The Baleful Hounds - Renegade Chapter

[War of the Eagle]

Chapter Name: The Baleful Hounds (formerly Hounds of the Hunt)

Founding: Ultima founding

Chapter world: None

Chapter Monastery: aboard the battle barge "Iron Chariot"

Chapter Master: Taras "Lord of the Hunt"

Gene-Seed: gene legacy is listed as coming from the 5th legion.

War cry: "Today we hunt, tonight we feast!"

Known descendants: None

Main colors: Dark grey and white

Insignia: a dog head with spiked collar with a broken chain.

 

Chapter origin and history:

 

During the Ultima founding the Hounds of the Hunt where founded as a fleet based chapter who's main goal was to give chase to splinter fleets or retreating contingents. Due to the tendency of the retreating enemy forces containing warlords or attempting to lead the Astarties into traps, the Hounds quickly adopted lightning strike tactics that used almost wreckless speed and vigor. Often the hounds will go for a decapitating blow, destroying the enemys command structure, leaving the rest of the force in disarray.

 

Due to the peculiar culture and honor system of the chapter, the hounds have let escape more than a dozen high profile and powerful chaos and xeno warlords. Communication and rumors being as volatile as they are with the current state of the Imperium, these actions went unnoticed for years. Eventually reports from reliable sources painted a disturbing picture for the Inquisition. One confirmed account was of the Hounds granting Golgoth the Afflictor safe passage off a battle field after being firmly surrounded by joint imperial forces. The Inquisition sent message to the Hounds to cease their actions, but they merely replied that the foes had won their freedom honorably and the hounds only answered to the Emperor.

 

Soon after Felkis, head of the Warseers had a vision showing him a fleet of inquisitorial forces coming to exterminate the chapter. It seams the Inquisition had decided to declare the Hounds heriticus excomunicatus for their wreckless and uncontrollable nature. Felkis warned the chapter, and as his visions had never been wrong before, Taras belived him without question. The chapter packed up all of their ships to the brim with extra supplies and spare primaris gene seed. They also reqositioned ships, manpower and supplies from an Astra militarum force in the sector before word got to them of the Hounds excomunication. They then escaped into the rift and the Inquisition was surprised to see the chapter long gone when they arrived.

 

After their escape they changed their name to The Baleful Hounds. The chapter then underwent some major changes. Firstly the chapter restructured itself, no longer set up like a codex compliant chapter, but taking in other renagade space marines and astra militarum groups who swore fealty to Taras. The chapter size has swelled well above the standard 1000 marines and many many more human solders and workers.

 

Despite being declared excomunicatus, the chapter still believes in and worships the Emperor. Taras was once offered patronage from a greater demon of Khorne not long after their escape. His only condition was the chapter slaughter all their Warseers and, lay their skulls at his feet. Taras slew the greater demon in response and its skull adornes his trophy wrack to this day. Even tho the hounds belive themselves champions of humanity, they will still slay any Imperial force that gets in their way.

 

Culture:

The Hounds are set up in the visage of old knightly orders of antiquity.

Ranks within the chapter are as follows.

Lord of the Hunt - Chapter Master

Duke - Company captains

Viscounts - chapter Ainchents and Champions

Warseers - Librarians

Troubadours - Chaplains

Barons - first company/terminator honors

Paladins - Apothocarys

Knight captains - squad Sargents

Knights - rank and file Marines

Squires - neophytes

Serfs - any none astartes human

 

Maybe due to their long solitary missions away from other imperial forces or a flaw in their geneseed, the hounds are extremely prideful and dont respect the authority of any none Astartes. Despite their arrogance, the chapter believes in a strict honor system. Any foe to emerge victorious after a dule will be granted their life, aslong as they do not stain their honor by returning to the battle. The chapter will also honor any deals made and will avoid unnecessary killing of none combatants.

Gradually the hunting tactics and honor dules became a game to the hounds, where warlords and champions where great feats to be claimed. This traditionary hunting game became integral to the command structure of the Hounds. To gain rank within the Hounds, individuals would have to defeat worthy foes in 1v1 combat. Due to fierce competitiveness, many young aspiring members of the chapter will challenge opponents outside their ability.

Apart of their kightly structure, each marine is allowed two squires. These are generally young astra militarum soilders who have caught the marines eye in combat. These squires are trained up to be neophites. Only after slaying an enemy Astartes are they granted rank of knight and gain the right to declare dules and start training their own squires.

After battle the Hounds often host a feast to toast their victory and honor their fallen. These feasts can become rather lively with the frequent accompaniment of music, boastful recounts of the battles more interesting moments, or the showing off of newly recovered trophies. The final toast of the feast will be made using blood from fallen brothers mixed with a mead like alchohol in their honor.

 

Often Troubadours withing the chapter will recite heroic feats of chapter individuals as often as holy scripture to inspire their brothers.

Since the reclamation of geneseed is such a highly important task, all Paladins within the chapter are hand picked from some of the most skilled fighters. The post is highly respected within the chapter tho many hope to never receive the title as they are forbidden from declaring dules.

Edited December 23, 2020 by War of the Eagle

[Gamiel]

Looks like a good start. You need to give it a reread since you are not constant with which words you capitalise and have some compounded words and a full stop that's misplaced.

 

Suggest fusing the Origin and History part, like this:

 Chapter origin and history
During the Ultima founding the Hounds of the Hunt where founded as a fleet based chapter whos main goal was to give chase to splinter fleets or retreating contingents. Due to the tendency of the retreating enemy forces containing warlords or attempting to lead the Astarties into traps, the Hounds quickly adopted lightning strike tactics that used almost wreckless speed and vigor. Often the hounds will go for a decapitating blow, destroying the enemys command structure, leaving the rest of the force in disarray. The final mop up becoming a crazed blood bath.

The hounds have a strong contingent of Librarians they call the Warseers. The Head of the Warseers Felkis occasionally has visions of future events, these visions often giving them the ability to cut off prey unexpectedly. One of these visions showed him a fleet of inquisitorial forces coming to exterminate the chapter, It seams the inquisition got wind of the chapter showing mercy to the foes of the emperor and marked them heriticus excomunicatus. Felkis warned the chapter and as his visions had never been wrong before and where often thought to come from the Emperor himself they belived him without question. The chapter packed up all of their ships to the brim with extra supplies and spare primaris gene seed. They also reqositioned ships, manpower and supplies from an Astra militarum force in the sector before word got to them of the Hounds excomunication. They then escaped into the rift and the Inquisition was surprised to see the chapter long gone when they arrived.

After changing their name to The Baleful Hounds, the chapter underwent some major changes. Firstly the chapter restructured itself Into a raiding warband, no longer set up like a consistant Space marine chapter but taking in other renagade space marines and astra militarum groups that swore fealty to Taras. The internal hierarchy developed much like a knightly order with the. Space marines at the top and the normal humans as serfs. The knights taking on human apprentices to train on becoming space marines, aswell as take care of their daily choirs.

Despite being declared excomunicatus the chapter still believes in the emperor and believe if they preform enough heroic feats in his name they will eat at his banquet table in the afterlife. Taras was even offered patrionage from a greater demon of khorne if only the chapter slaughtered all their Warseers and, laid their skulls at his feet. Taras slew the greater demon in response and its skull adornes his trophy wrack to this day. Even tho the hounds have no ties with chaos, they will still slay any Imperial force that gets in their way.

 

Should probably mention what enemy of the Emperor they had shown mercy to  and why. Personally do it feel strange that the =][= would try to censure them for just something that small and without an investigation. But we know that some =][= are very trigger happy and this is your story.

 

 

 

 

*Drinking a bloodmead Toast made from the blood of fallen comrades to honor their memory.

Is this mead as in what the Space Wolves drink or mead as in the RL drink? If the former where did they get the recipe from? If the later where do they get they honey?

 

 

 

*Chaplains becoming more bard like, Inspiring their comrades with songs of chapter warriors accomplishments.

Suggest that they are called Story-keepers, Skalds, or similar.

 

 

 

 Do they plan to try to get in contact with Big G, or similar, to clear their name?

[War of the Eagle]

Should probably mention what enemy of the Emperor they had shown mercy to and why. Personally do it feel strange that the =][= would try to censure them for just something that small and without an investigation. But we know that some =][= are very trigger happy and this is your story.

 

Is this mead as in what the Space Wolves drink or mead as in the RL drink? If the former where did they get the recipe from? If the later where do they get they honey?

 

Suggest that they are called Story-keepers, Skalds, or similar.

 

Do they plan to try to get in contact with Big G, or similar, to clear their name?

1st thanks very much for taking the time to read it over. I will defiantly work on a rewrite and plan on adding more.

 

2nd as for who they let go, I was thinking Gulgoth the Afflictor. And at least a dozen other warlords. Tho not sure how many to make up or pull from the lore. (Yes thats a lot of lost dules, but allot of lower ranking Hounds challenge enemy's who out class them to make a name for themselves.) It also took some time for all these incidents to come to light. One or two could be written off as mistakes or rumors but their case file eventually built up. In my head, the Inquisition would be appalled that these enemys of mankind where permitted safe passage aftering being cornered, sometimes when it was one of the hounds main objectives to slay them. Where they in cahoots? Swayed by chaos? Couldn't be they would just let them go on a gentlemans agreement.

 

3rd: the Mead is similar to the real world drink, but likely made with some sort of synthesized honey. Mixing the blood with the mead was a way for them to make the ceremony more classy. They take both honoring the dead and their courtly mannerisms very seriously. So to make the drinking less vulgar and more akin to a toast of antiquity, mead was added.

 

4th: Since they are a white scars successor and allot of my chaplains ride bikes, what about troubadours?

 

Lastly they have little intention of clearing their name. Much like the White Scars they feel little brotherhood with the rest of the Imperium. They have become too prideful and cant see their own faults, not truely understanding the consequences of their actions, but feeling no reason to change their ways.

 

I want the feel of them to be much like old monarchys. Pride and arrogance just gone to far. Where their silly traditions and rituals feel foolish and peacocky from the outside.

[War of the Eagle]

updated the info, tho my writing skills are still subpar.

[Brother Lunkhead]

I like what you are doing here with your renegade chapter It all looks very promising.

 

I like the idea of the singing chaplains. Remember though, The Chaplaincy is the guardian of the chapter orthodoxy, and purity of soul. They should have a name befitting this position of responsibility. The Resounding Voice, The Guardian Choir, The Great Scalds, or something along those lines.

 

In reference to the reason the chapter has been censured in the extreme, other chapters have been condemned and marked for destruction for far less (the Celestial Lions for example). Your story looks fine, but should probably be extrapolated upon.

 

Looking forward to seeing more

[Gamiel]

Have read the new version and it's an improvment.

 

If you don't know about it do I suggest this thread for possible ideas how to make your chapter more "knightly" Suggestions on how to make a Chapter "knightly"

 

If you want to lean a bit more on the Hound name could you have rank-titles like “Pack master” or similar among the Chapter, you could also use “packs” instead of “squads” or maybe for larger forces.

 

There is also the possibility that they use war dogs. This could be represented with Aximillion or Chaos Warhounds rules, or if you they have some big dogs in their kennel: Fenriesian wolves’ rules. If you plan to play the Hounds and use this idea would I actually say that the easiest would be to use Space Wolves rules for your whole Chapter since that makes it easier to explain the hunting dogs and how they works when it comes to rules. If you paint the Fenriesian wolves as German shepherds, Rhodesian ridgeback, dalmatians or similar would you make them appear a bit less wolf-ish. Using the SW rules would also open up for you to use the wolfen rules, which you could use to represent xenos that has allied with the Chapter or sworn them servitude after the Hounds beat them but did not, as you said is the Chapter’s way, kill them all.

 

 

 

2nd as for who they let go, I was thinking Gulgoth the Afflictor. And at least a dozen other warlords. Tho not sure how many to make up or pull from the lore. (Yes thats a lot of lost dules, but allot of lower ranking Hounds challenge enemy's who out class them to make a name for themselves.) It also took some time for all these incidents to come to light. One or two could be written off as mistakes or rumors but their case file eventually built up. In my head, the Inquisition would be appalled that these enemys of mankind where permitted safe passage aftering being cornered, sometimes when it was one of the hounds main objectives to slay them. Where they in cahoots? Swayed by chaos? Couldn't be they would just let them go on a gentlemans agreement.

Suggest adding some fully made up names of xeno enemies both of the major races and possibly of minor xenos (some which you could make up yourself, or refer to others fanon creation, since there are many minor xeno groups). 

 

 

 

3rd: the Mead is similar to the real world drink, but likely made with some sort of synthesized honey. Mixing the blood with the mead was a way for them to make the ceremony more classy. They take both honoring the dead and their courtly mannerisms very seriously. So to make the drinking less vulgar and more akin to a toast of antiquity, mead was added.

I would say that if you have it so that they use real honey would that be something that you can build on more. It could mean that they have gardens of some kind aboard at least some of their ships (maybe agri-ships whose inside is mostly gardens and farmland exist as part of the fleet, or maybe each ship has their own garden area – could be that the Hounds has that every ship that joins their fleet has to be retrofitted to have gardens?); or maybe they constantly trade with somebody that gives them honey; or maybe honey is one of the things they raid for when raiding worlds (or maybe they have a preference for raiding worlds where they know/think they can get honey);

 

 

 

In reference to the reason the chapter has been censured in the extreme, other chapters have been condemned and marked for destruction for far less (the Celestial Lions for example). Your story looks fine, but should probably be extrapolated upon.

 

Based on Spear of the Emperor so is the Lions not officially marked for destruction since Amadeus did not know of any such thing and had hard to believe (openly at least) that they =][= was personally targeting the Lions. The Hounds are different in that they have officially been declared heriticus excomunicatus.