What is known the Imperium of Man's economic strength

[Lucky]

I was wondering as to what is known about the Imperium of Man's economic and logistical strength?

I realize the IOM is big, but being big does not mean it can meat the demands placed on it.

[Trinoya]

I was wondering as to what is known about the Imperium of Man's economic and logistical strength?

I realize the IOM is big, but being big does not mean it can meat the demands placed on it.

IIRC there was a statement floating around to entire planets being rounding errors or being lost due to clerical errors, so it would likely be pretty massive. The real question is how efficient it is, since I believe a large amount of it is based on individual worlds as ship/equipment production facilities.

[Mith]

I was wondering as to what is known about the Imperium of Man's economic and logistical strength?

I realize the IOM is big, but being big does not mean it can meat the demands placed on it.

IIRC there was a statement floating around to entire planets being rounding errors or being lost due to clerical errors, so it would likely be pretty massive. The real question is how efficient it is, since I believe a large amount of it is based on individual worlds as ship/equipment production facilities.

I'd agree it's massive, however in regards to efficiency, probably not. It takes them decades, if not centuries to build their warships. Their laws throughout their space probably aren't consistent nor are they likely to be consistently enforced. My guess that the major laws of the Imperium are as follows; 1) give us your taxes and 2) Follow the Cult of the Emperor/Adepts of Mars.

Other than that, it seems that planetary governors can run their worlds more or less however they want, treat their people more or less however they want, and no one back home has the time or energy to care unless you're either close by or a major world.

[Khas]

Although, when Planetary Governors become too incompetent, stuff like this happens:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LOi3CzZjV0M

[Lucky]

I was wondering as to what is known about the Imperium of Man's economic and logistical strength?

I realize the IOM is big, but being big does not mean it can meat the demands placed on it.

IIRC there was a statement floating around to entire planets being rounding errors or being lost due to clerical errors, so it would likely be pretty massive. The real question is how efficient it is, since I believe a large amount of it is based on individual worlds as ship/equipment production facilities.

IIRC there was a statement floating around to entire planets being rounding errors or being lost due to clerical errors, so it would likely be pretty massive. The real question is how efficient it is, since I believe a large amount of it is based on individual worlds as ship/equipment production facilities.

It doesn't matter how many planets an empire has if it does not use them in an intelligent manner.

The Leman Russ Vanquisher is becoming increasingly rare as the skills and technology required for the construction of the Vanquisher-pattern battle cannon were lost when the forge world of Tigrus was overrun.

The Executioner is one of the oldest varients of the Leman Russ; archives show that during the Great Crusade entire regiments of this tank were fielded. Gradually, over many millennia, understanding of plasma technology has been lost and the Executioner is now a rare technological relic.

Plasma Cannon: Plasma technology is rare and highly destructive, for both the enemy and the wielder.'Bolts' of pure plasma explode upon impact with the fury of a supernova, scything through steel, flesh and bone as if it were nothing.

Hunting Lance: Rough Riders are armed with a long hunting lance tipped with a shaped explosive charge that can tear through even the toughest amour.

Rough Riders use their hunting lances the first time they charge into close combat, after which they cannot be used again

Th weapons carried by the Vostroyan Firstborn regiments are exquisitely crafted pieces, often heirlooms that are passed down through the generations. Hand-carved wooden stocks and precision-tooled barrels replace the utilitarian weaponry of other Imperial Guard regiments.

According to the Imperial Guard Codex, the Imperium of Man is losing technology, sends guys with explosive lances into combat to seemingly be blown up by their own weapon, and has such trouble outfitting its troops that some use family heirlooms.

Technology
The heresy of these aliens reaches its zenith when one looks at their technology. While, admittedly, its performance can match and occasionally exceed that of Imperial manufacture, it displays none of the proper obeisances to the holy spirit of the Machine God. Such effrontery I can scarce believe and I recommend that all recovered Tau artefacts be destroyed (in accordance with Adeptus Mechanicus directive AdMech666). It is on the eastern frontier that one finds the most blatan disregard for Imperial doctrine, with many outlying colonies trading with these aliens for their technology in the form of improved construction and agricultural machinery. Where Imperial servants have discovered such illegal artefacts they have seized them and placed the offending colonist in penal servitude.

This makes it look like the Imperium of Man can't send its own people needed farm and construction equipment.

[Picard]

Imperium of Man is pretty much combination of Soviet Union and Imperial Russia IN SPACE!, so I'd say that while horrifyingly inefficient, it is also very powerful due to its sheer size. And that includes economy.

[Khas]

Soviet Union, Czarist Russia, Nazi Germany, Maoist China, and Imperial Japan put together, with the Spanish Inquisition and the nastier parts about the Colonization of the Americas dumped in for good measure.

[Lucky]

Imperium of Man is pretty much combination of Soviet Union and Imperial Russia IN SPACE!, so I'd say that while horrifyingly inefficient, it is also very powerful due to its sheer size. And that includes economy.

I was kind of hoping for some quotes to support what is said.

I'm not sure the Imperium of Man can adequately police its borders. It can't ship things to where they a needed after all, and I seem to recall a quote about planets being out of contact with the IOM for decades or more.

[sonofccn]

I was wondering as to what is known about the Imperium of Man's economic and logistical strength?

Imperium of Man is pretty much combination of Soviet Union and Imperial Russia IN SPACE!, so I'd say that while horrifyingly inefficient, it is also very powerful due to its sheer size. And that includes economy.

I was kind of hoping for some quotes to support what is said.

Okay, I'll give it a shot.

The Imperial Guard is a fighting force consisting of billions of men and millions of fighting vehicles. It is deployed to warzones and garrisons across the galaxy. At any one time the Imperial Guard might be engaged in thousands, maybe tens of thousands of conflicts, all of which need supplying

One example of the scope of the Imperial Guard which the IOM has to equip and support. On the low end this suggests a vehicle for every thousand troopers which seems low to my eyes for a pesudo-modern force. A issue further magnified by:

In an Imperium where diligently-maintained war machines were often ten, twelve, fifteen times older than their pilots or drivers, there were plenty of tales of particular planes or tanks carrying a jinx. Cursed machines, plaguing the lives of their users until they were themselves destroyed. Serial Nine-Nine had a long and patchy record. Six pilots dead or maimed at the controls, two bad landings, three major refits

Taken from the excerpt here,page 10, it shows the average service life of a Imperium vehicle can be measured in centuries lessening the demand on the IOM's industry to sustain their mechanized forces.

For a Hive world as Armageddon, caught in the throes of an all-consuming war, a draft of at least a hundred million men at arms and several million armoured vehicles is typical-a tiny fraction of the total populace which numbers in the hundreds of billions. A far-flung agri-world may have a significantly lower military tribute, perhaps as few as five million men and cavalry, but this may be a significant proportion of the world’s population

Example of the range of recruitment and therefore, assuming year in and year out they maintain on average the same size force, some hint at possible "bleedage" due to fatalities, wounded and simple "aging out". Also of note is Armageddon's tithe of "several million armoured vehicles" indicating 1) Armageddon represents a mammoth percentage of the Imperium's vehicle output, 2) there is a mammoth expendature of material which counteracts such production or 3) Gamesworkshop is not unduly concerned with internal consitency of the background for a faction meant to entice the selling of miniatures.

As with all highly militarized zones, it is important for the Imperial Navy to maintain substantial reserves of vessels around the eye of Terror, ready to deploy as reinforcements should the need arise. Whilst it is possible to keep the vessels themselves ready in this manner, Battlefleet Obscura simply does not possess the manpower to keep reserve crews stationed aboard these vessels as well. Instead, whole shipyards are filled with rows of silent, inactive vessels, often representing classes of ship now outdated or scarce. In times of great need these ships will then be brought into service and crewed with sailors from destroyed or crippled vessels or even with hastily mustered new recruits

An example the IOM does posses and maintain reserve fleets in addition to grim and tested Naval forces. How much value they are and how "substantial" should be wieghted are of course open questions. As well this quote I gleamed from Spacebattles and I have not been able to independently verify so take it with a little caution.

In the 41st Millenium, a spacefaring vessel is a rare and precious. Ships take decades, even centuries to build…it is rare to find a “new” starship-most are hundreds or thousands of years old, and some date back to the earliest days of the Imperium. Therefore, ships are never mass-produced, and even two ships of the same class are rarely alike.

Straight forward. Ships are old, take a very long time to build.

A plea for military aid may come to to the ears of the Imperium, but not be acted upon for months, years or even decades. Such requests typically make their way through countless adepts before finally reaching the hands of who can sanction suitable action, sitting at a dimly lit pulpit-station many hundreds of light years away

The unpredictable nature of the Warp and the inherent dangers of interstellar travel are such that it is not unusual for entire regiments to be lost or even destroyed in transit

An idea of logistics and response time in the IOM. Safe to say its very ossified and bureacratic hampered by "age of sail" travel conditions.

Should an imperial planet come under attack and the local defences prove insufficient, an imperial Commander is entitled to request aid from the Departmento Munitorum, for which its primary response will be the deployment of the Imperial guard. As war descend upon neighbouring systems new regiments will be raised and army groups formed, drawn from the resources of all nearby planets…When Waaagh! Grax invaded the Ryza system in 925.M41, all planets within ten light years were ordered to recruit and raise at least an additional fifty regiments as a primary reaction to counter the Ork invasion. Should the Imperium’s response not prove decisive in crushing an enemy then the sphere around the conflict zone is increased in ever-larger increaments…

Typical response to a "pressure situation".

[Mr. Oragahn]

http://forums.spacebattles.com/threads/ ... st-8700136

You'd have us ally with the Eldar? Liars among liars, who care nothing for us save for how we can be bent to their service and would discard us like a paper cup as soon as we no longer had the strength to serve their ends? Why, that alone invalidates your points! One can never trust an Eldar, especially when they're telling the truth.

Are you serious?
Are half the people on this forum stranded out on some Emperor-forsaken rock, surrounded by savages or are you just deliberately ignoring fact?

By Gork and Mork, we have enough damn Xenophobes as it is. And your entire 'Raar Eldar are bad because their Eldar Raar' completely invalidates any points you would make either. It just shows you have no idea how intergalactic politics work and that you're racist to anything outside your own species.

The Eldar have been one of our major trading partners for centuries, even if we don't get along with some of the minor Craft-worlds. Where do you think half our exports go? To the Orks? We are depend on them as a source of income, through trading basic things that they can't create in quantity for high quality goods (I won't say that the Eye of Terror was a good thing, but it certainly boosted our economy, just as it lowered theirs). Anyway, we need them, or the Orks would get a massive boost to their exports, as the can out produce us every time when it comes it, even if its lower quality.

:) ?

[Lucky]

http://forums.spacebattles.com/threads/ ... st-8700136

You'd have us ally with the Eldar? Liars among liars, who care nothing for us save for how we can be bent to their service and would discard us like a paper cup as soon as we no longer had the strength to serve their ends? Why, that alone invalidates your points! One can never trust an Eldar, especially when they're telling the truth.

Are you serious?
Are half the people on this forum stranded out on some Emperor-forsaken rock, surrounded by savages or are you just deliberately ignoring fact?

By Gork and Mork, we have enough damn Xenophobes as it is. And your entire 'Raar Eldar are bad because their Eldar Raar' completely invalidates any points you would make either. It just shows you have no idea how intergalactic politics work and that you're racist to anything outside your own species.

The Eldar have been one of our major trading partners for centuries, even if we don't get along with some of the minor Craft-worlds. Where do you think half our exports go? To the Orks? We are depend on them as a source of income, through trading basic things that they can't create in quantity for high quality goods (I won't say that the Eye of Terror was a good thing, but it certainly boosted our economy, just as it lowered theirs). Anyway, we need them, or the Orks would get a massive boost to their exports, as the can out produce us every time when it comes it, even if its lower quality.

:) ?

It's rather disturbing that they talk as if they are part of the IOM.

[Mr. Oragahn]

It's rather disturbing that they talk as if they are part of the IOM.

It's part of the thread's point. It's a very funny thread.
What is more interesting is the point I highlighted, as in the influence of the EoT on economics. An endless pouring of enemy, easily identified to unite mankind, that's a arms dealer's dream come true.

[Lucky]

It's part of the thread's point. It's a very funny thread.

It seems like I've seen Hammies refer to the IOM as if it was them when role play wasn't involved. Some people just can't disconnect themselves from the human faction in a setting.

What is more interesting is the point I highlighted, as in the influence of the EoT on economics. An endless pouring of enemy, easily identified to unite mankind, that's a arms dealer's dream come true.

The problem is that the IOM isn't being strengthened by all the war, and can't meet its own needs. The IOM has to let Tau have planets, and citizens of the IOM need to trade with Xenos just to meet their needs.