30k Sergeant Differentiation

[Xanthous]

Hi all,

I'm currently testing the waters of a 30k project with some tactical marines, and I've run into some confusion regarding sergeants and their helmets. The MKVI box comes with a transverse crest, and GW's store page photos reflect this as the sergeant signifier, but the colour plates I've seen for various legions suggest that sergeants should be differentiated with a distinct paint job on the helmet - stripes, face plates, etc. These also go on to say that transverse crests are for line officers, but then sergeants are referred to as line officers. Oh dear... 

 

I'm probably overthinking this, but 30k appeals to me as pseudo-historical, and an important part of that tone is getting the details right, so I thought I'd ask to see how others approached this. I'd be interested to hear any opinions, received wisdom, alternative sources on heraldry and rank, etc.

[Corswain]

I don't think you will find one clear answer for this. Yes, Heresy has a touch of historical to it but it also has plenty of old-school GW freedom to it to let you do whatever you want.

No codex Astartes yet so the Legions were pretty much doing their own thing.

 

The black books were probably the most comprehensive sources if you can get a look at them but they still left wiggle room for creativity. 

[Bung]

Try to get your hands on the Legion Pages about the Heraldy of the Legions you are interested in.

Most have something about Sergeants and generall Heraldy.

Facebook Groups and the Horus Heresy Discord Server are full of people willing to Help.

[lansalt]

The crests are crearly stated to be for "centurions" and above in the Black Books, while basic "sergeants" get any combination of a different coloured helmet, a vertical stripe, an iron skull, or just the older RT style chevron.

 

A centurion should be an officer in charge of around a hundred men (as the name says in latin), like 40k captains. But in practice, it seems that there was a ton of overlap between older veterans, members of elite units, NCOs, and lower line officers.  So a sergeant could become a veteran and even earn the centurion rank while still only in charge of a squad (with that squad becoming effectively his chosen), or a command squad could be fully composed of low line officers. Just like in 40k, after decades of warfare, there were probably many more veteran sergeants/line centurions than commissions for them, so they stayed as NCOs until a position was open.

 

This is all further complicated because many legionaries stopped using the terran roman-like crests due to cultural reasons like the TS, WS, SW or NL. While others like SoH apparently kept them long after the war began, and top knots and other cthonian stuff became more common.

 

There's also the fact that for gaming purposes a crest gives leaders a more distinct silouette in a table, so FW/GW favours showing sergeants like that in their marketing and studio minis despite what the fluff says otherwise.

 

Edited October 22, 2023 by lansalt

[Brother Kraskor]

Agree with everything that's been said so far. Only thing I would add is there is another layer of difficulty re: historical accuracy (or extra room for personal taste, however you see it) when you consider different legions and their bespoke approaches to rank structure. Which legion are you collecting? 

Edited October 22, 2023 by Brother Kraskor

[Xanthous]

Thanks for the replies, everyone, the Black Books were an especially good shout.

 

24 minutes ago, Brother Kraskor said:

Agree with everything that's been said so far. Only thing I would add is there is another layer of difficulty re: historical accuracy (or extra room for personal taste, however you see it) when you consider different legions and their bespoke approaches to rank structure. Which legion are you collecting? 

 

I'm thinking Iron Hands. From what I've read, it seems like their rank structure is fairly clear cut, if obscured somewhat by silly titles. I'm probably leaning more towards helmet stripes rather than crests now, I reckon it suits them better.

[Noserenda]

Stripes are certainly what they use in the all too brief Liber section :) Ranks are one of the sections where the illusion of historical authenticity collapses sadly so id always go with what i fancied or liked personally.

[Xenith]

I'm alpha legion and my line grunts have crests...

 

It's open to interpretation, and will very legion by legion, and even fleet by fleet! Ultimately, go with the option that makes the most sense to you, both in background and aesthetically. 

Edited October 23, 2023 by Xenith

[Dark Legionnare]

Like others have said.  Follow what you like, within reason of fitting the Legion of choice's styling.  The books offer good insight.  For instance, my Luna wolves are based heavily on the cover of "False Gods" with a black crest instead of Red because the contrast looks better IMO and it doesn't compete with the cloaks, pteruges, etc... which are often red across the army depending on the model's rank.

 

Edited October 23, 2023 by Dark Legionnare

[lansalt]

17 hours ago, Noserenda said:

Ranks are one of the sections where the illusion of historical authenticity collapses

I think the game and the stories just simplify all the types of different NCOs that should exist for their convenience. After all IRL there are also many types of sergeants in the military, many with equal or more seniority than junior officers.

 

[Noserenda]

Oh yeah its certainly getting better, bear in mind for years a marine chapter of 1000 had 4 different ranks running it, in total and Imperial Guard essentially 5 ranks for a similar organisation (Ish, Guard have always been less uniform) wheras a modern (or even not so modern really) would have more NCOs or even Commissioned Officer types than that all doing a variety of useful things, let alone the raw numbers of each :D 

But you can look those details up for a historical project, and thats not what 30k is; the priority in this set up is artistic impression and the freedom to make an army of little guys than suit the owners preferences.

[lansalt]

On 10/25/2023 at 3:22 AM, Noserenda said:

you can look those details up for a historical project, and thats not what 30k is; the priority in this set up is artistic impression and the freedom to make an army of little guys than suit the owners preferences.

But there's a clear pseudo-historical side of 30k, and not the smallest, which is also aligned with many fans preferences.

[Petitioner's City]

I guess the clue to this is the original resin upgrade packs, which did feature the crests

 

 

 

 

 

Given these were sergeant/box/vexilla upgrades, I guess we can assume the general intention was crests for sergeants - here is the MK3 set description:

 

Quote

A set of 2 Legion Vexillas, 2 Legion Nuncio-voxs and 2 Legion Sergeant Helmets to upgrade sets of MkIII Iron Armour and Legion MkIII Iron Armour.

 

But I'm not sure how many people did or continue to do this? (I haven't for either my VIth or XVth, for example).

[lansalt]

16 hours ago, Petitioner's City said:

I guess the clue to this is the original resin upgrade packs, which did feature the crests

Yes, but their description was contradicted by the Black Books and the name of their kits: Legion MKIII Command Upgrade Set. It's just a theory, but maybe those were  designed initially to mimic IG command squads before they decided to use them for normal ones, and design the later ancient + champion mkII-IV kits with more bling.

[Noserenda]

The upgrade sets arent even consistent between themselves :D They do offer some good suggestions though. I used bits from them on my Iron Warriors army, Black horizontal crests on Sergeants, Black and Yellow striped crests on centurion ranks and a vertical one on my praetor. NCOs also had striped on the front of their pauldrons including corporals but its from the era where most of my photos were lost so ive not got a good shot of them, just an awful group shot, which all the relevant models are thankfully at the front of :D 

Though thinking about it the striped crest might have been a senior sergeant? (Centurion in the rules) As the Terminator Centurion here has a vertical, metal one. Hmmm. Anyway hope that helps, i might look up my old blog, see if i wrote stuff down!  

[Agramar_The_Luna_Wolf]

With my SoH I tried to do it simple: Crests or topknots for sargents in red with copper or brass attachment, black for Consuls with silver attachment, and black and gold for Praetors and similar. No crest on Sarge's helmet, like in the case of terminators? Sarge's with black helmets with metallic trimmed adornment, then.

 

But most of the legions don't have rigid heraldry codes. Unless you play UM or IF for example. So I think best is to be flexible, keep it simple and easy to apply.

[OttoVonAwesome]

Front to back crests are for officers in the new colour plates with the regular side to side ones for lower veteran ranks. 

[Marshal Rohr]

Sergeant - Transverse Crest in Red

Veteran Sergeant/Lieutenant - Transverse Crest in Red and White

Centurion/Line Captain/Lieutenant Commander - Transverse Crest in Black

Senior Captain/Consular Officer - Transverse Crest in Black and White

Battalion/Chapter Commander/Praetor - Longitudinal Crest in Red, Black, White, or any mix of the 3. 
 

Veteran Bodyguard/Lifguard/Chosen - Short Longitudinal Crest in Red, Black, White, or any mix of the 3. 

[FashaTheDog]

I took a note from the Liber Hereticus, page 208 and used a mk. III helmet for a Tactical sergeant in a mk. VI squad instead of as a veteran as labeled.  I also use helmets with bat wings and one sergeant has a bare head because I had a spare Sevatar head that just had to be used somewhere. 

[Kloros Endall]

I started my Luna Wolves Company with a strong desire to make it ‘historically accurate’ and based on the Principia Bellicosa entry in Betrayal. As the project wore on though I had to adapt to the reality that there are many ‘historically accurate’ ways to depict heraldry and legion structure.

Can be a little frustrating when you’re trying to scratch a particular itch, but the upside is the creative freedom to go with what you find appealing or aesthetically pleasing. In this regard I’m quite sure it’s intentional and I’m thankful for it in a lot of ways.

As to the original question I opted for Horizontal Black Crests for my Centurions (Lieutenants) and Longitudinal Red Crests for my Sergeants. The Sergeants with a plain helmet have a red stripe to signify the crest.

[Gorgoff]

On 10/22/2023 at 8:21 PM, Xanthous said:

Hi all,

I'm currently testing the waters of a 30k project with some tactical marines, and I've run into some confusion regarding sergeants and their helmets. The MKVI box comes with a transverse crest, and GW's store page photos reflect this as the sergeant signifier, but the colour plates I've seen for various legions suggest that sergeants should be differentiated with a distinct paint job on the helmet - stripes, face plates, etc. These also go on to say that transverse crests are for line officers, but then sergeants are referred to as line officers. Oh dear... 

 

I'm probably overthinking this, but 30k appeals to me as pseudo-historical, and an important part of that tone is getting the details right, so I thought I'd ask to see how others approached this. I'd be interested to hear any opinions, received wisdom, alternative sources on heraldry and rank, etc.

In my Iron Warriors characters wear no helmets.

Easy solution.

 

In my Alpha Legion only the characters wear a fancy helmet. ;)