Night Lords Questions

[Hyaenidae]

I have just a couple of questions on the Night Lords Legio as I build my army, hope somebody can help...

 

1. Is there any evidence that the Night Lords ever adopted Chaplaincy? I don't see it in their character to adopt such a brotherly faith, and I know some of the pre-heresy Legions didn't use them either. Just curious.

 

2. Do you think that it's still possible that there are Terrans within the Night Lords? Once again, no evidence they conducted a 'Destroy the Earthlings' pogrom like the Word Bearers, or even needed a cleansing like the Sons of Horus. I'm assuming that the Night Lords had done so many terrible deeds, the Terrans were bound by their hate /guilt to their gene-father and Legion before even the Word Bearers fell from the light, and followed further into the darkness without question. Am I wrong?

 

3. Exactally what tech DID the Night Lords have access to, being so far away from Terra and Mars? Termi's, and Jump Packs, I know, but what about Land Speeders? How about some of the tech used by the Blood Angels, such as Infernus Pistols or hand flamers? Why in the heck DON'T we use thunderhammers!?!? All these existed during the Heresy. What else I miss? Your thoughts?

[AekoldHelbrass]

1. First of all, in "Dark King" there were chaplains who watched execution of conquered nation. Secondly, chaplain is not about religion, he is about morale of soldiers, their battle spirit. In case of Night Lords I can see them telling "now you see how true were visions of Night Haunter" or something like this, to inspire fellow marines for war.

 

2. Why not? Imagine 20,000 of marines (i don't know ecact size of legion, but...). They couldn't clean every one of them. And as I understand there were cold relations inside the legion, but no hate. So while they were fighting on one side - they did not cared about planet of origin.

 

3. As we can see by "Battle for Abyss" Word Bearers had even dreadnoughts on their battle barges. Mechanicum stated that some legions are running out of supplyes and they're getting supplies only from their internal fleet production facilities. So I think you can tell any story you wish about your warband. Like "we run away with that battle barge responsible for Land Speeders production", or something like that. But there were some equipment too complicated to create it on local basis I think, or not popular enough, or something like that. In case of Blood Angels equipment - Blood Angels are greedy bastards, they have more than 30 Land Raiders and will not give them to anyone, they tool Baal Predator STC and will not share it with Mars, and so on. So first of all you should read where Blood Angels got it, maybe they're only who can use it because they didn't shared it. But again, you can tell your story, like "we butchered full company of Knights of Blood and salvaged their equipment" or something like that.

[Hyaenidae]

1. Thanks, I unfortunately haven't heard 'Dark King ' yet. As Chaps not being religious, I know this. Thus why I stated it being a 'Brotherly Faith', aka faith in their legion and father, nothing more.

 

2. Agreed. By hate, I meant hatred for themselves for what they had become. Then again, maybe the Terran NL's enjoyed what they did, even moreso than their Nostromian cousins.

 

3. Sorry, I probably shouldn't have mentioned the BA's directly. Weapons like the Infernus pistol and the thunder hammer were all over the place during the heresy time line, why wouldn't we use it? They are weapons that are far easier to maintain over time than something as complicated as a land speeder. Hell, hand flamers and Infernus pistols sound right up the Iron Warriors alley for that final push into breaches. I just hate the C:CSM sometimes. I know we're not supposed to be just some C:SM knock off, but some equipment just makes sense to still own. Eh, maybe it's just me.

 

Thanks for your help, brother.

[AekoldHelbrass]

I just hate the C:CSM sometimes. I know we're not supposed to be just some C:SM knock off, but some equipment just makes sense to still own. Eh, maybe it's just me.

 

You're right it's just you, I hate it all the time! It's really strange to see difference in weapons range, like assault cannons, autocannons, plasma cannons, storm bolters... But then, there are holes bigger than my head and way more important. Take a look at Bikers, they are relentless but price for plasma pistol and plasma gun is the same. Why do they need plasma pistol at all then? Or Chosen, you will add only 2 points and instead of chosen with power weapon you'll get Terminator with combi! Sorry for offtop.

[Hyaenidae]

You're right it's just you, I hate it all the time!

 

Jerk.

Lol, just kidding. I do agree with you though, and I'd like my damn Night Lords To pack at least a little Imperial punch. I'm not talking about LR Crusaders, or Baal pattern anything, but come on! If I was a Warband leader, and I saw a damn Assault cannon sitting on the arm of a dead foe, you could bet I'd rip that sucker off and turn it against the corpse emperors lakeys!

[Lexington]

Weapons like the Infernus pistol and the thunder hammer were all over the place during the heresy time line, why wouldn't we use it?

I haven't read the bulk of the Heresy novels, but as far as long-standing 40K background goes, thunder hammers, assault cannons and the like weren't developed until very late in the Heresy, or in the post-Heresy era. Infernus Pistols are sort of murky territory, tho, since Dante's was unique until the recent Blood Angels Codex.

[AekoldHelbrass]

I haven't read the bulk of the Heresy novels, but as far as long-standing 40K background goes, thunder hammers, assault cannons and the like weren't developed until very late in the Heresy, or in the post-Heresy era. Infernus Pistols are sort of murky territory, tho, since Dante's was unique until the recent Blood Angels Codex.

No. "Fallen Angels" describes Dark Angels dreadnought with assault cannon, whie short story from Tales of Heresy describes that Dark Angels used Land Speeders. And in Soul Drinkers inquisitor's agent used Inferno Pistol. Thunder Hammer is the only thing I cannot remember. Not sure about hat weapon Fulgrim forged for Ferrus.

 

Also, according to the current fluff - Horus ordered Mars to supply his legions first. So Chaos Legions got all the most recent weapon developments. So they should both have it or it should be developed after the heresy.

[Hyaenidae]

Eidolian of the Emperor's Children carried a thunder hammer in the HH books. And still, we're talking about 10,000 years of salvaging and warfare. Even taking into account the variables of time in the Eye, we're still looking at at least 100 years of combat time. I'd drop my chainsword and pick up a TH any dang time.

[Dark Bjoern]

I haven't read the bulk of the Heresy novels, but as far as long-standing 40K background goes, thunder hammers, assault cannons and the like weren't developed until very late in the Heresy, or in the post-Heresy era. Infernus Pistols are sort of murky territory, tho, since Dante's was unique until the recent Blood Angels Codex.

No. "Fallen Angels" describes Dark Angels dreadnought with assault cannon, whie short story from Tales of Heresy describes that Dark Angels used Land Speeders. And in Soul Drinkers inquisitor's agent used Inferno Pistol. Thunder Hammer is the only thing I cannot remember. Not sure about hat weapon Fulgrim forged for Ferrus.

 

Also, according to the current fluff - Horus ordered Mars to supply his legions first. So Chaos Legions got all the most recent weapon developments. So they should both have it or it should be developed after the heresy.

Mortarion had have an Infernus pistol, his Laterne (or what is was called). ACs had been very new developed weapons during the Great Crusade. Only a few of them had been aviable to the Legions. And that had been only larger versions usable only on vehicles. Originally the dreadnought was developed as a test platform for new weapons that would be later find use with the TDA. Plasma cannons, ACs, MM had been first tested on dreadnoughts.

Horus didn´t get all the new stuff for his Legions first. For example the MK 5 and MK 6 armours had found it´s use only amoung the loyalist legions.

[AekoldHelbrass]

Horus didn´t get all the new stuff for his Legions first. For example the MK 5 and MK 6 armours had found it´s use only amoung the loyalist legions.

 

Before the heresy MK4 was the best MK available. MK5 was born because loyalists lost Mars to Dark Mechanicus and didn't got enough of them, and it was mostly combination of older armours and different scrap to patch holes. So MK6 was developed during the heresy or after the heresy, not sure about that. Any way, the most recent "official" history of power armour is 16 years old, so let's leave this question until we'll get updated version.

 

PS: by the way, according to current Codex CSM they should have "Codex pattern", which is not described in Codex SM. What do you think about that?

[Dark Bjoern]

I have only access to the german C: CSM. It speaks of older pattern and parts of salvaged newer loyalist armours. And that newer renegade chapters have completly MK 7 armour. I think they mean with "codex patter" the newer pattern MK6, MK7, MK8. Many loyalist chapter have replaced their older suits with newer one. The older one got an honour place amoung the other chapter relicts.

It make sense to salvage such things. Examples can be found in Soul Hunter and in The Core (NL short story from Fear the Alien). Talos took a undamaged breastplate from a fallen BA and they salvaged the destroyed BA dreadnought. In The Core they salvaged six Salamander Terminator suits, including an Assault Cannon.

Even loyalist chapter salvaged from time to time. In the novel Salamanders the Sallies meet some Marines Malevolant which plunders a drifting abadoned AdMech ship.

[AekoldHelbrass]

I think they mean with "codex patter" the newer pattern MK6, MK7, MK8.

Not really. "At the time of the Heresy, Crusade pattern armour had all but disappeared from the Legions, having been replaced by the much improved Codex pattern, with the exception of those Legions still fighting on the Eastern Fringe.". Crusade is MK2, so Codex should be MK4 Maximus (because in old-old "official" power armour history MK3 is specialized suit for boarding actions made to fight Squats rather than improvement over MK2). As for me it's just a dumb mistake of Codex:CSM authors.

[Hyaenidae]

My warband will be current (40th millenium), I was just stating that it doesn't make much sense that as Chaos players, we wouldn't have gotten our greedy little fingers on some of the Imperial weapons within 10,000 friggin years. And I don't buy that 'but it's too hard to maintain' crap. So, GW is trying to say that an assault cannon, which uses basic mechanical principles at it's core, would be harder to maintain than, say, the nuclear powered power pack every marine carries? Meh.

 

@darkbjoern: The Thousand Sons were carrying Assault Cannons in their book. They continued to call them Reapers because the name had meaning to their mystical ways.

 

@AekoldHelbrass: Thanks for the assist, brother. Ave Dominus Nox. By the way, what's your opinion of using a different Codex other than CSM for the Haunter's sons?

 

EDIT:Nix that last part, just read some other posts on that topic. I'll build my army for both CSM and BA, BA for friendly games with my buds, CSM when at the hobby shop. Thanks all.

[AekoldHelbrass]

what's your opinion of using a different Codex other than CSM for the Haunter's sons?

 

Hard to say. It's obvious that it's too hard to create fluffy army using current CSM codex. So I will try to use C:BA too. I'm fan of Raptors, and C:BA allows you to make army full of those guys. But I have problems with current Raptors models, and local model designer is so .... lazy so I will not have my full army of Raptors for years... I tried to organize few guys and create our local fan codex, but looks like verything will end with few homerules instead. It's good for me that I moved to smaller city, there are no official gameclubs and no tournaments, so all my wars are friendly fights. Looks like even C:SM allows you to make a way better Night Lords army, because you can get Lord on Bike and all your bikes are troops! And of course bike is 8 points cheaper - that matters.

 

By the way, what do you think of Raptors in Night Lords legion? You're using some? What will you say if you'll see army that is mostly Raptors?

 

And another BTW: what do you think of Vindicators? I like that unit very much. From one side it's not very fluffy to use artilery for Night Lords, but from the other size - it's the only unit that can terrify your opponent. It has no fancy rules about that and any way most of units are fearless now, but when you fielding 2 Vindicators - your opponent starts to dance around them. In moments like that I feel that Vindicator is the spirit of Night Lords somehow...

[Dark Bjoern]

@1000heathens: I didn´t say that they didn´t have AC for terminator armour already. I only mentioned that it was rare at this time and most of them had been dreadnought mounted.

 

@AekolHelbrass: Raptors are mandantory for NL, but i would not use them in mass. For my 1750 points i´m planing with 2x5 Raptors.

I find Vindicators very fluffy for NL. They prefer CC and specially in urban terrain the Vindicator is an exellent support for CC troops. And what is more terrifying then a tank that drive through a building and fire a massive shell on short distance into your lines.

[Leonaides]

And I don't buy that 'but it's too hard to maintain' crap. So, GW is trying to say that an assault cannon, which uses basic mechanical principles at it's core, would be harder to maintain than, say, the nuclear powered power pack every marine carries? Meh.

But it needs a new barrel made to exceedingly fine tolerances after every battle... If your warband doesnt happen to have the raw material, the necessary forging capability, plus the ammo requirements, then it'd last all of 1 or 2 battles before it would explode on the unlucky users arm. Used to be a rule for that - 3 jams and it blew up killing the model., but jams are a thing of the past as far as rules go. THtas why your termies still carry reaper autocannons - much more reliable, and do comparative damage. Its a bit like why the Ak47 is the weapon of choice for most miltaries instead of the argueably superior M16 - its reliability and simplicity is the very thing that makes it a better proposition than an M16 for your generic undertrained ill-maintained guerilla, and yet it can be comparatively lethal in the hands of someone who is highly trained with it and its well-maintained.

 

And those nuclear powered packs -? Thats old familar tech to every marine armourer, while doing up an AC is something that chaos srmoureres dont get the chance to do that often, meaning they are less able to repair it safely, meaning the marines are less likley to want to actually use it.

[Lexington]

I was just stating that it doesn't make much sense that as Chaos players, we wouldn't have gotten our greedy little fingers on some of the Imperial weapons within 10,000 friggin years.

While it's something of a patch, I've always seen this more as a result of the Traitor Legions' bitterness. Chaos Marines have massacred Loyalists for 10,000 years now, so getting their hands on Imperial technology isn't the problem; it's that they see the Imperium as weak and inherently wrong. The Traitor Legions turned their back on mankind in the pursuit of power, and lost everything in the end. They were exiled to a hellish canker of unreality in a remote corner of the galaxy, and were forgotten by a human race who turned to worship of the very man the Traitors betrayed. It's hard to live through that, then say "yeah, but they make a really nice gun..."

 

Admittedly, this was a little easier to imagine back when post-Heresy equipment was actually created post-Heresy, but, eh.

 

It's obvious that it's too hard to create fluffy army using current CSM codex.

It is? Seems pretty simple to do to me. There's not an entry in the Chaos Marine Codex that a Night Lord cohort wouldn't either have handy, or hire on.

[Hyaenidae]

@Aekold Helbrass: I only use Raptors sparingly, as they have a habit of dying blind and screaming. Were they slightly more effective, heck yeah. I wouldn't go so far as to say they are mandatory for a NL army, but they do fit pretty damn well. An all raptor force? Jeez, man, if you ever find yourself around North Carolina, bring 'em and we'll get an Apoc game going, lol. Last, as for the use of vindicators...Brother, we fall upon our foes in midnight clad. Fear and terror are our weapons. The bolter, blade, our tanks and ships are just tools to plant the seed of blood curdling fear in our foes hearts. Pretty sure a demolisher round (or two) dead center into the middle of an enemy squad would fit the bill quite well. I've seen the 'get away, get away!' syndrome before myself, especially when using the Vindi. Use the tools that do the job.

 

@Leonaides: I respect your opinion, my friend, but comparable damage my pasty white butt. Besides that though, how exactly do we maintain and fully repair our ships then? Tanks? Dreads? Heck, even power armour is extremely complex. All this is maintained though. But maintaining assault cannons and thunder hammers is too hard for our marines and their Dark AdMech reps, despite the fact that the weapons have been around for 10,000 years? Sorry man, still not buying it.

 

@Lexington: Hmm, I see your point, but along those lines, we would have exchanged the bolter and chainblade long ago for something else. Yet we still use all of these weapons precisely because they are "really nice guns." Nah, a tool is a tool, and any proper Traitor Marine will use any tool possible to remove the False Emperor from his throne. Umm...barring the deamonic. Just a personal opinion, but I won't use a weapon that will eat my soul, lol.

[Captain Tezdal]

Eidolian of the Emperor's Children carried a thunder hammer in the HH books. And still, we're talking about 10,000 years of salvaging and warfare. Even taking into account the variables of time in the Eye, we're still looking at at least 100 years of combat time. I'd drop my chainsword and pick up a TH any dang time.

 

Wasnt Eidolon using just a power hammer?

[AekoldHelbrass]

@Lexington: Hmm, I see your point, but along those lines, we would have exchanged the bolter and chainblade long ago for something else. Yet we still use all of these weapons precisely because they are "really nice guns." Nah, a tool is a tool, and any proper Traitor Marine will use any tool possible to remove the False Emperor from his throne. Umm...barring the deamonic. Just a personal opinion, but I won't use a weapon that will eat my soul, lol.

 

Ok, let's look from the other side. At the time of Heresy Horus cared about proper supplies for us and used his authority to break supplies of loyal legions. So 10,000 year ago we got the best armour, best weapons, we had battle barges that can take most part of legion on board, and of course we had factory barges to produce everything we need on the fly, including tanks, dreadnoughts and everything. Most of current equipment existed at the time of Heresy, and we could have it but we got better pieces. Small warbands like 10th company described in Soul Hanter are minority, bigger warbands still can produce pretty everything they want. Why should they care about loyal guns and their maintainance if they can produce better weapon on board? Trophy make sense, so when you kill SM Captain or Commander or something you take his weapon with evil smile on your face and cut his head to put it as trophy onto your backpack. But why do we need Assaul Cannon if it sucked and was replaced by better Reaper Autocannon and we can get plenty of those?

 

So as for me fluff works fine this way. To represent smaller warbands like in Soul Hunter or traitor chapter you can use any Codex you want and say that they just took equipment from their fallen enemies and it will be fine. Another thing that Codex SM is using some rules that are not playing good with fluff. Like "Rending", yea, I already can see how hail of small caliber bullets can penetrate Land Raider armour and cripple all 3 duplicates of all systems, sure. I could beleive it up to armour value 12, but Land Raider is made to protect against weapons like that.

 

 

It is? Seems pretty simple to do to me. There's not an entry in the Chaos Marine Codex that a Night Lord cohort wouldn't either have handy, or hire on.

I don't know, Night Lords are not that good at diplomatics and not very friendly. So I am not counting on "hire", only on units that can be Night Lords. So there is little difference - you can use Codex CSM with less than half units or Codex BA with less than half units + Raptors will become Troops. If C:CSM is not better in fielding Night Lords than C:BA - it's not doing it's main job then.

[Lay]

While it's something of a patch, I've always seen this more as a result of the Traitor Legions' bitterness. Chaos Marines have massacred Loyalists for 10,000 years now, so getting their hands on Imperial technology isn't the problem; it's that they see the Imperium as weak and inherently wrong.

At the time of Heresy Horus cared about proper supplies for us and used his authority to break supplies of loyal legions. So 10,000 year ago we got the best armour, best weapons, we had battle barges that can take most part of legion on board, and of course we had factory barges to produce everything we need on the fly, including tanks, dreadnoughts and everything. Most of current equipment existed at the time of Heresy, and we could have it but we got better pieces.

"Because the Traitor Legions were the ones that had advanced the furthest from Terra, they were the last to receive new weapons and armour. This meant that the Space Marines fighting for Horus lacked many of the weapons that would subsequently phased into the arsenal of the Imperium over the next millennia.

[...]

Innovation and invention have become anathema to Chaos Space Marines as they battle the hated Imperium. They preserve their bitter anger to the lost millennia forced on them by the Emperor and anything new serves only to drive the shards of hatred deeper into their tortured minds." 2E Codex Chaos, p.71

 

But why do we need Assaul Cannon if it sucked and was replaced by better Reaper Autocannon and we can get plenty of those?

The Reaper autocannon came first.

"The most successful early weapon was the Reaper autocannon, which was later developed into the fearsome Assault cannon which remains in use to this day. The Traitor Terminators, lacking the technology and equipment to maintain the notoriously fickle Assault cannon, still make use of the Reaper with its simpler mechanism and solid ammunition." 2E Codex Chaos, p.73

[AekoldHelbrass]

The Reaper autocannon came first.

"The most successful early weapon was the Reaper autocannon, which was later developed into the fearsome Assault cannon which remains in use to this day. The Traitor Terminators, lacking the technology and equipment to maintain the notoriously fickle Assault cannon, still make use of the Reaper with its simpler mechanism and solid ammunition." 2E Codex Chaos, p.73

You got me with this. Always thought about 2nd edition as something between Rogue Trader and Warhammer. And I hate that nothing like this is ever mentioned in current editions.

[Hyaenidae]

But why do we need Assaul Cannon if it sucked and was replaced by better Reaper Autocannon and we can get plenty of those?

The Reaper autocannon came first.

"The most successful early weapon was the Reaper autocannon, which was later developed into the fearsome Assault cannon which remains in use to this day. The Traitor Terminators, lacking the technology and equipment to maintain the notoriously fickle Assault cannon, still make use of the Reaper with its simpler mechanism and solid ammunition." 2E Codex Chaos, p.73

 

@Lay: Dang. Got me there too. Oh well, back to the drawing board.

 

@AekoldHelbrass: Guns make good trophys too. I'd be sad if someone doesn't end up using the plasma pistol that BA Sgt. was carrying at the end of Soul Hunter. Hmm, maybe I'm just more like Uzas when it comes to salvaging stuff.

 

@Tezdal: Thunder Hammer. And I'm just mentioning it to point out the weapon has been around for ages.

[AekoldHelbrass]

Lay, we need you help with this: wasn't Thunder Hammer available for Chaos Terminators in 2nd edition? I can remember it from some very-very old WH40k stuff but can't remember exactly where. And if it was available - why we lost it?...

[Dark Bjoern]

Back in 2nd Ed. the Chaos counterpart to the imperial THammer was the Power Mace.