Dark Angels and their possible allies

[march10k]

I still abide by the "no abhumans" restriction.

[facmanpob]

Do you mean Inquisitor Halleck?

 

He is mentioned on P23 of the codex as being beset by an unknown enemy having captured a heretic known only as the "Angel of Truth", with the only Imperial forces in the area being those of the Dark Angels..... the Inquisitor is never seen or heard from again...

[FarFromSam]

It's funny to see that the xenophobic aspect of the DA has been totally erased... (Politically correct or because it would limit the opportunity for players to buy allies?)

 

I remember the time when fluff used to told story of inquisitor lost in the warp while studying the chapter.

I remember special rules forbidding DA to fight along side an IG army containing ogryns or ratings

I remember a short text showing how a DA sgt was disgusted to see that the operation which costed the life to a brother was to save a squad of Ogryns...

 

 

This x100.  I think they may have stopped reinforcing this aspect of the Dark Angels in order to make it Black Temp unique. (Am I mistaken or are they the same way +no libbies?)

[Master Avoghai]

@facmanpob : actually, I was more talking about v3 era but I'm glad to see that the inquisitor melting has not totally disappeared. :D

 

@farfromsam : well the BT are more corruption-phobic. But I can't remember a story or a rule of BT forbidding them to ally with ogryn or ratlings...

 

(I really miss the time of codex catachan with the "sorry sir" rule at the beginning of a game :lol:

[elphilo]

It's funny to see that the xenophobic aspect of the DA has been totally erased... (Politically correct or because it would limit the opportunity for players to buy allies?)

I remember the time when fluff used to told story of inquisitor lost in the warp while studying the chapter.

I remember special rules forbidding DA to fight along side an IG army containing ogryns or ratings

I remember a short text showing how a DA sgt was disgusted to see that the operation which costed the life to a brother was to save a squad of Ogryns...

I don't just remember it, I live it. My friends keep trying to have me ally my Dark Angels with filthy Xenos. I tell them the 3rd edition codex specifically states that I cannot, then I get a weird look and I just smile

[MadMek83]

IMHO: Space Wolves and Dark Angels bear rivalry and what others may call grudge but I always consider it to be as: If Someone would attack Fenris heavily and could actually come close to destroy wolves, I am sure Dark Angels would come to aid, kick ass and Shout: Nobody but We are allow to finish the mangy dogs! However actually who would be good allies: Black Templars: They trust no psychers and have no psychers + are in eternal crusade against chaos. They share enemy, they share fanaticism and no nasty psycher there to pry infromation, read minds or otherway poking their nose where they don't belong. BT's are too occupied honing their power swords, filling their flamers with promethium and polishing their stormshields so they would start wondering what DA have to hide. Besides BT and DA love to hate abhumans, kick ratlings, bully ogryns and kill xeno. Its very much match made in heaven.

 

Imperial Fists would make good allies too. They share stubborness of Dark Angels and share heavy losses during Horus Heresy (albeit DA's would never admit this publicly) However they would never trust GK's (those 40K Dodley Not-Do-Gooders / Extermitus-in-your-face) who poke their psychic nose everywhere and are part of inquisition and not Astartes. They're worst possible "ally" for Dark Angels. And Children of the Isha, the Eldritch kind. While DA these days would fight along side them, if necessary, psychically gifted eldars are something that would make DA's feel very uncomfortable. And Eldars are fickle and you never can predict what they do next.

[Tiger9gamer]

what about Admech allies? I was thinking of adding a Knight Titan household as my allies someday.

[Phoebus]

I think the Adeptus Mechanicus would work quite well on paper. The Dark Angels are a First Founding Chapter, so it goes without saying that they have long-lasting ties with the Mechanicum. They tend to be insular and protective of their own lore, which is just as well because the Adepts of Mars do the same.

 

Where I think you start getting into snags is the Mechanicum's ongoing theme of snooping around to increase their stores of technological knowledge and artifacts - even if that means stepping on Astartes boots. Do the Mechanicum know of the special toys the Dark Angels possess, for instance? It doesn't *sound* like they shared the STC for the Land Speeder Vengeance - it's "exclusively employed by the Unforgiven Chapters." What about the ten Darkshrouds and the means by which they are powered? Hmmmm? ;)

 

The Black Templars could *almost* be great allies. They are fiercely uncompromising, though, and they Suffer Not The Witch To Live... which is a dubious proposal for a chapter so dependant on its Librarians, like the Dark Angels. In addition, the Templars have to be at least curious over the role the Dark Angels may or may not have had in the destruction of their strike cruiser so recently...

[shabbadoo]

If I were to choose a chapter to ally with then it would be Blood Angels, but that is just a nod to the 2E Codex: Angels of Death.  I sure wouldn't ally them with Space Wolves.  When the Dark Angels and Space Wolves meet, they do have their honor duel, but there is no back slapping and sharing of drinks between them afterwards. The two chapters do not like each other.  At all.  They will work together toward a common Imperial goal, but that is it.  IG/PDF would also be better than Space Wolves.

[Master Avoghai]

I don't think that the SW and the DA hate each others...

They fought together during all the great crusade so they know each other very well and complement very well too. After all Horus sent them so far because he feared them.

 

They don't drink together after the fight because DA don't drink at all! :lol:

[facmanpob]

They don't drink together after the fight because DA don't drink at all!

Apparently Asmodai gets cross when the Dark Angels have fun! It's not like that on Mortikah VII. Every night is party night for the GotC! Oppa Guardian Style!

Anyway, if I had to rank them in order, I would obviously put IG/PDF at the top....if for no other reason than they can't back-chat the Astartes, and have to do as they are told. In second place I would put the Salamanders, as everyone is their friend. In third I would put the Wolves, after that the other codex chapters (Ultras, Fists etc), BA and the Templars all lumped in together. Finally, I would put any forces associated with the Inquisition or High Lords of Terra. After that, its the xenos, who just get the flamer!

[Phoebus]

I have to take back a couple of my points.

 

The core rulebook has us as "allies of convenience" with the Space Wolves, which means our relationship is not as built up as I'd hoped.  Such is life.  Conversely, even after an incident that has been mentioned in more than one source, the Dark Angels and the Black Templars are listed as "battle brothers".  The Blood Angels are accorded that relationship as well.  I'm kind of embarrassed that I forgot something so basic.

[MadMek83]

 

 

 

The Black Templars could *almost* be great allies. They are fiercely uncompromising, though, and they Suffer Not The Witch To Live... which is a dubious proposal for a chapter so dependant on its Librarians, like the Dark Angels. In addition, the Templars have to be at least curious over the role the Dark Angels may or may not have had in the destruction of their strike cruiser so recently...

 

That was unfortunate warp storm ;) Ships get lost in warp storms all the time. Trust me, what would Dark Angels would have to hide for fellow Astartes. Nothing!!! And they just happend to have countless number of servitors in the rock for fun. Seriously, Dark Angels have nothing to do with that tradig accident... (So they might have fired few broad sides of lances etc) but it was tradig accident with wrap storm. There's official seal on that :D

[Phoebus]

Well played, brother!

[Stormtrooper-VII]

An unfortunate, warp-storm inducing broadside fired from a dark Angels strike cruiser perhaps, complete with 100% deniability . Back on topic I think most space marine chapters would be ok allies as long as they didn't go around putting their noses in places they shouldn't. The Dark Angels will ally with pdf/ IG as long as it suits them and they don't get in the way of anything.

[facmanpob]

I have to take back a couple of my points.

The core rulebook has us as "allies of convenience" with the Space Wolves, which means our relationship is not as built up as I'd hoped. Such is life. Conversely, even after an incident that has been mentioned in more than one source, the Dark Angels and the Black Templars are listed as "battle brothers". The Blood Angels are accorded that relationship as well. I'm kind of embarrassed that I forgot something so basic.

Although I would obviously play the allies table as it is written, unless it was changed in my gaming group under a house rule, its always worth noting that there is an element of "gaming freedom" written into the allies table.....if it was entirely fluff based then we wouldn't be allies of convenience with eldar or tau for instance. But yes, there really is no reason, I suppose, for the Templars to worry about us, or vice versa, after all we know they've got far more than 1000 marines in their chapter, and we won't say anything if they don't

[BigGumbo]

I think there's a couple of different questions underlying this discussion. On the one hand, there's the "who would we choose to ally with, if we could choose freely?" question; and on the other there is "who do we trust so little (or hate so much) that we would rather fight against them than with them, no matter who the enemy is?". The fluff-based comments speak to the former; the Allies Matrix in the BGB, to me, speaks to the latter.

 

The Allies matrix is defined in positive terms but you could equally well define it in negative ones:

 

Battle Brothers: we'd never go to war against these guys (well, not unless we really, really had to).

Allies of Convenience: we'd need a good reason to go to war against these guys but we'd also need a good reason to risk our lives to help them out.

Desperate Allies: we'd normally go to war against these guys, unless there was a bigger imminent threat.

Come the Apocalypse: we'd ally with anyone else to fight these guys.

 

Clearly the 'nids are out for everyone, as there is no reasoning with the ravening menace - that makes sense. Equally, from our point of view, any sort of alliance with Chaos is unthinkable; everything else, though, falls somewhere on a spectrum of hatred and distrust. Do we want to throw in our lot with the Xenos? No, all things being equal; but if it's that or face the prospect of defeat by Chaos, then I certainly don't see it as a problem. 

[Mattias]

I would have thought that the Dark Angels should get along quite well with the Raven Guard in any conflict that did not involve the Fallen. Both chapters put a heavy emphasis on scouting and intelligence gathering and both seem to prefer a military strategy that involves cutting the head off the enemy.

[Jaminos]

I'm really interested in the direction my post has taken this. I have had a lot more insight into this than expected.

 

Now all I have read as far as books go is Angels of Darkness and it really only focuses on the inner workings of the chapter for the most part. Don't get me wrong, that's great. But there is only a small handful of information out there with the novels when it comes to allies.

 

Until the next Space Marine Manuel comes out saying differently, I will be going with a hybrid DA/SW army. I like the story dynamic. Its like some sort of twisted Buddy comedy. "One chapter has a dark secret and will kill any who get in their way. The other has a corrupted gene seed and does not play by the rules. Now they have to move into the same house? Their landlord is Old man inquisition and he is just sure his tenants are up to no good!"

 

Grant it, its is nowhere that silly. But honestly it sets up some funny moments when dice rolls fail. "Oh look. My Space Wolves failed their leadership roll and run off the board. Well it looks like they had somewhere else to be." And then a hoard of orcs roll over my last squad of termites.

 

Just my two cents.

[Tiger9gamer]

I'm really interested in the direction my post has taken this. I have had a lot more insight into this than expected.

 

Now all I have read as far as books go is Angels of Darkness and it really only focuses on the inner workings of the chapter for the most part. Don't get me wrong, that's great. But there is only a small handful of information out there with the novels when it comes to allies.

 

Until the next Space Marine Manuel comes out saying differently, I will be going with a hybrid DA/SW army. I like the story dynamic. Its like some sort of twisted Buddy comedy. "One chapter has a dark secret and will kill any who get in their way. The other has a corrupted gene seed and does not play by the rules. Now they have to move into the same house? Their landlord is Old man inquisition and he is just sure his tenants are up to no good!"

 

Grant it, its is nowhere that silly. But honestly it sets up some funny moments when dice rolls fail. "Oh look. My Space Wolves failed their leadership roll and run off the board. Well it looks like they had somewhere else to be." And then a hoard of orcs roll over my last squad of termites.

 

Just my two cents.

 

 

 

I want... no, I NEED this sit-com.

[FarFromSam]

I think there's a couple of different questions underlying this discussion. On the one hand, there's the "who would we choose to ally with, if we could choose freely?" question; and on the other there is "who do we trust so little (or hate so much) that we would rather fight against them than with them, no matter who the enemy is?". The fluff-based comments speak to the former; the Allies Matrix in the BGB, to me, speaks to the latter.

 

The Allies matrix is defined in positive terms but you could equally well define it in negative ones:

 

Battle Brothers: we'd never go to war against these guys (well, not unless we really, really had to).

Allies of Convenience: we'd need a good reason to go to war against these guys but we'd also need a good reason to risk our lives to help them out.

Desperate Allies: we'd normally go to war against these guys, unless there was a bigger imminent threat.

Come the Apocalypse: we'd ally with anyone else to fight these guys.

 

Clearly the 'nids are out for everyone, as there is no reasoning with the ravening menace - that makes sense. Equally, from our point of view, any sort of alliance with Chaos is unthinkable; everything else, though, falls somewhere on a spectrum of hatred and distrust. Do we want to throw in our lot with the Xenos? No, all things being equal; but if it's that or face the prospect of defeat by Chaos, then I certainly don't see it as a problem. 

 

Gumbo the last line... concerns me...  I would rather see myself destroyed by the forces of chaos than "throw in" with the xenos.  I'd like to think that even though we are pragmatic warriors of the first, we would not be tempted to fight alongside the alien races.  At most, we would let the xenos wear down the forces of chaos then annihilate both.  If the Fallen were involved I believe that would make us even less compromising.  My two cents.

[elphilo]

I think there's a couple of different questions underlying this discussion. On the one hand, there's the "who would we choose to ally with, if we could choose freely?" question; and on the other there is "who do we trust so little (or hate so much) that we would rather fight against them than with them, no matter who the enemy is?". The fluff-based comments speak to the former; the Allies Matrix in the BGB, to me, speaks to the latter.

The Allies matrix is defined in positive terms but you could equally well define it in negative ones:

Battle Brothers: we'd never go to war against these guys (well, not unless we really, really had to).

Allies of Convenience: we'd need a good reason to go to war against these guys but we'd also need a good reason to risk our lives to help them out.

Desperate Allies: we'd normally go to war against these guys, unless there was a bigger imminent threat.

Come the Apocalypse: we'd ally with anyone else to fight these guys.

Clearly the 'nids are out for everyone, as there is no reasoning with the ravening menace - that makes sense. Equally, from our point of view, any sort of alliance with Chaos is unthinkable; everything else, though, falls somewhere on a spectrum of hatred and distrust. Do we want to throw in our lot with the Xenos? No, all things being equal; but if it's that or face the prospect of defeat by Chaos, then I certainly don't see it as a problem.

Gumbo the last line... concerns me... I would rather see myself destroyed by the forces of chaos than "throw in" with the xenos. I'd like to think that even though we are pragmatic warriors of the first, we would not be tempted to fight alongside the alien races. At most, we would let the xenos wear down the forces of chaos then annihilate both. If the Fallen were involved I believe that would make us even less compromising. My two cents.

Well then you're not following the New Dark Angels GW has in mind

I just got my Iyanden supplement and one of the missions has Eldar allied with DA versus Chaos. I don't really know why we were, I just saw that put the book down and started to repent.

[Phoebus]

What were you doing with a Xenos codex to begin with, brother?

[elphilo]

What were you doing with a Xenos codex to begin with, brother?

Well I uh, you know errr uhhh

I'll just be in Chamber 42

[BigGumbo]

 

I think there's a couple of different questions underlying this discussion. On the one hand, there's the "who would we choose to ally with, if we could choose freely?" question; and on the other there is "who do we trust so little (or hate so much) that we would rather fight against them than with them, no matter who the enemy is?". The fluff-based comments speak to the former; the Allies Matrix in the BGB, to me, speaks to the latter.

 

The Allies matrix is defined in positive terms but you could equally well define it in negative ones:

 

Battle Brothers: we'd never go to war against these guys (well, not unless we really, really had to).

Allies of Convenience: we'd need a good reason to go to war against these guys but we'd also need a good reason to risk our lives to help them out.

Desperate Allies: we'd normally go to war against these guys, unless there was a bigger imminent threat.

Come the Apocalypse: we'd ally with anyone else to fight these guys.

 

Clearly the 'nids are out for everyone, as there is no reasoning with the ravening menace - that makes sense. Equally, from our point of view, any sort of alliance with Chaos is unthinkable; everything else, though, falls somewhere on a spectrum of hatred and distrust. Do we want to throw in our lot with the Xenos? No, all things being equal; but if it's that or face the prospect of defeat by Chaos, then I certainly don't see it as a problem. 

 

Gumbo the last line... concerns me...  I would rather see myself destroyed by the forces of chaos than "throw in" with the xenos.  I'd like to think that even though we are pragmatic warriors of the first, we would not be tempted to fight alongside the alien races.  At most, we would let the xenos wear down the forces of chaos then annihilate both.  If the Fallen were involved I believe that would make us even less compromising.  My two cents.

I get where you're coming from but you seem to have missed the point: I'm talking about already having made the assessment that "letting the xenos wear down the forces of chaos" will just mean both we and they are defeated piecemeal, where combining our strength might prevail. It's not a matter of temptation but of necessity and the true pragmatist makes such alliances as are necessary to achieve the desired goal, but only those that are necessary - I'm not talking about a long-term alliance with a particular Craftworld, say, but on an engagement-by-engagement basis.

 

Obviously once the initial battle is won, we'd turn on our erstwhile allies...