PH unit markings

[binary]

Since I'm starting a PH army within the next few days (waiting for bits to arrive) and something has occured to me.

Does anyone have any ideas/fluff on the unit markings the different legions used pre/during the heresy? I know from the old ravenguard IA that they used a halved pattern for tactical, triangle for devestator and quartered for assault, and that the current arrow designs come form the post-heresy codex astartes. But I've yet to find any other info on the other legions.

 

Since I'm building a WE army I was considering just using squad numbers but i need something to differnetiate the squads if there's any fluff floating around.

 

thanks guys

-Binary

[Ufthak]

Hi there.

 

As usual, fluff concerning the heresy (and indeed almost anything in the universe of WH 40K) is inconsistent.

The markings you mentioned are, in fact, the old Rogue-Trader-era standard markings, if I remember well. You could use those - would look nice - but there is no fluff that states they were used during the heresy.

 

As sources I recommend the Horus Heresy Series of books, the artworks in the Horus Heresy: Collected Visions, and, seriously, your own imagination. Since the myriad of authors and artists who did work on the heresy all had their own ideas - and also used them - then why not you?

 

In any case, if you want to believe the Collected Visions, it appears most units from most Legions used the standard markings which we later find in the Codex Astartes.

Add to this the many markings typical to each Legion, like for example:

 

Thousand Sons: Fellowship markings, Scarab symbol

Space Wolves: Great Company markings, fetishes, warrior-own inscriptions and decorations, etc. (possibly also different colours denoting Terrans and Fenrisians)

Dark Angels: Green shoulderpad for Calibanites (but not for Terrans)

and so on.

 

As for the colour of the trim, it appears that the different Legions all ever used one and the same colour for all their companies - for example, all Ultramarines had a gold trim (like their 2nd Company in the later Codex Astartes), the Thousand Sons marble/bone white, the Imperial Fists black, and so on.

 

Hope that helped. Will try to update if something else springs to mind which I could add.

[Hyperion]

The markings you mentioned are, in fact, the old Rogue-Trader-era standard markings, if I remember well. You could use those - would look nice - but there is no fluff that states they were used during the heresy.

Not entirely true. Like the OP mentioned, these markings are shown in Index Astartes: Raven Guard:

As Ufthak mentions, HH: Collected Visions has a lot of reference artwork, and does show a wide variety of markings, giving you a lot of scope to style your marines how you like. There are quite a lot of PH World Eater images in the book, so it's worth checking out.