What if they set the game during the Great Crusade, or Heresy?
How much lore is there for The Dark Age of Technology?
From the OP:
Will take place well after Horus Heresy, in a time frame similar to current 40k lore.
I'm sure things can still change, but it is probably safe to assume that it takes place some time in the 41st millenium.
Part of the beauty of 40k is you can have huge, solar system sweeping story lines, involving millions of combatants, and billions of deaths, and it barely registers as a blip in the grand scheme of the galaxy as a whole.
So they can basically do whatever they want, however they want and it doesn't necessarily have to be canon or lore breaking.
I hope I can be chaos, and actually serve a specific god. And that I get things to reflect that/make a difference. Rather than just a different color tint to my armor or something.
What do ya mean?
Personally I hope warhammer 40k is not like warhammer online. In warhammer online, if you played chaos, you worshiped Tzee.
No, I hope this time around all the gods are represented. Hopefully your part of an undivided faction. Classes (if there are any) could be based on which god your worship. For example, you could be a Khorne beserker and heavily DPS oriented or perhaps a plague marine which would be pretty much a tank with Dot abilities.
I think he means, based on the god you serve, you are actually a different type of space marine: Noise Marine, Plauge Marine, Khorn Berserker, Sorcerer, etc, rather than just being a colour swap of your armor. Maybe chaos undivided: Word bearers? Something like that. That would be fun.
I think if you could play as Chaos, I would pretty much have to.
personally i would be more then happy if they announce it is basically an mmo of inquisitor. that would be the best way to incorporate all this shit, or necromunda, hive gangs ftw
Friggin' pansy-ass codex clingers. "Oh look, my big brother wrote a book; you totally have to do what it says! DAD! THEY'RE NOT FOLLOWING THE BOOK!"
Obi-Wan
Sherlock
Clouseau
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GnomeTankWhat the what?Portland, OregonRegistered Userregular
edited March 2010
So wait wait...is that Space Marine game still coming out? Or has it released? I had never heard of it, but I follow Relic pretty closely....it doesn't look like an RTS either. Oh god, I must know more.
So wait wait...is that Space Marine game still coming out? Or has it released? I had never heard of it, but I follow Relic pretty closely....it doesn't look like an RTS either. Oh god, I must know more.
It looks like a 3rd person action game, possibly based on a scaled up DoW 2 engine? The website calls it an 'action RPG' so you'll presumably be able to upgrade your character or weapons and armor.
Pretty early in development though, from what I can tell. Probably a mid to late 2011 release would be my initial guess. But I could be wrong.
So wait wait...is that Space Marine game still coming out? Or has it released? I had never heard of it, but I follow Relic pretty closely....it doesn't look like an RTS either. Oh god, I must know more.
It looks like a 3rd person action game, possibly based on a scaled up DoW 2 engine? The website calls it an 'action RPG' so you'll presumably be able to upgrade your character or weapons and armor.
Pretty early in development though, from what I can tell. Probably a mid to late 2011 release would be my initial guess. But I could be wrong.
Man, if they made this a series...like, the first one is Space Marine, the second one is Exarch, etc. Where you get to do the action/RPG thing with a bad ass of every race...I'd own every game.
And it sort of makes sense really, that Relic would move in this direction. I mean, if you want to get technical, DoW2 was a squad based action RPG that has an RTS multi-player component.
It does look like a lot of fun. I'd pay good money for a Spacemarine hybrid of Dynasty Warriors with RPG elements in there. One thing that I want well represented in it are huge numbers. Tabletop aside (for obvious reasons) fluff and lore battles in 40k are often gigantic.
Which brings us back to the MMO version, one thing about MMOs is the generally smaller number of things going on at once. I suppose that's partly because it's easier to balance things when individual enemies are made soloable in ones and twos, rather than 10s and 20s. Having said that, I would kind of like to see a 40k mmo where the number of enemies are rather large. So it feels like battles, rather than skirmishes.
I think that's part of what I keep sticking on in my head when speculating. The 40k setting seems made for large squads and armies, not individuals doing what they want, when they want. I wonder how/if they will represent that in the game.
GnomeTankWhat the what?Portland, OregonRegistered Userregular
edited March 2010
(From that SM trailer, it seems it's about one space marine fighting an army of orcs, which I am okay with).
As far as the MMO, yah, that's going to be interesting. Warhammer, in all it's forms, is really about gigantic, epic, conflict. Yah, tabletop 40k is more about tactical squad based combat (as compared to Epic anyway), but it's still about squads of units moving around a battlefield.
They could easily have hordes of weak mobs instead of 3 strong ones to give you the feel that your doing super human feats. They should make commissar a player voted in class that the GM's grant so if anyones being really annoying said commissar could team kill the player hahaha good way to cull the WoW kiddies or atleast quiet them down. It would be fun to do that also if a discussion breaks out about the emperor and you go in shooting anyone questioning the emperor haha throw in a little immersion.
Ever since aion fell flat on its ass i think they'll stay away from a WoW based game because theres no ways in hell they could compete with all the features aion had and aion couldent compete with WoW. They might just be forced towards a unique MMO purely because of WoW's dominance which is actually awesome--WoW is like jesus taking EQ's system selflessly upon himself to rid the world of it.
Actually for the Space Marine game, its more squad based. You can choose one of four squad members for a mission, and you control him, while the rest tag along and be AI Buddies. I'm holding out for some four way multiplayer.
still holding out for a player controlling a squad, i'm pretty sure if they don't do something with squads i will be disappointed.
my guess is this game will fall flat on its ass as well, i don't think it will be possible to appease the hardcore fans
If darksiders is any indication, then I wouldn't expect innovation. Virgil's only game to date is very widely known for being an unsubtle mix of other games.
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Yeah. I posted that and was like. *facepalm*
But decided not to edit. THANKS FOR DERAILING THE THREAD.
I mean if by derailing you mean "bringing up" the importance of slaanesh then thank you I mean you cant have a 40k game without big tall men who kill things and like to hump corpses.
Yeah. I posted that and was like. *facepalm*
But decided not to edit. THANKS FOR DERAILING THE THREAD.
I mean if by derailing you mean "bringing up" the importance of slaanesh then thank you I mean you cant have a 40k game without big tall men who kill things and like to hump corpses.
I love how slanesh is supposed to be this depraved god but in every 40k book/game i can always imagine more depravity hahaha--call that depravity? I'LL SHOW YOU DEPRAVED!
I love how slanesh is supposed to be this depraved god but in every 40k book/game i can always imagine more depravity hahaha--call that depravity? I'LL SHOW YOU DEPRAVED!
Speaking of slaaneshi "depravity" I think my favorite scene was in the book legion when the Emperor's Children fell.
Had space marines sexing up dead bodies and instruments. It was funny, and peculiar.
I love how slanesh is supposed to be this depraved god but in every 40k book/game i can always imagine more depravity hahaha--call that depravity? I'LL SHOW YOU DEPRAVED!
I know it's not 40k (rather warhammer fantasy) but Slaanesh is done the most justice in Elfslayer by Nathan Long...
It's yet another book where Gotrek and Felix pretty much kill everything, this time the body count is composed of hundreds of Slaanesh worshiping dark elves. I gotta say, it's perhaps the best Gotrek and Felix book, slow start amazing amazing finish.
But it has some of the sickest scenes ever in it. Scenes of depravity that are really really, well, sick.
For example, theres a scene in the Dark Elf version of a strip club, where the Dark Elves are jackin it to nude children... nude children screaming as molten gold gets slowly poured on them.
Yeah...
I always saw Dark Elves as stupid emo elves, after that book I see them in a totally different light.
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ArchonexNo hard feelings, right?Registered Userregular
edited March 2010
That scene in that particular Gotrek and Felix novel only makes it all the sweeter when Gotrek finally loses his cool and goes apeshit and tears the place apart (Literally.).
But yeah, having actual Dark Elves/Dark Eldar in a game would probably classify it as an adults only game, were they depicted properly. Even some Slaaneshi followers get squicked out at some of the shit they do.
I love how slanesh is supposed to be this depraved god but in every 40k book/game i can always imagine more depravity hahaha--call that depravity? I'LL SHOW YOU DEPRAVED!
Speaking of slaaneshi "depravity" I think my favorite scene was in the book legion when the Emperor's Children fell.
Had space marines sexing up dead bodies and instruments. It was funny, and peculiar.
Yeah but i read that as more of them slaughtering everyone as they couldent take part in the sexing. It also wasent legion it was Fulgrim--legion is the alpha legion book.
I gotta say molten gold on screaming children is pretty good but pretty much anything from japan would do.
I can only imagine this focussing on the lower tiered roles of each 'race'. Much like Necromunda and Inquisitor, which a few others have mentioned.
I genuinely don't anticipate being able to play as a Space Marine, it just doesn't fit the MMO template at all. There'd be practically no customisation available (Green power armour or red power armour?) and equipment choice would be pretty limited.
It makes a whole lot of sense for this to be a gritty, underworld game based on Hive gangs, Inquisitors, Cultists, Pirates, Scouts, Officers and troops. They could get really far into the whole 'Heretical' thing and basically base their 'factions' around this. Almost every race has something to offer this template, and those that don't could easily feature prominently as NPC's.
Yeah. Plus, space marines would kick ass in PvP.
Lets see.
Ork Vs. Space Marine. What does the ork have? Crappy bolters that are held together with duct tape and spit, who can't aim, and love to rush in for the kill.
Whats does the space marine have? YEARS and YEARS of training and preparation, kickass accuracy, and martial prowess.
Ork charges, space marine shoots it once.
Ork explodes due to bolter impact.
Space marine wins.
Of course, that is, if they are following the lore. But then again, we have to wait until summer to see it.
I can only imagine this focussing on the lower tiered roles of each 'race'. Much like Necromunda and Inquisitor, which a few others have mentioned.
I genuinely don't anticipate being able to play as a Space Marine, it just doesn't fit the MMO template at all. There'd be practically no customisation available (Green power armour or red power armour?) and equipment choice would be pretty limited.
It makes a whole lot of sense for this to be a gritty, underworld game based on Hive gangs, Inquisitors, Cultists, Pirates, Scouts, Officers and troops. They could get really far into the whole 'Heretical' thing and basically base their 'factions' around this. Almost every race has something to offer this template, and those that don't could easily feature prominently as NPC's.
What you talkin bout son? Plenty of custimation for Space Marines.
As far as equipment goes... jesus man? How the hell is that limited? Do you even know 40k? You got chainswords, hammers, axes, guns of all shapes and sizes, flame throwers, grenades, rocket launchers, plasma weapons, jet packs, standards, and all sorts of crazy tech stuff!
As far as armor goes... ever play Dawn of War 2? As an RTS it's pretty limited, but still got some fairly different looking armor. The later armor is much more epic then early armor. You can really visually see the diffrence in characters as they gain levels... and like I said... it's an RTS.
Space Marines fit the MMO template pretty damn well. Only problem is how to handle their uber when compared to other races. Chaos Space Marines, Eldar, and Orks (the biggest ones) can match Space Marines in combat though...
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Space Marines fit the MMO template pretty damn well. Only problem is how to handle their uber when compared to other races. Chaos Space Marines, Eldar, and Orks (the biggest ones) can match Space Marines in combat though...
Problem with this in my book is... EVERYTHING does this. Every single game (pretty much) has Space Marines, Chaos, Elder, Orks, and Tau, as the classes to play. I do like Tristeros idea of having the lower tiered races. I'd absolutely love to see some inquisition stuff, and I'd love for it to focus on the humans more. You got imperial guard and all of their regiments (not to mention the millions of different homeworlds, Cadia, Catachan, Valhalla, to name a few.) You can have heretics (from each of the four gods respectively), te inquisition, psykers.
Hell, you don't even have to make alien races playable at all. Of course, that would piss 0off a lot of people, but it'd work.
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Just_Bri_ThanksSeething with ragefrom a handbasket.Registered User, ClubPAregular
edited March 2010
Plus, the standard armor for Marines in the 41 millennium is Mark 7. Mark 8 exists, but it has not reached wide distribution since a Marine keeps his armor all his life, and only the Marines who were initiated after Mark 8 was approved would have it. Many older Marines would still have Mark 6 armor.
Marines are often rewarded for valor and ability with armor and weapon relics, which are all quite old. So you may have a Marine in Mark 7 armor wearing pieces from a set of Mark 6 or Mark 5. The best of the best may have even older pieces.
As for how I would handle Marine epicness, I would make all Orcs pet classes. While a player playing a Marine would just be himself, I would start an Orc with a handful of gretchin and snotling hangars-on and build from there. Orcs come in great numbers, and even if a Marine could easily best an individual Orc, if the Orc player has some backup available all the time it would even the fight.
I would do the same thing with Imperial Guard. Give the Orc three or four NPC allies, give the Guardsmen a half-squad to start with.
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...and when you are done with that; take a folding
chair to Creation and then suplex the Void.
Sorry, but I don't equate Customisation to choosing if I carry a sword, a chainsword, an axe or how many skulls and litany sheets are on my power armour. There is alot of variation between Marines, and even more when you consider the Chapters, but I just don't think it's enough for an MMO and potentially thousands of Marines milling around.
I love Space Marines despite their over-exposure, and I love their background. I think it would be about a million times cooler if the first time you got to witness one of these Gods-among-men ingame was some number of hours down an intense quest line, and one of them just strides into a room and instantly owns everything inside it (I do not mean pwn, either), then your jaw is on the floor, and all you can think is how much you hope he likes you.
I personally fall into the 'Played the tabletop game years ago and remember a few key facts, as well as anything else I found specifically interesting' category.
As we see in many CGI renditions of space marines, they are quite less super than they are portrayed as in Fluff. I think both DoW games (and their cinematics) made Space Marines seem incredibly powerful without overdoing it, unlike the fluff. A simple ork with a shoota can still kill a spacemarine, and the MMO should be able to reflect that.
Can you imagine the population imbalances if you allowed players to be space marines? SM or a small human with a flash light hmm...... The entire population would be SM's no one would play any other race. After reading a few kal jerico comics and reading the necromunda books i'm convinced that the only way the MMO could work is if its about humans and aliens not fucking super humans and aliens.
Theres also the mere fact that theres not supposed to be a fuckton of marines so regardless of how you balance it having potentially hundreds of thousands of marines running will just fuck the lore up. Trist has it right they'll be much more fucking awesome as a scripted NPC that just walks into a scenario and rapes everything screaming FOR THE EMPEROR! as you stare in awe.
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Just_Bri_ThanksSeething with ragefrom a handbasket.Registered User, ClubPAregular
As we see in many CGI renditions of space marines, they are quite less super than they are portrayed as in Fluff. I think both DoW games (and their cinematics) made Space Marines seem incredibly powerful without overdoing it, unlike the fluff. A simple ork with a shoota can still kill a spacemarine, and the MMO should be able to reflect that.
It is very hard to directly compare Orcs and Marines except in the broadest sense. They are comparatively strong, and are about equally adept at recovering from wounds, but for different reasons.
The Space Marine may be a bit harder to kill individually because they by-default have better armor. The Orcs make up for this by having a metric fuck-ton more Orcs.
The real difference comes in what each side dies with its might. The Orcs mass into an area, take and hold, and specifically look to engage in combat with anything they can. If it doesn't fight back it is food, fuel, or slave labor. If it fights back better than the Orcs, well... there are always more Orcs.
The Marines will drop a single squad into a combat area under stealth and rapid strike conditions with a single objective or target in mind, and evacuate just as rapidly. They might take out a bridge or a dam to contain a race like the Orcs, and then take out the war boss, letting the resulting infighting eliminate the opposition for them. These guys typically only recruit from their home world once a generation, and cap out at about 50 aspirants. Casualty rates are LOW for Marines.
The reason Space Marines live for hundreds of years isn't the biological manipulation, but that helps. It is mainly because in order to take advantage of those modifications they first need to be very good about surviving on the battlefield.
Get in, hit hard once, get out leaving the enemy nothing to shoot at. The books really like talking about the dramatic last stands though, since that sells books.
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Get in, hit hard once, get out leaving the enemy nothing to shoot at. The books really like talking about the dramatic last stands though, since that sells books.
Marines are a scalpel to the guards sledge hammer, but I'd say you're being a tad generic when describing the role of Marines in general as small scale tactical hit and run.
There are generic codex chapters who can fill multiple tactical roles, as well as the more specialised chapters such as the Space Sharks (specialising in Orbital Drop Pod Assaults), Sons Of Arura (Armoured Spear Head Assaults.) White Scars (Hit and Run) Raven guard (Stealth tactics).
Then we have the more tactically flexible but theme based Chapters, a good example for one of these chapters is the Space Wolves (as flexible as a Codex chapter but with and emphasis on mid to close combat range combat)
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Just_Bri_ThanksSeething with ragefrom a handbasket.Registered User, ClubPAregular
Marines are a scalpel to the guards sledge hammer, but I'd say you're being a tad generic when describing the role of Marines in general as small scale tactical hit and run.
There are generic codex chapters who can fill multiple tactical roles, as well as the more specialised chapters such as the Space Sharks (specialising in Orbital Drop Pod Assaults), Sons Of Arura (Armoured Spear Head Assaults.) White Scars (Hit and Run) Raven guard (Stealth tactics).
Then we have the more tactically flexible but theme based Chapters, a good example for one of these chapters is the Space Wolves (as flexible as a Codex chapter but with and emphasis on mid to close combat range combat)
Tactical flexibility is a useful tool, but that doesn't invalidate anything I have said about how a Marine Chapter would typically operate. Also, with a thousand Chapters, most at least subtly different from the dictates of the Codex Astertes, being generic is all I've got.
You have to look at what a Marine Chapter can physically accomplish regardless of specialized tactics or favored equipment load-out however: A Chapter typically has only a thousand line personnel. Even transport pilots are typically drawn from the line personnel, not support personnel like you would expect from a force with such tight size restrictions.
Hit and run, however specifically it may be accomplished, is the only real winning tactic a Chapter has. Everything else is suicide missions, and the fluff doesn't have recruitment nearly high enough to replace losses if those became popular. It takes years just to mature a new gene-seed if one is unrecoverable from a fallen Marine.
Look at the loss of the Dark Angel's First Company as an example of what happens there. 100 of the hardest Marines the Dark Angels had went in and five came out. Many suits of fabulously valuable armor were lost, of which it would take decades (at a minimum, if my understanding of Mars is correct) to replace. The chapter's fighting power took an undeniable hit. A chapter can't afford to soak that kind of loss, not least of which would have the consequence that the Tech Priests of Mars would be infuriated at the loss of the armor.
Edit: Dropping from Orbit, zooming in on Speeders or Thunderhawks, teleporting in to the objective... It's all hit and run.
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Posts
How much lore is there for The Dark Age of Technology?
Critical Failures - Havenhold Campaign • August St. Cloud (Human Ranger)
From the OP:
I'm sure things can still change, but it is probably safe to assume that it takes place some time in the 41st millenium.
Part of the beauty of 40k is you can have huge, solar system sweeping story lines, involving millions of combatants, and billions of deaths, and it barely registers as a blip in the grand scheme of the galaxy as a whole.
So they can basically do whatever they want, however they want and it doesn't necessarily have to be canon or lore breaking.
That video really should say
NO PITY! NOT REMORSE! NO FEAR!
And have black armour with white shoulders space marine
I would be upset if I was stuck with Ultra Marines as my only choice if they had space marines in the game
I would be all about a Necromunda game.
HERETIC! BE CLEANSED BY MY HOLY FLAMER!
Friggin' pansy-ass codex clingers. "Oh look, my big brother wrote a book; you totally have to do what it says! DAD! THEY'RE NOT FOLLOWING THE BOOK!"
Obi-Wan
Sherlock
Clouseau
It is from Relic. http://www.spacemarine.com/
It looks like a 3rd person action game, possibly based on a scaled up DoW 2 engine? The website calls it an 'action RPG' so you'll presumably be able to upgrade your character or weapons and armor.
Pretty early in development though, from what I can tell. Probably a mid to late 2011 release would be my initial guess. But I could be wrong.
Man, if they made this a series...like, the first one is Space Marine, the second one is Exarch, etc. Where you get to do the action/RPG thing with a bad ass of every race...I'd own every game.
And it sort of makes sense really, that Relic would move in this direction. I mean, if you want to get technical, DoW2 was a squad based action RPG that has an RTS multi-player component.
Which brings us back to the MMO version, one thing about MMOs is the generally smaller number of things going on at once. I suppose that's partly because it's easier to balance things when individual enemies are made soloable in ones and twos, rather than 10s and 20s. Having said that, I would kind of like to see a 40k mmo where the number of enemies are rather large. So it feels like battles, rather than skirmishes.
I think that's part of what I keep sticking on in my head when speculating. The 40k setting seems made for large squads and armies, not individuals doing what they want, when they want. I wonder how/if they will represent that in the game.
As far as the MMO, yah, that's going to be interesting. Warhammer, in all it's forms, is really about gigantic, epic, conflict. Yah, tabletop 40k is more about tactical squad based combat (as compared to Epic anyway), but it's still about squads of units moving around a battlefield.
Ever since aion fell flat on its ass i think they'll stay away from a WoW based game because theres no ways in hell they could compete with all the features aion had and aion couldent compete with WoW. They might just be forced towards a unique MMO purely because of WoW's dominance which is actually awesome--WoW is like jesus taking EQ's system selflessly upon himself to rid the world of it.
my guess is this game will fall flat on its ass as well, i don't think it will be possible to appease the hardcore fans
If darksiders is any indication, then I wouldn't expect innovation. Virgil's only game to date is very widely known for being an unsubtle mix of other games.
Image by Sharpwriter on deviantart.com
Fix'd
SC2: XxKhrushchev.539
Yeah. I posted that and was like. *facepalm*
But decided not to edit. THANKS FOR DERAILING THE THREAD.
I mean if by derailing you mean "bringing up" the importance of slaanesh then thank you I mean you cant have a 40k game without big tall men who kill things and like to hump corpses.
While having a 4 way.
SC2: XxKhrushchev.539
With corpses from the previous kills.
Speaking of slaaneshi "depravity" I think my favorite scene was in the book legion when the Emperor's Children fell.
Had space marines sexing up dead bodies and instruments. It was funny, and peculiar.
SC2: XxKhrushchev.539
I know it's not 40k (rather warhammer fantasy) but Slaanesh is done the most justice in Elfslayer by Nathan Long...
http://www.amazon.com/Elfslayer-Gotrek-Felix-Nathan-Long/dp/1844166635/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1269724241&sr=8-1
It's yet another book where Gotrek and Felix pretty much kill everything, this time the body count is composed of hundreds of Slaanesh worshiping dark elves. I gotta say, it's perhaps the best Gotrek and Felix book, slow start amazing amazing finish.
But it has some of the sickest scenes ever in it. Scenes of depravity that are really really, well, sick.
For example, theres a scene in the Dark Elf version of a strip club, where the Dark Elves are jackin it to nude children... nude children screaming as molten gold gets slowly poured on them.
Yeah...
I always saw Dark Elves as stupid emo elves, after that book I see them in a totally different light.
Image by Sharpwriter on deviantart.com
But yeah, having actual Dark Elves/Dark Eldar in a game would probably classify it as an adults only game, were they depicted properly. Even some Slaaneshi followers get squicked out at some of the shit they do.
Rated MaM for Massive amounts of Masturbation.
I ,like Keanu Reeves, I may have gone too far.
SC2: XxKhrushchev.539
Warhammer40k: Lord of the Cock Rings.
I think I may have gone just far enough.
Yeah but i read that as more of them slaughtering everyone as they couldent take part in the sexing. It also wasent legion it was Fulgrim--legion is the alpha legion book.
I gotta say molten gold on screaming children is pretty good but pretty much anything from japan would do.
I genuinely don't anticipate being able to play as a Space Marine, it just doesn't fit the MMO template at all. There'd be practically no customisation available (Green power armour or red power armour?) and equipment choice would be pretty limited.
It makes a whole lot of sense for this to be a gritty, underworld game based on Hive gangs, Inquisitors, Cultists, Pirates, Scouts, Officers and troops. They could get really far into the whole 'Heretical' thing and basically base their 'factions' around this. Almost every race has something to offer this template, and those that don't could easily feature prominently as NPC's.
Lets see.
Ork Vs. Space Marine. What does the ork have? Crappy bolters that are held together with duct tape and spit, who can't aim, and love to rush in for the kill.
Whats does the space marine have? YEARS and YEARS of training and preparation, kickass accuracy, and martial prowess.
Ork charges, space marine shoots it once.
Ork explodes due to bolter impact.
Space marine wins.
Of course, that is, if they are following the lore. But then again, we have to wait until summer to see it.
What you talkin bout son? Plenty of custimation for Space Marines.
As far as equipment goes... jesus man? How the hell is that limited? Do you even know 40k? You got chainswords, hammers, axes, guns of all shapes and sizes, flame throwers, grenades, rocket launchers, plasma weapons, jet packs, standards, and all sorts of crazy tech stuff!
As far as armor goes... ever play Dawn of War 2? As an RTS it's pretty limited, but still got some fairly different looking armor. The later armor is much more epic then early armor. You can really visually see the diffrence in characters as they gain levels... and like I said... it's an RTS.
Space Marines fit the MMO template pretty damn well. Only problem is how to handle their uber when compared to other races. Chaos Space Marines, Eldar, and Orks (the biggest ones) can match Space Marines in combat though...
Image by Sharpwriter on deviantart.com
Problem with this in my book is... EVERYTHING does this. Every single game (pretty much) has Space Marines, Chaos, Elder, Orks, and Tau, as the classes to play. I do like Tristeros idea of having the lower tiered races. I'd absolutely love to see some inquisition stuff, and I'd love for it to focus on the humans more. You got imperial guard and all of their regiments (not to mention the millions of different homeworlds, Cadia, Catachan, Valhalla, to name a few.) You can have heretics (from each of the four gods respectively), te inquisition, psykers.
Hell, you don't even have to make alien races playable at all. Of course, that would piss 0off a lot of people, but it'd work.
Marines are often rewarded for valor and ability with armor and weapon relics, which are all quite old. So you may have a Marine in Mark 7 armor wearing pieces from a set of Mark 6 or Mark 5. The best of the best may have even older pieces.
As for how I would handle Marine epicness, I would make all Orcs pet classes. While a player playing a Marine would just be himself, I would start an Orc with a handful of gretchin and snotling hangars-on and build from there. Orcs come in great numbers, and even if a Marine could easily best an individual Orc, if the Orc player has some backup available all the time it would even the fight.
I would do the same thing with Imperial Guard. Give the Orc three or four NPC allies, give the Guardsmen a half-squad to start with.
chair to Creation and then suplex the Void.
I love Space Marines despite their over-exposure, and I love their background. I think it would be about a million times cooler if the first time you got to witness one of these Gods-among-men ingame was some number of hours down an intense quest line, and one of them just strides into a room and instantly owns everything inside it (I do not mean pwn, either), then your jaw is on the floor, and all you can think is how much you hope he likes you.
I personally fall into the 'Played the tabletop game years ago and remember a few key facts, as well as anything else I found specifically interesting' category.
Theres also the mere fact that theres not supposed to be a fuckton of marines so regardless of how you balance it having potentially hundreds of thousands of marines running will just fuck the lore up. Trist has it right they'll be much more fucking awesome as a scripted NPC that just walks into a scenario and rapes everything screaming FOR THE EMPEROR! as you stare in awe.
It is very hard to directly compare Orcs and Marines except in the broadest sense. They are comparatively strong, and are about equally adept at recovering from wounds, but for different reasons.
The Space Marine may be a bit harder to kill individually because they by-default have better armor. The Orcs make up for this by having a metric fuck-ton more Orcs.
The real difference comes in what each side dies with its might. The Orcs mass into an area, take and hold, and specifically look to engage in combat with anything they can. If it doesn't fight back it is food, fuel, or slave labor. If it fights back better than the Orcs, well... there are always more Orcs.
The Marines will drop a single squad into a combat area under stealth and rapid strike conditions with a single objective or target in mind, and evacuate just as rapidly. They might take out a bridge or a dam to contain a race like the Orcs, and then take out the war boss, letting the resulting infighting eliminate the opposition for them. These guys typically only recruit from their home world once a generation, and cap out at about 50 aspirants. Casualty rates are LOW for Marines.
The reason Space Marines live for hundreds of years isn't the biological manipulation, but that helps. It is mainly because in order to take advantage of those modifications they first need to be very good about surviving on the battlefield.
Get in, hit hard once, get out leaving the enemy nothing to shoot at. The books really like talking about the dramatic last stands though, since that sells books.
chair to Creation and then suplex the Void.
Tactical flexibility is a useful tool, but that doesn't invalidate anything I have said about how a Marine Chapter would typically operate. Also, with a thousand Chapters, most at least subtly different from the dictates of the Codex Astertes, being generic is all I've got.
You have to look at what a Marine Chapter can physically accomplish regardless of specialized tactics or favored equipment load-out however: A Chapter typically has only a thousand line personnel. Even transport pilots are typically drawn from the line personnel, not support personnel like you would expect from a force with such tight size restrictions.
Hit and run, however specifically it may be accomplished, is the only real winning tactic a Chapter has. Everything else is suicide missions, and the fluff doesn't have recruitment nearly high enough to replace losses if those became popular. It takes years just to mature a new gene-seed if one is unrecoverable from a fallen Marine.
Look at the loss of the Dark Angel's First Company as an example of what happens there. 100 of the hardest Marines the Dark Angels had went in and five came out. Many suits of fabulously valuable armor were lost, of which it would take decades (at a minimum, if my understanding of Mars is correct) to replace. The chapter's fighting power took an undeniable hit. A chapter can't afford to soak that kind of loss, not least of which would have the consequence that the Tech Priests of Mars would be infuriated at the loss of the armor.
Edit: Dropping from Orbit, zooming in on Speeders or Thunderhawks, teleporting in to the objective... It's all hit and run.
chair to Creation and then suplex the Void.