Why are there no Salamanders out there?

[Medjugorje]

I dont see that. I know a few Salamanders Players. Real Salamanders painted in green!! Much more then White Scars which are played very often but never had the White Colour on their models but green, red, blue, black ….

[firestorm40k]

There's a couple of people I follow on Instagram who are keen Sallies painters - one of whom posts amazing conversions using 3rd party bits, really honing in on the dragon scale visual aspect. I'll see of I can find a link to their stuff.

 

I've actually considered painting my Primaris as Sallies (when I finally get round to it ;) ), but I would really want to go for either the flame or dragon scale aesthetic which the 'vanilla' Dark Imperium Primaris don't have.

Edited July 11, 2020 by firestorm40k

[Medjugorje]

Maybe you can find some bitz of the old WHF lizardmen and the Chaos Dragon Lasercanon...

[Bjorn Firewalker]

I think the problem with Salamanders is Games Workshop's failure to properly promote them via Black Library publications and video game tie-ins. The Ultramarines have Graham McNeill and THQ (publisher of the Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine video game) as advocates, the Blood Angels have James Swallow, the Iron Hands have Chris Wraight, the Black Templars have Dan Abnett and Aaron Dembski-Bowden, the Space Wolves have William King, the Dark Angels have Gav Thorpe...

 

Who's advocating for the Salamanders, i.e., writing Black Library novels that portray the Chapter in a way that makes us want to learn more about Vulkan's sons? Nick Kyme? He's to the Salamanders what Matt Ward is to the Ultramarines. I certainly lost interest in Vulkan's sons after reading the disturbing way they branded themselves during a Salamanders Captain's funeral; due to Nick Kyme's poor writing, the act seemed to have no point beyond masochistic self-punishment, compared to Chris Wraight's explanation for why the Iron Hands augment themselves in Wrath of Iron.

[Bung]

I think the Salamanders Trilogy of Nick Kyme wasnt that bad. There has been way more bad story telling in 40k.

Personly i think Gave Thorpe and Dan Abnett are the worst writters for 40k.

But that would be another rant not fitting here.

Nick Kyme has the problem that you can read his X-Men fandom in that novels.

Its bearable. Not like Gaunts Band of Mary Sue Ghosts.

 

And self punishment for the loss of honor is very space mariney.

Not as masochistic as some sons of Dorn but its there in the lore and novels.

 

I think the biggest problem was, that Salamanders never had that top tier rules to get top places at tournaments.

Initiative 3 Marines anyone. (Third Edition rules).

 

@firestorm40k

Look at Kromlech, they have fitting conversion parts for Primaris.

Spellcrow has some stuff too.

Just out of my head.

[Bjorn Firewalker]

And self punishment for the loss of honor is very space mariney.

Not as masochistic as some sons of Dorn but its there in the lore and novels.

Competent writers will know overemphasizing self-punishment (e.g., using the Pain Glove) will turn potential players away from a Chapter, and not portray Marines as mega-masochists whose stories belong in pornographic publications. The Ultramarines, Iron Hands, and Black Templars have such competent writers; the Salamanders do not.

I think the biggest problem was, that Salamanders never had that top tier rules to get top places at tournaments.

Initiative 3 Marines anyone. (Third Edition rules).

Good point.

Look at Kromlech, they have fitting conversion parts for Primaris.

Spellcrow has some stuff too.

Just out of my head.

Obvious problem: Kromlech and Spellcrow are third parties who provide UNLICENSED work, not Games Workshop affiliates. IIRC, some tournaments ban third party models. Edited July 12, 2020 by Bjorn Firewalker

[TheNewman]

OK, in regard to point B and C:

 

Five Flamestorm Aggressors.

Relentless Determination to count as Stationary.

Flamecraft to max shots.

The Crucible of Battle, Promethazine Cult, and Catechism of Fire for +1 to wound each.

 

120 auto-hitting shots, S4, Ap 1, plus three to wound. Master Crafted for the serg so his shots are D2, The Fires of Battle on a grunt to pump 12 mortals to top it off. It would put 66 wounds on a Knight with Rotate Ion Shields up.

 

Obviously 9th changes the math there.

Edited July 12, 2020 by TheNewman

[Bung]

 

And self punishment for the loss of honor is very space mariney.

Not as masochistic as some sons of Dorn but its there in the lore and novels.

Competent writers will know overemphasizing self-punishment (e.g., using the Pain Glove) will turn potential players away from a Chapter, and not portray Marines as mega-masochists whose stories belong in pornographic publications. The Ultramarines, Iron Hands, and Black Templars have such competent writers; the Salamanders do not.

 

Sorry, i found it rather fitting to use branding irons instead of other stuff for Salamanders and it shows a bit of real life research.

With the description of the dark black skin it should be clear that normal tattos wont work on Sally skin and Scarification is a way of bodymodification that works.

Scarification has been part of different cultures and still exist today. 

 

I think its better done than the IF and their successor chapters idea of the pain glove as communion with the primarch.

 

And for the Ultramarines novels, they have so much flaws in my eyes i cant read them. Uriel Mary Sue Ventries is on of the poster boys of bad writting in 40k in my eyes.

I am talking about this sort of writting, that totally puts my of

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Sue

 

Ultramarines and Gaunts Ghosts are the biggest offenders i encountered.

 

 

 

Obvious problem: Kromlech and Spellcrow are third parties who provide UNLICENSED work, not Games Workshop affiliates. IIRC, some tournaments ban third party models.

 

Not a problem, when you use mainly GW parts, adding tabbards, shoulder pads etc. to GW plastic to personalize  it shouldnt be a problem as long as the miniature is mainly GW.

And if someone ask, just tell them you sculpted them yourself. What will they do, scratch the paint from the minis?

I havent heard about a tournament banning converted GW models as long as some parts are still from GW,

But i live in an area and country with more common sense, even GW staff wouldnt ban you from the store for using third party bits.

One i know even recommends Pop goes the Monkey for chapter specific bits, that arent made by GW to personalize an army.

And the non-GW Nerdstores i visit are normally pretty cool about converted armies. 

What could be a better marketing for your event than people showing up with an army they invested alot of time, money and effort to personalize it? 

Thats the stuff looking great on pictures. 

Better than cutthroat tournaments with grey plastic and 3d printed custodes tanks without any effort to paint and base.

[CaptainMarsh]

It is a combination of factors. The rules haven't always been the best (though I have loved playing them in 8th), they don't have a lot of really good and accessible BL material, and they've never been given a marketing push as a focused chapter. 

[Medjugorje]

in German tournaments its very and appreciated if you have conversions or 3rd Party if the base is correct and the scale is correct.

Edited July 12, 2020 by Medjugorje

[leth]

I have met quite a few salamanders, just never in the colors. basically most people use the rules that are most powerful at any given time for marines(myself included). 

 

I don’t know the most about the rules but I am see salamanders(or a successor) being powerful in the MSU meta I expect to see. 
 

salamanders also strongly reward the old school marines(with 1 reroll per unit) where they can take specialist weapons per squad and they are kinda on the outs compared to primaris who are exclusive weapon types. 

[Minsc]

As a Salamander-player I don't mind my chapter being rare. As to why that is, it's probably been covered already pretty well.

From a fluff PoV they are a fairly small chapter. They're fairly unique in both appearance and the fact that they are one of the few factions that can be called "good guys", but they're not really being pushed by GW nor do they play a major role in recent events or books. Basically they need a better publisher. If you ask someones who's fairly new to the game to name all the founding loyalist chapters, Salamanders will probably be one of the last, if not the last chapter to be listed.

From a rules PoV they're fairly average compared to the other chapters (but still good in general). I like their rules myself, but if you really want to utilize them to the fullest they do force you into a specific play style (involving MSU, Flamers and Meltas) that isn't necessarily for everyone. Most of our new toys (aka. Primaris-units) don't synergize well with Salamanders, as they tend to include fairly big squads where everyone has the same weapon (meaning one re-roll is less important) and lack flamers/meltas (with a few exceptions, i.e. Aggressors.)

From a modelling PoV they're a chapter that's easy to paint "OK/decent" but fairly hard to paint "good". Green and black marines is fairly easy to paint. Once you start adding scales and flames everywhere it starts to get challenging.

The reason I began with Salamanders in 5th was mainly for fluff reasons, closely followed by modelling reasons (I couldn't care less if their chapter tactics back then where the best or the worst in the codex), and I bet this mentality is pretty common for people who play Salamanders, but at the same time very uncommon for the average 40k-player in general.

 

[Ishagu]

I think Salamanders are one of the best Chapters in terms of rules, strats and traits.

 

They will be even better in 9th, and their Eradicators will be a pretty scary unit.

[Boytoy]

i just find their lore to be lacking. not really a fan of kyme's writing style. this is backed up by their rather lackluster upgrade sprue. was hoping for some scaled skin bits for their pauldrons like the SW use fur. also, the fact that they find phosphex to inhumane, but still use flamers always confused me

[leth]

Salamanders have a lot of love options from third party as well. 
 

I remember my first salamander cloaks back I third edition were the tiny Malus dark blade cloaks that I got on bits order. 
 

I think you can really make an amazing looking salamanders army with the 3d printing available, if I was not enslaved to Deathwatch I would want to do salamanders, 

[Gederas]

i just find their lore to be lacking. not really a fan of kyme's writing style. this is backed up by their rather lackluster upgrade sprue. was hoping for some scaled skin bits for their pauldrons like the SW use fur. also, the fact that they find phosphex to inhumane, but still use flamers always confused me

It's because Phosphex isn't just fire. It's a chemical weapon. Basically the unholy child of a threeway between Napalm, Greek Fire and White Phosphorous, with the added effect of a Dirty Bomb of some kind (it's stated that Phosphex makes areas affected by it "inimical to life for centuries").

 

As to the flamer thing: It's the whole "fire allows for regrowth and renewal" thing.

Edited July 13, 2020 by Gederas

[Lord_Caerolion]

I loathe what Kyme did to the Salamanders, given he's the one who introduced the whole "7 Companies recruit only from their own city" nonsense.

 

As for the "fire vs phosphex" thing, as Gederas says, it's to do with the fact that fire has themes of regrowth, tempering, and creating new life (there are plants in Australia that literally depend on bushfires in order to germinate their seeds). It's central to the Promethean Cult that fire strengthens. It destroys, but only so that what comes next is stronger. Phosphex, on the other hand, simply destroys. You cannot rebuild where phosphex has been deployed, it has to be quarantined. 

 

tl:dr, you can be "reborn in fire", you sure as hell can't be "reborn in phosphex".

[Bung]

I loathe what Kyme did to the Salamanders, given he's the one who introduced the whole "7 Companies recruit only from their own city" nonsense.

 

Nope, a part of this had been Part of the lore since third edition. The old Index Astartes from then stated that the 7 companies were founded in the 7 cities of Nocturne.

The only addition of Kyme was to mention that the companies only recruit from that cities.

Given that Space Marines are traditionalists its something which is rather believable.

[Lord_Caerolion]

 

I loathe what Kyme did to the Salamanders, given he's the one who introduced the whole "7 Companies recruit only from their own city" nonsense.

Nope, a part of this had been Part of the lore since third edition. The old Index Astartes from then stated that the 7 companies were founded in the 7 cities of Nocturne.

The only addition of Kyme was to mention that the companies only recruit from that cities.

Given that Space Marines are traditionalists its something which is rather believable.

 

 

Yes, and that's what I said. "7 Companies recruit only from their own city" was what Kyme introduced, which categorically cannot work if the Salamanders only have 7 Companies. Why? Because the 7th Company was the Scout Company, which was comprised of the new recruits who went on to join the other Companies, and the 1st Company was comprised only of Veterans promoted from the 2nd-6th Companies. The 1st Company cannot simultaneously only recruit from one city, while also only be comprised of the veterans from the other Companies.

 

The only way what Kyme wrote works is if there are 9 Companies. 1st Company comprised of Veterans, 2nd through 8th being the Battle/Reserve Companies each comprised of recruits only from a single city on Nocturne, and the 9th being the Scout Company that trains the recruits and sends them on to their respective Company once they're ready. The previous Space Marine Codex fed this confusion, stating that the Chapter had "7 main companies", with a Scout Company "in addition to these", only for the organization chart two pages later to show 7 Companies total.

[Bung]

So you blame one Author for nearly 20 years of GWs inconsistency of Space Marine organisation?

Chapter Organisation never worked with the limit of 1000 Battle Brothers which had been mentioned for years / decades.

[Dracos]

Okay guys this discussion is way off off the original post topic and sounds like its getting personal. Maybe take it to PMs or at least a Lore sub-forum

[Noserenda]

Salamanders have been popular before, they may well be again. Once upon a time Ultramarines were basically unheard of despite Codex Space marines being literally called Codex Ultramarines :D (On an army scale anyway, lots of them were painted by rookies who then headed to greener pastures rules wise). 

Some people pick a faction for one of a thousand reasons and stick with it forever, others change every edition or so, some change every time a new hotness comes along. Any given Chapter is always going to be a bit of a niche from any of those given reasons unless they get particularly good rules or arguably a great BL book, neither of which Salamanders have had for a while.

[Lord_Caerolion]

So you blame one Author for nearly 20 years of GWs inconsistency of Space Marine organisation?

Chapter Organisation never worked with the limit of 1000 Battle Brothers which had been mentioned for years / decades.

 

No, I'm saying that Kyme changed one thing about Salamanders organization, and it didn't work as a result. There cannot be only 7 Companies for the Salamanders if they both have a Veteran and Scout Company, while also having each of the 7 Companies recruiting only from a specific city. I've made no comment on standard Chapter organization. The "Companies recruit only from their city" is a change made by Kyme alone. Every other bit of confusion regarding Chapter organization is on the other assorted GW authors over the years, as you state.

 

As Dracos has said, though, we're getting off-topic. We can continue this in the appropriate topic, if you wish: http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/topic/294584-how-many-companies-and-in-what-format/

[Bung]

 

 

So you blame one Author for nearly 20 years of GWs inconsistency of Space Marine organisation?

Chapter Organisation never worked with the limit of 1000 Battle Brothers which had been mentioned for years / decades.

No, I'm saying that Kyme changed one thing about Salamanders organization, and it didn't work as a result. There cannot be only 7 Companies for the Salamanders if they both have a Veteran and Scout Company, while also having each of the 7 Companies recruiting only from a specific city. I've made no comment on standard Chapter organization. The "Companies recruit only from their city" is a change made by Kyme alone. Every other bit of confusion regarding Chapter organization is on the other assorted GW authors over the years, as you state.

 

As Dracos has said, though, we're getting off-topic. We can continue this in the appropriate topic, if you wish: http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/topic/294584-how-many-companies-and-in-what-format/

I am not here to defend Kymes writting.

I have my Problems with the Salamanders novels too.

There are other novels with other chapters haveing similar divergences with established Lore.

My problem is the forced X-Men fandom in that novels.

 

I had my Salamanders in third Edition.

Noone played them then for their -1 Initiative in an Edition where it was needed in Close Combat.

Then their other Special Rules got either roled into the normal SM Codex or simply removed in 4th.

The got a bit popularity die to 4th Editions SM rules but that didnt help them much till now as you didnt need them to play the special caracters.

At least that was my experience over the years.

 

They arent even popular in 30k as they mostly show up to die in Istvan.

[Lord_Caerolion]

I remember their 3rd ed list well, it was the first thing that got me interested in Loyalist Marines. I do wish we'd get a bit more information about their role in the Trefoil in regards to 30k, give them something other than "they show up and get annihilated".