The Red Helms

[Toomanyprojects]

The Red Helms

 

“There are crimes that even a space marine can be guilty of. Refuting the codex, decrying the Emperor, disobeying orders, or other, unspeakable crimes. But you are all space marines, and could yet prove of value to the emperor.

 

Your previous chapters are gone. You are dead to them. You will regain your honour as Red Helms, or you will die.”

                                                            -Attributed to Chapter Master Tiberius

 

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The Red Helms are a closely guarded secret amongst the Adeptus Astartes. Whilst officially a chapter founded from Ultramarines geneseed in the fifteenth founding they are in fact a chapter whose soldiers are drawn from a number of different sources.

It is possible for a space marine to fail his chapter master and his emperor without turning rogue.  Such marines could still prove to be of use to the constantly-warring imperium of man, especially when the crime warrants death.

Upon occasion, a stay of execution is ordered upon the condemned, and he is brought before his chapter master or his captain. Often there are a pair of strangers with the chapter master, adorned in war-plate of regal purple and with their faces obscured. One Chaplain, and one Librarian: a pairing of pilgrims whose task is to shepherd wayward battle brothers into the emperor’s light once more. The condemned will be addressed by the Chaplain, and watched by the Librarian, his worth being measured by both. Only if both agree that the brother is worthy of life will they petition for his release into their custody.

Should the petition be granted (and it is oftentimes necessary for the Chaplain, the librarian and their cohorts to prove themselves to be worthy battle-allies before such a petition is even considered) the brother will be expunged from his previous chapter, as if he had never been recruited. He will leave, sometimes unwillingly, to begin his journey to the space-borne fleet that forms the home of the Red Helms. 

Upon arrival, each battle brother is addressed by Chapter Master Tiberius personally: and given a chance to regain the honour that they have lost. By serving in his chapter, by fighting to regain worlds that even the Imperium has deemed lost to them, they can prove their worth in the eyes of their emperor.

All entrants to the Red Helms must earn their way through the chapter as if they were a raw recruit, even if they are a veteran of a thousand worlds. Rank may be gained in the same manner as codex-adherent chapters, and it is possible for the worst sinner to rise to the rank of Chapter-Master.

The Red Helms employ a wide variety of fighting styles. Some captains favour treacherous ambush, others honourable declarations of war. Some favour overwhelming application of fire and melta, and others massed bolter fire. This variety owes its existence to the chapter’s recruitment: each marine is in the Red Helms precisely because they are too individual for their parent chapters. Such restraints are not in place within the Red Helms. Any marine that survives long enough to command a company is allowed to fight in his own way.

This individuality also affects their armaments: some companies maintain three times the number of land speeders that the codex assigns to them, others feature armoured centurion suits. The fourth company can field more rhinos than most other chapters, the second can employ massed artillery and the seventh can deploy almost its entire company as jump pack troops. Such deviations from the codex do not sit well with the majority of chapters, who tend to shun the company of the Red Helms wherever possible.

Another unusual feature of the Red Helms is that they maintain no honour guard. This was a deliberate choice on the part of the chapter’s founders: to remind each marine that they will never fully regain the honour that could have been theirs.

Even the ancient dreadnoughts of the chapter wear crimson helmets, despite their past exploits as heroes of the chapter: their penance extending as far as watching over their still-breathing brethren, correcting them and guiding them along the path to the emperor’s forgiveness.

How high a marine must rise in the chapter before gaining absolution is not certain. Even Chapter Master Tiberius still wears the red helmet of shame, and it is unclear whether any Red Helm has ever been permitted to remove the livery of his censure.

 

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Okay, so I’m giving in. I’ll do a Codex: Space Marines army too J

 

I came up with these guys on Saturday. I just popped in for a tub of paint and ended up building and painting up a Space marine in ficticious chapter colours for a store event.

The result was this guy:

 

http://i954.photobucket.com/albums/ae29/kdruthless/E1ADF388-A1DF-4433-AD69-CF70B5CB0685-1794-0000035F130C5787_zps465438cb.jpg

Unfortunately for my wallet, I rather like him. So, onward the dishonoured! Death and glory await you!

I don’t want to be tied to a particular parent chapter, and I want an excuse in fluff to play with whatever rules I like so the idea of a penal chapter was perfect for what I had in mind.

What do people think? I’d also be interested to hear about potential army lists that people favour

 

[Leonaides]

Interesting idea, but I'd specifically remove dreadnoughts (no chapter is going to relinquish a rare and honoured dreadnought chassis and a marine already in a dreadnought can pretty much do anything he wants and not get censured for it - however the flip side being any marine who is sufficiently great to get interred is highly unlikely (read: will not ever) to ever do anything that would require such banishment - even if he did its more likely that he would be killed/executed and the dreadnought prepared for a new occupant.

 

Land-raiders. Similarly to dreadnoughts, quite simply if this is a penal chapter then it wont be getting massive amounts of honoured wargear and tanks. Landraiders are rare and special. They require specialist skills and training to maintain - how often are you going to get a techpriest doing something to merit being sent to this chapter that means you actually have enough of them to maintain a full armoury, as well as all these Landraiders? 

 

Also - every chapter will have the capacity to deploy at least a full company of marines on bikes, and every company will be able to be deployed as drop-troops (assuming you mean via drop-pods here, though even if you actualy mean jump-pack equipped assailt troops then there is at least a full companies worth of marines able to eb equipped as such). What you are describing is bread and butter marine equipment - verbal chaff if you will - that does not distinguish your marines in the way I suspect you want them to be.

 

Just a few thoughts... Good luck

[ferrus]

Nice idea. Penal marines would be a potent force as they have more to prove than other marines.

[GrandMagnus]

Hmmm... I like this idea of yours. It reminds me a bit about the Deathwatch (with the marines of diferent chapters) but its an original thought.

[Toomanyprojects]

Interesting idea, but I'd specifically remove dreadnoughts (no chapter is going to relinquish a rare and honoured dreadnought chassis and a marine already in a dreadnought can pretty much do anything he wants and not get censured for it - however the flip side being any marine who is sufficiently great to get interred is highly unlikely (read: will not ever) to ever do anything that would require such banishment - even if he did its more likely that he would be killed/executed and the dreadnought prepared for a new occupant.

 

Land-raiders. Similarly to dreadnoughts, quite simply if this is a penal chapter then it wont be getting massive amounts of honoured wargear and tanks. Landraiders are rare and special. They require specialist skills and training to maintain - how often are you going to get a techpriest doing something to merit being sent to this chapter that means you actually have enough of them to maintain a full armoury, as well as all these Landraiders? 

 

Also - every chapter will have the capacity to deploy at least a full company of marines on bikes, and every company will be able to be deployed as drop-troops (assuming you mean via drop-pods here, though even if you actualy mean jump-pack equipped assailt troops then there is at least a full companies worth of marines able to eb equipped as such). What you are describing is bread and butter marine equipment - verbal chaff if you will - that does not distinguish your marines in the way I suspect you want them to be.

 

Just a few thoughts... Good luck

 

 

Thanks for the input. I hear you with the land raiders. May change that to Rhinos instead :)

 

I think that I might be able to wrangle the dreadnoughts though: claiming that the ancients are ex-captains who still serve the chapter by overseeing the impetuous upstarts beneath them. Or something like that :)

[blackoption]

Although I think the idea is a novel one, I do not think it would be that practical.  The galaxy is a big place. Astartes are spread thin as it is.  I would rather keep my penitant marines in house for two reasons.  Even if the Red Helms go from chapter to chapter to recruit, I'd rather not "air my dirty laundry" so to say and announce I have a screw up. Secondly, Astartes are a valuable resource (going back to being spread thin across the Imperium),  I'll keep and rehabilitate my own penitants. 

[scrimdog]

Why not raiders or anything else you want? It's only a game and if you have created a fictional chapter then its roots and armory are yours to decide, maybe a chapter went rogue and its raiders machine spirit revolted and turned on the chaos filth and was later interned into your chapters ever growing company's. If you have go to war then you must have a ship/battle barge to get there, then thunderhawks to deploy and drop pods and so forth so surly you will have some level of tech priests kicking around and who says they too have to be under the same shame as your chapter, to be fair they are a bit weird anyhoo. Many tech priests probably have done something wrong by fiddling with stuff they should not and might be declared unworthy of there parent chapter but still loyal and far to valuable to dispose of.

 

My point being that in the grim dark of the 41m anything can happen and it almost always does no mater how unlikely. And that ultimately gives you free reign on your chapter to do as you please. Plus I really like the write up I was fooled for a few lines as to believe this was some new fluff I had not read lol.

 

Good look and good modeling brother.

[Molokai]

I like the idea. When you bring it down to the individual level each marine would be more "out there" than your average marine. This could translate to them being more violent, even psychotic to an extent, on the battle field.

Cool story man.

[Toomanyprojects]

Just for information, I've updated the history to ease a few of the big holes in my plan :) i'd be happy to hear anyone else's input on it all

 

I was alos of thinking about using the Black Templars rules for the chapter, at least to begin with. Can anyone offer advice on how to build/play with such a force?

 

Thanks to all who have contributed thus far, please keep em coming

[Gripharius]

What if they did not start off as a penal Chapter but became one over time?

 

Perhaps their geneseed is flawed and only very, very rarely can it be successfully implanted in a new recruit.  Over time their numbers would dwindle from natural losses in battle, until eventually they would be on the verge of being wiped out.  Maybe they were on the verge of being shut down because they were considered doomed, a lot cause and a waste of resources... but they were given a second chance as a penal Chapter.  This would allow them to already have a number of their own dreadnoughts, land raiders, techpriests, etc.

 

Maybe the Red Helms comes from a tradition of always wearing their helmets, so no one can distinguish the "original" members of the Chapter from the penal members. 

 

Just a thought.