Infantry Heavy Undivided Legion

[minigun762]

Is there a particular Legion that just has alot of your basic CSMs?

 

I remember the Word Bearers being described as having alot of troops, but many of those are daemons or cultists used as cannon fodder.

The fluff on the Black Legion that I've seen seems to indicate that they took quite a beating after the Horus Heresy and that they're probably one of the smallest Legions around in sheer numbers.

Iron Warriors are often shown to be using huge amounts of machines/tanks/artillery but Storm of Iron gives them a fair number of current Marines and the potential for alot more. I suppose the same could be said about the Black Legion though...

 

I'm clueless as far as the numbers of Night Lords or Alpha Legion Marines who survived to this day.

[Drudge Dreadnought]

Black Legion is one of the largest legions, as many have joined their ranks. They have all sorts of units though, not specifically massed infantry. Word Bearers is what you are looking for.

[Magnus Thane]

Yes the days the BL were on the brink of oblivion has long since passed.

BL is now one of the if not THE biggest Legion.

 

As for your question... i'm inclined to say Alpha Legion, Wordbearers and Night Lords.

All three in my view have a lot of basic csm supplemented above all with the kind of units adding to their 'specialty'.

[minigun762]

Yes the days the BL were on the brink of oblivion has long since passed.

BL is now one of the if not THE biggest Legion.

 

Really? I didn't know that. I thought their lack of a homeworld and early beating kept them down and it was only Abaddon that really held them together.

Sounds like they're better off than I had assumed.

[Iron-Daemon Forge]

I would say Alpha Legion as well. Did they not wipe out half a chapter yet have the other half join there rank (& go into smaller warbands), also being the youngiest of Legion would not have loss as much as other legion??

 

Other than that, Red Corsier getting more Marines to there side... then again they are not a legion but a chapter.

 

Not sure on the Night Lords not really read much there background. While Word Bearer... yes I would possible say so?? as can't they turn Space Marines to join there rank (if I rememeber they said this in the Iron Hands book where it spoke of Word Bearers??).

 

IP

[Epic Thoughts]

I don't really see Night Lords as being an infantry 'heavy' list. It's totally an opinion sort of thing, but I tend to favor Night Lords (and Alpha Legion with them) as being veteran heavy armies. While they're certainly not into tanks and armor like Iron Warriors, I often picture Night Lords taking key objectives with handfuls of highly trained and heavily armed regular units. Alpha Legion to a lesser degree, especially where cultists are concerned. If you're able to field cultist troops, then yes, Alpha Legion would be infantry heavy. However, the new CSM doesn't grant that as an option, and outside of local groups and Apocalypse, that idea isn't legal.

 

Word Bearers were shown as an infantry heavy list in the last codex, but that was because they could take daemons as troops choices. Another idea you might want to take a look at, if you're willing to consider a Cult Legion, is Death Guard. Almost every DG army I've seen, old codex and new, is very heavy on basic troop choices.

 

Edit; Glaring typo.

[Redbaron997]

I would not say BL is the biggest, it may be numerically but it is split into many small warbands and only united when Abby comes along and says get up and go.

 

Word Bearers get my vote, Troops are troops it doesnt have to be daemons. Its the "Multitudes of the Faithful" Idea. That the host of the rightous will bring down the establishment of the corrupt and all that jazz.

[minigun762]

Good thoughts but I can see that maybe my original question wasn't clear enough. :whistling:

 

I didn't mean "what army could be played best with basic CSMs" but rather "which Undivided Legion has the most non-Cult, non-Possessed members in it?"

[Redbaron997]

Oh sorry, well although Possession and Cult is common plcae in the BL, it probably still has the most due merely to its large size, as far as who is probablly most pure? Well Iron Warriors dont seems to like possession to much, and although they have some cult, most would be undivided. While Word bearers have some possessed, cult would not be tolerated as it would be considered heretical. Although Night Legion is known for not really being religious at all, and possession and cult would be minimal (As long as you dont count Raptor cult ;))

 

So as far as sheer numbers? BL. As far as what legion has the largest percent of undivided non possessed? I would wager on Night Legion as cult or possession would be very rare.

[the jeske]

it probably still has the most due merely to its large size, as far as who is probablly most pure?

3-4th ed fluff tells us that after the legions wars the BL to work properlly started possessing [or rather abadon encouraged it] . we have 0 new fluff about BL in the 5th , so we can say that it hasnt changed .

also I really cant remember where it was writen that BL started mass indoctriantion of new marines . I think that the thing with BL is that unlike the WE who were almost extinc after the heresy and legion war , the BL didnt break up in to warbands . Each and every BL guy still works for abadon and thats why they seem to have bigger numbers as even a legions with lots of loses will always be bigger then any warband .

[WarpWhisper]

It has been suggested on several occaisions that the Alpha Legion still actively recruit, or at least turn loyalists 'renegade' (see C:CSM). By that token, then these 'virgin' squads should qualify as an addition to the basic stock. As to numbers, who knows how many Alpha legion there are out there; I bet ten times the rest of the legions put together :P

[AekoldHelbrass]

I'm agree with WarpWhisper, Alpha Legion in some fluffs is mentioned as very stable to mutations, much cleaner than others from fanatics and declared destroyed about 3 times, but still active. If I'll build Alpha Legion armies - I think at least 2 of 3 elita slots will be chosen.

[minigun762]

I was doing more research and it seems came across something noting the Night Lords as having a particularly good geneseed, even when compared to Loyalists. Such a stable geneseed would make it seem more likely that they have a minimal amount of direct warp influence.

 

It makes sense that the Alpha Legion would not have alot of warp-influenced units either, mostly because they tend to operate in normal space (and the whole issue with the Legion book and their role in the universe...)

 

I'm thinking that Word Bearers and Iron Warriors would have about the same amount/percent of normal CSMs compared to warp-influenced ones (Cults or Possessed). The Word Bearers and Possessed and the Iron Warriors and Cults respectively. Black Legion still seems like a hodge podge so I'm thinking its safe to assume that while they may have a greater number of bodies that are "normal", the percent of warp-influenced units is much higher.

 

So in order of "most normal" would probably be

Alpha Legion

Night Lords

Iron Warriors/Word Bearers

Black Legion

[Sception]

It has been a long, long time since the Heresy, and most of the legions look nothing like they did then. Several of the primarchs have either died or abandoned their legion, others are content to lord over their own daemon worlds, dragging their entire Legion into relative inactivity. The Emperor's Children and World Eaters have mostly fractured into separate warbands, the Night Lords have degenerated into debased chaos worship, the Thousand Sons suffered a massive internal split following the Rubrik of Ahriman, which saw dozens of their best sorcerers banished.

 

The Sons of Horus were devastated after the Heresy, and suffered horrible losses inflicted by the other legions as well as internally from the frequent practice of voluntary possession.

 

Abaddon reforged the remaining Sons of Horus as the Black Legion, rejecting Horus and his failure. In the time since, the Black Legion has been the most active of the Chaos Legions in recruitment, whether of new traitor marines, new chaos marines (created through Bile's methods), and even split off warbands from other Legions (the Black Legion has absorbed splinter bands from the Emperor's Children and World Eaters, as well as some of those banished Thousand Sons sorcerers). In fact, warriors of all the legions have fought under Black Legion colors, whether on allied endeavors like the Black Crusades or simply as cast offs and splinter groups absorbed into the Black Legion on a more permanent basis.

 

At this point, the Black Legion is the largest and most diverse of the Chaos Legions. The organization is fairly simple. At the top is Abaddon. Beneath him are the Chaos Lords - warriors and generals whose greatness is recognized by the Despoiler, and rewarded with their own command. Beneath that, organization is loose, as each Chaos Lord is free to manage their host as they see fit, so long as they achieve victory on the battlefield and success in the Warmaster's endeavors. Thanks to this structure, the companies of the Black Legion show a wide range of specialties.

 

 

 

As such, a Black Legion warhost could consist of a large force of undivided infantry, and indeed many do.

 

Outside of the Black Legion, the Word Bearers are the most likely to employ such a force. Slightly less common, but still not unheard of, would be Iron Warriors (who generally prefer tanks and big guns) or Alpha Legion (who generally don't follow any pre-set structure). Night Lords generally don't favor large groups of infantry, as they don't lend themselves to the hit & run terror strikes they prefer. The other Legions are all aligned, and thus do not generally make use of undivided infantry.