By around m42 there are a few characteristics of war in the imperium of man.
>the only important fighters are the PDF and the arbites The sheer number of PDF forces and arbites officers throughout the empire alone makes them the only forces that matters to the entire security situation of the IOM. The inquisition, sisters, astartes, mechanicus forces, custodes, and more are only used for highly niche purposes. Otherwise, most fights are almost entirely composed of the arbiters and PDF against most aliens and traitors.
>most fights aren’t particularly densely violentThe sheer amount of violence in most conflicts fought in the IOM is explicitly tied to the scale of each conflict being fought. Most battles faced are unamed and consist mainly of firefights between human soldiers against terrorists and mutants using auto guns, lasguns and some light machinery. The fights on each world resemble the battles fought in MENA today. These battles may occasionally have a nuke or a series of air strikes, but most battles will consist entirely of gunfights. Soldiers rely primarily on cheap weapons and equipment. They find themselves dying and coming out of battles that will be forgotten about if they were even remembered.
However, these small battles also comprise most of the deaths faced by war in the IOM due to the sheer number of them present throughout the galaxy. Its not the tyrannic wars or interstellar invasions that fucked up the empire, but the dozens of thousands of planetary and continental scale battles that collectively have pushed much of the galaxy into a near constant state of disrepair.
>space is cold and dark and bigMost PDF and Arbites officers fight in dimly lit or pitch black conditions throughout the imperium. The amount of light that reaches the vast expanses of cold and distant worlds is only barely enough to keep most worlds illuminated enough to be hospital enough for settlements and armed conflict. The danger of warp travel also puts limits on logistics networks throughout the galaxy. Many soldiers may spend years to decades entirely on spacecrafts travelling between worlds and systems before they’ll ever begin their mission. Additionally, the availability of vehicles to transport military equipment throughout each world varies between nonexistent and semi effective. Many soldiers within the empire must march on foot
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