Flesh Tearers Organization and Resources

[Akylas]

Hello everyone,

The Flesh Tearers have always been my favorite chapter out of the loyalists (I credit Echos of Gaius Point for that) and I've always thought about painting up a force of them sometime (perhaps concurrently with the Alpha Legion I'm working on).

 

Their lexicanum article (found here) seems fairly well sourced but there were a few small things that confused me. One had to do with their vehicles. It's stated in the article that they have mostly transports with a grand total of one baal predator and some whirlwinds. This statement doesn't seem to be cited. I always thought their problem was more an issue of manpower due to losing marines to their gene curse at such a high rate rather than other resources. If anything I might have guessed they would have more resources per the number of marines with their manpower shortage (for instance, they could easily have one terminator suit per every four marines with only 400 in the chapter), even taking into account what might be lost to recklessness of a strike force that succumbs to the red thirst at the wrong time. With their chapter master's stated goal of doing as much with their limited time as possible if I were doing a Flesh Tearers force I'd likely include as many force multipliers like tanks as possible, to make the most of every marine. I also notice despite being said to have a "small" navy they have a battle barge and multiple strike cruisers, which seems pretty good for 400 marines.

 

One other thing was chapter structure. The article takes a line in the Blood Angels codex that the Flesh Tearers use the same company color schemes for their heraldry and divides them into four companies based on their remaining numbers. Would all ten companies be folded into 4 even if, say, the 6th company was still at half strength with their captain? If so, how would they be organized? Would scouts still be in the highest number company and all terminators in the first?

 

I was wondering if anyone more knowedgeable here might know if these parts of the article are correct or not, or if perhaps they haven't been officially addressed.

[Darkchild130]

veterans are distributed evenly between companies so no one company would have a higher proportion of terminators.

 

the companies are not folded as you propose, they merely have enough Marines left for 4 companies after 10,000 years. It would have been an organic process over thousands of years.

 

As for vehicles, the IA states that "The extremely limited vehicle resources of the chapter tend to be concentrated on transports such as rhinos and razorbacks" It mentions nothing about Baal preds or Whirlwinds. Maybe the Lexicanum article is confusing fluff with the old 3rd ed Flesh Tearer rules where you could only take one "tank" but unlimited transports.

 

Darkchild

[SnorriSnorrison]

Their lexicanum article (found here) seems fairly well sourced but there were a few small things that confused me. One had to do with their vehicles. It's stated in the article that they have mostly transports with a grand total of one baal predator and some whirlwinds.

This statement doesn't seem to be cited. I always thought their problem was more an issue of manpower due to losing marines to their gene curse at such a high rate rather than other resources. If anything I might have guessed they would have more resources per the number of marines with their manpower shortage (for instance, they could easily have one terminator suit per every four marines with only 400 in the chapter), even taking into account what might be lost to recklessness of a strike force that succumbs to the red thirst at the wrong time. With their chapter master's stated goal of doing as much with their limited time as possible if I were doing a Flesh Tearers force I'd likely include as many force multipliers like tanks as possible, to make the most of every marine. I also notice despite being said to have a "small" navy they have a battle barge and multiple strike cruisers, which seems pretty good for 400 marines.

 

Well, I think the part about vehicles(Baal and Whirlwinds) is taken from an old Index Astartes article from 3rd or 4th edition if I remember that correctly. It stated that the armoury was reduced to transports(as the Lexicanum article says) as well to some Whirlwinds, but almost no other battle tanks. I can't recall the reason unfortunately. Could have been because they don't care about their armour(y) and just continue fighting, but I still think its fluffy.

They are somewhat blood-crazed rednecks, their existence reduced to 'have manslaughter will travel' and repeat.

 

And I don't think that they do have that many suits of terminator armour. The Imperial Fists do have 100 suits I think, and they are a first Founding Chapter.

 

One other thing was chapter structure. The article takes a line in the Blood Angels codex that the Flesh Tearers use the same company color schemes for their heraldry and divides them into four companies based on their remaining numbers. Would all ten companies be folded into 4 even if, say, the 6th company was still at half strength with their captain? If so, how would they be organized? Would scouts still be in the highest number company and all terminators in the first?

They use the same company markings and -organisation, so 100 marines per company. If they had more, the 5th to 10th company would be filled up again and the markings would continue as seen in C:Blood Angels.

 

I don't think they would fold all 10 companies into 4 as long as they exist. It's just the thing that they don't exist anymore. <_<

So no pure Scout company I guess, as well as no all-terminator company as both are of too small numbers to be fielded/organised in that way you described.

The veterans are scattered along the remaining companies I think, as well as the Scouts.

 

I was wondering if anyone more knowedgeable here might know if these parts of the article are correct or not, or if perhaps they haven't been officially addressed.

 

Well, it's the Lexicanum...so it's never officially addressed. The guys over there do good work at gathering information from official sources but also from non-canon works...and mix it up a bit.

 

I still think the part about limited vehicles is true, though.

 

 

Snorri

[Akylas]

So if I understand correctly, the reduction to 4 companies would have been very gradual, maybe starting with the reserve companies being depleted to fill out frontline ones until the former didn't exist?

 

There goes my remnants of 5th company painting idea. <_<

 

So fluffwise, scouts and vets would be spread throughout the companies, transports would be ok but tanks thin on the ground, and an above average number of death company would be fairly likely?

 

I wish I'd gotten into the game earlier. It would have been nice to get my hands on some of the IAs when they were new.

[Darkchild130]

So fluffwise, scouts and vets would be spread throughout the companies, transports would be ok but tanks thin on the ground, and an above average number of death company would be fairly likely?

 

Yes, exactly that.

 

Darkchild

[SamaNagol]

Basically they exist in such a way that you can have any arrangement you like and it still be fluffy.

 

Aside from spamming of any type of vehicles other than transport.

 

So a 1750 force with 6 predators would probably represent the entirety of their armoury.