What are the some of the most idiosyncratic Legions in the Empire? Does the Empire have a Legion specialized in taking down the weakly-godlike entities? If that is the case, I suspect such Legion(s) will be under jurisdiction of the Transcend.
Also, considering the Empire has twin war-gods (Dúréníän and Kalasané) I wonder each of the gods possesses their own Chariot and Legion.
For the simplest answer, here’s a screenshot from my notes listing the not–one-of-the-standard-four type legions:
For that, you’d be looking for the 74th (“God Slayers”) and 159th (“God’s Pallbearers”). They were both around pre-Transcend, but in the modern day while not strictly under its jurisdiction, they do receive an appropriate amount of Transcendent assistance.
Ah, but they have different focuses. Dúréníän’s the god of strategy and generalship, so is usually found behind the lines: if he embodies in anything, it’s probably the artificial moon Core Command is housed in. Kalasané’s is the god of battle, valor, and personal combat - more of a soldier’s god than a general’s, so he’s the one who takes the field in God of War.
Neither of them has a specific legion (although they share a militant religious order), because in their role as patrons of the Imperial Military Service, it would be improper to show that sort of favoritism. And the individual legions, of course, do have their own patron spirits.
Oh my. What an unanticipated gift. There are so many great ideas in there. A feast for the eyes and soul!
There are equally many questions to ask. So I will divide them into three parts.
Are all legions made up of the roughly same number of legionaries?
I suppose not-numbered Legions are the standard ones? Could the specialist Legions be “farmed out” to the standard Legions in a piecemeal fashion? After all, operating thousands of specialists as a single unit can be inefficient and wasteful.
Are the 1st, 6th and 7th Legions equipped with better and/or specialized wargear?
How the Hounds of Makrast met their end? There must have been a great many legions that fought against slavers. What makes them special?
There are many different combat engineering Legions, and more than one communications specialist Legions, but only a single logistics Legion. Why is that?
Is the 19th the sole siege specialist Legion?
What is the meaning of the denomination “Guardsmen”?
Is the Emperor’s Eye specialized in the execution of the perfect decapitation strike in an equally perfect plan founded upon the perfectly gathered information?
May you kindly provide some examples of experimental technology deployed by the 32nd? And how do the 32nd and 42nd differ from one another?
Don’t the Empire make an extensive use of automata? What makes the 43rd special? Do they simply use better/more “elite” technology, or is there something else?
Are the Firestorm Riders specialized in the flame-based warfare and battlefield conflagration?
Are there some hidden meanings in the names of the combat engineering Legions? Their particular specializations may differ from each other, but I can’t be sure.
If my curiosity makes you uncomfortable in any way, please let me know. I will apologize for incommoding you and cease the interruption immediately. The above question has been divided into three parts to minimize the burden on you, in addition to other reasons. Still, I’m concerned whether I’m practically bombarding you with questions.
I’d like to prioritize the questions concerning the Transcend and Transcend-affilitated Legions!
For that, you’d be looking for the 74th (“God Slayers”) and 159th (“God’s Pallbearers”). They were both around pre-Transcend, but in the modern day while not strictly under its jurisdiction, they do receive an appropriate amount of Transcendent assistance.
Were the 74th and 159th around pre-Transcend? That is insane. How had they already managed to kill gods without patronage of their own gods? Really, what precisely is the “applied eschatology”?
I wonder if the 74th and 159th are still killing gods with the standard, Empire-grade equipment. In this case, the role of the Transcend would be limited primarily to providing necessary information.
From whom does the 160th receive its orders? From the entire Transcend? Or from a more militant portion of it?
Does the 160th make use of specialized Transcend-grade weaponry?
Ah, but they have different focuses. Dúréníän’s the god of strategy and generalship, so is usually found behind the lines: if he embodies in anything, it’s probably the artificial moon Core Command is housed in. Kalasané’s is the god of battle, valor, and personal combat - more of a soldier’s god than a general’s, so he’s the one who takes the field in God of War.
Fascinating. Are there any other Eikone that could function as war gods? For instance, Barrascán and Braníël.
Neither of them has a specific legion (although they share a militant religious order), because in their role as patrons of the Imperial Military Service, it would be improper to show that sort of favoritism. And the individual legions, of course, do have their own patron spirits.
Patron spirits. How lovely. Very Roman indeed. The main difference is, the former is being very real. How the patron spirits act upon the Legions?
May you please elaborate on the militant religious orders of the Empire? Besides, how many religious orders are there in the Empire?
Have tested some of functions of the site. It seems completely deleting the post is not viable.
Yes. Full establishment gives each legion a fighting strength around 14,000.
Ah, I may have inadvertently misled you. By the numbers, in the 7200-ish milieu I’ve set a lot of things in, peacetime mobilization rates let the Empire field 77,000 full legions. I don’t have names and details and assignments for all of them, naturally enough - the only ones in my notes are the ones I’ve had something to say about and/or inspiration for.
(And the above table is only the one for the special legions that don’t fit into the normal four categories - light infantry, light cavalry, heavy infantry, heavy cavalry - which is why you don’t see those on the list; I keep them in separate tables. 
Every legion has a number, and all but the very newest a name and standard to go with it.)
This is also the answer to your questions 5 and 6, by the way. They’re not unique in the Legions, only in the small subset of them I’ve created so far.
Certainly. In building forces for particular purposes, it’s not uncommon to break off an ala, merarchy, or cohort (roughly equivalent to brigade/regiment/battalion) for independent operation, and it’s particularly common for the legions of specialists.
The 1st primarily have the ceremonial versions, as part of their job is to be on display. (Unlike a lot of ceremonial versions on Earth, the 1st’s equipment isn’t even slightly less functional; but it is definitely prettier, as an additional part of their job is to be on display.)
I haven’t yet defined the 6th and 7th strictly. They’re intended to be remnants of a doctrine that was selected against[1] for general use (worked really well, but too expensive to justify), but left behind in its wake a couple of units that were too useful to disestablish.
I’m saving the details of their story in case I feel moved to write it one day, but the quick summary is that they’re the only legion to be completely wiped out. They guarded the pass of Makrast (“Cloven Mountain”) along the Brightwall, met what amounted to a Genghis Khan-level horde trying to pass the wall from the not-yet-Imperialized south, and held it back; but before reinforcements could reach them –
Well. They all died where they stood, and they all died standing. And that carved their legend into history.
Just what it sounds like: specialists in holding and protecting an area. (Legion doctrine by and large is lightning-fast maneuver warfare: hit fast, hit hard, move on. It makes digging in and holding ground more of a special function.)
Not entirely on their own, but when the Legions execute an operation exactly like that, the Emperor’s Eye are the Legion that went in first to gather the information and perform any necessary sabotage.
Whenever there’s some new technology to test - whether it’s as simple as a new model of battle carbine or something completely paradigm-breaking, it goes to the 32nd or one of the other experimental technology legions to use in the field before it gets rolled out to all the other legions. Back in the days where the 32nd earned their name, the leading edge of technology was still quite “steampunk”-ish, so they were fielding clank legionaires, five-furnace dragons (steam tanks with style), coilspring serpents, and all sorts of nifty stuff like that.
As for special weapons legions like the 42nd, they specialize in being very good at rapid cross-training on new weapons unlike anything in current use (hence “special”). Sometimes that means something advanced but off-the-wall that’s ended up stored in the Imperial Military Service vaults until they need exactly that thing. Sometimes it means something suitable for particularly outré circumstances, likewise. And sometimes it means that due to really bizarre circumstances, the Military Service has a sudden need for horse archers, longbowmen, or a pike square. Either way, it’s legions like the 42nd that get to learn how… really quickly.
This is one of those obscure technical points, I’m afraid. The Imperial Service does make a lot of use of robots (both “smart” cybershells and “dumb” drones) and other automation, but “automata”, in this case, means “not thinky at all”.
The Brass Legion started out in the same part of steam-and-clockwork-driven history as the machines that gave the 32nd their name, and they were, in fact, very simple clockwork legionaries. No artificial intelligence driving them; just a bunch of cams and cogs driving automatonic responses. Very limited, but useful enough.
Why are they still around?
Well, apart from being a fascinating piece of military history, when fighting some opponents - and I’ll talk about this some more when I respond to your other post - there’s a definite advantage to legionaries that can’t be talked to, persuaded, intimidated, hacked, reprogrammed, or infected.
They just keep coming.
That’s where their name came from, indeed. Although it’s not their only option: if tasked to go wreck things underwater or on a solar array, they do have other choices available. But fire? Fire is near-universally scary.
Legion names often come from within, and reference some particular custom or incident, so while they may occasionally offer hints as to specializations, just as often they refer to something not terribly relevant. Of the ones on the list, we can be reasonably sure that the 93rd (“Wrench Wenches”) came from one of the Empire’s more matriarchal constituent nations, and the 168th (“Ethring Marine Engineering Brigade”) have special skills in exactly that, but the others are probably just noodle incidents.
No, no problem. As long as you don’t mind that answers aren’t guaranteed in any particular timeframe (my time and ability to respond varies widely), ask away!
Tank dragoons, maybe? Maybe. ↩︎
