Death Guard Pre-Heresy

[Demus Ragnok]

Every pre heresy Death Guard army I have seen is painted white. Who decided they were white? I skimed through Eisenstein last night and one description is that their armor was "iron colored". Iron isn't white. I'm just curious as to when and why the "white Death Guard" started?

[Tellos05]

I had the same convo with a friend of mine. And still came to no concluson. The description I read was that Mortarion didnt like ornamentation and such. Hence the reason why there armor was bare ceremite with green details. But I still find it abit of a conundrum as to what colour ceremite is. Arent the grey knights bare ceremite armor?

[Midwest]

I believe the Index Astartes entry for them made it official, tho' I seem to recall seeing a lot of white DG armies prior to that (in the days of 2nd edition).

 

TBH, I think it started as an alternate scheme to the normal green that became popular enough that it was retconned in by the IA article - for whatever reason it became popular during the IA series to give alternate 'pre-heresy' schemes to the legions, and it seems both ironic and natural for the DG to have had their originally 'clean' white look corrupted to the 'current' green by their fall to Nurgle.

[Doghouse]

It comes from the original Epic Space Marine where the DG were white with a single red arm and shoulder pad. Back when Adeptus Titanicus came out it was decided that in order to make the game affordable to produce that both sides would use the same models rather than add to the cost of production by adding a second race. This is how the Horus Heresy first came into being.

 

As they produced metal space marine vehicles and dreadnoughts to support the titans they made the move to make plastic infantry using the same format of both sides using the same models and so Space Marine, the first epic system, was born. There were a lot of decisions made during it's production to ensure that the colours of the marine weren't all the same, interesting enough this is when the Dark Angels became green because they felt that there were too many black armoured marines and the Imperial Fists made their first appearance. I suspect that the Imperial Fists replaced the Crimson Fists because there were already a number of darker armoured marines at the time.

 

The IA articles draw on the established material of the later 40k 2nd Edition chaos codex, where the Legions had been fully established and took inspiration from the original Space Marine for their colour schemes. The main exception to this were the World Eaters that if I remember right where dark blue.

[NemFX]

they were originally the dusk raiders, black armour with a red right arm and shoulderpads. as for the white and green? probably mortarions choice. maybe he took over that bastion in the fluff, and decided he would just switch his colours instead of redecorate?

[The Crimson Cartel]

This doesn't have to do with why we sometimes see them painted white, but someone (help me out here brothers) has an AMAZING white painted DG force over on bell of lost souls that is certainly an inspiration to white DG fandom...

 

-CC

[Hemal]

Aye - FG have been white and green AFAIK since early days of 40K as we know it (i.e. post Adeptus Titanicus)

[Honda]

This doesn't have to do with why we sometimes see them painted white, but someone (help me out here brothers) has an AMAZING white painted DG force over on bell of lost souls that is certainly an inspiration to white DG fandom...

 

That would be Bigred and yes, it is a very impressive and large army. What's also very interesting is how he has modeled the progression of the DG from pre-Heresy to their more commonly known chaotic form.

 

BTW, I had the same thoughts after reading FotE, and for the record, I think you ought to go with the metal + green version. I think it could be quite awesome looking, especially if it had Mk II & III bits in it.

 

Cheers,

[Crossraguel]

Hi, thought I'd chip in with my three-pennies-worth asI've just been reading Eisenstein.

 

Now I may be getting muddled but I think the references to bear ceramite were specifically with regard to the Deathshroud. What I remember very clearly is that Garro's armour is described at one point as "marble grey" which is near as damn-it white. It's interesting that Mortarion, for all his eschewing of ornamentation and frippery, swaggers into battle in a jazzy brass-coated get-up - cheeky sod.

 

Regrading the Dusk Raiders' colour scheme, I thought they were white with a crimson arm and shoulder, not black as suggested by NemFX...