Land, Air and.....hmm. Something is missing.

[Mr Mystery]

This post is brought to you by HMS St Albans (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_St_Albans_(F83)) which is presently parked out the back of my office.

Naturally, being a Nerd, it got me thinking 'oi! 40k! Where's the planet bound naval/water based stuff?'

We've got land battles aplenty, and of course increasing amounts of air power. More if you count Aeronatics Imperialis, despite its currently defunct nature (I say currently, because you never do know)....but nothing on the high seas.

And this is a shame, because it could prove an interesting take on 40k.

Me, I'd do it as two or three 'proper' ships per side, and numerous smaller boarding craft, which would ultimately be the key to winning. After all, the best way to deal with an opposing craft has been to board her, and take out her crew. Indeed this was preferred during the Napoleonic era, as it was cheaper by far to patch up and re-crew a captured enemy craft than build a whole new one. You even got paid for nicking stuff. They called it Prize Money, and it was shared amongst the capturing crew, making it an even more attractive proposition. You should read up on that, it's really interesting!

Hold on. I've digressed, and quite possibly waffled.

Where was I?

Ah yes. But how would this be portrayed? One thing that immediately springs to mind is that Dark Eldar are already fairly well equipped thanks to lots of cheap skimmer. Tau, Astartes, Necron and other Eldar would very likely have skimmer craft, and everyone else more conventional ships (oh, and Chaos could have skimmers. Would explain where they go when a new force of Astartes rebels. After they've been unceremoniously mugged by larger, better established renegade and traitor forces)

Beyond that, I dunno. So I turn to you BoLS.

Have at it!

[Tyrendian]

would the BFG ruleset not work pretty well for that (except ships obviously being unable to move through eachother)? differing armaments of craft are there, including fast torpedo destroyers and lumbering broadside brawlers, movements feel suitably sluggish, smaller craft are also represented (why should the rules for bombers not also cover an attack squadron of Falcons/LandSpeeders/whathaveyou)?

it's a strange hole in the fluff as well, altough that might partially be explained by them being even more vulnerable to orbital bombardment than ground forces (no need to hit anything, the waves will do the job)

[Kirsten]

it isn't in the fluff because the imperium always ends up polluting/using up all the water so there is nothing to float in :p

[Denzark]

I think with proper anti-grav technology in play, there is absolutely no advantage to machinery that can only travel as far as the coast and then stops. OK - you could have what UK military refers to as 'the littoral' - the coastal zone - with some land based stuff. But a ship would be locked in the same way a railway gun/armoured train would be locked.

I mean why have an attack boat if your landspeeder/storm raven can go at wave top height 100s of times faster?

As to underwater, full power armour can last in vacuum so I expect with minor mods (that would be so small as to not be noticeable in 28mm) they could just walk under water a la Pirates of the Caribbean.

[Tyrendian]

yeah there's repeatedly fluff for Astartes underwater operations floating around in various books, so that works for sure.
I actually have the team in my Deathwatch campaign doing an underwater mission right now - gave them modified jump packs for less-awkward movement and "special underwater bolt shells" that basically only say "you can't use special ammo" to keep it slightly simple - and then a whole new threedimensionality (dimensionalness? dimensity? 3Dity?) to the fights, which is fun.

[modelguyicmt]

Well in real life boats exist to project power and ferry troops. In 40K Thunderhawks, Drop Pods and Drop Ships do this. If a planet with 70% surface water like Earth were in 40K, and the natives had a huge navy, it would be taken out from orbit or the air, or just flat-out ignored. They'd be giant vulnerable artillery batteries and not much else. You wouldn't travel 1000 light years to invade a planet with space marines and titans and leman russ's, and also bring along a fleet of water vessels too.

Now, if it were a planet like Kamino from Star Wars, I could see a navy being slightly less useless.

Battletech has the same issue, there are rules for naval vessels, but the whole point of a navy is moot when you can drop your troops anywhere you want on the enemy's planet while you're invading.

Likely in the 30K period there were planets that had wet navies, but as soon as you reach the advanced space age, they become totally obsolete.

There are special circumstances where boats are useful in 40K though- otoh- Some Orks threw together some submarines to attack a city with on Armageddon, used to be an Apocalypse datasheet.

[40kGamer]

IIRC the Blood Angels used a submarine in the Black Tide novel... I don't remember any other mentions of naval craft.

[CoffeeGrunt]

Yeah, if you've got flight or orbital transport that can carry heavy loads like the Imperium does, the logistical use for seaborne navies is gone as it's much slower. Add on the fact that coastal defense is only necessary if your opponent is also using vessels - because ships are incredibly vulnerable from the air or obit - and the fact that they're not even particularly good at breaking a coastal defense line, (and worse at breaking an inland bastion,) and you have a lot of reasons why the Mechanicus simply wouldn't bother.

Vessels and seaborne vehicles definitely exist, but I don't think there's ever been a seaborne invasion in the Imperium. It's much more effective to blast a clearing into a forest and land the troops and tanks there.

[Mr Mystery]

There's naval stuff in the Mechanicus short stories, and the Cain audio story, so Imperium definitely has it.

Orks have a massive one in Deff Skwadron.

Surely all races would have stuff capable of fighting at sea?

[Arkhan Land]

theres several worlds noted as being sea-planets, like Talasaar (not prime) one could only assume that theres no real avoiding the water on that planet.

[Stephen James Hand]

I think in the 40k world ships might always be a much more niche weapon than they are on Earth simply because many planets wouldn't have significant amounts of surface liquid for them to fight on.

The reality is that the only way you could have 40k ships would be to have them in their own game, 40k battlefields aren't big enough to have combined land & sea battles (although it might have worked in Epic as special rules?), and when they decided to make a 40k based game about ships, they (quite rightly) concluded SPACEships were much cooler than the floaty sort and made Battlefleet Gothic.

I certainly don't think arguments about ships being obsolete in 40k hold any water (see what I did there?). 40k is crammed full of weapons that would be hopelessly obsolete in a space faring military already. If Thunderhawks / Drop Pods / Teleporters were so ubiquitous they rendered naval transports obsolete, surely the same would go for ground based APCs like Rhinos and Chimeras? Main Battle Tanks have been rendered obsolete by helicopter gunships and attack drones in the 21st century, yet they are a mainstay of the 41st millennium's military and don't even get me started on guys who run up bash people with chainsaws when they have perfectly serviceable guns available or horse riders...

Why are these things in 40k? Well do you want to tell the 40k player base that you're taking their tanks away for no other reason than that they're silly?

You're right that Eldar, Tau and Necrons could simply use the same vehicles the use on land so having 'ships' would make no sense, but anti grav technology is rare in the Imperium and getting rarer (no more 30k Imperial Jetbikes in 40k, well okay, one...) so I could totally see them making use of surface ships, and a big gothic style battleship would look awesome, as would cobbled together Ork gun barges and 'Nid sea monsters.

[Lurker]

I don't think they'd become obsolete, however planets that did have a need of a militarized surface fleet, i could see them being relegated to essentially the same job as coast guard. They might be operated by Arbites, PDF or even local LEO's for rescue and intervention ops. Looking out for smugglers and saving rich, drunk idiots on their luxury vessels.
As far as mainstream Guard and Marine forces, just can't see them using them except as specialized troops with light vessels, like the Navy Seals small boats or river patrol craft.
However- I do think it would be neat to see a specialist game, sort of a fusion of BFG and Necromunda (but with better rules, i'm looking at you necro) ala WW2 style surface warfare. I could see something like that allowing you to field whole invasion fleets; Carriers, battleship etc, as well as troop transports (for the island hopping campaigns of course). then you could run games in tandem like they used to with BFG and 40k. Any of the current armies could easily work in it, also you might even be able to use smaller BFG warships (destroyers and frigates for example) to add yet another tie in there.

Of course, that's just wishlisting though...

[CoffeeGrunt]

In Helsreach, the Orks attack from the sea, but the Imperium has no fleet on Armageddon to contest them. Thus they destroy a series of offshore prometheum platforms then engage in a beach assault against the city.


If Thunderhawks / Drop Pods / Teleporters were so ubiquitous they rendered naval transports obsolete, surely the same would go for ground based APCs like Rhinos and Chimeras? Main Battle Tanks have been rendered obsolete by helicopter gunships and attack drones in the 21st century

Except they wouldn't. On the one hand only Space Marines get Thunderhawks, Pods or Tellyportas, so the Guard that do most of the fighting and more of the dying still need APCs. Additionally, said APCs are much cheaper to produce, can burn almost anything to run, and can project force in a way aircraft can't. They can take and hold ground.

Tanks as well are still used in the 21st Century because everyone else is still using tanks. They're not as essential as they were in WWII, obviously, but they exist to combat other armoured threats that Drones or Gunships couldn't really engage.

[Stephen James Hand]

In Helsreach, the Orks attack from the sea, but the Imperium has no fleet on Armageddon to contest them. Thus they destroy a series of offshore prometheum platforms then engage in a beach assault against the city.



Except they wouldn't. On the one hand only Space Marines get Thunderhawks, Pods or Tellyportas, so the Guard that do most of the fighting and more of the dying still need APCs. Additionally, said APCs are much cheaper to produce, can burn almost anything to run, and can project force in a way aircraft can't. They can take and hold ground.

Tanks as well are still used in the 21st Century because everyone else is still using tanks. They're not as essential as they were in WWII, obviously, but they exist to combat other armoured threats that Drones or Gunships couldn't really engage.

So presumably if the Guard still need APCs to get across land, they would also need transport ships if they needed transporting across water or needed to perform an amphibious assault?

And helicopter gunships perform anti armour roles excellently, one of the main reasons MBTs are obsolete is that they are a liability against forces using gunships, far too easily taken out. There are 2 reasons modern armies still have MBTs, 1 is inertia, military forces are conservative and tend to hold onto things after they are obsolete, think cavalry being used up until WW1 when they'd arguably been obsolete for 100 years. The other one is that they are pretty good for terrorizing civilians that might be thinking of rebelling, but in tactical terms, the MBT's usefulness in a first rate 21st century military is marginal at best

[Fueldrop]

The major problem with Naval battles is that ships are hard to transport. Whoever owns the planet likely has a wet navy, but ships are too large to easily transport through space and getting them from space to the planet is equally difficult.

So the only practical way to get ships on a planet in any significant numbers is to take over a shipyard and build your own, or else steal someone else's.

[CoffeeGrunt]

So presumably if the Guard still need APCs to get across land, they would also need transport ships if they needed transporting across water or needed to perform an amphibious assault?

And helicopter gunships perform anti armour roles excellently, one of the main reasons MBTs are obsolete is that they are a liability against forces using gunships, far too easily taken out. There are 2 reasons modern armies still have MBTs, 1 is inertia, military forces are conservative and tend to hold onto things after they are obsolete, think cavalry being used up until WW1 when they'd arguably been obsolete for 100 years. The other one is that they are pretty good for terrorizing civilians that might be thinking of rebelling, but in tactical terms, the MBT's usefulness in a first rate 21st century military is marginal at best

The last cavalry charge was during the Siege of Warsaw in 1939. It went better than you'd think, but ultimately still failed. Military commanders are also acutely aware that sometimes the old school is the best school. Take Operation Barbarossa. The German Panzers tear their way through Russia until they're in sight of Moscow, the whole way along they're rounding up millions of Russian militia and laughing at their poor equipment, especially the fact that they transport themselves via horse and cart.

Then the winter hit, the ground froze, fuel froze in the tanks of their vehicles, and the horses were fine so long as they were looked after. Then the Germans got it, hence why a lot of them stole horses to escape the counter-attack from 41 very angry Siberian regiments.

Then you have things like Vietnam, where the military talks about changing the game by using leap-frogging helicopters and all this other new-fangled tech. Turns out it's easy to counter and pretty ineffective if the enemy knows about it, so you start to have a military failure on your hands.

Never discount the tactical validity of something that is said to be obsolete.

[Houghten]

So presumably if the Guard still need APCs to get across land, they would also need transport ships if they needed transporting across water or needed to perform an amphibious assault?

Those Guard APCs are the amphibious assault!

Chimeras float.

[CoffeeGrunt]

The question is, when you can theoretically attack from any front or bombard a target from orbit, when will you ever need to engage in an amphibious assault? They're only done currently because the easiest way to transport materiel with our current technology is by sea until an airfield can be secured, and because we rarely have the means to simply land in a relatively undefended area with several regiments plus support without flying over said country first anyway.

[Fueldrop]

Okay, first thing I'm going to suggest is that a wet navy can do stealth really well. Submarines are difficult to detect, are comparatively simple (requiring only modern level technology to make pretty good ones), are very difficult to attack without specialized weapons, and can be loaded out for a lot of different roles.

For example:
Long Range Missile Support.
Covert Insertion.

If you want to upsize a bit the Covert Insertion could include an aircraft carrier that pops up out of nowhere, unleashes a wing of bombers, vanishes, then reappears to recover the bombers later.

EDIT:
From the point of view of planetary defense having mobile, concealed weapon platform is hugely useful. Any invading force is likely to try and alpha-strike any defenses they can locate and target, or they'll send infiltrators to sabotage them. Ditto for any PDF motorpools or aircraft hangers. By making them ocean-borne they become harder targets for both the alpha strike and the sabotage.

[Sigismund420]

I think it would be like its own game, but like a planetstrike or apoc type thing, a special 40k games. rules for not only transports, but fighting on ships. fighting ship to ship. honestly though it could jus tas easily bea board with boats as terrain features, and water as impassable terrain. you give the boat terrain special rules to move if manned by infantry and boom, you have very simple sea battles at least.
Far as lore goes though, plenty of aquatic action in 40k. most notably to my memory, armageddons orky subs.

[Katharon]

Orbital ships pretty much make the use of surface ships invalid by default. There's a reason why those Armageddon orks built submarines and not surface ships.

[Stephen James Hand]

The last cavalry charge was during the Siege of Warsaw in 1939. It went better than you'd think, but ultimately still failed. Military commanders are also acutely aware that sometimes the old school is the best school. Take Operation Barbarossa. The German Panzers tear their way through Russia until they're in sight of Moscow, the whole way along they're rounding up millions of Russian militia and laughing at their poor equipment, especially the fact that they transport themselves via horse and cart.

Then the winter hit, the ground froze, fuel froze in the tanks of their vehicles, and the horses were fine so long as they were looked after. Then the Germans got it, hence why a lot of them stole horses to escape the counter-attack from 41 very angry Siberian regiments.

Then you have things like Vietnam, where the military talks about changing the game by using leap-frogging helicopters and all this other new-fangled tech. Turns out it's easy to counter and pretty ineffective if the enemy knows about it, so you start to have a military failure on your hands.

Never discount the tactical validity of something that is said to be obsolete.

But keeping loads of old ineffective stuff around, spending resources on maintaining it that could be spent on something genuinely effective just because it may be useful in a theoretical specific situation that may arise in the future is way to run a military force.

That's how things become obsolete, they don't become completely useless overnight, they become less and less useful in less and less situations until it simply isn't worth keeping around any more. I think it's unlikely we're going to be keeping battle tanks around for another 38000 or so years on the off chance they may come in handy...

And I'm sure it's quite possible to think of a scenario where a mass amphibious assault could happen in 40k, a traitor governor holed up in a fortified city on an island with way too much flak cover to make landing on the same island feasible, for instance (maybe more a job for the Astartes, but there are many reasons why they might not be available). If we can have trench warfare (http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Siege_of_Vraks) in 40k, I'm sure you can contrive a scenario for mass amphibious assaults too. Like I said, naval warfare would be a niche and specialised aspect of war in 40k, much moreso than in modern earth, I doubt most Imperial task forces would even bring naval equipment along, but it doesn't mean it has to be absent entirely.

Houghten - Chimeras float but they aren't seaworthy, only good for negotiating swamps and crossing rivers.

I'm loving the idea of Astartes operating underwater in power armour as well, can imagine the having something that looks a bit like a jump pack but with props rather than booster jets to get them around, very cool.

[CoffeeGrunt]

I'm loving the idea of Astartes operating underwater in power armour as well, can imagine the having something that looks a bit like a jump pack but with props rather than booster jets to get them around, very cool.

Space Wolves and Tau do exactly this, the Tau using custom-fitted Crisis Suits and the Space Wolves Drop Podding into the deep then climbing out with custom Jump Packs IIRC.

[completeHook]

In Dan Abnett's Double Eagle there is a massed seaborne invasion, and before that the Chaos forces are using massive land based aircraft carriers to cross a desert.

What's to say that a fleet doesn't have void based elements to it? If you think about it contemporary navies use a combination of surface ships, submarines, aircraft and satellites already. Surface ships in this context are no more impractical than Titans or Leviathans or painting your armour in primary colours and officers dressing themselves up in really fancy hats (sniper rifles are rubbish in the 41st millennium so maybe that's not such an issue).

For use in game terms you could probably just use Master of Ordinance rules (there are more options to represent artillery barrages in one of the Forgeworld Guard lists but I can't remember which one) to represent a coastal bombardment from the fleet. There's a custom Stronghold Assault scenario in there somewhere.

[Katharon]

I can tell you straight up, again, that orbital and space-capable warships or weapon platforms make any form of surface vessel (ie, not a submarine) obsolete. It's like crushing an ant while it scuttles across a large, empty plate.

[Houghten]

Only if the plate's empty.

The justification for having land battles and not just orbitally bombarding is there's something to fight over.

So if you have a sea-surface-based installation, such as a promethium-drilling rig, kelp farm or even a whole Kamino-style stilt city, you'll want a sea-based force with which to defend it.

[Charon]

So if you have a sea-surface-based installation, such as a promethium-drilling rig, kelp farm or even a whole Kamino-style stilt city, you'll want a sea-based force with which to defend it.

You probably will have a void shield, you probably will have city based macro cannons. you would still go by air. You would probably have civillian ships refitted but no actual defence fleet.
Part of the reason is that every attacker (unless we see a civil war) does come from space. So the attacker MUST have a battlefleet.
Battlefleets usually do not carry any ships. Even if they would what would be the advantage over carrying aircraft?

An example for such a battle was Fulgrims fight against the Laer.

[Houghten]

Battlefleets usually do not carry any ships. Even if they would what would be the advantage over carrying aircraft?

Fuel. Staying aloft requires the active expenditure of energy (unless you're a zeppelin), whereas staying afloat is an entirely passive measure. Thus, an aircraft can stay up for a few hours, after which it must either return for home or crash messily. A ship can go for days without refueling (years if it's nuclear).

[Fueldrop]

depending on what sensors are in play, it might be possible to conceal a surface ship from orbital scans relatively easily. Scan for heat? Heat dispersal into the ocean. Visual scan? planets are big! Radar? If it's choppy then that's not going to work, too many false positives. Sonar? Can't be done from orbit. Add in the stealth technology we know is available to the Imperium, and I can see small to medium-sized craft avoiding automatic notice.

The fact is that it's not easy to scan the entire surface of a planet, so most invaders are going to do a general scan for anything that'll indicate a major threat (population centers, radiation hotspots, ect) then focus their attention on their landing zones. The lack of AI really hinders planet-wide scanning.

[Katharon]

Only if the plate's empty.

The justification for having land battles and not just orbitally bombarding is there's something to fight over.

So if you have a sea-surface-based installation, such as a promethium-drilling rig, kelp farm or even a whole Kamino-style stilt city, you'll want a sea-based force with which to defend it.

There is such a thing as a 'tactical bombardment'.

[Haighus]

You probably will have a void shield, you probably will have city based macro cannons. you would still go by air. You would probably have civillian ships refitted but no actual defence fleet.
Part of the reason is that every attacker (unless we see a civil war) does come from space. So the attacker MUST have a battlefleet.
Battlefleets usually do not carry any ships. Even if they would what would be the advantage over carrying aircraft?

An example for such a battle was Fulgrims fight against the Laer.

Well, looking at this from an IG perspective. Imperial Navy squadron arrives over planet not-Kamino. Needs to land it's complement of Imperial Guard regiments. The available aircraft are Valkyries, which have only recently been retconned to be void-worthy in a sort of dropped onto the planet kind of way, and massive bulk dropships landing at least a company at a time. Valkyries are in short supply and fairly uncommon, so it is likely the bulk landers will be used. These need a large, sturdy area to land, and are valuable and not suited to island hopping, being large and unmanoeuvrable. Once the IG regiments have managed to force a landing on the few areas capable of taking such an assault, they will need some way of moving around to other platforms/islands etc, and the Imperial Guard often doesn't have sufficient or even any transport aircraft. At this point, I can see a wet navy having a use. Agree that submarines are far more viable though. I am assuming that such vessels would be constructed on site on the planet, as they are much lower tech in theory than something like a valkyrie.

I think submarines would make excellent mobile PDF defense emplacements, in the same way as nuclear subs provide a mobile deterrent today, and because of the same advantages. They would be much harder to alpha-strike than a surface emplacement, and could stil mount the typical Imperial defensive technology such as void shields.

For Space Marines, it would make very little sense, as they are fully airmobile and rapid strikes and insertions are their preferred method of warfare.

A massive, mobile submarine fortress monastery would be pretty epic though...

[Katharon]

depending on what sensors are in play, it might be possible to conceal a surface ship from orbital scans relatively easily. Scan for heat? Heat dispersal into the ocean. Visual scan? planets are big! Radar? If it's choppy then that's not going to work, too many false positives. Sonar? Can't be done from orbit. Add in the stealth technology we know is available to the Imperium, and I can see small to medium-sized craft avoiding automatic notice.

Anything large enough to be considered a fleet, and therefore a valid military threat, is not going to be able to hide very well. Visual detection programs are easy enough to run, like the childhood game of two almost-identical images where you find the small differences in between. If a child can find those differences with the naked eye, a programmed computer can do better.



The fact is that it's not easy to scan the entire surface of a planet, so most invaders are going to do a general scan for anything that'll indicate a major threat (population centers, radiation hotspots, ect) then focus their attention on their landing zones. The lack of AI really hinders planet-wide scanning.

It's actually quite easy. You only have to triangulate a few different points in orbit to be able to have its entirety covered. Any invasion space fleet is going to have enough ships to do this, as they don't need to be anything bigger than a frigate to be in the right position. Any commander that sticks his head to a telescope and focuses on a single detail and not the whole doesn't deserve to be in a position of command.

Again, I realize that a lot of WH40K stories don't seem to take in too many detailed military operations like what I'm describing, but if they did then this would be the case.

[Haighus]

Anything large enough to be considered a fleet, and therefore a valid military threat, is not going to be able to hide very well. Visual detection programs are easy enough to run, like the childhood game of two almost-identical images where you find the small differences in between. If a child can find those differences with the naked eye, a programmed computer can do better.



It's actually quite easy. You only have to triangulate a few different points in orbit to be able to have its entirety covered. Any invasion space fleet is going to have enough ships to do this, as they don't need to be anything bigger than a frigate to be in the right position. Any commander that sticks his head to a telescope and focuses on a single detail and not the whole doesn't deserve to be in a position of command.

Again, I realize that a lot of WH40K stories don't seem to take in too many detailed military operations like what I'm describing, but if they did then this would be the case.

The ones described in Imperial Armours or the FW Horus Heresy books do- it is very refreshing. I wonder how well submarines could hide when taking into account the increased tech of the IoM (for both scanning and detection and also concealment).

[Charon]

Why not just use stuff from this list?

http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Imperial_Aircraft

There are a lot more aircraft than on the tabletop. And if you send an imperial regiment to claim "definitely-not-karmino" a regiment with plenty of aircraft (like Glavian regiments) is nothing unheard of. Unless of corse the administratum messes up (again??) and sends Tallarn Desert Raiders.

I dont even think we would use ships for anything else than civillian transports if we had a choice.
The only reasons why we keep a navy is fuel for aircraft (which seems to be next to no issue in 40k), range of missiles and missile speed (the closer you are the less time for countermeasures). So you basically have Aircraft carriers and Missile carriers and a whole lot of battleships just designated to protect these 2 ships and another big number of ships who supply those ships.

It basically comes down to: If we did not need carriers, we would not need battleships.

[Haighus]

There are a lot more aircraft than on the tabletop yes (although almost everything in the list you linked to is available on the tabletop), but most of them are either civilian haulers like the Arvus which can be press-ganged into use, and are not effective military vehicles, or they are advanced and rare like the Valkyrie. Drop regiments do exist, Elysians, Harakoni etc, but they are rare, and the Administratum messes up a lot, so it is likely that a force sent to an ocean planet would not have adequate air transports. The other aircraft, whilst useful, will not be able to hold ground any better than an orbital bombardment. I can see the Imperial Guard capturing/creating on site transport ships to get within range of an amphibious Chimera assault or similar.

Also, the OP was not just referring to surface ships, and submarines have distinct uses aside from carriers and warships. A submarine assault deploying troops to the base of an ocean platform would likely be a stealthier attack than a full air assault- Helsreach is a good example as mentioned by CoffeeGrunt.

[CoffeeGrunt]

If the Administratum sent the hypothetical Guard regiment with insufficient aircraft, then where the heck are they getting a wet navy from? Commandeered civilian vessels? Surely it's more efficient to use some sort of Depth Charge to attack the supports of the watercities and sink them?

Maybe you could have an SBS-inspired regiment who are dropped in by Grav Chute Insertion under cover of darkness with small vessels, so they can infiltrate or sabotage a city and its foundations, but a full wet navy would be extremely rare.

[Charon]

The other aircraft, whilst useful, will not be able to hold ground any better than an orbital bombardment.

You don't need to. Thats the point of an air mounted assault.
Take out key locations and, in the case of 40k, provide air support for the arriving troop carriers. Not every part of a city contains military or important industry. And the imperium is not known for "keeping civillian losses to a minimum". Buildings can be rebuild and I would not be surprised if it is nearly easier to rebuild them via STKs than to demolish them.

In the case of an alien planet with an alien civilisation there won't be anything to "conquer" anyways as everything has to be destroyed.

[Macharius]

Everyone interested in this topic should look into Bastion Wars by Henry Zou. The Imperium is on a Kamino-like planet and talks about how they transport water based ships across the galaxy and how they use them for tactical operations.

[Morgrim]

Navies are best for defensive and support purposes, so while I agree that any planet with a high percentage of ocean probably has a PDF fleet I don't think they'd be standard equipment for deployment into warzones. That said, there have GOT to be a few patterns for various ships in the STKs even if they're civilian haulers with tank guns welded on. So presumably the IG can request some if a particular planet could be subdued much more easily with them.

But other than orks, chaos guard and tyrannids, who would they fight? In The Masque of Vyle the Dark Eldar deal with enemies on mostly water planet by floating above them in raiders taking potshots while dumping a large amount of poison into the water. No boats required.

[Denzark]

. So presumably the IG can request some if a particular planet could be subdued much more easily with them.


When they request them though, how are they going to get the vehicles from orbit into/onto the water? By some sort of orbital lander.

But hang on, why doesn't the orbital lander just drop a land vehicle on the land mass near the objective? After all both Guard and SM have ways of conducting opposed drops.

But - what if the planet is mostly water or the objective is an island?

Well my point above still stands.

Skimmer technology pretty much renders blue navy redundant - in fact I can only see water vehicles being useful in a swamp environment where sufficient skimmers are unavailable.

[Morgrim]

Imperial skimmers do seem to be smaller, lighter vehicles though, and also rather fragile (although arguably that's a skimmer trait in general). For the specialised "move a large amount of heavy stuff across water" task a skimmer isn't going to cut it. If you're sending in a few hundred guardsmen that's a task for either fliers or watercraft. But agreed that to attack there aren't many options that navy suits best. Perhaps 'towable gun platform'.

[Denzark]

No sure, but you mentioned IG requesting specialist water vehicles. As I said, why use your inter-orbital lift capacity to drop a vehicle onto the sea when it could drop a similar sized vehicle onto the required land mass?

[Katharon]

Did we all forget that there are mechanized regiments of Chimera-mounted guardsmen and women?

[Fueldrop]

Hmmm... some form of amphibious superheavy transport would be fairly awesome.

[grimmas]

If the planet is totally or mostly water then you're going to need some sort of Blue navy, air power is all well and good but to cotrol it you will to get somthing on the surface. Ships are vulnerable to Air power but that's why great efforts are made to protect them, after all one can't bomb a ship is your aircraft is blown out of the sky. The imperium is a big place and not everywhere has vast orbital resources available

[Chris*ta]

Hmmm... some form of amphibious superheavy transport would be fairly awesome.

Isn't the Gorgon amphibious?