How would the imperium use battlesuits?

>morning stars

You mean power flail.

as scouts. imperial doctrine really doesn't have much use for the whole dodging and mobility thing beyond scouting. Its why damn near everything they use is a sold block of armor that moves on good honest treads rather than something that can dodge effectively.

Battlesuit noble houses of course.

Or Robots?

Or Thallax?

>guards see a stormsurge for the first time
>"why the fuck didn't WE think of that?!"

...

The Stormsurge was the result of Tau seeing Imperial stuff and going "why the fuck didn't WE think of that", so...

>Under the assumption that they have developed the technology itself.

Im sure the Admech could be divinely inspired by the Omnimessiah to discover a true design already inherent in the universe that could be described as a battlesuit. IF they wanted to. However, that wouldnt change much of anything in IG doctrine, and I'll use an analogy to illustrate why.

>Its one thing to design a tank that can compete reasonably well against an Abrams/T90/Leo2 ect.
>Its another to design one that can do that while being mass produced as fast as a Sherman tank
>Its another to make said design operate reliably in every environment on earth as well as the moon and mars.
>It also has to be able to be reproduced, in at least downgraded form, in any city greater than 150k pop.
>A small town mechanic needs to be able to maintain it, and a barely literate conscript able to operate it
>It also needs to be demonic possession proof

That's the sort of design and manufacturing obstacle facing the AdMech, on a scale several orders of magnitude larger. The sheer size of the IG is mindboggling, and just keeping it supplied with what they have now in a multi-front, multi-millennia long war is a high science in and of its self. Its not worth building 1 crisis suite instead of 10 Leman Russ's.

the guard are large in number, so many zero's

so many

But if they did come up with a design, it wouldn't common in the guard for logistical reasons. Instead, they'd be reserved for a Space Marine like role, caring out surgical strikes against high value targets. But that leads us into the question of why bother with the suits in the 1st place?

While a Crisis Suite is undoubtedly better than a SM crunch wise, in fluff its a lot closer. The Marine is more versatile, and they tend to have longer service lives before going down, with many marines surviving centuries of combat.

There's also the Chaos question. Running AI around the Ruinous Powers without a soul or machine spirit to protect it is like leaving an unlocked car running in the ghetto. Somebody's taking it for a ride.

So, that battlesuit's either going to need an advanced machine spirit, which makes it even harder to mass produce and opens it to becoming temperamental. Or they'll need servitor brains rigged in there as some sort of bio computer. That also seems difficult and open to all kinds of potential fuckery.

While it works for the Tau and their tiny, Chaos free empire, battlesuites seem like a lot of work for something that could just as easily be taken care of by a few marines, a knight, or a fuckton of derpy IG box tanks.

put a space marine in it

Give them to richboys and allow them to personally fistfight criminals.

Actually, it was more along the lines of

"Ha, that shit sounds fucking dumb and impractical let's ignore what these primitive fuckheads are doing."

And then they got their shit stomped in by it, so tried to copy it while attempting to keep it in line with their doctrines and somehow producing something effective despite having no experience with the things in question and lacking the Eldar's Soul-possession to give it instinctive and fluidic grace.

Only reason they got their shit stomped in was because GW needed to sell more big robots.

The traditional Tau method of Mont'ka and Kauyon and mounting titan weapons on large flyers instead of walkers was sound.

Contrary to popular belief, Boxnaughts are very agile for being a walking sarcophagus, and other patterns of Dreadnaughts like the Contemptor and it's derivatives are way agile while enjoying supremely good armor and heavy weaponry with needing to be anchored down, the only thing lacking is Jump-jet capability and the Blood Angel's are looking into it.

It was only sound when battlefield conditions allowed for it.

Which it almost never did, considering that the vast majority of factions -including the fucking ORKS, are superior when it comes to holding orbit, and a great many of the factions are capable of fucking up Atmospheric conditions something horrific.

I want you to contemplate for a minute what the weather is going to be like once an Imperial, Ork, Chaos, or Tyranid army decides to land on a world.

All of that is in addition to the fact that mounting titan-scale armaments on large flyers is the rough equivalent to arming a zeppelin with a nuclear bomb.

Dangerous, but it's both fragile and a huge target to the point it's not even funny.

All the Tau losses to titans were defensive wars. The Tau destroyer air force would already have been planetside.

"Proper" Titans would still have made more sense, it would be the rough equivalent of mounting your Ground-to-Orbit armaments on movable pylons yes, but the large flyers would really have been more vulnerable.

It's the simple idea of "If something is large, it's important." combined with "If something is flying, it crashes pretty hard."

Personally, I DO find Titans and assorted Giant Mecha silly, though I'm not one of those "All weapons platforms belong on treads, even if the environment isn't suited for them" guys, but flying Titan-equivalents is too much for me, although it would make Orbit-to-Ground deployment much easier compared.

relevant

If all of those Guardsmen fired their lasguns, they would quite honestly simple destroy the material universe wherever they hit.

Do you mean tanks? Cus the imperium has tanks, they're better than mechs and doesn't require you to have the body and soul of an angsty 14 year old to drive.

They'd likely get used by the SOB if the Imperium developed them.

There isn't much advantage to a Marine in one over a human and the SOB are a highly elite group with a strong history of ranged, highly mobile troops. They also have huge amounts of doshmoney to highly equip smaller amounts of people.

So you'd see them likely in the role of Seraphim+

Walkers serve really only to navigate the absolute worst of terrain, Tank traps and ruined cities, for anything else you probably want tank treads, Wheels if you happen to have the luxury of paved roads.

Which brings up two questions for me:
1) Why is the Sentinel the Primary scout vehicle of the Imperial guard, Why isn't it the Tauros, and save the Sentinel for the rare urban combat mission?
-It's relatively slow for a scout, the Lexicanum gives it 20kph off road (25 on,) vs the Chimera of 55/70kph, and Only War Shield of Humanity has the Tauros at 120kph.

2) Why isn't there a Heavier weapons platform Sentinel more comparable to a Battletank, that can take and dish out some punishment?
-Specifically a vehicle under the Imperial guard, and not a space marine or titanicus vehicle.
-Basically: Why doesn't the Imperial Guard have a Dreadnought equivalent for heavy fighting in ruined urban environments?

Pic Related looks like it would have serious heat and power issues though, Maybe Dual Autocannon and a Rocket Launcher would be a more feasible configuration

>battlesuites seem like a lot of work for something that could just as easily be taken care of by a few marines, a knight, or a fuckton of derpy IG box tanks.

Yeahhhh....

And said battlesuit had taken 2 unit worth of marines, a (or couple or even more if its an ace) knight, and a fuckton of scrapped IG tanks with them.

Seriously, a multiwound armored all terrain weapon platform? why not?

> Why is the Sentinel the Primary scout vehicle of the Imperial guard, Why isn't it the Tauros, and save the Sentinel for the rare urban combat mission

You know, the term "scouts" not actually emphasize on speed alone, its about maneuverability in all terrain, risk, and size

Chimera even with that speed, is too high profile and hard to conceal, plus it take a worth of crew with them, which is kinda waste of manpower for such a risky job.

Moreso the taurox, hell do you even see the design of that shit, it will had a bad time in rought terrain and its really high, so put them for scouting mission is like painting "hit me" mark on them.

Sentinel, even if they're slow compared to both above, are smaller, cheaper, can move in all terrain, and only take minimal crew with them. Also with that thin frame, it can easily be concealed, and can adjust their height by folded their joints.