a while back I semi-jokingly suggested “Valor: 40,000”

A valor game set in the Warhammer 40k universe

With the stated goal of “What if we disrespected the scene tone by having everything start out all bleak and hopeless but then overthrow the galactic order and start an era of peace”

“Who cares what canon says. This is our playground now.”

The vague plot idea I had was that some mysterious benefactor gathers together a group of aliens and forces them to work together

So you got a space marine, an eldar, an ork, etc etc

And the stupid sticking place I got stuck on was “how do you justify having an imperial guard and a space marine in the same party and still have fights make sense?”

Like you could just say “this guardsman is really awesome” I guess but it would bug me

Anyway tldr FATE: 40,000 would probably work better

PROBABLY

Well, it depends. I mean, if the Guardsman is a HERO OF THE IMPERIUM! it might work.

You have my attention

Also my first thought is "the guardsman is a Mind-focused build", so the fluff is that he's a tactical genius surviving fights with things that would pulp him by outsmarting them.

Yeah you could probably do it in valor

It would just take all my self control to not be like “B-but space marines are the best at fighting! ”

... consider: the space marine and the guardsman are two halves of a single companion build.

Intriguing

Tactical genius and his terrifyingly strong giant man friend who just carries him around on his shoulder.

The space marine overhead him talk and was like 'this guy is way too smart to get wasted as cannon fodder, mine now'.

The guardsman may or may not have been given a choice in the matter. This is just his life now.

I'm here for this as long as I can bring back my absolutely bugfuck insane Dark Reaper whose answer to half the things was rocket jumping and the other half was magclamps with very little variation.

Alternately, I could play my orc who hit her head hard enough that she's convinced she's a SoB.