Power Armour technicalities

[Vash113]

Well just to crack in for a moment.

 

It is possible for warriors to remove parts of Power Armor while retaining the majority of systems. Most of the technical elements are housed in the chest-plate, backpack and helmet. Fluff wise there would be disadvantages to losing parts of power armor and even the super-stealthy Raven Guard prefer modifications to their kit over removal of their second-skin. Removal of the boots for instance would eliminate the magnetic clamps and auto-stabilization features of power armored greaves, removal of the gauntlets would reduce hand-strength without the boost of fiber muscle bundles in the gauntlets. Then of course there is the loss of environmental integrity. Hostile environments, toxins and poisons as well as void are all elements Space Marines deal with regularly and even the Space Wolves keep their helmets around and don their buckets when necessary. Fluff wise I don't see any practical reason to remove armor parts. Even Thunder Armor, while listed as Power Armor, is also described as basically being comparable to Scout Armor, it does not provide strength enhancement, environmental protection or most of the other advantages conferred by modern power armor. That said just because the models have gloves and boots does not mean they aren't wearing power armor beneath those elements. Many of the older Dark Angels models and some chaos models are shown wearing leather gloves overtop of their armor but these aren't in place of gauntlets but overtop of them. The boots may be a stretch but hey, why not? There are slim astartes greaves out there, they aren't all the big bell shape.

 

Tabletop wise... do what you want. Lots of people use Chaos Warriors for Space Marines. Some replace the gloves and boots with power armor gauntlets and greaves but not all. Personally I don't like the static, slow appearance of the Chaos Warrior's but that's me, and it's your army, if you like the look then go for it. You don't have to justify every aesthetic choice of your army with a fluff justification. 

[Frater Cornelius]

Heh, I know the Chaos Warriors are static, but that is why you have knifes and green stuff, huh ;)

[Valerian]

Aye, so basically guys running around with a mix of plate, chain and leather seems legit with Space Wolves. Well, I guess that is the one SW faction that could pull it off

Let me go off-topic for second then. A wandering company still needs to recruit from Fenris given the SW fluff,....

That's not exactly accurate in the fluff. In an article in White Dwarf 245, concerning Lost Companies, it is postulated by the author that Space Wolves Great Companies would recruit from whomever was available in order to maintain long-term viability of the unit. Let me see if I can find that....

Here we go:

It appears that in some cases a Wolf Lord and his Great Company separate from the main body of the Chapter, undertaking their own quests and missions for a variety of reasons. The case of Jotun Bearclaw, for example, indicates that his men had elected not to return to Fenris because of the long journey time through warp space, and presumably the temporal displacement they would suffer on arrival (potentially several years over such a distance). I suspect that there is a more hidden motive behind the Company's actions, one which he chose not to share with the Kimmerians. This may be related to the Space Wolves' ancient quest to find their lost Primarch.

As to the long term viability of these 'lost companies' it is difficult to say. Given sufficient geneseed and technical competence it is entirely possible for such a company to maintain its strength over a protracted period, inducting and training new recruits in the same way as a normal Chapter. Less well-supplied companies might have to resort to training ordinary humans to fill their ranks or face the prospect of gradually dwindling in numbers until the company ceases to exist.

Speculation aside, this subject obviously requires further investigation. A Space Wolves Great Company is a substantial organization and the concept of having such groups wandering the galaxy without any kind of check or balance is somewhat worrying. I shall endeavor to uncover more information before contacting you again.

- Inquisitor Asmorales Harkenforth

[Frater Cornelius]

Valerian, you just made my day :O Have an ale! :D

[Leif Bearclaw]

 

That's not exactly accurate in the fluff.  In an article in White Dwarf 245, concerning Lost Companies, it is postulated by the author that Space Wolves Great Companies would recruit from whomever was available in order to maintain long-term viability of the unit. 

But isn't that old fluff somewhat superseded by the more recent allusions to only Fenrisians being compatible with the Canis Helix given 'current' recruitment technologies (ie. it was doable in GC era, but the knowledge lost since then makes non-Fenrisian Wolves unstable Wulfen)?

[Valerian]

 

 

That's not exactly accurate in the fluff.  In an article in White Dwarf 245, concerning Lost Companies, it is postulated by the author that Space Wolves Great Companies would recruit from whomever was available in order to maintain long-term viability of the unit. 

But isn't that old fluff somewhat superseded by the more recent allusions to only Fenrisians being compatible with the Canis Helix given 'current' recruitment technologies (ie. it was doable in GC era, but the knowledge lost since then makes non-Fenrisian Wolves unstable Wulfen)?

 

 

What is the source for those "more recent allusions?"  I could be way off here, but the only place that I've read that theory is here on these boards; I've not actually read anything from the Black Library or the Studio that has said it.

 

V

[Leif Bearclaw]

 

 

 

That's not exactly accurate in the fluff.  In an article in White Dwarf 245, concerning Lost Companies, it is postulated by the author that Space Wolves Great Companies would recruit from whomever was available in order to maintain long-term viability of the unit. 

But isn't that old fluff somewhat superseded by the more recent allusions to only Fenrisians being compatible with the Canis Helix given 'current' recruitment technologies (ie. it was doable in GC era, but the knowledge lost since then makes non-Fenrisian Wolves unstable Wulfen)?

 

 

What is the source for those "more recent allusions?"  I could be way off here, but the only place that I've read that theory is here on these boards; I've not actually read anything from the Black Library or the Studio that has said it.

 

V

 

If memory serves (which it may not, I'll freely admit) the principal allusion comes from Battle of The Fang. Specifically the Tempering Wyrmblade is undertaking with the goal of stabilising the Helix, allowing non Fenrisians to accept the Wolves' gene-seed. Unfortunately I don't have my copy to hand to give you a direct quote, but it kinda makes sense in context (plus of course it's alluded to, not stated outright). The Wolves can recruit from Fenris without issue, but the fate of the Wolf Brothers shows there's issues with using other stock for recruitment. Wyrmblade's goal is to 'fix' the Helix so the Wolves can propagate successors (implying that successors are currently not a viable option) beyond Fenris, in the style of the Ultramarines, and seal the EoT in a ring of Wolves.

[Frater Cornelius]

 

 

 

 

That's not exactly accurate in the fluff.  In an article in White Dwarf 245, concerning Lost Companies, it is postulated by the author that Space Wolves Great Companies would recruit from whomever was available in order to maintain long-term viability of the unit. 

But isn't that old fluff somewhat superseded by the more recent allusions to only Fenrisians being compatible with the Canis Helix given 'current' recruitment technologies (ie. it was doable in GC era, but the knowledge lost since then makes non-Fenrisian Wolves unstable Wulfen)?

 

 

What is the source for those "more recent allusions?"  I could be way off here, but the only place that I've read that theory is here on these boards; I've not actually read anything from the Black Library or the Studio that has said it.

 

V

 

If memory serves (which it may not, I'll freely admit) the principal allusion comes from Battle of The Fang. Specifically the Tempering Wyrmblade is undertaking with the goal of stabilising the Helix, allowing non Fenrisians to accept the Wolves' gene-seed. Unfortunately I don't have my copy to hand to give you a direct quote, but it kinda makes sense in context (plus of course it's alluded to, not stated outright). The Wolves can recruit from Fenris without issue, but the fate of the Wolf Brothers shows there's issues with using other stock for recruitment. Wyrmblade's goal is to 'fix' the Helix so the Wolves can propagate successors (implying that successors are currently not a viable option) beyond Fenris, in the style of the Ultramarines, and seal the EoT in a ring of Wolves.

 

Battle of the Fang was about a cure to the Curse of the Wulfen. All it means that the Gene-Seed is highly unstable and any sort of recruitment has high failure rate. Fenrisian dudes are just suited for it because they are bad-ass. I do not think that would exclude other supreme badasses being able to handle it though.

[Leif Bearclaw]

 

Battle of the Fang was about a cure to the Curse of the Wulfen. All it means that the Gene-Seed is highly unstable and any sort of recruitment has high failure rate. Fenrisian dudes are just suited for it because they are bad-ass. I do not think that would exclude other supreme badasses being able to handle it though.

 

 

I dunno, if the gene-seed is just unstable, why are Fenrisians so much better at accepting it? After all, most Chapters don't really recruit form weaklings. Plus I'm unaware of there  it ever being stated in the fluff that Fenrisian recruits have a particularity high rejection rate vs Astartes averages, which is what I would expect if it was 'simply' a matter of unstable gene-seed. Whereas if the Curse (being a unique trait to the gene line of Russ) affects Fenrisians less severely than other people (for whatever reason), it would explain how the Wolves don't have trouble recruiting from Fenris, but the Wolf Brothers did when they moved away from that gene stock.

[Vash113]

I would also point out that the Inquisitor only postulates the possibility of recruitment, he does not state it as a certainty. The Inquisitor is also not a Wolf Priest, he is only speaking from his own knowledge of Adeptus Astartes, not with knowledge of the fate of the Wolf Brothers or the events of the first Battle of the Fang.

Recruiting from Fenresian Kaerls aboard the company ships is more plausible and may well be possible, how long that can be sustained before lack of genetic diversity, inbreeding and insufficient population numbers has an adverse effect on the quality and compatibility of recruits is another matter. One in a million human is capable of becoming a Space Marine, even at the largest estimates of fleet and crew strength a Great Company could only call upon a few hundred thousand Kaerls. The population is simply not large enough to sustain reasonable recruitment.

 

That leads to other possibilities however. Early in his tests on the Adeptus Astartes and his work on New Men the Apothecary Fabius Bile created many hybrid gene-enhanced warriors armored in crude exosuits and armed with a variety of exotic weaponry. Cypher also used similarly crudely enhanced humans in up-armored exo-suits as simulacrum of the Dark Angels in the Angels of Darkness book, and that is contemporary era stuff. It is entirely possible that a Lost Company, desperate for additional soldiers and willing to break with Imperial taboo, might undergo similar experiments. Using vat-grown, muscle-bulked and gene-spliced techno-gladiators as the basis for crude simulacrum of the Adeptus Astartes and to provide additional soldiers for the company to use in battle. I was actually looking at the Anvil Industries Afterlife models for that very purpose. Anvil is producing lots of cool exo-suit armored soldiers and the possibility for conversions to 40k are endless.

Now such actions are of course beyond forbidden in the Imperium, akin to creating functional Artificial Intelligences, but for a group operating outside the bounds of Imperial Authority... they could potentially, feasibly, possibly, maybe be willing to try it.

 

EDIT: Leif is right, Battle of the Fang pretty specifically lays out that the problem occurs with recruiting non-Fenrisians. As to why that would be the case, well that is up for debate, but it is that lack of compatibility with other genetic sources that has prevented successor chapters and shattered the vision of a ring of Space Wolf chapters surrounding the Eye of Terror. The Horus Heresy books from Forge World also address this issue a little, they specify that the VI Legion had difficulty with the implantation process on Terra, but later Horus Heresy material and contemporary works mention no such difficulty implanting warriors taken from Fenris. While not definitive this does suggest that the Terran Space Wolves were notably less compatible with the gene-seed than Fenrisians and that early implantation before the recovery of Russ was much more difficult than it was later. We can also postulate that perhaps the very existence of the Terran VI Legionaries was only possible thanks to the gene-science of the Emperor and without him solving the implantation problems is nigh impossible, and what work was accomplished in M32 on the subject has long been destroyed and lost, never to be taken up by the chapter again.

Now all of that is pretty unreliable conjecture, but IMO it makes the most sense given the material we have.

[Frater Cornelius]

Well, as for the Kaerls, there could be relieve ships going back and forth between the main fleet and Fenris with fresh aspirants and Kaerls. The Company is wandering, but definitely not lost.

I like the way you are thinking with experiments. But what if they tried to stabilize the Seed? If someone was able to do it in the past. Sure, it will not be a cure, but maybe they managed to tweak it a tiny bit to make outside recruitment a possibility. This could create some interesting stories and dilemmas about a SW with no Fenrisian blood is trying to live up to the SW legacies and prove himself worthy of being a Wolf. Maybe there could be a rivalry with another company whose Lord did not accept an outside as a true wolf and refused to pay him homage.

 

As for auxilaries, my Company has them. I am working on IG allies and I also have abhumans in form of Ogre-like being posing as Centurions. Lovable guys that are generally in charge of heavy work that a Kaerl can not handle.

[Vash113]

Well, as for the Kaerls, there could be relieve ships going back and forth between the main fleet and Fenris with fresh aspirants and Kaerls. The Company is wandering, but definitely not lost.

I like the way you are thinking with experiments. But what if they tried to stabilize the Seed? If someone was able to do it in the past. Sure, it will not be a cure, but maybe they managed to tweak it a tiny bit to make outside recruitment a possibility. This could create some interesting stories and dilemmas about a SW with no Fenrisian blood is trying to live up to the SW legacies and prove himself worthy of being a Wolf. Maybe there could be a rivalry with another company whose Lord did not accept an outside as a true wolf and refused to pay him homage.

 

As for auxilaries, my Company has them. I am working on IG allies and I also have abhumans in form of Ogre-like being posing as Centurions. Lovable guys that are generally in charge of heavy work that a Kaerl can not handle.

 

Tweaking the gene-seed would be a pretty large fundamental fluff change, and if you want your company to be fluffy, I don't think that's the way to do it. Remember in M32 the Wolf Priests failed, they couldn't stabilize the gene-seed, and all their research, all their work, is gone. Now we are 8000 years further on and the gene-seed has been watered down by scores if not hundreds of generations of marines and someone trying to fix it would have less resources, less knowledge, worse materials to work with. Again it's your army and you can do what you want but purified gene-seed? Not a fluff piece I'd go with.

[Frater Cornelius]

Guess the only plausible thing left would be to have relieve ship to supply the main fleet with new aspirants and Kaerls. Otherwise I am out of ideas.

[Vash113]

Guess the only plausible thing left would be to have relieve ship to supply the main fleet with new aspirants and Kaerls. Otherwise I am out of ideas.

 

Personally I justify the continued existence of my Lost Company, and it's actual growth in size, in multiple ways. One of them is the occasional reinforcement from Fenris, sort of unofficial, under-the-table type of contribution of fresh troops despite the official outside the chapter designation of the company.

 

Secondly the company also draws in other outsider groups of wolves. Isolated garrisons, sub-deployments, depleted task groups and other bands of Lost Company warriors, Lone Wolves and so on and so forth. Groups like Lukas the Trickster and his Blood Claws who partly leave, and are partly kicked out, of the Fang from time to time and go off adventuring on their own. Other groups like the pack in Stormcaller who decide to take a ship and go off on their own to pursue their own quest regardless of orders to the contrary. And small deployments like the garrison of the Shrine of Garm, long-distance patrol fleets and the like. Each such group of reinforcements may be small, 1-5 marines in total. It's not the most 100% fluff accurate concept, but it's well enough within established material I think that it works alright for my company background.

 

So for instance, say the Great Wolf dispatches a Battle Leader and thirty Grey Hunters as a small strike force to cleanse orks from the Randomexample system, located somewhere near Sodallagain. Things don't go to plan and the strike force is depleted in number when suddenly they encounter your Lost Company who are also hunting the orks. A bit of posturing later and the strike force is temporarily... or perhaps permanently, folded into the Lost Company. Maybe after the campaign the survivors return to the Fang... maybe they choose not to. Anyway that's an example of one way you can reinforce an otherwise isolated Lost Company.

[Frater Cornelius]

Hm, sounds legit actually.

[Frater Cornelius]

I wonder, could you somehow justify T4 and S4 without being an actual Marine?

 

I had an idea regarding this. There are not a lot of Marines in an army when regarding the fluff. A wandering SW company relying on relieve ships from Fenris and well as picking up one or the other straggler on their way, like Vash mentioned, will always have fewer Marines in their army than a regular Company. So they need other soldiers.

I already used Bullgryns as Centurions, led a Marine. So why not model the Sergeants/Pack Leaders of Tacs/GH as Marines, using my Warrior of Chaos, and have the other guys accompanying him being enhanced human. BS4 is well within the reach of a human as seen with Sisters and Veterans. Assassins are no Marines and have super-human stats.

This is expanding on the idea Vash gave me with 'experiments'. They take willing soldiers who get a number of enhancement. Nothing really out of the ordinary, but enough to represent Marine stats on the table.

This also gives me some interesting modelling opportunities to make all the tacs slightly diverse and maybe even have one or the other female in there. I just feel that it would make for an interesting army to look at.

This also satisfies my need for regular dudes and thus spares me IG allies.

 

Opinions?

[Vash113]

I wonder, could you somehow justify T4 and S4 without being an actual Marine?

 

Like I said exo-suits, techno-barbarians, gene and flesh bulked killers. What do you think Mechanicus Skitarii are? Some of them are nearly as big and bulky as marines, or bigger. The Thunder Warriors were bigger and stronger than the later Space Marines, they just weren't as stable or long-lasting.

 

Here's some inspiration from Warzone Resurrection and Afterlife:

 

http://i107.photobucket.com/albums/m307/Vash113/10384614_694268063987849_2480525645804371896_n_zps9dd40910.jpg

 

http://i107.photobucket.com/albums/m307/Vash113/Rmech2-800x500_zpsf3f16cf5.jpg

 

http://i107.photobucket.com/albums/m307/Vash113/UCmech2-800x500_zps0470e31a.jpg

 

http://i107.photobucket.com/albums/m307/Vash113/cd78bdf184f93c443c4cdb278adf21a4_large-2_zpsb9736efd.jpg

 

http://i107.photobucket.com/albums/m307/Vash113/goliath-800x500_zps93727df5.jpg

 

http://i107.photobucket.com/albums/m307/Vash113/golden-lions_zps25330410.jpg

 

http://i107.photobucket.com/albums/m307/Vash113/juggernauts_zpsc5bf6a44.jpg

 

http://i107.photobucket.com/albums/m307/Vash113/vulcan_zps171d3af4.jpg

 

http://i107.photobucket.com/albums/m307/Vash113/brotherhood-troopers_zps37638ac0.jpg

 

I particularly like these guys:

 

http://i107.photobucket.com/albums/m307/Vash113/heavy-infantry_zps31e742fb.jpg

 

There's even some Valkyries:

 

http://i107.photobucket.com/albums/m307/Vash113/valkyries_zpsd61057c3.jpg

 

Any of those could be used as crude power-armored pseudo marines or techno-barbarians, or non-compliant humans, or gene-grafted gladiators or whatever you want to say they are. Some are more sleek and sophisticated looking, some are more crude, and there's other stuff out there, not just from those two product lines. Hope that gives you some ideas.

[Frater Cornelius]

Hell yeah! Actually, this gave me an awful lot of ideas for my Tau

But I already have a plan. I get a box of 'Sisters of Avelorn' for female and 'Chaos Barbarians' for male soldiers. Then I will splice both with my current unpainted Grey Hunters and Scions to get humans empowered with Exoskeletons led by an actual Space Marine.

In the top hatch of my Sicaran I will put a Scion Commander body to look like a Tank Commander. As mentioned, Bullgryns are Centurions.

Fenrisian Wolves will stay wolves. Iron Priests are fairly common, which really explain all that tech.

TWC.. I am split on those. The Jarl is definitely a Marine. Who else can take it up with the likes of Hive Tyrants and the sorts. I am also inclined to leave the TWC as the only unit that is exclusively filled with Marines. It is hard enough to ride a horse. To ride one in open combat against high tech and even fight on top of said horse takes a lot of skill. It would be the elite that is reserved for the most bad-ass Marines. Same as TDA.

To sum it up:

Wolves = Wolves.. yes, really

Jarl = SM

TWC = SM

TDA = SM

Tacs = Humans w/ SM sarge

Scouts = Humans

Tank Crew = Humans

Tank Commanders = SM

Iron Priests = SM

Light Skimmers = Humans

Bikes = Humans w/ SM sarge

How does that sound?

[Vash113]

I dunno, personally I don't like the sisters of avalorn models very much, chaos warriors... yea that sounds ok, but again that's just me.

 

As for the conversions and unit breakdowns I think it will very much depend on what the finished product looks like. The humans are going to have to look roughly proportional to the unit commander to mesh aesthetically, shouldn't be too difficult since normal scale SM bodies aren't that much bigger than IG or standard human models in 40k.

[Frater Cornelius]

It actually fits damn well. Chaos Warriors are slightly bigger than Marines while Scions and GH are around the same size. This means they would be proportional with the SM scale while showing a distinction between SM and human.

[JCarter]

Without full enclosure, the suit would not have the structure to provide the strength augmentation provided to space marines.

[dusara217]

On the earlier subject of the instability of the canis helix, the whoke reason that the Terrans had more issues with the gene-seed was because the native Fenrisians lived on a Death World. Death Worlds, like Fenris, produce stronger men then ordinary worlds. Just look at the natives of the DA homeworld of Caliban. The harshness of life and the culture of warfare on their Deathworld bred men strong enough to exterminate an entire planet's worth of Daemons. They may have been under the leadership of the Lion, but these people had killed off millions of Daemons before their Primarch had even arrived and decided that a full scale genocide was needed. The main idea here is that Death Worlds breed men who are stronger of body mind and spirit thaj those bred by ordinary worlds, and thus those men are.better able to deal with flawed gene seed.

[Frater Cornelius]

That does not explain the compatibility with Fenrisians. There numerous death worlds out there, so how is Fenris different? You want to tell me what the Helix was magically compatible with a genetic code that could be found on the planet that Leman Russ landed on when the Chaos Gods kidnapped the kids? What an unbelievable coincidence.. also knows as bad writing.

While GW made an amazing setting and a lot of great stories, some of them are a bit far fetched and the reason why only Fenrisians can deal with the Helix (despite Big E not even knowing that his kids will disappear and not knowing where Leman Russ will be landing) is one of the least believable ones I have seen. Yes, less believable than the Vindicare that headshots a fighter pilot while falling from space.

[Leif Bearclaw]

Plus remember the environment of Unification War era Terra, rad-wastes, overrun by techno barbarians and other horrors of Old Night, with a plentiful culture of warfare of its own. Before being pacified by the Emperor, you could be forgiven for thinking it a Death World as well. Either way, coming from that background, the Terran Astartes recruits would've been as 'strong' as the inhabitants of any Death World.

[Z00Z]

I don't think the compatibility argument sticks in regards to only Fenrisians are able to handle the unstable Helix. I think Immerstum is right in this regards.

 

However, I  I think the adoption of warriors from Fenris by the Wolf Priests is more a "choice", so granted there is some leeway in this regard to forge your own narratives. But bare in mind the inclusive nature of the Fenris populace, the clan based markings carried over to astartes, the observation and choosing of 'candidates' of exceptional calibre within the clans by the Wolf Priests, the ritualised concepts of the lone wolf...etc.etc.

 

The continued clan-based, pack mentality even after conversion to Astartes, observation of rituals, gothi's and Fenris traditions is probably the SW's most distinguishable elements against other chapters. 

 

It is likely that these are the determinants for selection rather than a death world, or hardships etc. As rightfully pointed out, there are many such cases.

 

There is a lot of cultural spillover from the traditions, practices and beliefs from the Fenris clans to the SW Astartes. In here lies what I believe to be the crux of the inclusive nature and mistrust of outlanders or non Fenris based humans. Language is also a big part of it, the dual language, both from Fenris and their own 'battle tongue'. The clan-based culture is also one of the reasons cited that the SW's didnt break up, in that the companies were self-run and managed similar to the clans of Fenris and in such they weren't a single force than needed to be broken up due to being too powerful a legion.

 

But of course, making a case for non-power-armor, inclusion of females or more 'humans' in the fighting force is purely discretionary and personally, your own discretion. It is your army and your hobby at the end of the day. Like Vash, I would suggest forging a narrative in support of these army changes rather than trying to find specific cases  to make an argument against why they shouldn't be allowed.

 

i.m.o.