Well, this thread is going to be posted on the "commonly posted thread" sticky!
How strong would that make them? What does that relate to in "real world" terms?
Unfortunately, not only their training regimen but their bionetic augmentations make this a fairly redundant question . That is, the results of what goes into
creating a Marine also goes to skew any form of standard equation of strength
vs. height, which is problematic anyway.
I figure the average Guardsman is around the same as people today so about 5'8. A Space Marine at even just 7'1 would be about 25% taller.
The problem is that there are lots of contradictory information here. About the only bit of 'fluff' that tries to give some information on this is Jes Goodwin's scaled "Space Marine" image in the back of his artbook, but in that he couldn't count (he starts off at 2'). With that said, I
personally agree with his overall scale, i.e. a Space Marine is around 8' in power armour. This means that, reasonably realistically, they're going to have an average height of around 7'7". With that said, I would put their average weight at around 350 lbs or so.
I figure he'd be about twice as strong too...
Canonically they are around four times as strong. (I find this amusing since I originally had them at around that strength out of power armour, but PA increased that to around twenty-five times as strong! A tad too high...
)
Actually, on this premise, how much do you think that a Marine in Power Armour could lift with a single arm without overtly straining themselves? Is the Marine using a Power Fist?
Not too relevant, methinks.
[quote autho=Vlex]I've found that assuming the Toughness and Strength scale used in 40K is logarithmic is useful.
That doesn't hold up with the comparisons that GW has, though.
[quote autho=Vlex]However, for real approximations of strengths you need to turn to Inquisitor and even there the system is a bit broken. A space marine punches harder than a plasma rifle shoots. [/quote]
Ain't that the truth. I'm also interested in this because it helps me model them in
GURPS Rogue Trader, my own personal conversion of 40k...
Lets say that we have Bill, the Imperial guardsman who is 5'8" and weighs 160 lb. Bill can bench press 200 lb.
The values are a tad low, out of interest. Average weight would probably be higher. As to the lifting capacity? Hmmn... definitely on the hight side for the average, I think.
So our Space Marine would weigh 505 pounds and could bench press 967 pounds.
Again, a tad too high based upon how weight tends to go. More so when you add in the "heroic factor".
Ya know.. genetic augmentation is nice and all.. but I still think there's a limit human physiology can take.
Amen to that.
As for there beings a maximum strength even with augmentation - that is true. But with the Ossmodula which not only stimulates bone growth but allows for the bones to absorb ceramic compounds to become even stronger and the Biscopea organ which stimulates muscle growth, I would have to think that a Space Marine would be stronger than just a larger version of a normal human weight lifter. With augmentation like a space marine has, I don't even know if you could call it "human physiology" anymore.
With such a wonderful physiological response for cross-sectional area, to get this one for Marines is a tad disappointing. I would take a more balanced approach and let game mechanics work out average strength of specific activities based on determined values. Anyone care to provide any suggestions?
Personally I'm torn on how strong to make the average human in RPG terms. I would hate to make them completely munchkin!
Kage