Exorcists gene-seed primogenitor named!

[Ryltar Thamior]

Oof. That ... was not an ideal read. 

It's not (really) about the Fists gene-seed, either. I can see how it would make a certain sense, regardless of whether one likes the concept. But that first page excerpt does make it sound like the Exorcists became the Exorcists [i.e. daemon-fighting specialists in earnest] as the result of a single campaign some time after their founding. 

It's not impossible to suggest that the previous narrative of them being a bespoke Inquisitorial creation [which this article does appear to reference] could synch with this - by having them deliberately deployed to this warzone, face this sort of foe, in order to bring to the surface a latent element to them that had always been planned [it would certainly explain their chapter name ..]  ... but I will be surprised if there's that kind of nuance going on in the rest of the article.

Personally, I'd thought that the 13th Founding might have been an earlier (and arguably more successful) 21st Founding type effort - and therefore, that chimaeric or otherwise significantly altered geneseed in order to produce specific sorts of Astartes , presumably under Inquisitorial mandate [well, *some* Inquisitor's mandate] was the order of the day. That would still be reconcilable with having Fists geneseed - after all, something nice and stable would make for a solid template to build from. [speaking of 'Inquisitorial mandates', it occurs that with three confirmed 13th Founding chapters , and three Ordos Majoris , this would make the Exorcists the Malleus ones; and presumably the Death Specters the Xenos one .. which leaves the Crimson Sabres, ironically, as the Hereticus one. But I digress]

Back in the day, something I quite enjoyed about the Index Astartes articles of old was their ability to present things in a manner that was truth-adjacent and left space to read between lines. For example, the Imperial Fists and Iron Warriors IA articles both presented perspectives on the Iron Cage incident that are broadly in agreement but differ hugely upon some rather salient stuff [in particular, whether Dorn semi-deliberately went into the trap as a sort of shriving of the legion as a whole in preparation for reduction down to chapter strength, and was left with a hardened but flexible core ready to accept the re-organization [iF IA version] .... or whether Dorn arrogantly blundered into throwing away much of his legion for pride and was left a "broken man" via the aftermanth [iW IA version]] ... or, for that matter, the several fates for Garro in the Death Guard article that we now know to be all semi-true (for a given value of "true" that involves several Astartes other than Garro). 

There were some relatively deep shadows in amidst those broad and yet detailed outlines in which all manner of intricate headcanoning could take place. And I actually think it tended to make for better writing, too. 

I don't think it proper to move rom judging to executing a book via its cover - or,in this case, its first page or so - and it's certainly possible that the rest of the article would redeem it somewhat ... but yeah. We'll have to see what happens.



 

[Brother Kraskor]

I would hardly describe the Exorcists as psychos. They are, in fact, described as being very calm and studious while outside of battle.

 

The comment was tongue-in-cheek, but there's a grain of truth to it! They're hardly the most normal Chapter when it comes to initiation...!

[Charybdis]

Wasn't there some mention of Rogal Dorn having some sort of anti warp ability? 

 

I think I read it in one of the recent 'Siege of Terror' books but I think Malcador basically tells Dorn to not bother trying to comprehend the Warp as his very being seem's to be immune/disrupt it. I think the Sigillite even states that Rogal was purposefully designed this way. 

 

If I'm remembering correctly then it makes a certain amount of sense that a Fist successor would train their inherent strengths to be extra Warp resistant. 

[Marshal Loss]

While I don't like it in this particular case, given the Exorcists' own pedigree & mystery, I do think that framing prominent examples where chapters change dramatically in response to stimuli (as opposed to being produced as ready-made (x) specialists with (x) character) is a great idea, and makes for good inspiration for folks looking to make their own mark on the setting.

[Doghouse]

For me, I don't mind that they are IF sucessors at all. Having the Exorcists be weirdly from GK stock always felt a bit mary sue to me and I'm glad it was an uninformed in-universe opinion!

 

 

That's my take on it as well. I think they had to pick one Chapter for the Chapter tactics and to be fair given canonically that so many Chapters hail from the Ultramarines this is a nice turn of events. 

 

The Grey Knight Successors thing lessens the difference between the GKs and the regular Codex Chapters for me. 

 

This sounds more like a retcon to me of a regular Fists Successor Chapter that gets a lot of marines possessed while battling daemons and ends up specialising in Daemon fighting using dark and forbidden practices, rather than these guys were specifically made to fight Chaos.

 

Much in the same way that back in the RT days the Fire Hawks were a regular Chapter before becoming the Legion of the Damned.

[Joe]

ADB has just thrown out a thread on the subject in response to a post from 40kLore on Twitter.

 

 

 

Hoo, boy. This one.

 

They get a mention of it in a short story, but when they were covered extensively in the Badab War books, it was intentionally never mentioned as a Thing.

 

It's like the Blood Ravens / Thousand Sons. Supposed to be a possibility, not a confirmation.

 

 

 

@40KTheories There are times when, for years, you know something's basically not true, even as it's absorbed by the online fandom as fact.

 

This is one of those times. I learned my lesson from talking about the Thousand Sons / Blood Ravens, though. It's easier to let the ignorance exist.

 

 

 

@Ti_Dinzeo @40KTheories That's exactly the wrong question. The point is not to know. It's hard to preserve, but that's the craft.

 

 

The answer to that question is that there's actually no answer, which means any definitive answer is wrong.

 

 

 

@adembskibowden So is this simply a case of someone writing something "too firm" for something that needed to be left intentionally vague?

 

 

@40KTheories Yep.

 

Though, that said, the story was still presenting the info as subjective, so it's not like it was saying THIS IS 100% TRUE. It's totally understandable why fans believed it, of course.

 

And it could be true! That's the point.

Edited March 1, 2021 by Joe

[Valkyrion]

Why the Exorcists at all?  They had rules in a FW publication a decade ago, have no official models or extant rules, or even a transfer sheet.

 

Don't get me wrong, I'm not against them getting fleshed out a little, but why them and why give them rules at all?

Why not do something a little more out there, like Mantis Warriors and instead of chapter tactics all Core infantry can infiltrate. Or Red Scorpions with an apothecary upgrade. Aurora Chapter and allow tanks to be taken 3 to a slot. 

Stir the pot a little rather than just make a rule set for an army that a player could have picked anyway, but never did, that doesn't really reflect the one bit of established fluff they had...

[SkimaskMohawk]

I'll refer you to all the chapters in the imperial armour index and the blood ravens white dwarf article. Because it's low effort.

 

At least the emperor's spears got stratagems, warlord traits and relics that synergize with the their generic mix of chapter tactics.

[Charlo]

Why the Exorcists at all? They had rules in a FW publication a decade ago, have no official models or extant rules, or even a transfer sheet.

 

Don't get me wrong, I'm not against them getting fleshed out a little, but why them and why give them rules at all?

Why not do something a little more out there, like Mantis Warriors and instead of chapter tactics all Core infantry can infiltrate. Or Red Scorpions with an apothecary upgrade. Aurora Chapter and allow tanks to be taken 3 to a slot.

Stir the pot a little rather than just make a rule set for an army that a player could have picked anyway, but never did, that doesn't really reflect the one bit of established fluff they had...

Because all of those things you list are representative of an older style of rules. These indexes fit within the parameters of the current codex and still (presumably if it's like the Spears) offer something new

[MegaVolt87]

I'll refer you to all the chapters in the imperial armour index and the blood ravens white dwarf article. Because it's low effort.

 

At least the emperor's spears got stratagems, warlord traits and relics that synergize with the their generic mix of chapter tactics.

 

Not just that, I think its GW's attempt to capture the prestige of older chapters fondly loved by the old vets as an olive branch to them without understanding what they actually like about those chapters. Retaining the old lore, while tacking on a post Cadia part would have been more than enough to make people happy. I don't understand how GW did a great job with the revised CF IA, but make this one a dumpster fire. 

[Brother Tyler]

It doesn't matter what Chapters/factions GW chooses to feature in these Index Astartes articles - someone is going to question why they were chosen and why others weren't. Similarly, someone is going to take issue with whatever rules GW provides (for example, I would have given the Exorcists completely different Chapter Tactics without changing their gene-seed). The best thing that we can learn to do is to cope effectively with GW not doing the things we want them to do and/or not doing things the way we want them to do them. Ultimately, if this article and its rules inspire any players to collect Exorcists forces, it's a win.

[MegaVolt87]

It doesn't matter what Chapters/factions GW chooses to feature in these Index Astartes articles - someone is going to question why they were chosen and why others weren't. Similarly, someone is going to take issue with whatever rules GW provides (for example, I would have given the Exorcists completely different Chapter Tactics without changing their gene-seed). The best thing that we can learn to do is to cope effectively with GW not doing the things we want them to do and/or not doing things the way we want them to do them. Ultimately, if this article and its rules inspire any players to collect Exorcists forces, it's a win.

 

While that is the sensible and mature way to deal with all this, its still important to draw a line in the sand somewhere, otherwise it will just snowball out of control if we don't explain in detail why its not a good idea to do it. 

[Spinsanity]

As for unknown progenitor/founding, this mostly stemmed from the Blood Ravens and only got worse as people came into 40k without the understanding that sometimes, things in the Imperium just get lost and that not knowing something doesn't mean it was hidden away.  Or that something hidden away was worth not knowing.

Uh, what? The Blood Ravens were introduced with the first Dawn of War, back in 2004. As a comparison, the Dark and Cursed foundings, which all along were originally composed exclusively (IIRC) of "unknown founding Legion" chapters (just to name these), and the Cursed founding was first presented in WD in 2003. And I'm pretty sure the idea of unknown founding/unknown lineage chapters didn't just start there either, it's pretty much been a prevalent idea since the beginning of 2nd edition as far as I can recall...

[jeremy1391]

Wow their chapter tactics are basically the two most “meh” traits.

 

And what is it with index chapters getting stalwart? First the blood ravens, now the exorcists.

[Jareddm]

 

As for unknown progenitor/founding, this mostly stemmed from the Blood Ravens and only got worse as people came into 40k without the understanding that sometimes, things in the Imperium just get lost and that not knowing something doesn't mean it was hidden away.  Or that something hidden away was worth not knowing.

Uh, what? The Blood Ravens were introduced with the first Dawn of War, back in 2004. As a comparison, the Dark and Cursed foundings, which all along were originally composed exclusively (IIRC) of "unknown founding Legion" chapters (just to name these), and the Cursed founding was first presented in WD in 2003. And I'm pretty sure the idea of unknown founding/unknown lineage chapters didn't just start there either, it's pretty much been a prevalent idea since the beginning of 2nd edition as far as I can recall...

 

Not my point at all.  I'm saying there's a sizable portion of the community that equates "unknown geneseed" with "traitor/messed up geneseed."  Prior to the Blood Ravens, people weren't defaulting to traitor geneseed for every unknown founding chapter.

[MECHFACE]

I think that revealing a Primarch gene-seed for a chapter should not instantly lock them into the whole mechanics of using that Primarch 1st Founding Legion. So why should the Exorcists need to use the Legacy of Dorn detachment doctrines super trait anyway?

 

DETACHMENT DOCTRINE TRAIT - LEGACY OF DORN
'The Imperial Fists are peerless makers of siege, demonstrating an uncanny knack for identifying and exploiting the weak spots of enemy vehicles and fortifications'.

Whilst the Devastator Doctrine is active, each time a model with this ability makes an attack with a Heavy weapon against a VEHICLE or BUILDING unit, if that attack has a Strength characteristic of 7 or more, add 1 to the Damage characteristic of that attack.

 

However, the Black Templars ARE a Imperial Fists Successor (2nd Founding) but have rules which are completely different, making them more of a unique chapter than just a index successor. 

 

CHAPTER TACTIC - BLACK TEMPLARS: RIGHTEOUS ZEAL
*'Hot burns the hatred of the Black Templars for the mutant, the witch and the heretic, and bright blazes their faith in the immortal Emperor of Mankind. With furious cries do these crusading warriors hurl themselves into battle against their reviled foes, and with fervent prayers do they shrug off even the most grievous wounds'. You can re-roll Advance rolls and charge rolls made for units with this tactic. Each time a model with this tactic would lose a wound as a result of a mortal wound, roll one D6: on a 5+, that wound is not lost.*

 

DETACHMENT DOCTRINE TRAIT - KNIGHTS OF SIGISMUND
*'Skilled with both blade and bolter in equal measure, the warriors of the Black Templars are a creed unto themselves. A brethren of unquestioning loyalty, they exist to bring the Emperor’s retribution to every heretic and unbeliever within the Imperium and beyond'. Whilst the Assault Doctrine is active, when resolving an attack made with a melee weapon by a BLACK TEMPLARS model with this ability against a unit that is not a VEHICLE in a turn in which that model made a charge move or performed a Heroic Intervention, an unmodified hit roll of 6 automatically scores a hit and successfully wounds the target (do not make a wound roll).*

 

 

So unless they already define some of these fundamental mechanics (and hopefully don't retcon the lore too much as we fear) then there is still a lot of room to use in steering the chapter back to the Exorcists theme we have with stratagems, warlord traits and a more suitable detachment doctrine in the manner that the Black Templars do. 

 

Lets see what the full article says though speculation is always fun (for the speculative mind anyway). 

[Kastor Krieg]

I don't understand how GW did a great job with the revised CF IA, but make this one a dumpster fire. 

I think ADB partially hints at the reason why. For better or worse, there's no institutional memory within the GW writer group. "It's just friends and our talks", no huge library of stuff written down and hard facts. Which means that in a tragic event like Alan Bligh's passing, a huge swath of internal background knowledge is simply lost. Forever. Unretrievable unless it can be gleaned from his personal notes. And then there's simple failure of memory, mixed up references, mismatched interpretations, etc.

 

And since they need to consult in person, there's no big reference book / archive for them to use, then such discrepancies and issues occur. We pick up on them easily, as we are Legion. They're just 2d6 dudes, a few of them get to talk to each other at a time, once a month, maybe.

Edited March 2, 2021 by Reclusiarch Krieg

[MECHFACE]

It doesn't matter what Chapters/factions GW chooses to feature in these Index Astartes articles - someone is going to question why they were chosen and why others weren't. Similarly, someone is going to take issue with whatever rules GW provides (for example, I would have given the Exorcists completely different Chapter Tactics without changing their gene-seed). The best thing that we can learn to do is to cope effectively with GW not doing the things we want them to do and/or not doing things the way we want them to do them. Ultimately, if this article and its rules inspire any players to collect Exorcists forces, it's a win.

 

So if you could choose the traits from the big successor list (or half from this / half from the examples of Imperial Fists) which would you choose?

 

I've been thinking on this and I would alter it slightly for the below:

 

CHAPTER TACTIC - EXORCISTS: BY MY WILL I DENY THEE

Deep within the soul-seared hearts of the Exorcists lies a hidden brutality which emerges when faced by the warp-spawned horrors of the immaterium. Through ritual and inherent resistance this chapter possess an unbreakable strength of will that allows them to face the mental and physical horrors of the galaxy and emerge victorious.

 

Each time a model with this tactic makes a melee attack against a unit with that DAEMON or PSYKER keyword, re-roll a hit roll of 1 and wound roll of 1. Each time a model with this tactic would lose a wound as a result of a mortal wound, roll one D6: on a 5+, that wound is not lost.

[Ryltar Thamior]

 

I don't understand how GW did a great job with the revised CF IA, but make this one a dumpster fire. 

I think ADB partially hints at the reason why. For better or worse, there's no institutional memory within the GW writer group. "It's just friends and our talks", no huge library of stuff written down and hard facts. Which means that in a tragic event like Alan Bligh's passing, a huge swath of internal background knowledge is simply lost. Forever. Unretrievable unless it can be gleaned from his personal notes. And then there's simple failure of memory, mixed up references, mismatched interpretations, etc.

 

And since they need to consult in person, there's no big reference book / archive for them to use, then such discrepancies and issues occur. We pick up on them easily, as we are Legion. They're just 2d6 dudes, a few of them get to talk to each other at a time, once a month, maybe.

 

This is incredibly 40k in a QED kinda sense 

 

and that's unfortunate.

 

Although at the same time , it's never been easier to do some level of cursory fact-checking for background that's been published - google is a thing, as are not only Lexicanum and 40k wiki ... but forums such as this one [i would also suspect that GW may have digitized various articles, codexes etc.of yesteryear for internal use].

 

Checking some semi-obscure thing is as simple as firing up a question in the right place - and presuming it gets seen by a grognard or three, you'll get an answer and probably some half-decent surrounding spec. [although there are multiple "if's" in that ]

 

Now, where things go awry is either when i) as you've pointed out, somebody like Alan Bligh goes to take his place in the War Eternal , and a whole lot of hand-scribbled notes (or even notes that had never left the inside of his skull) are lost with him, that mean that metaplot and 'hidden truth' details go out the window, to be replaced by other writers picking up pieces they may not even realize are only half of the puzzle

 

and/or ii) somebody comes along later and decides to 'make their mark' on a subject by changing up some element of the canon in a way that overwrites or is simply manifestly incompatible with some detail (important or minor) of what's gone before. I suspect that this happens more than we realize - but I also suspect that it gets caught out in various departments to prevent it from needlessly happening (or to re-adjust the rest of the universe to compensate). So Black Library publications around the Heresy, for instance, have numbers and dates that bounce around a fair bit from one year's fluff to the next ... but are then corrected on subsequent printings. And something that we've also seen with regard to the ever-shrinking Indomitus Crusade timeline likewise. 

 

Although the really big stuff which falls afoul of ii) - like the Dark Angels' situation in the Heresy and just who the *real* loyalists/traitors were - even though it MAY be one author with a barrow to push, I would be enormously surprised if it was something which didn't make it through a 'quality control' or 'brand identity' [ugh] panel review. I know the HH series had writers' workshops for exactly that purpose. [and I also *think* there used to be a Fluff Bible back in the 90s/00s , when outside writers were brought in more frequently] 

 

This particular Index Astartes article - again, going just on what's on the front page (and also some of ADB's comments above) - appears like somebody operated a bit beyond a more stringent oversight. And something which may have been censored / murked into a more creative ambiguity in an earlier era ... plus the changes to their specific origins and inception, was just run relatively uncritically. 

 

Cynic that I am, I tend to put a lot of this more down to some writers and other people involved in the process having less interest in and appreciation for the delicate balance of revelation and ambiguity that used to characterize a lot of the older writing. Everything's presented in starker contrast and a paradoxical blend of higher resolution and greater bland. 

[MegaVolt87]

 

I don't understand how GW did a great job with the revised CF IA, but make this one a dumpster fire. 

I think ADB partially hints at the reason why. For better or worse, there's no institutional memory within the GW writer group. "It's just friends and our talks", no huge library of stuff written down and hard facts. Which means that in a tragic event like Alan Bligh's passing, a huge swath of internal background knowledge is simply lost. Forever. Unretrievable unless it can be gleaned from his personal notes. And then there's simple failure of memory, mixed up references, mismatched interpretations, etc.

 

And since they need to consult in person, there's no big reference book / archive for them to use, then such discrepancies and issues occur. We pick up on them easily, as we are Legion. They're just 2d6 dudes, a few of them get to talk to each other at a time, once a month, maybe.

 

 

The community does a better job than that with having a lore catalogue with references and aren't even paid to do it. If they wanted, they could set aside time to lurk/ make posts with a dummy account in any 40k community online or even just fire up a wiki and jump to the reference list and dig out the relevant original works from their own archives at GW HQ for the direct source to consult. I mean, if only there was a recent body of work that documented the travails and origins of the founding of the grey knights, during say the horus heresy era via the Knights Errant? Or via the siege of terra arc? Guess that doesn't exist which is why this happened. 

[Brother Tyler]

I've responded to MECHFACE's line of questioning about what rules I would have given to the Exorcists, but I took that up in the Homegrown Rules forum discussion topic for my homegrown Exorcists rules (I don't think it's really relevant here since we [will] have official Exorcists rules soon).

 

I don't think the speculation about little/no control is at all accurate. From what AD-B has said, there is a level of control, and it can be rather firm in certain areas. There are a lot of areas where there is room to maneuver, both areas where conflicting lore is deliberate as well as areas where GW hasn't finalized things. I think that what we have in the case of the Exorcists is that GW's lore gurus haven't locked in what they want and have allowed a level of malleability.

 

The Third War for Armageddon lore was, in my opinion, genius. It violated something that many fans would never have allowed (daemonic possession of loyalist Adeptus Astartes), but did so in a way that worked perfectly in the lore. If a player had presented a DIY Chapter that did this, they would have been crushed. With GW doing it, however, and doing it in a way that worked, players were forced to accept that the realm of the possible was a bit wider than was previously thought. The Third War for Armageddon lore for a number of Chapters (the Exorcists, Relictors, and Celestial Lions) was a watershed moment for DIY Adeptus Astartes Chapter creation.

 

The problem with the Exorcists bit, though, was that many fans immediately latched onto the Grey Knights and that Chapter's relationship with the Exorcists. I don't have any evidence whatsoever, and I may be totally off the mark, but that (misguided?) association with the Grey Knights led to the "official" relationship being established in the Deathwatch stories from Steve Parker, and even though it was given from the perspective of an unreliable narrator, players latched onto it as the gospel truth. I didn't like the notion of the Grey Knights being the progenitor of the Exorcists, though I grew to accept the possibility. Personally, I never liked the notion that the Grey Knights were derived from the Emperor's own gene-seed (since the Emperor never had gene-seed). I could see how the Emperor's genetic material might have been included in some Legion's gene-seed (or potentially a mix of gene-seed from the Knights Errant) to create a new strain, but the lore never presented it in that way. If we looked at it from that perspective, the Grey Knights' gene-seed could have been used in a successor, especially if a few samples were stolen by some radical Inquisitors with access to the Grey Knights. In that sense, I grew to accept the notion of the Grey Knights being the Exorcists' progenitor.

 

The Badab War campaign book article on the Chapter was sublime. It wasn't quite how I would have developed the Chapter, but it took all of the previous conflicts and satisfactorily resolved them. In addition, it gave us the Orisons (which weren't a huge deal, but were very characterful), the visual distinctiveness (which was uncomfortably reminiscent of the pre-Heresy Word Bearers), and Silas Alberec. I was never a fan of the shift in rules, marginalizing the anti-daemon stuff and making them highly flexible in terms of their rules. I saw those rules as a way to appease players using the Exorcists in the Badab War campaign rather than as a representation of the Third War for Armageddon lore. Aside from those Chapter Tactics, however, everything else about the Badab War book Exorcists was great.

 

And that brings us to the latest development, which might not be so much of a change as it is a clarification. If we go with the [brother Tyler] theory about the Grey Knights being created from gene-seed infused with the Emperor's own genetic material, it could be that of the Imperial Fists (I never ascribed it to any particular Legion in my head-canon); and that gene-seed might then have been stolen by Inquisitors to create their secret anti-daemon Chapter. The Grey Knights might never know of the relationship, the gene-seed having been stolen from samples held by the Adeptus Mechanicus (the latter not necessarily even knowing that it was the gene-seed of the Grey Knights).

 

The developments in this article look like GW is reining things in, not like some authors are disregarding the previous lore in a bid to turn the Exorcists into something completely different. The impression I get is that the lore powers-that-be have decided that they need to get a handle on things and gave the authors marching orders. All of the previous elements can be made to work within the new lore concerning genetic lineage, both that of the Exorcists and the Grey Knights. It's just that GW has thrown some more (new) facts into the mix and those change the dynamic a bit. They might be changing some things, but I'll reserve judgment/reaction on that until I see the whole article. For me personally, the defining element of the Exorcists lore is the daemonic possession/exorcism element. Everything about that, from how it was initially inspired (which has never been revealed, though I've created my own interpretation of it) to what it imparted to the Chapter, is central to any representation of the Exorcists. If they change that (as some have speculated), I might be a bit perturbed. If they preserve it with some changes (perhaps limiting it to the Enochian Guard), I'll be less perturbed, but perturbed nonetheless because it will remove the justification for the additional two Scout Companies.

 

I wonder, though, how changes may have been provoked by an examination of the introduction of Primaris Space Marines into the Chapter and a real-world effort to ensure that the integration of Primaris didn't necessitate some internal friction. Imagine Primaris Space Marines, some potentially being born/created during the time of the Great Crusade/Horus Heresy. Now imagine them being introduced to their Chapter and finding out that the Chapter possesses its aspirants with daemonic entities as part of the transformation process. Such a scenario might have led to bloodshed, and with the involvement of the Adeptus Custodes, it probably wouldn't have ended well for the Exorcists. The solution, then, may have been to retcon things a bit so that the Primaris could be integrated into the Exorcists without bloodshed.

 

We still haven't seen the Warlord Traits, Relics, or Stratagems for the [new] Exorcists, so it may be that the anti-daemon rules are represented therein. If that's the case, then the Chapter Tactics that have been given for the Exorcists, while a "meh" choice to many, might work fine in tandem with the rest of the body of rules that we'll be given. What I'm hoping for is that, as with the Tome Keepers, we'll be given some bespoke rules for Silas Alberec, correcting him from what we currently have and bringing out more of the anti-daemon stuff (and hopefully inspiring some wonderful conversions).

[Gamiel]

I have no problem with them being of Dorn stock, and I can't see that putting their gene-origin down changes them in any way (unless they would have been declared BA or WS successors).

 

Just wondering, did the Badab or Armagedon books declare them of unknown gene-seed origin, or just not mention it?

 

 

 

Haven't we gotten a lot of stuff to imply GK? Given that, why are we taking this particularly seriously?

We have one character (unreliable narrator) in some BL books that has stated the kinship with the Grey Knights. 

Have not read that story but do the speaker indicate a kinship by gene-seed/blood or just say "kinship"? Because if it is the later could it be a spiritual kinship, or a kinship in traditional, ways, philosophy or such that he ment.

 

 

 

Why the Exorcists at all?  They had rules in a FW publication a decade ago, have no official models or extant rules, or even a transfer sheet.

 

Don't get me wrong, I'm not against them getting fleshed out a little, but why them and why give them rules at all?

Maybe one of the WD writers just wanted to write an article about the Exorcists, asked if s/he could ang got OK?

 

Or could be that GW is doing this to show how to an unusual Chapter would look like, as inspiration for players?

 

Or maybe somebody in GW just got tired of reading on the internet that the Exorcists was a Grey Knights successor and declared that they will have a IA article and their non-GK origin will be nailed down?

Edited March 3, 2021 by Gamiel

[Brother Tyler]

The only known Chapter extant from the 13^th Founding of the Space Marines, called the 'Dark Founding' in some sources, the exact nature of [the Exorcists'] creation and the gene-seed used in their creation has remained classified by special Bull Absolute of the Inquisitorial Representative issued at the time of their founding.

I can't provide the quote from the Deathwatch story because it's either somewhere deep in the bowels of my garage (and I don't feel like digging for it) or I no longer have it, but the statement was an explicit statement of both gene-seed lineage [from the Grey Knights] as well as direct training with that Chapter. It caused quite a bit of furor at the time. I always wondered if Mr. Parker had been cleared to make that statement by GW's lore masters since nothing prior to that had indicated any such relation; the only time the Grey Knights were mentioned in relation to the Exorcists prior to that was when a squad was held in reserve during the initial test run of the nascent Chapter on a world overrun with daemons. Many players assumed some relationship with/similarity to the Grey Knights, but there was nothing to support that assertion. The impression I got was that Mr. Parker was simply applying his own personal interpretation to give that theory the official stamp of authenticity. For all I know, though, someone at GW told/allowed him to do it. Either way, making them a Successor of the VIIth Legion now retcons both the Grey Knights descendance as well as the later secret starting with the Badab War book and that all subsequent editions of Codex: Space Marines have presented.

[Son of Sacrifice]

10,000+ years is a heck of a long time. I see no reason for a successor chapter to need to resemble their parent chapter at all. If anything we see too much of that.

 

I always thought the Ultramarines and Mortefactors were a good illustration of how a successor chapter would deviate over time and distance.

[MECHFACE]

Here it is:

 

"Of course, that was why Rauth had been sequestered to Deathwatch in the first place. The inquisitor had never said so explicitly, but it simply had to be the case. As enigmatic as Sigma was, he was clearly no fool. Who better than an Exorcist to watch over one such as Karras? Even the mighty Grey Knights, from whose seed Rauth’s Chapter had been born, could hardly have been more suited to the task".

 

Hang on - here is the Ordo Redactus version!

 

"Of course, that was why Rauth had been sequestered to Deathwatch in the first place. The inquisitor had never said so explicitly, but it simply had to be the case. As enigmatic as Sigma was, he was clearly no fool. Who better than an Exorcist to watch over one such as Karras? Even the mighty Grey Knights =][= Imperial Fists...shhhhh don't tell   =][=, from whose seed Rauth’s Chapter had been born, could hardly have been more suited to the task".

 

I can't provide the quote from the Deathwatch story because it's either somewhere deep in the bowels of my garage (and I don't feel like digging for it) or I no longer have it, but the statement was an explicit statement of both gene-seed lineage [from the Grey Knights] as well as direct training with that Chapter. It caused quite a bit of furor at the time. 

Edited March 3, 2021 by MECHFACE