[Marauderlegion]

There are a lot of technical difficulties to overcome in actually doing it (Comms, travel) and even more thematic/story problems (not as cool, or compelling), but presume first it those were possible or had been overcome. I don't recall an overall Grand Crusade HQ, was there ever anything else like this in cannon?

Someone has to be in charge, of course, but what if we could fill out the rest of a General Staff of the great crusade?

You're going to need an overall leader of course. Let's just put Horus there for now.

After that;

-Chief of Staff, because someone needs to organize it all (Guilliman? Dorn?)
-but not Personnel, because I feel that is better handled at a lower level, as a more technical endevour or dovetailed with another role.
-Intelligence (Couple different options there)
-Operations (Guilliman or Dorn, again?)
-Logistics (Perterabo perhaps? maybe with an R&D section separate or cooperative with Mars for his own projects?)

If you're looking for jobs for people then Psychological Warfare might apply for Curze.


I'm not sure this makes sense, even if you can overcome the communication and travel issues, but what do you guys think about who fills out what? Staff roles and who fills them.

 

[Vaz]

Are we pigeon holing the Primarchs yet again? I thought that was debunked years ago?

If the logistics of the Great Crusade make the title of Warmaster obsolete, then the idea of having petty titles like Fleetmaster etc is equally obsolete.

Expeditionary Fleets were often huge in size. They weren't always lead by a Primarch, but instead by a personage of immense capability - either a high ranking Legionary such as a Company Captain (in 40k terms, approximately a Chapter Master), Excertus Imperialis strategic commanders (General, or Admiral level), Mechanicum Taghmata Magos (Primes or Dominus') or Rogue Traders with their private Mercenary fleets.

Self contained, with Imperial Mandata to operate as they see fit and to explore the outer reaches of the galaxy and subjugate those who did not willingly accept the Imperial Truth, the need of a centralised command is unnecessary. Plus, if a Primarch said to do something, it would happen, regardless of whether said Primarch was Angron or Horus himself. The only thing which could gainsay a Primarch was another Primarch - and there had been legion on legion conflict before - such as the IF versus the White Scars when the Scars thought that the Fists breached the honour code, or the Wolves versus World Eaters, or the legions which attempted to prevent Curze from destroying Nostramo, or the Alpha Legion in general.

Legion versus Legion conflict has happened prior to the heresy, as a result of primarchs and legion upper echelons disagreeing over courses of action. Against such lesser foes as the Excertus Imperialis, they either went along, went their seperate ways, were annihilated, or had those commanders who disagreed with Primarch's course of action forcibly taking early retirement as a result of a premature death.

The appointment of Warmaster to Horus was more than a ceremonial recognition of Horus' ability, it was the Emperor giving Horus a carte blanche to orchestrate the final stages of the galaxy's compliance. Horus was the Emperor in all but name and ability prior to that - now he had the authority of the Emperor's right hand man, to operate in war as if he was the Emperor. The need for a fleet master is irrelevant.

If an Expeditionary fleet was in trouble, it would attempt to flee, or mark a target as dangerous to allow the more capable fleets to attempt to kill it - such as the War on Murder - where the Blood Angels called for aid, and recieved help from the Emperor's Children and the Sons of Horus. But the fleets were self contained.

 

[Over Two Meters Tall!]

I do have the impression, because it's been so long since I read the book, that the Vengeful Spirit did have a much larger general command staff following the appointment of Horus to Warmaster. There are even multiple descriptions of the dichotomy of Horus as the leader of the Sons of Horus to his need to focus on the overarching role as Warmaster with the additional demands. As any number of authors use in plot tools, diving into the bottomless pit of bureaucracy and administraion... or even command structure, is pretty open ground considering it's the outcome of the roles and their effects on the main characters that's important.

 

[Marauderlegion]

I just thought it would be a cool thought exercise guys.

I mean; you could never afford to just yank 6 or a dozen primarchs from the front-lines of the crusade to be super-staffers.

I'm just saying like; who among the Primarchs would make say; the best chief of staff? Or The Intel guy? or whatever?

I mean, like the Warmaster arguments are kinda old-hat now, but what if we asked different questions?