits than Loyalist Marines. We keep thinking of time as linear, i.e. Kill ten Word Bearers today and that's 10 less to deal with tomorrow, but the Warp is always described as being removed from any notion of time as we know it. So you could kill every single Chaos Marine in the galaxy and they could be back in 100 years time because it hasn't happened to them yet.


Since the renegades don't care where the geneseed comes from, they will simply implant whatever geneseed they can into whatever recruits they have. Space marines are like Humans in that they still follow the nature versus nurture argument. Geneseed does not automatically determine your conscience or your "alignment". A recruit with Salamander geneseed can be raised to become a ruthless, bloodthirsty murderer like any Chaos warrior, however he will have the Salamander affectations such as the black skin, red eyes and most likely a penchant for smithy work.

I do wonder how much trouble Thousand Sons have recruiting:

Ahriman: Welcome to the Thousand Sons traitor marine! As one of the foremost tactical geniuses of your previous chapter your battle prowess should by far make up for your lack of sorcerous power!
Tzeentch: No sorcery? I think you'll find that's mine then *Tzeentch takes soul leaving mindless drone*
Ahriman: Aw.

[Rev. Tiberius Jackhammer]

I do wonder how much trouble Thousand Sons have recruiting:

Ahriman: Welcome to the Thousand Sons traitor marine! As one of the foremost tactical geniuses of your previous chapter your battle prowess should by far make up for your lack of sorcerous power!
Tzeentch: No sorcery? I think you'll find that's mine then *Tzeentch takes soul leaving mindless drone*
Ahriman: Aw.The rubric was a one-time thing (although I hope they get to do it on a smaller scale to prisoners :P), so by now they probably have a decent following of normal Tzeentchian marines, even if they're not "genetically" Thousand Sons.

And it won't be long before we reclaim the Blood Ravens >:}

[ElectricPaladin]

And it won't be long before we reclaim the Blood Ravens >:}

I just started a new Blood Ravens force. My 1500 points says "bring it, b*tches." :D

[Xenith]

This reminds me of the RPG Exalted. There was this place in Exalted where outcaste Dragon-Blooded (minor formerly-mortal godlings) were trained. In their efforts to make the place a terrible, brutal, heartless ****hole, the developers... exaggerated the numbers a little. Interpreted literally, this place killed more than it took in, resulting in a negative number of new Dragon-Bloods.
One gene seed from a fallen brother is implanted into a recruit. IIRC, The geneseed then stimulates the growth of a second geneseed, so for each fallen marine, you get two back. Even with a 10% failure rate, if 100 marines die, you get 200 geneseeds, which is 180 new marines, allowing for that 10% fail.


why is the apothecary a special character you'll only find in a Captain's entourage, not a specialist you'll find in every squad? If I were in charge of a chapter, the first thing I'd do is make sure that one person in each squad was trained to extract geneseed under otherwise uncomplicated combat conditions.
The red scorpions, and other chapters are wardens of the purity of their chapter, and each sergeant is also an apothecary. Each space marine would also undoubtedly have some basic field training, and be able to remove a gene seed if needs be. The ones that prove exceptional at battlefield surgery get inducted into the apothecarion.


Ahriman: Welcome to the Thousand Sons traitor marine! As one of the foremost tactical geniuses of your previous chapter your battle prowess should by far make up for your lack of sorcerous power!
Tzeentch: No sorcery? I think you'll find that's mine then *Tzeentch takes soul leaving mindless drone*
Ahriman: Aw.
IIRC, the souls of the rubric Thousand Sons that have had their shells broken can be summoned back from the warp when their armour is resealed. Also, it was the Rubric that made the Rubricae, Tzeentch loves tactical genius as much as anyone, I should imagine he would want to keep such an interesting plaything in one piece.

[ElectricPaladin]

One gene seed from a fallen brother is implanted into a recruit. IIRC, The geneseed then stimulates the growth of a second geneseed, so for each fallen marine, you get two back. Even with a 10% failure rate, if 100 marines die, you get 200 geneseeds, which is 180 new marines, allowing for that 10% fail.


When you put it that way, it doesn't sound too unreasonable. The question is, though, A. What is the failure rate for implantation? and B. What is the failure rate of retrieval? That is to say, out of every 100 marines, how many will die in such a way that their geneseed cannot be recovered, and of the remaining progenoid glands, how many will implant successfuly?



The red scorpions, and other chapters are wardens of the purity of their chapter, and each sergeant is also an apothecary. Each space marine would also undoubtedly have some basic field training, and be able to remove a gene seed if needs be. The ones that prove exceptional at battlefield surgery get inducted into the apothecarion.


So, you're saying that every space marine does, in fact, know the basics of removing and preserving their fellows' geneseed. The ones who are really good at it get trained as field medics (hence granting Feel No Pain to their squads) and become Apothecaries/Sanguinary Priests? That makes a lot of sense.

[Cursed13]

That is correct, all Space Marines are trained in basic geneseed extraction, simply pulling out their combat knife and cutting into the throat and chest and roughly ripping out the progenoid glands and then place into small containers. An apothecary however is much more skilled, much faster and much more careful in the procedure. However for gameplay purposes, the Apothecary is limited to the Command Squad so that the apothecary can be a separate model and have beneficial special rules that are granted only to a specific squad and specific characters that join the squad, so that not every space marine chapter is running around with Sanguinary Priests. Logistically having only a single Apothecary attached only to a single squad makes no sense, in reality there is a single Apothecary and several apothecaries in training under him. For the simplicity of modelling and game play purposes, we ignore these and focus only on the fully initiated apothecary.

What happens after the geneseed is extracted and gets stored in the vaults and the processed into more geneseed for implantation is not actually specified. There is no pseudo-science written to explain what happens, this is a complete mystery to us. No one has ever tried to explain it, no one has ever tried to write about it, and I doubt anyone has even tried to figure out an explanation for it in any of the canon. All we know for certain is that it gets extracted, it gets stored and then it gets processed. Somehow in there one space marine is able to produce enough for several more, numbers unspecified. But somehow they are able to make enough to further the chapter, and make enough to pay the geneseed tithe required by the Mechanicus. Perhaps these things are best left a mystery.

As far as I know, when an initiate is implanted, either both progenoid glands will take and mature successfully, or they will both be rejected by the initiate's body. I have never heard of a case where only one of the progenoids successfully matured. I may be wrong, but as far as I know, that has never been the case.

Also, readers beware, don't trust everything you read on Lexicanum. A lot of the stuff on there is speculation and a lot more is simply fabricated. As in completely made up. Anything that does not have a direct reference is probably false, this I have found in my experience. The last time I looked at the Raven Guard entry, there was so much stuff that was simply incorrect and fabricated that I had to scour the entire thing from my memory in order to prevent contamination of my internal canon records. If none of you have seen my blog, I'm a huge Raven Guard fanboy. I'm not afraid to admit it.

[ElectricPaladin]

If none of you have seen my blog, I'm a huge Raven Guard fanboy. I'm not afraid to admit it.


Post a link, bro. You've earned it.

[DarkDesigner]

One gene seed from a fallen brother is implanted into a recruit. IIRC, The geneseed then stimulates the growth of a second geneseed, so for each fallen marine, you get two back. Even with a 10% failure rate, if 100 marines die, you get 200 geneseeds, which is 180 new marines, allowing for that 10% fail.

I just think this is still quite optimistic a prediction. Ok so every Space Marine can potentially create 2 new marines, and we'll take a sample company of 100, so that's a potential 200 recruits. But if you can only harvest from half of the marines because the other half are too badly injured or the apothecaries can't get round to them in time for whatever reason, that's down to 100. Keep the 10% failure rate and that's only 90. That's a 10% loss which should build up over time. Even if 50% is too pessimistic a harvest, the other factors such as only one gland being ripe, mutated DNA, etc, would probably bring it down around this level.

The only thing I did remember that may improve it, I'm sure I read somewhere that when Space Marines get old enough sometimes their progenoids are harvested while they're still alive, just in case they die in battle. Does anyone else remember reading that? As I have no idea where I'd have read it.

Also why is it that I always imagine the progenoids are just superhuman tonsils and apendices?



Also, readers beware, don't trust everything you read on Lexicanum. A lot of the stuff on there is speculation and a lot more is simply fabricated. As in completely made up. Anything that does not have a direct reference is probably false, this I have found in my experience. The last time I looked at the Raven Guard entry, there was so much stuff that was simply incorrect and fabricated that I had to scour the entire thing from my memory in order to prevent contamination of my internal canon records. If none of you have seen my blog, I'm a huge Raven Guard fanboy. I'm not afraid to admit it.

Hey, nothing to be ashamed of. I finished reading Deliverance Lost with a great respect for the Raven Guard, actually there's very few legions I haven't come away with more respect for upon reading a HH novel about them. Even the Ultramarines, which as a Chaos player through and through is a pretty difficult thing to admit.

While we're on the topic of the Ultramarines (and sorry for bringing up a tired old argument, but I'm only touching on it) it's hinted that after whatever befalls the II and XI legions the Ultramarines received a large intake of new recruits. And I was thinking about this, if this is taken to mean that the Ultramarine's ranks were swollen with the still loyal marines from the two lost chapters, would there still be a concern about mixing the geneseed? Or do you think these marines would be marked so as to let their geneseed die with them? I like to think that perhaps the successor chapters of Ultramarines which get tempted away are actually the descendants of the forgotten or the lost...

[DF3CT]

I vaguely recall something about techpriests on Mars "farming" geneseed? Using cloned candidates so the implantation's always successful, leaving it in a vat until it's old enough, harvest, kill, repeat. Maybe they use this to resupply needy chapters.

I wonder what would happen if a large contingent of marines, thought lost in the warp return to normal space after thousands of years, but only a few years to them.

What would they think about the modern practices of the Imperium and the god worship of the Emperor?

Would they submit to this fallen state of the empire of man and their veritable ball and chain around the Marine Legions?

Heresy books are cool, but I want civil war and cleansing of the ranks in the 41st. ;)

To me the Mechanicus are something that is tolerated by other aspects of Imperial power due to their machine worship and inhuman modifications to their body and souls.

I'm surprised there hasn't been a move in the fluff to usurp power from those C'tan worshiping cyborgs on mars. ;)

[ElectricPaladin]

I wonder what would happen if a large contingent of marines, thought lost in the warp return to normal space after thousands of years, but only a few years to them.

What would they think about the modern practices of the Imperium and the god worship of the Emperor?

Would they submit to this fallen state of the empire of man and their veritable ball and chain around the Marine Legions?

Heresy books are cool, but I want civil war and cleansing of the ranks in the 41st. ;)

Don't forget that most Space Marine Chapters maintain the Imperial Truth. They're a little odd and posthuman, but they aren't (generally) superstitious or deluded. The fact that they continue to obey the orders of the Imperium? That's not a new conflict. And there's a word for the Space Marines who rebelled against the rule of ordinary humans.

Traitor Legions ;).

So, I don't think that a bunch of warp-lost heresy-era Marines would rebel against the Imperium. Enough of them would look at what the Chapters are doing and agree that it's for the best that there wouldn't be a wide-spread civil war.

At least, not for that reason...

[Rev. Tiberius Jackhammer]

I just started a new Blood Ravens force. My 1500 points says "bring it, b*tches." :D:P My Warcoven'll be practicing their Gift of Chaos jazzhands.

Now that they can bring Horrors, Flamers and Fateweaver to the party, they actually stand a chance :P

[Cursed13]

It is only speculated that the Ultramarines took in the remnants of the failed Primarchs. Whether this is true or not, we'll never know. Most likely that they were shepherded into the Ultramarines legion simply because they could still be useful and the Ultramarines were the most "lawful-good" marines around, so they would be the best to babysit them until the failed legionnaires could meet their end in honourable battle. Most likely their geneseed would not be collected and implanted into new recruits. They would be permitted to die in battle and earn themselves some measure of honour to redeem the failure of their Primarch and then they would be permitted to rest. They would most likely not force their legacy to continue re-earning that honour endlessly by continuing the use of their geneseed.

Off topic, for Electric Paladin, my blog is not Raven Guard centric, it is hobby centric. Small things that others can take note of to make their hobby and gaming experience more enjoyable. At least that's what I hope to achieve with it. I don't post often as I find myself endlessly busy with innumerable tasks, but when I do have the time to finish a project, I like to share it on my blog. So that in mind, I will share a couple of my Void Ravens (Raven Guard successors, presumed second founding although unknown) posts that discusses chapter creation and my Kayvaan Shrike conversion, Captain Veylar Marius. Although these articles will have to be updated as I am considering changing the colour scheme a little bit and the pictures need to be updated as well. One day I'll get to it! Maybe...

http://darkworkshop.blogspot.ca/2010/12/army-profile-void-ravens-chapter.html

http://darkworkshop.blogspot.ca/2010/09/character-profile-captain-marius.html

[bfmusashi]

You don't extract the implanted geneseed, only two organs called the Progenoids. There are two, one in the neck, and one deeply set in the chest. The geneseed is the full set of wacky organs. Each set is made from one Progenoid. The neck one is matured and ready to remove at 5 years, the chest requires 10 years to mature. Why they don't just clone up some servitors to grow them in is beyond me.

[Chris*ta]

You don't extract the implanted geneseed, only two organs called the Progenoids. There are two, one in the neck, and one deeply set in the chest. The geneseed is the full set of wacky organs. Each set is made from one Progenoid. The neck one is matured and ready to remove at 5 years, the chest requires 10 years to mature. Why they don't just clone up some servitors to grow them in is beyond me.

I seem to recall reading some fluff on here about using regular humans in cloney vats to produce extra geneseed. I seem to recall it taking a very long time, and it might be one of those lost tech things.

I think the process is meant to take some time (at least 5 and 10 years) and requires subjects that are compatible with the geneseed anyway, so it would be difficult.

This may be one of those plot oversights that you need to either justify/ignore, though :D

Like mobile phones in any of the X Men movies ;)