Great Company?

[Erazoender]

I was wondering if anyone knew the general layout of a Great Company. I am wanting to make an Apocalypse army about the size of the smallest Great Company (Because the largest are about 1000... :) )

 

Anyways could someone give me a general layout, kind of like the C: SM codex.

 

EX:

 

Battle Company:

- Captain What's his face, master of fail

- Command Squad

- Libraian-who-must-not-be-named

- Chaplain

- 6 Tactical Squads in Rhinos

- 2 Assault Squads

- 2 Devestator Squads

- X amount of Predators

- X amount of Whirlwinds

- X amount of Vindicators

 

etc.

 

I know they are all different, but I need a general idea.

 

Thanks.

[Sharpsilver]

A Great Company will probably resemble the following, a basic layout.

 

Wolf Lord

+ Retune of Wolfguard.

 

+ Unknown number of Rune-priests, wolf priests and Iron-priests. each with dedicated retunes e.g. Servitors for Iron-Priest. Depends on the company.

 

There will always be more blood claws in a great company, due to the poor attrition on them. So here is a basic plan.

 

120 Blood Claws. 8 packs of 15. 24 individual claws. Varies depending on casualties and influx of new blood claws

 

60 Grey Hunters. Might be much lower due to varying survival rates on the transition between blood claw and grey hunter. Here we have 6 squads of 10 Grey Hunters.

 

20 Long Fangs.

 

(This is just a basic 200 man Great Company. What is great about the Space wolves is the lack of Formal Codex organisation. It's all down to the Wolf Lord of each company to decide what the company should include.)

 

A great company undoubtably will include much more than the above, but this is a template on which you could build upon.

 

 

My ideal Great Company would have individual squads with a dedicated rhino.

 

1 Rhino will fit 10 Marines. Either 2 claws of blood claws or 1 grey hunters pack.

 

Razorbacks would be used for Long Fangs, in more fire support roles.

[Forseti]

I don't know how different it was in 2nd ed codex, but I usually go by the most recent..

 

"Grey Hunters make up the majorities of the great companies" meaning theres more hunters than any other troop type..Yes they need a lot of blood claws because of high casualties, but once they mature and are promoted to Grey Hunters they're tough old bastards that survive a long time.

 

Officially there are no Rune Priests, Wolf Priests, Dreadnoughts or Scouts in the great companies..these are all in the Company of the Great Wolf and he attaches them to other companies when needed, though undoubtedly each priest has a preferred lord to serve with, and each dread would most likely be deployed with the company they once called their own.

 

According to the lexicanum (I'm not sure exactly where they got these numbers as there is no reference) the great companies number from 150-1000..I'd assume that the only one with close to 1000 would be grimnar's.

 

I'm hoping in the new codex they give us a more solid idea of the sizes of our Great Companies and what resources they have access to (Kinda irks me when I hear other chapters claiming 1 of their 100man companies can take on a great company because they think they're same size)

[Erazoender]

Thanks for the guidelines. I guess it will be up to me for the final result, but I wanted to know essentially how they ran. And I'm just wondering, would great companies have Predators, Vindicators, Whirlwinds, Land Raiders, and Terminator Wolf Guard? Land Speeders? Bikes?

 

Thanks a lot.

[Bannus]

I don't know where Lexicanium got their numbers either. in fact, no numbers have been mentioned since 2nd edition IIRC - and a "Great Company" really wasn't that different from a Company in terms of size. They were slightly larger (numbering between 100-120 Marines) with the majority of them being Grey Hunters.

 

The Space Wolves were divided only once (the ill-fated Wolf Brothers Chapter) and likely come close to the 1000 Marine mark.

 

A Great company of 1500 Marines (especially for an "unstable" Chapter) would not be tolerated by the =][= or the High Lords of Terra.

[Forseti]

Weren't the legions massive? like 10k+ marines each? Wolves weren't really involved in any massacre type things during the herasy so while UM were atleast 14,000 but SW were 2,000?

 

(where did 1500 come from? I said 150-1000 with the only one being close to 1000 is the chapter master)

 

And I doubt the wolves fear the inquisition, they've proven their loyalty time and time again and didn't they even shoot down an =][= ship because it got too close to Fenris w/o their permission?

[sumeet]

i agree with forseti, the wolves are about as close to the old legions as it gets, they were only divided once and that wasnt succesful, pre heresy they mediumish size legion anyway. And as far as i can tell, the inquisition and terra do not interfere with how they run ther chapter. SW were highly deviant before and after the codex was introduced, there not about 2 change now. So would gauge there size at about few hundred per company with the biggest being about 1000. No were in thier history have the SW had their numbners significantly reduced, as far as i can tell apart for the wolf brothers thing. They have and always will be highly unorthodox, and i think some chapters and the powers that be resent that to a certain extent.

[Florida Gator]

yeah the space wolves are very different from everyone else in that they do everything different... from everybody else. And if you dont believe me when i say the space pups wouldnt be criticised for 500+ (take or leave a couple hundred) by the inquisition, read ragnar's claw by william king. The inquisition has almost no control over space marine chapters. As the book says, space marines are elite warriors that predate the "imperium" itself.

[Durfast Spiritwolf]

The OP may wish to use the search function here as this issue has been raised a few times and it would be a shame to go over old ground.

[Dewi Sant]

As for vehicles I always liked the idea that the Wolf Lord had a set amount of basic transport options within his company. The rest being held by the Iron Priest and serviced by Servitors, but always ready to go at a moments notice. A whole fleet management if you like. :yes:

[LPetersson]

Personally, I think ti would be interesting if those who give numbers/guesstimates could also give references as to where those numbers came from...

 

Otherwise it's really just their own speculation?

[Hfran Morkai]

Mine will run at about the same size as a standard company unless we get some concrete evidence in the dex that they are larger (and hopefully they give us a typical range of numbers, nothing concrete but something to work with)

[eyeslikethunder]

In Epic it was 20 Wolf guard 120 Grey hunters and 50 Blood claws IIRC

[Hfran Morkai]

In Epic it was 20 Wolf guard 120 Grey hunters and 50 Blood claws IIRC

 

That would mean I have to double up on everything. I'll wait 'til the new dex and see if they have some guidelines/suggestions.

[Skalver]

Lexicanum seems to have some stuff wrong about the space wolves. So here we go.

 

A great company contains:

 

1. Wolf Guard

2. Grey Hunters

3. Blood Claws

4. Long Fangs

5. Wolf Scouts

6. Dreadnoughts (not venerable)

 

It is not stated anywhere that I can see whether the scouts are still part of the Company of the Great Wolf. I suspect they are not for two reasons, one the scouts blurb on the last page of the codex describes how the scouts come up through the company from being inducted as Blood Claws. It also states "[in addition to the Wolf Guard] the remaining troops are divided into four groups ... the Grey Hunters, the Blood Claws, the Long Fangs and the scouts". While they tend to operate independantly from their company there is no reason they would not remain as part of their own Wolf Lords great company. Secondly, the inside back cover states "[The Great Wolf] in addition to his own company is in charge of the Wolf Priests, Rune Priests, Iron Priests, Thralls, the Fang and the Fleet". Having scouts as part of the Company of the Great Wolf also makes little sense as that company is supposed to be the Great Wolf's advisors. It makes sense to have the various Priests and Ven. Dreads in it but having every scout in the chapter in there makes no practical sense. It goes against its organisational purpose.

 

This also suggests that the non-venerable dreadnoughts are still part of some Wolf Lord's company. Presumably whatever company they were "born" from only getting moved to the Great Wolf's company when they become so ancient as to spend most of their time within the Fang dormant.

 

This differs from the chapter structure presented in the 2nd edition codex on page 11. Where all the dreadnaught's and the Wolf Scouts are shown as part of the Company of the Great Wolf. In that edition however Space Wolves began their lives as scouts just like normal marines and so with the change in 3rd edition to scouts squads being a veteran squad for Space Wolves it now seems to have changed in the 3rd edition blurb and scouts now remain with their own companies.

 

As for the size of the companies, I can't find any specific mention of it in either of the Codexes but I am pretty sure I have seen somewhere that the chapter is about 1200 marines total which would put each Great Company at a size of about 100 marines on average, pretty much the same size as a normal chapter company. The idea of individual companies of up to 1000 Space Wolves seems pretty outlandish as it would put the chapter size up there with that of the Black Templars and three or four times larger than the original Space Wolves legion.

 

In fact, nothing in either Codex suggests to me that the company size can be much larger than a standard 100 marine company. I would be interested to see a source for people claiming that Great Companies can be up to 1000 marines. While it does seem reasonable that company size varies much more within the Space Wolves than it does within other chapters I would imagine about 80-120 marines would be pretty much standard.

 

With all that in mind, a Space Wolves great company for apocalypse would be something like:

 

1 Wolf Lord + bodyguard (10 wolf guard)

3 Grey Hunter Packs (10 Grey Hunters + 1 Wolf Guard)

2 Blood Claw Packs (15 Blood Claws + 1 Wolf Guard)

2 Long Fang Packs (5 Long Fangs)

2 Scout Packs (5 Wolf Scouts)

 

Thats a pretty reasonable 95 marine force. The Wolf Lords Bodyguard is a bit bigger than the codex allows but it just makes the force chart a bit easier to manage. You can obviously adjust the numbers of each squad size up and down to personal preference but the general ratio of 1GH : 1 BC : 0.5WG : 0.3LF : 0.3WS seems about right for an "average" great company.

 

P.S. As always this is just about what I can gather from the Codices. People are of course free to change whatever they want for the purposes of their own force if it makes them happy.

[Florida Gator]

As for the size of the companies, I can't find any specific mention of it in either of the Codexes but I am pretty sure I have seen somewhere that the chapter is about 1200 marines total which would put each Great Company at a size of about 100 marines on average, pretty much the same size as a normal chapter company. The idea of individual companies of up to 1000 Space Wolves seems pretty outlandish as it would put the chapter size up there with that of the Black Templars and three or four times larger than the original Space Wolves legion.

 

Actually skalver, i agree as to 1000 a company being a little outlandish, but even if a few companies had 1000 marines, it would not make their chapter bigger than their 10, 000 + pre-heresy legion. And as stated, the Space wolves only divided once, so the MAXIMUM amount you could actually send to the wolf brothers would end up being around 5,000 with the min. being around 1000. this obviously left the space wolves with more marines than most chapters, (for instance the ultrasmurfs divided into like more than ten chapters or something crazy), and then the wolf brothers disbanded. But i think since the Space wolves are unorthodox, unless you have real proof, we can just conclude it's mostly up to the wolf lord.

[Vash113]

A little late to the party but I may as well see what I can add.

 

Basically a Great Company fluctuates massively, with varying cassualty and recruitment rates a Great Company can swing from roughly the size of a Codex Company, to two or three times the size. We've done lots of various estimates on the size of a Great Company. Based on the full strength max of 20 Wolf Guard per Great Company from the 3rd Edition Codex and the percent of Veterans that makes up a Codex Chapter (10%) a rough estimate would put a full strength Great Company at around 200 Marines. My general guess would be anywhere from 100-250 on average with perhaps larger or smaller sizes reached under extraordinary circumstances. There are also many examples of a Great Company one could give but the only real hard and fast is that there will be more Grey Hunters than Blood Claws, more Blood Claws than Long Fangs. However with some Companies like Ragnar Blackmane's or the previous Berek Thunderfist the combat style of the Company might demand a higher proportion of Blood Claws. It all depends really.

 

All in all if you are looking for a general breakdown like with a Codex Company, your going to be dissapointed as there really is none. The best anyone can do is well... guess.

[Erazoender]

Okay thanks for all of the input, I guess it all comes down to what you want in your company.

 

I think I'd do mine more for mobility, but with some nice fire support, including a Reaver titan and some Baneblades (for Apocalypse).

 

What would be the command group for a company?

 

I'm guessing one Wolf Lord, a few Wolf Guard Battle Leaders, some Rune Priests, etc. etc.

[Quillen]

WOOOOW! Hold the staition. There is more Grey Hunters in a great Company the Blood claws. Says it in all the codex.

 

There is a list of an Epic space Wolf force. I can't seem to find it thou. Do a search function and you should find it somewhere here.

 

We are not like normal chapters. Our Great Companies can grow and die with the Wolf Lord running it. A successful WolfLord can pull in more followers and the Great Company grows. If he is known for failures then it dwindles. Which is why we had an HQ for every 750 points. It represents heroes and their followers who have joined the Wolf Lord.

 

Every Great Company is different. There is no set peices it has to have.

 

For Appoc I do 6 Grey Hunter packs 2 Blood Claw Packs and 2 Long Fang packs for the Company data fax. Thou in the fluff they can be any size.

[Skalver]

We are not like normal chapters. Our Great Companies can grow and die with the Wolf Lord running it. A successful WolfLord can pull in more followers and the Great Company grows. If he is known for failures then it dwindles. Which is why we had an HQ for every 750 points. It represents heroes and their followers who have joined the Wolf Lord.

 

As far as I know Great Companies, for the most part, don't die, when the Wolf Lord dies the company chooses a new Wolf Lord and the company is henceforth referred to with his name. However each company has a long and proud history that they trace back through the long list of Wolf Lords who have been its leader in the past. What happens in the case of a GC being totally wiped out or lost I don't know though it is hard to imagine that all that history and sagas would just be left to die.

 

Also how would a successful Wolf Lord pull in more followers? The only way into the company is for new Blood Claw packs to be assigned to the company from the fang to replace combat losses. It would seem unlikely that reinforcements would be allocated based on popularity.

 

Whatever the GC size is I find it hard to imagine that it would vary too widely between GCs. The simple fact of the matter is that allowing some GCs to grow way out of proportion to the others would act as a destabalizing influence on the chapter itself. In the same way that SM chapters are kept small so that no single chapter can gain too big an influence, within the Space Wolves allowing a single GC to become too large would have the same problem. If you have one company of 1000 while the others are all 100-200 then that one company is between one third and half of the entire chapter. It's Wolf Lord would be a de-facto Great Wolf because if he disagrees with the Great Wolf the chapter is pretty much sundered.

 

Even if there was some situation that required a huge amount of Space Wolves the simple thing to do is send two or more GCs. Even in that circumstance it is hard to see why they would instead choose to make one company a lot larger than the others. The Wolf Lords are supposed to be equals and while undoubtedly there is scope for Wolf Lords who prefer a smaller more mobile or others who prefer more weight in numbers it would be very bad for the internal politics of the chapter to allow unrestrained leeway as regards GC growth.

[Durfast Spiritwolf]

Also how would a successful Wolf Lord pull in more followers? The only way into the company is for new Blood Claw packs to be assigned to the company from the fang to replace combat losses. It would seem unlikely that reinforcements would be allocated based on popularity.

 

Agreed but the various book do show that, given that SWs are giving fealty to the WL, they do have some choice in the matter. Much like the members of our Great Companies chose their WL whilst Chapters appoint them.

 

That said, the great and good wouldn't be too happy about some whelp turning down the offer of service to one or other WL without a very good reason!

[Vash113]

Okay thanks for all of the input, I guess it all comes down to what you want in your company.

 

I think I'd do mine more for mobility, but with some nice fire support, including a Reaver titan and some Baneblades (for Apocalypse).

 

Are you planning on making them a Wolf Reaver and Baneblade? Fluff wise the Space Wolves would most likely not have access to vehicles like Baneblades though it may be possible, Titans are deffinitely out though as only the Adeptus Titanicus can physically crew a Titan.

 

As far as I know Great Companies, for the most part, don't die, when the Wolf Lord dies the company chooses a new Wolf Lord and the company is henceforth referred to with his name. However each company has a long and proud history that they trace back through the long list of Wolf Lords who have been its leader in the past. What happens in the case of a GC being totally wiped out or lost I don't know though it is hard to imagine that all that history and sagas would just be left to die.

 

That's not what Quillen meant, it's a phrase of speach, what he means is a Company's success or failure is in turn determined by the success or failure of the Wolf Lord.

 

Also how would a successful Wolf Lord pull in more followers? The only way into the company is for new Blood Claw packs to be assigned to the company from the fang to replace combat losses. It would seem unlikely that reinforcements would be allocated based on popularity.

 

Actually according to the Space Wolf novels popularity does play a role. In the SW books there's information saying that Berek Thunderfist was known as a glorious if reckless commander and that many Blood Claw packs clamored to be part of his Company and consequently more wound up assigned to his Company than most others. I doubt Blood Claws all get to choose where they go, but because of the fluidity of Command in the Space Wolves popularity likely plays a role, as well as general temperment. The Wolves are a pack at all levels and it would make sense to form Great Companies from like tended individuals to make for a unified and co-operative fighting force.

 

Whatever the GC size is I find it hard to imagine that it would vary too widely between GCs. The simple fact of the matter is that allowing some GCs to grow way out of proportion to the others would act as a destabalizing influence on the chapter itself. In the same way that SM chapters are kept small so that no single chapter can gain too big an influence, within the Space Wolves allowing a single GC to become too large would have the same problem. If you have one company of 1000 while the others are all 100-200 then that one company is between one third and half of the entire chapter. It's Wolf Lord would be a de-facto Great Wolf because if he disagrees with the Great Wolf the chapter is pretty much sundered.

 

I doubt Great Companies would be so largely disproportionate but they most certainly aren't all the same size and there is deffinitely going to be a wide range of sizes to the Great Companies. Also remember that your hypothetical situation is not a hypothetical at all. It has happened, Wolf Lord's swear oaths to the Emperor and Russ but not to the Great Wolf. Companies have gone rogue from the Chapter and been declared "Lost Company's" because the Wolf Lord disagreed with the Great Wolf at the time. The Space Wolves are a very, and I mean VERY fluid Chapter.

 

Besides it's not unheard of for Great Companies to operate away from Fenris for decades if not centuries at a time during which the lack of fresh reinforcements results in a gradual reduction in size. While a Company that has just left from Fenris is probably massively swelled by new Recruits meaning that at any one time the largest and smallest Companies may be upwards of 200 marines different in size depending on cassualty rates, how long they've gone since being reinforced and the rate of recruitment of new Blood Claws and the numbers that join each Great Company and whether they suffer serious cassualties early on or not.

 

There are a lot of factors that would influence the size of a Great Company but unlike a Codex Chapter there is no prescribed size or organisation so there's no limit to the variation that could incure.

 

Even if there was some situation that required a huge amount of Space Wolves the simple thing to do is send two or more GCs. Even in that circumstance it is hard to see why they would instead choose to make one company a lot larger than the others. The Wolf Lords are supposed to be equals and while undoubtedly there is scope for Wolf Lords who prefer a smaller more mobile or others who prefer more weight in numbers it would be very bad for the internal politics of the chapter to allow unrestrained leeway as regards GC growth.

 

No there's almost certainly not unrestrained leeway, on the other hand there's nothing stopping the Great Wolf from assigning more troops to a trustworthy and experienced Wolf Lord. The Great Wolf is ultimately going to be the one who decides who goes where and does what unless they become a Lost Company, if the Great Wolf trusts and respects a Wolf Lord and that Lord is renowned for his glorious victories and the young Blood Claws are all clamoring to be assigned to his Great Company, then that Great Company will likely grow faster, tend to be larger and likely be sent to more dangerous and important war zones. Alternately a Wolf Lord that is not particularly successfull, not well liked, and is inexperieced is probably not going to be assigned as many troops.

 

Or to sum up, as Quillen said, the Great Company lives or dies with the Wolf Lord. Guess the phrase was confusing but it is a whole lot more simple than all the above explenation hehe. :D

[Durfast Spiritwolf]

Also how would a successful Wolf Lord pull in more followers? The only way into the company is for new Blood Claw packs to be assigned to the company from the fang to replace combat losses. It would seem unlikely that reinforcements would be allocated based on popularity.

 

Agreed but the various book do show that, given that SWs are giving fealty to the WL, they do have some choice in the matter. Much like the members of our Great Companies chose their WL whilst Chapters appoint them.

 

That said, the great and good wouldn't be too happy about some whelp turning down the offer of service to one or other WL without a very good reason!

[Forseti]

OK this is probably a longshot since it was ages ago.. but does anyone have issue 151 of White Dwarf? Apparently thats the issue with the article on the 1st war for Armageddon.. reading the lexicanum it says 2 different things.. 1 was that he lead his full great company against angron, plus a full company of GKs, in another part it said it was 300 Space Wolves..Just want to know which it says in the actual article.

 

Could either be fluff contradiction or info that Grimnar's company is only 300 ( a long way off the 1000 mentioned elsewhere on lexicanum, assuming ofcourse that Grimnar's company is the largest)

[Grey Mage]

*shrugs*.

 

My GC comprises of approximately:

 

Wolf Lord

WPx2

Rune Priest

Iron Priest x3

17 Wolf Gaurd

15 Long Fangs

130 Grey Hunters

40 Bloodclaws

12 Scouts

6 Dreadnaughts

 

And a bunch of bondsmen and armor to back them up. This includes pilots, drivers, bikers... all of it.

 

Ive debated the numbers over and over and over again, and it seems that the average GC would be around 190-220 marines due to pack sizes, fluff stories, and general comments and quotes from GW. Some GCs would be smaller- veteran companies after a long campaign might number as few as 80 marines while others would be larger- comprising of perhaps 300 individuals, most of them being bloodclaws.

 

Grimnars Force is by far the largest. We know this because on top of his Great Company *and you can be sure he gets whatever recruits he darn well pleases* he also has the command of every priest and dreadnaught in the chapter as part of his position of Great Wolf.