Exterminatus
Exterminatus is the Imperium's biggest middle finger they can give to xenos and Chaos infestation on their own planets. It basically involves them UTTERLY DESTROYING THE PLANET via heavy orbital bombardment if they see that it would be impossible to re-take the planet by drowning their enemies in corpses, like they always do.
Before you go onto some sort of moral tirade about the morality of blowing the fuck out of a planet, understand the motherfucking context. A world deemed worthy of Exterminatus is one considered past the point where anything can be salvaged from it - whether because it's about to be lost to ravening monsters that will eat fucking everything or because it will be turned into a fucking daemon-infested shit-pit where neither sanity nor time has any meaning. The alternative is fucking glassing a planet and trying to deny it to the enemy or ensure SOMETHING can be fucking saved. It's the last-ditch measure and it's there because the alternative sucks even fucking worse. Well that's the theory, but the over the top villainy of Warhammer 40k means that the Imperium does sometimes get trigger happy with this, using an Exterminatus on worlds over things like a few of its people coming into contact with alien technology, or a small hint of heresy that would probably not require killing everything.
Deal with it. Bitching any further will rile the Commissariat. You have been warned.
Ways of Exterminatus
The Inquisition has several means for dealing with infestations:
Just Shoot the Shit Out of It
Shooting planets with oversized lazor cannons larger than apartment buildings is the steryotypical way of nuking the fuck out of something you dont like. Space marine battlebarge bombardment cannons, Nova cannons, Lance batteries and any type of HUEG lazor is often used. An example of this being used is when the Dark Angels destroyed their homeworld, Caliban, after it was lost to heretics within their chapter. AFTER SOMEONE THOUGHT IT WAS A GOOD IDEA TO HUNT FOR DINNER USING THE ORBITAL BOMBARDMENT CANNONS FOR OUR NON-HERETICAL AND OBVIOUSLY LOYAL BROTHERS, the Night Lords' purge of Nostramo, and during the purging of Typhon.
Virus Bombs
Loaded with a biological payload that causes living tissue (plant or animal) to rot and decompose, Virus Bombs are only rarely used now because every time they're used, they feed the fucking Plaguefather. The general gist is that they spread a virus that spreads by contact that causes necrosis of tissues and rapid decay of plant and animal tissues. This immediate rot causes a buildup of flammable gases, which in turn, ignite suddenly, sweeping the area in firestorms. A relentless bombing of these fucking things is what reduced Tallarn from a verdant forest world to the desert hellhole it is now. They were also used by Warmaster Horus to kill off loyalist space marines during the Istvaan Campaign of the Horus Heresy.
Cyclonic Torpedoes
Modified Melta Torpedoes, these capship-fired warheads each generate a series of massive self-sustaining nuclear reactions, which, when fired in bulk, trigger a much larger reaction that causes the devastation to spread and multiply, eventually glassing the entire world with nuclear fire given a sufficient barrage. If you fire enough in the same spot it will break through the crust of a planet causing part of the mantle to erupt out, royally butt fucking the planet in the process(See Fire Warrior End Cinematic). Krieg is an example of a World that survived multiple cyclonic torpedo strikes, though in this case it was on a much smaller scale. This was the method that probably killed Typhon in combination with the above shoot the shit out of it method. (Another theory holds that the bombardment is used to remove anything that might prevent the torpedo from reaching the surface).
Two-Stage Cyclonic Torpedoes
Same thing but they use the melta charge to burrow into the planet's crust and down to the core. A second charge then goes off causing the planet to break apart Death Star style. Really the only way to deal with Necron Tomb Worlds since due to their undergroundness they aren't overly bothered by the other two methods which devastate the surface but leave the planet as a whole mostly intact.
IRL Exterminatus
SAGE Bombing
The electronic equivilent of Exterminatus, a Sagebomb is achieved by repeatedly using the SAGE tag on a thread, ergo reducing its priority. When fired in bulk by multiple users simultaneously, such barrages of SAGE are capable of dragging almost any thread screaming down to the depths of a given imageboard, where they will eventually be purged. The ultimate fate for all threads containing Furry and similar Heresy.
The Fall of Typhon
Good to know there's a ceremony for blowing up a planet.
We have arrived, and it is now that we perform our charge. In fealty of the God-Emperor (our Undying Lord) and by the Grace of the Golden Throne, I declare Exterminatus upon the Imperial World of Typhon Primaris. I hereby sign the death warrant of an entire world and consign a million souls to oblivion. May Imperial Justice account in all balance. The Emperor Protects.
The Words of Gabriel Angelos:
It is human nature to seek culpability in a time of tragedy. It is a sign of strength to cry out against fate, rather than to bow one's head and... succumb. Inevitably many will fault the hands upon the sword that fell Typhon, The Ordo Mallaeus, But the Inquisition merely performs the duty of it's office, To further fear them is redundant, to hate them, heretical. Those more sensible will place responsibility with those who forced the hand of the Inquisition. And with some fortune they may foster this hatred into purpose, and further rule their own fate by coming to the Emperor's service.
Yet ultimately... It was I who set these events into motion, with a single blow from my hammer... God Splitter.
-End-
The use of a properly modified version of this quote from Dawn of war Retribution has proved highly effective in saging furfag troll threads and thus has been sanctioned by the holy /tg/ Inquisition for public use (keep it on /tg/).
Exterminatus on the Tabletop
Though not the most effective of lists, it is particularly hilarious and surprisingly fluffy to declare Exterminatus on large table games of 40k. The general gist is to simply stock up on as many large blast templates fired from off table as possible, whether via army list or stratagems. One relatively simple list is to simply take a Witchhunters or Daemonhunters army, field a single Inquisitor and two troop choices (because that's the minimum(though you do not have to use the troops choices in apocolypse)) and then spend the rest of the considerable points value on a fuck-ton of Orbital Bombardments from the Heavy Support section, for a measly 80 to 100 points each. For the average 3000 point game, you can get around 40 of them. Picture your Inquisitor standing on a hilltop, pointing at buildings and going "Bang.", then watching them all blow up. Of course, if the Inquisitor dies, you're fucked. So maybe just camp him in cover. But that's only if you're lame.
TL;DR
You fuckers just backed Chaos and now you have a daemon infestation? Your planet 'gon git raaaaaaaaaaaaaaped.
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The E-quisition vigilantly purges the Emperor's internets of chaos taint.
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If the inhabitants of a planet remotely resembles this creature, it's guaranteed to be exterminatused upon discovery. If pictures like this are found on a thread in /tg/, it's guaranteed to be saged and trolled upon discovery
Vidya: