Warband help?

[Lord Pariah]

Hello my fellow denizens of darkness.

 

so I may or may not be inspired to place my warband into the pages of this forum... but i kind of hit the first hurdle right there, did you see it?

 

because I made my table top army a collection of different warbands as opposed to one uniform force, they are better described as a small covenant... and this is where the problems start..

 

because the unbound nature of Chaos, I am offered more creative freedom, but this is a double edged sword.. but there is no easier way of putting this other than a general splurge of ideas and picking out the ideas from the mess... here goes. (names are placeholder)

 

• The Pariah wolves -  The back bone, made out of the broken company of the sons of Horus that sought to outrun the imperial fleets as opposed to seek shelter in the eye of terror... but this plan sort of worked as the warp made it so that time passed faster in the material universe. but this was no respite as they were always in the path of one enemy of some form or another and forced to be on the move, only stopping to refuel, picking up the occasional decimated warband along the way. I had the idea that the commander became nostalgic for the good ol' days of the legion and decided to stop running... but this back fired as they become decimated after an attack leaving only thirty marines to their name... and this was when they met the rest of the covenant..

 

• The Dead angels - the First apothecary of the Ferox Angels prided himself on never losing a single brother under his care until the Plague farther unleashed a pathogen that brought the entire chapter low save for the apothecary (gallus) himself, this despair unlocked a dormant psychic potential, which nurgle would have capitalized on if this grief did not turn to wraith against his cultist that brought the pox... this was where he came into contact with a Coven of witches that taught him a form of biomancy that helped his 'resurrect' his brothers, the Coven hoped that Gallus would be so grateful that he would turn to the architect of fate out of gratitude... no one said that Tzeentch's servant were all geniuses, so the apothecary used them to 'raise' his chapter and turn on the Coven... and fended off all the warbands that came after his chapter fortress monastery  until he came into contact with he captain of the Pariah wolves, and was persuaded to join him on the condition that his chapter comes with him, leaving no brother behind... the captain accepts if only to get his hands on terminators.

 

• The Silent machines - this was interesting to create. renown tech magi were collectively outcast when whey went too far, and started to experiment in binding machine spirits (not too different, hear me out). the main quirk is that they see the concept of siege warfare to be inefficient and therefor an affront to the machine... and human in general, so they started to bind servitors to various pieces of equipment such as Astartes bikes, Fast attack vehicles and occasionally placing human slaved pilots into dreadnought and sentinel chassis to see if they can increase maneuverability, all the while moving away from the traditional heavy vehicles that the mechanicus is fond of.  not brilliant in the book of the mechanicus, but not techno heresy? well they started to run into problems regarding power requirements, and this is where the groups split into three, the first tried to solve the problem with he conventional methods, the second tried to sneak in xenos tech and the other tried to use warp-craft... and it all back fired and were mostly on the run inside a single exploratory cruiser until they met the Covenant and became their logistical back bone. Still favor the open field warfare and the occasional city fight over prolonged siege battles. They gained their name for the strange obsession to make things as quite as possible, even vox chatter.

 

• The Wolfpack - A very small war-band that fields most of their marines in terminator armor wit the 'new bloods' in regular power armor... but they favor ambush tactics as opposed to deep striking into the unknown. mostly made from the sons of Horus, most have mutated to the extent that they cannot leave their tactical dreadnought armor for one reason or another. Employ larger number of Psykers than average.

 

• The +something+ rangers -  a somewhat placeholder name, but this is the main "mortal" contingent, the ones that operate under their own banner as opposed to under the leadership of the other war bands... lead by a single Astartes commander with a cadre of legionnaire bodyguard but mostly made up of mortal officers drawn mostly from slave stocks and 'liberated' humans.

 

• +a druid coven+ -  I have somewhat of a soft spot of feral worlds in the 40k universe so i decided to make a coven of rouge witches with a druid theme...  and it would have been complete if R&H had rough riders *shakes fist at IA13*

 

• The Exposed - my justification for Daemon stuff in a largely renegade structure. Rouge sons of Horus that took the new faith a bit to far, but instead of worship the pantheon, they worship "the Greatness" and see the gods as a part of it as opposed anything else. although the rest of the Covenant don't believe that the Exposed are traitors per se, but they are given a liberal amount of space. they see Daemon hood to be the great Ascension and tend to bind lesser unaligned Daemons into their ranks.

 

All the war bands operate independently, mostly. They were originally guided by a greater undivided Daemon by the name Mal'ash until the Pariah wolves took over through reason I'd rather not spoil... and the first act was to loosely associate with he black legion for various reasons.

They mostly tend towards hit and run tactics but follow the flexible nature of the Sons of horus, but generally avoid prolonged engagements such as sieges. 

 

and yeah, that's mostly it... i plan a story around the Pariah wolves so i apologize for being vague with them... but my biggest question is what you all think? 

Too much?

Wrong direction that a chaos war band/covenant should take?

[Tenebris]

Truth be told... pretty standard for a Chaos Warband. You know, if one wants to last as long as this guys have, well you have to come to a form of compromise. If there is one truth in Chaos is the following: "Misery begets strange bedfellows."

 

In the end the divisions would only be known to the warband, for everyone else, their victims, their allies, their enemies... it is just one of the many Chaos warbands. As long as the Lord gets results and keeps his warriors supported, the deities worshiped and his rabble fed... well it matters not from how one came into his service... the warband functions and this is all that matters. 

 

I believe that way strange alliances have been made in the Chaos camp so in truth your warband well... it is quite standard.

[Rev. Tiberius Jackhammer]

Scaling things back a bit might help - focusing on 4 fleshed out factions over 7 can help a lot! Maybe fold the Sons of Horus-based factions into the Pariah Wolves? The Wolfpack becoming the 1st-company Terminators accompanying the Pariah Company, who have become heavily mutated due to their frequent teleportation into combat (since teleporting moves through the Warp). This activated psychic abilities in many of them, some of whom seek to gain more and more power through summoning Daemons (the Exposed). This could hint at internal conflict between those Psykers and the Pariah Commander.

 

On the note of Rough Riders - you could always use the Chaos Spawn entry as close-combat Rough Riders. Not perfect, but close.

[Teetengee]

I like the mishmash, it shows the depths that renegades must go to in order to survive.

[Lord Pariah]

I like the mishmash, it shows the depths that renegades must go to in order to survive.

Cheers, this was the feel i was going for.

 

Scaling things back a bit might help - focusing on 4 fleshed out factions over 7 can help a lot! Maybe fold the Sons of Horus-based factions into the Pariah Wolves? The Wolfpack becoming the 1st-company Terminators accompanying the Pariah Company, who have become heavily mutated due to their frequent teleportation into combat (since teleporting moves through the Warp). This activated psychic abilities in many of them, some of whom seek to gain more and more power through summoning Daemons (the Exposed). This could hint at internal conflict between those Psykers and the Pariah Commander.

you know, that's not a bad idea. I kind of wanted them to come together as separate war bands but slowly morph together.

 

i'll most likely stick the Pariah wolves, wolfpack and the rangers together as they seem to go together. I was contemplating dropping the Exposed all together and have them as yet another desperate alliance. 

The dead angels, in my mind, would be slowly moving away from the Wolves, as it really is only one guy that can form thoughts that really doesn't play nice. 

 

not sure about the Silent Machines... must explore this further. and the same with the Coven... Ah, ideas...

there are also other ideas such as a raptor cult... but one bridge at a time

 

 

Truth be told... pretty standard for a Chaos Warband. You know, if one wants to last as long as this guys have, well you have to come to a form of compromise. If there is one truth in Chaos is the following: "Misery begets strange bedfellows."

 

In the end the divisions would only be known to the warband, for everyone else, their victims, their allies, their enemies... it is just one of the many Chaos warbands. As long as the Lord gets results and keeps his warriors supported, the deities worshiped and his rabble fed... well it matters not from how one came into his service... the warband functions and this is all that matters. 

 

I believe that way strange alliances have been made in the Chaos camp so in truth your warband well... it is quite standard.

hmn... Interesting idea... although i see it more divisions among the groups... but this is as they first come together under the call of a greater daemon offering power, revenge and what not. But I thought of one thread that does bind them; and that is hate of other chaos warbands for one reason or another..

but in the time of the dark millennium, they are pretty much a war-band, albeit comparatively large and with a divided leadership... but a Covenant all the same.

[Malios]

There's some great merit in all of the above points.

 

 

Lord Pariah, I think a good way to look at your warband is like that of a hegemony: a collection of factions where the dominant faction (in this case the Pariah Wolves?) dictates the policies of the warband as a whole upon the rest. I think if it's looked at from this perspective, it'll help simplify things for you but still maintain that "feel" of having many factions under one (questionably) unified banner. Not to mention the unique modeling possibilities of creating interfaction leaders all fighting for the top position!

 

 

How the Pariah Wolves run said Hegemony is up to you:

 

 

Are they brutal dictators who assert their superiority upon their vassal warbands through force? Do the other warbands follow the Pariah Wolves out of some form of debt? Or is it that the Pariah Wolves simply have the most pull in the hegemony of warbands because of their ancient Legion ties? The possibilities from there are endless.

 

 

Another suggestion that might assist you is to have a solid figurehead or a goal for all of your warbands to rally behind. That may provide some unifying force to tie in all of your smaller warbands together and give a sense of direction.

 

 

The other thing that you could consider is to give the warband as a whole a fresh name, then use the smaller warbands to give your individual squads (or groups of squads) more character.

 

Hopefully these suggestions help.

[incinerator950]

Reminds me of my Wartorn. Renegades and Legionaires cobbled into a missmatched army wearing the ash and ruin camiuflage of Antecannis.

[Lord Pariah]

There's some great merit in all of the above points.

 

 

Lord Pariah, I think a good way to look at your warband is like that of a hegemony: a collection of factions where the dominant faction (in this case the Pariah Wolves?) dictates the policies of the warband as a whole upon the rest. I think if it's looked at from this perspective, it'll help simplify things for you but still maintain that "feel" of having many factions under one (questionably) unified banner. Not to mention the unique modeling possibilities of creating interfaction leaders all fighting for the top position!

 

 

How the Pariah Wolves run said Hegemony is up to you:

 

 

Are they brutal dictators who assert their superiority upon their vassal warbands through force? Do the other warbands follow the Pariah Wolves out of some form of debt? Or is it that the Pariah Wolves simply have the most pull in the hegemony of warbands because of their ancient Legion ties? The possibilities from there are endless.

 

 

Another suggestion that might assist you is to have a solid figurehead or a goal for all of your warbands to rally behind. That may provide some unifying force to tie in all of your smaller warbands together and give a sense of direction.

 

 

The other thing that you could consider is to give the warband as a whole a fresh name, then use the smaller warbands to give your individual squads (or groups of squads) more character.

 

 

Hopefully these suggestions help.

*Notes down on notepad*

 

The Pariah wolves are one of the few war bands that actually have a commander from the great crusade. i find people are quick to use the whole "veterans of the long war", although the legions were massive, they were not infinite and the sons of horus did not exactly emerge unscathed... so i was thinking that the Wolves have an immediate command structure that are vets.. the rest are looking to survive and have no real goals other than agendas... Until the Wolves take the reins.

The Wolves Captain would believe in discipline first and foremost, for he requires reliable warriors but the other bands mostly police them selves until they drop the ball and the Wolves step in to restore order, whether that be the original leadership or the opposer really depends on the situation.

 

This was borne out of boredom in painting, as i cannot sit down and paint a hundred of the same guys at once... and i like to have some variety, and I love 'desperate alliance' stories. 

 

I will flesh out the figurehead/goals when i do write this up.

 

A new name? hmn....

 

And they do help.