Why no camouflage?

[Magpie]

Thing is the real life of camo-ing up and hiding behind a tree has only been a part of warfare since the 1930's.
Who knows how things will change in the next 38,000 years and it's quite likely to swing back to what has been the usual case for so long.

[Nabterayl]

I think that's an oversimplification. Even in the 1700s the value of being hard to see in a firefight was well understood, and the value of being hard to see in battle generally was well understood for millennia prior to that. Ditto for fighting in skirmish order. It's true that line infantry and its descendants have only been camouflaged generally since the 20th century, but that was because until the mid-19th century or so the loss of command and control was not deemed worth the advantages of camouflage and skirmish order, and there was still offensive value to close order. And then it took a generation or so for those ideas to really take hold in the western military establishment.

If one is inclined to get deconstructionist on 40K, one should ask: are there situations in the battlespaces of the 41st millennium where (i) close order is a net offensive gain as opposed to skirmish order, and (ii) the command and control infrastructure makes highly visible friendlies desirable? I'm betraying my own slant on the lore here, but I'd answer both questions in the negative for all factions.

[Magpie]

Even in a Skirmish order style of fighting is individual camouflage particularly important? Conflicts as recent as Vietnam, in close jungle fighting conditions, still only saw camouflage used by special forces units where hidden surveillance and ambush operations were paramount.

In the much more recent First Gulf War I think a pretty solid case could be made that camo was a distinct disadvantage as evidenced by friendly fire incidents and the subsequent installation of bright orange panels on many vehicles, despite the highly advanced level of C3

Given the particular lack of supporting firepower available to a Space Marine Tactical Squad, a single heavy weapon; single specialist weapon; no on call artillery, scant air support and only direct fire support weapons organic to the Company; it would seem that close order concentration does offer distinct advantages by lessening the area to be effectively suppressed by the Squads Bolters.

For the Space Marine, in vast open terrain there is nowhere to hide, in close terrain IFF is more important, IMO

[Cap'nSmurfs]

I still think too much is being made of the value of "being able to see". Most armies in 40k don't need naked-eye line of sight to you, they can see your heat signature or psychic aura or what have you. If that's the case, it doesn't really matter if you're painted bright blue, because effective camouflage against that sort of capability is going to have to take a different form.

Again, I bring up holofields and camo-cloaks.

[Nabterayl]

Even in a Skirmish order style of fighting is individual camouflage particularly important? Conflicts as recent as Vietnam, in close jungle fighting conditions, still only saw camouflage used by special forces units where hidden surveillance and ambush operations were paramount.

In the much more recent First Gulf War I think a pretty solid case could be made that camo was a distinct disadvantage as evidenced by friendly fire incidents and the subsequent installation of bright orange panels on many vehicles, despite the highly advanced level of C3

Given the particular lack of supporting firepower available to a Space Marine Tactical Squad, a single heavy weapon; single specialist weapon; no on call artillery, scant air support and only direct fire support weapons organic to the Company; it would seem that close order concentration does offer distinct advantages by lessening the area to be effectively suppressed by the Squads Bolters.

For the Space Marine, in vast open terrain there is nowhere to hide, in close terrain IFF is more important, IMO

Space marines are special forces, they just do only a subset of things that our special forces do. When you're guaranteed to be heavily outnumbered and you only outgun people in a highly localized area of the battlespace, I'd think that individual camouflage would be even more important.

I still think too much is being made of the value of "being able to see". Most armies in 40k don't need naked-eye line of sight to you, they can see your heat signature or psychic aura or what have you. If that's the case, it doesn't really matter if you're painted bright blue, because effective camouflage against that sort of capability is going to have to take a different form.

Again, I bring up holofields and camo-cloaks.

Well, I think that's
I don't think that's really true. Most Chaos armies aren't even going to have low-light gear, and neither do most Imperial Guard units. It's not really clear how good the psychic aura sense of your average eldar soldier is, and if it isn't as good as their eyes then camouflage would at least require them to receive targeting information from the people who do have a good enough aura sense to spot you through your camouflage, which would degrade their effectiveness.

Most forces do seem to rely primarily on their eyes when it comes to finding targets and shooting them. Camo-cloaks are primarily visual-spectrum stealth, after all, and they work just fine.

[Cap'nSmurfs]

We can agree to disagree. As someone said above, it depends on how each person views things. I'm more into the science fiction aspects, I know others are much more into the military side of things.