The "Codex Compliant" Chapters can, and absolutely should, have access to Unique units.

[VengefulJan]

3 minutes ago, Orange Knight said:

 

There are people in the hobby, many of them, who when presented with a perfectly valid opinion such as: "Wouldn't it be nice to see X Chapter receive more support, perhaps a unique unit or two" respond with: "No, they shouldn't have anything unique because they are a vanilla chapter that follows the codex"

 

And I'm paraphrasing. 

 

But the rebuttal I am showing is one that comes from a lack of understanding of the lore.

Yup. I’m 100% on board. I definitely would like such chapters to receive more such support of more unique units. Bonus points if they are unique sculpts, soft applause for just an upgrade sprue. To deny such support simply because they are in the “vanilla” book I find would imply that they believe that their unique characters shouldn’t even exist in the first place. At that point, why have any uniques in the SM codex. Get rid of the ultramarines as well, chuck Guilliman out as well while we’re at it.

[Evil Eye]

8 minutes ago, Orange Knight said:

 

There are people in the hobby, many of them, who when presented with a perfectly valid opinion such as: "Wouldn't it be nice to see X Chapter receive more support, perhaps a unique unit or two" respond with: "No, they shouldn't have anything unique because they are a vanilla chapter that follows the codex"

 

And I'm paraphrasing. 

 

But the rebuttal I am showing is one that comes from a lack of understanding of the lore.

The rebuttal comes from the fact that in prior, more customizable systems, said unique units could just be slightly different loadouts and extra rules for existing units, and wouldn't have been competing for space in the book with a trillion other units. In the current system where there is almost no customization available at all, and space in a bursting-at-the-seams Space Marine codex is at a premium, giving every single codex-compliant chapter a whole new unit is making an already bloated book even more bloated when these "unique" units could easily have been enhancements and wargear for existing units.

 

You can have the current "deck of cards" system or you can have appropriately fluffy representation for the First Founding chapter quirks. You cannot have both. 

[Orange Knight]

4 minutes ago, Evil Eye said:

The rebuttal comes from the fact that in prior, more customizable systems, said unique units could just be slightly different loadouts and extra rules for existing units, and wouldn't have been competing for space in the book with a trillion other units. In the current system where there is almost no customization available at all, and space in a bursting-at-the-seams Space Marine codex is at a premium, giving every single codex-compliant chapter a whole new unit is making an already bloated book even more bloated when these "unique" units could easily have been enhancements and wargear for existing units.

 

You can have the current "deck of cards" system or you can have appropriately fluffy representation for the First Founding chapter quirks. You cannot have both. 

 

I agree we *shouldn't* have both.

 

But some chapters do, so all chapters should. 

 

The ship has sailed.

[HeadlessCross]

45 minutes ago, Evil Eye said:

Crusader Squads are a Black Templar exclusive unit that falls entirely outside the Codex Astartes (and rightfully so; having initiates charging into melee clad in carapace armour in a squad alongside their power-armoured, more skilled brethren is not exactly conducive to high survival rates after all and only makes sense in the context of a chapter so zealously faithful to the Imperial Creed that they even reject psykers despite the rest of the Adeptus Astartes considering such behaviour more than a little nutty), and the Black Templars explicitly don't use Librarians (see prior). If you want to run an assault-focused but otherwise compliant chapter with Librarians whose regular Marines are mostly equipped for CQC, you can totally do that- Assault Intercessors are a thing after all. You can't give them pyreblasters flamers, which does suck, but that's on GW's ridiculous lockdown on unit customization rather than the Black Templars not liking Psykers.

 

Crusader Squads themselves are a Black Templar unit- if you want to use them, you can't use Librarians. You might as well ask why I can't take Abaddon in a Sisters of Battle army (the answer is because the braziers keep setting fire to his cape every time he comes to visit Ophelia for tea and scones with Morvenn Vahl and those cape repairs are expensive!).

You evaded the point entirely. Crusader Squads are only Black Templar exclusive because you think they should be, even though there are other crusading fleet Chapters that don't follow the Codex point blank. 

 

There are 1000 Chapters and you're going to make a serious post that ONLY Black Templars ever made use of Crusader squads with scout meat shields? 

[VengefulJan]

8 minutes ago, Evil Eye said:

You can have the current "deck of cards" system or you can have appropriately fluffy representation for the First Founding chapter quirks. You cannot have both. 

I disagree, I think you can have both the Detatchment system (I’m assuming these are the deck-of-cards) and have some chapter unique units. I just don’t believe it is going to happen because I find GW incompetent and/or rushed. I found this first apparent around the beginning of 9th ed. when I could see that SM had 5 troop options to choose from.

[Evil Eye]

11 minutes ago, VengefulJan said:

To deny such support simply because they are in the “vanilla” book I find would imply that they believe that their unique characters shouldn’t even exist in the first place.

I don't think there should be no support for the codex-compliant chapters to represent their quirks. My issue is more that I think GW would thoroughly mess it up with their current design philosophy. Part of this is down to the absurd "you can only field exactly what we sell on this page of our website" policy GW has adopted with 40K, and part of it is down to the afforementioned deck-of-cards game design (the two are inextricably linked).

 

Using Salamanders as an example again; if GW made an upgrade sprue for the Bladeguard kit that added scaled hides, torches and other such Salamander-y features, along with thunder hammers instead of power weapons, that would be cool. But I'd want the rules to be as simple as an extra line on the Bladeguard sheet saying "Can swap power swords for thunder hammers" with a bit of fluff about the famed Hearthguard veterans who are known for their skill with the hammer (and a Salamanders or Salamander successor army getting a buff to hammer-equipped Bladeguard for added fluffiness). Thus, bladeguard with hammers could just as easily represent an Imperial Fists totally-not-Breachers-we-swear-Mr-Guilliman squad without having to worry about keyword bingo- hammerguard aren't exclusive to the Sallies even if the enhanced versions are. The problem is, GW would make this kit along with various other chapter-specific units and these would only be useable with that specific chapter's rules- hammerguard would be exclusive to Salamanders, and to make matters even worse we'd lose a bunch of other datasheets to make room for units that are either too similar to existing units to justify an entire datasheet rather than an enhancement, or are different enough from the rest of the roster that it would really suck that you would have to play a certain chapter to use them, even if the same unit archetype could easily be made to fit another chapter. And knowing our luck they'd be units people actually like- I wouldn't shed many tears for Suppressors if they got the boot, but I'd be pretty mad if the Whirlwind got shafted in favour of a chapter-specific unit.

 

So yeah. More support for variety in Marine armies? Sure. Do I trust GW to do it right? Absolutely not.

[VengefulJan]

8 minutes ago, HeadlessCross said:

There are 1000 Chapters and you're going to make a serious post that ONLY Black Templars ever made use of Crusader squads with scout meat shields? 

 Realistically speaking, of course not. In a universe designed to be a limitless playground of possibilities, it would only make sense that there would be others with similar mind sets and/or methods of being space marines.

 

The issue comes when you show up at the table to a person you have no report with and they find out that your BT list has 2 libbies in it during deployment. It breaks a sense of trust that one player has with the other as to wether or not this is going to be a fair spirited game.

 

I have a buddy of mine who wanted to do exactly this. He wanted his Crimson Templars to be BT but different, but instead of having to explain and ask permission with every opponent for him to include Librarians in his army for every game, he settled for the easier option to just run them using the vanilla book and simply take melee scouts with assault intercessors.

 

There is a social contract shared between players and unless one is willing to communicate to make amendments to said contract, everyone is expected to play with what is written in the book.

[Evil Eye]

16 minutes ago, HeadlessCross said:

Crusader Squads are only Black Templar exclusive because you think they should be, even though there are other crusading fleet Chapters that don't follow the Codex point blank. 

And they can be run with the Black Templars rules- any chapter as beholden to the Imperial Creed as the Black Templars to the point they ape their organizational structure (which they're basically only allowed to keep because of their fanatical faith, as a chapter as determined to ignore the rules put in place to avoid a second Heresy would be deemed a dangerous liability were they not as absurdly loyal as they are) would likely have a similarly dim view on psykers.

 

...Unless they DON'T ape the Templars' organization, in which case they wouldn't be using Crusader squads.

20 minutes ago, HeadlessCross said:

There are 1000 Chapters and you're going to make a serious post that ONLY Black Templars ever made use of Crusader squads with scout meat shields? 

You can absolutely use scouts as meat shields for assault-focused Marines though. You can't mix them into the squad, sure, but you 100% can field scouts as frontline troops rather than infiltrators, if you really want to. Most Chapters don't because initiates are valuable and unless you're drastically overstrength it's a very bad idea. And the only chapters who will be tolerated to be large enough to be close to legion strength will be fanatically loyal nutjobs like the Templars, who are as loyal as they are due to their ludicrous adherence to the Imperial Creed, which doesn't give them a great opinion on psykers.

 

It sounds to me like you literally just want to run Black Templars without one of the defining fluff AND crunch shortcomings of the Templars (no Psykers), and I can't see any particular reasons why that's something that needs to be accomodated. The game is supposed to represent the fluff after all- if you've got decent fluff that could justify "Black Templars without the Black Templars' main weakness" and isn't blatant Mary Sue nonsense I'd be glad to hear it.

[VengefulJan]

10 minutes ago, Evil Eye said:

So yeah. More support for variety in Marine armies? Sure. Do I trust GW to do it right? Absolutely not.

 

20 minutes ago, VengefulJan said:

… I think you can have both… I just don’t believe it is going to happen because I find GW incompetent and/or rushed.

We on same page. I got you brother.

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

1 hour ago, SvenIronhand said:

Where in the Codex does it prescribe a specialized forlorn hope company-sized formation, pray tell? 

Such a thing doesn’t exist

3 hours ago, Orange Knight said:

I would argue the point above that with the Primaris reset, all the chapters are potenitally able to represent their warfare quirks more accurately (or will be able to once the Outrider aspect of the army gets a full set of releases).

 

The Primaris offer ways to build armies the original Astartes did not. You could make an entire sneaky army, and entire tough army, you could have lots of plasma, lots of melta, lots of flamers, etc. The Primaris range actually offers a lot more genuine variety than the original one did, even if the individual units offer less customisation.

 

But now GW have gone back to making unique and exclusive units for the various chapters. To that point, I don't think it's fair to tell any hobbyist that  they shouldn't want to have a unique unit or two to represent their chapter, especially when the lore makes it perfectly clear that it could be something reasonable. That's the point I'm making.

I think this new found flexibility has more to do with the lack of FOC than primaris.

[SvenIronhand]

7 minutes ago, Inquisitor_Lensoven said:

Such a thing doesn’t exist.

Me when I lie.

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

1 hour ago, Blindhamster said:

Yes and no.

 

Lore wise, evil eye is 100% correct, blood angels are noted to have a particularly high number of librarians, this has been a thing for a very very long time. We dont have a means to play that - because it isn't really needed, its still just librarians and space marines can take a lot in a game as it is. (lore wise, we have ~5-10 more than ultramarines (varies through editions), 5 of which are dreadnaughts lol)

 

then there is the death company, which absolutely does not fit within standard codex space marines structure.

 

then there are the sanguinary priests - which serve the role of apothecary sure, but also serve other roles. We've been tood and frowed on if we can use apothecaries as well over the editions, but quite often have been able to use both. Regardless, they do not follow precisely the standard codex apothecary role or organisation.

 

their chaplains perform the usual role, but also the other role associated with monitoring the flaw, again I believe blood angels have slightly more than most chapters as a result.

 

sanguinary guard are indeed "just" honour guard with jump packs. But i'd also note that honour guard was a uniquely blood angels thing for a very long time as well :P Command squads were the norm. Sanguinary Guard changed in role over the years. It's reasonable to assume other chapters might have /something/ similar, but personally, id want such a unit to be unique and to the theme of the particular chapter.

 

blood angels don't HAVE more assault squads, however blood angels are more likely to have full strength assault squads as its a role that always has marines voluneer into.

 

Ultimately, blood angels are a codex compliant chapter but with a *. They are in as much as their geneseed quirks allow. The majority of their divergences come from said quirks. But a few come from other bits of lore, such as the overcharged engines (that went the way of the dodo, despite that literally being the origin of "da red wunz go fasta".

 

Anyway, on the main topic. Yes I totally agree with the original point, all geneseed lines should have access to 1-2 unique units, they shouldn't necessarily require models (though cool if they do), but at least variants of existing units wound be good (so, like death company or hounds of morkai or deathwing terminators now), i don't agree with just making all the unique stuff generic. I personally LIKE the flavour/character unique units and rules represent. I like that GW tries to instill a bit of lore into things still, even if its less than it once was.

The death company isn’t a part of the chapter’s structure though so it doesn’t matter if the codex astartes supports it or not.

 

its an ad hoc unit, and the old school rules around them represented that wonderfully. So unless someone has a lore/in universe reference of the codex astartes forbidding marines from various units being lumped together in an ad hoc manner, the DC do not deviate from the codex astartes.

there is no death company company or company of death company. It is not part of the chapter’s structure or organization. The closest thing you could mention to that is the guards for the tower of amaero, but even then I’d bet the codex is pretty vague and flexible about how garrisoning a fortress monastery should be done…does it even require a fortress monastery? Are all fleet based chapters divergent?

 

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

43 minutes ago, SvenIronhand said:

Me when I lie.

You clearly don’t understand how the blood angels chapter and all of their canon successors are structured and organized.

[VengefulJan]

54 minutes ago, SvenIronhand said:

Me when I lie.

You’re being antagonistic. You had the quote to confirm your point. Please reaffirm it.

[Evil Eye]

2 minutes ago, Inquisitor_Lensoven said:

The death company isn’t a part of the chapter’s structure though so it doesn’t matter if the codex astartes supports it or not.

 

It absolutely is. The Blood Angels have to deal with the ever-present risk of battle-brothers going irrevocably insane, and those not so far gone that the best they can hope for is a merciful death have to be dealt with somehow. They're not fit to serve as part of the regular chapter (for obvious reasons) but the decree against legion-building in the Codex is quite strict. The Blood Angels are only allowed to have the quite significant extra manpower by virtue of said extra manpower being doomed to die, and even the Inquisition not being quite cruel enough to declare one of the most loyal and beloved First Founding chapters, the sires of a Primarch so well-loved that he has Space Christmas named after him, Excommunicate Traitorius because they give their cursed brothers a chance at a glorious death in battle rather than ignominious euthanasia. But theirs is definitely a special case; if Chapter Master Joseph Bloggephes of the Demonstrators chapter said "Yeah, we know you're not allowed more than 1000 Marines but the 5th company's ceremonial mascot hamster died last week and they're still in mourning for poor Brother Chubbius, so we had to recruit an extra company to make up the shortfall, that OK with you?" then I suspect there would be questions being asked. The Blood Angels are allowed to break the norm of the Codex Astartes because of their unique predicament with the Flaw- hence, not Codex Compliant.

 

As far as the other non-compliant chapters, the Black Templars, as mentioned before, are tolerated because of their fanatical loyalty and tendency towards going on big crusades making them extremely unlikely to pull a Huron Blackheart, the Dark Angels are tolerated because nobody knows what they're actually up to regarding their shenanigans (something tells me if the truth of their skullduggery was fully outed, the defence of "well we weren't TECHNICALLY breaking the rules" would be responded to with "Well we won't TECHNICALLY erase you from existence by arranging accidents for every single Dark Angel and successor in the galaxy" (not that anyone would be foolish enough to try) , and the Space Wolves are tolerated because A: they can't actually sire successors conventionally, forcing them to effectively operate as a split-up legion, and B: nobody is stupid enough to try and take on a full-strength chapter of some of the scariest Marines to ever stride the stars, who are also very popular with their allies (of whom they have many) and ALSO take residence on one of the most un-invadable and inhospitable planets in the entire galaxy this side of Catachan. There's a reason the Inquisition were less than thrilled when the Celestial Lions got cozy with the Wolves after all, as the chapter they tried to destroy is now under the unofficial protection of a bunch of not especially reasonable space vikings who already didn't like them very much, and CERTAINLY don't like them after finding out that they tried to bump off their fellow Astartes over seemingly nothing.

 

As far as the other Chapters go, the Ultramarines wrote the Codex (which is actually pretty lenient aside from basic organization, code of conduct and the no-legion-building thing), the Raven Guard and White Scars don't actively deviate from it so much as simply don't use the bits they don't find useful, the Salamanders are pretty conventional in terms of organization even if they tend towards specific tactics and weaponry, and the Imperial Fists begrudgingly follow the Codex relatively closely, with the caveat that the Last Wall Protocol exists as a fairly reasonable "in emergency break glass rules" response in the event things go TOTALLY pear-shaped and there is a need for a combined Legion-strength force to counter an existential threat. And even then that skirts around the issue by being an explicit "Imperial Fists successors will cooperate closely with each other in times of great crisis, reinforce each other if necessary, and disband the alliance as soon as the threat is over" arrangement ala Roman Dictatorship (a similar concept where regular protocol is surrendered in times of emergency, giving supreme power to the Emperor until the crisis ends, upon which the Emperor willingly steps down from dictatorship, and indeed did so every single time) rather than the Dark Angels, who technically don't operate as one giant spread-out legion, they're just really good friends and keep in touch with each other at all times, totally different you see?.

 

The Iron Hands are the odd man out and could justify a separate Codex if their newer fluff is what we're going forward with. Hell, I'd be down for some interesting tank and Dreadnought variants exclusive to the Iron Hands. The thing with them is, to the best of my knowledge, whilst their internal organization is pretty different from other chapters, and they have access to a variety of rare wargear, they don't violate the legion-building decree at all. The Iron Hands are capped at the normal size, and they don't operate as a weird space mafia with their successors. They're definitely heavily deviant from the Codex, but they're not (AFAIK) actively bending or breaking any of the key important tenets of Bobby G's Big Book of Battle, specifically the ones that the book was written for. Most of the Codex are guidelines on strategy and tactics, with even some of the organizational elements being intended to provide favourable results, and the really important rules being "don't legion build", "don't withhold your tithe of geneseed" and "don't unnecessarily hoard technology from the rest of the Imperium" (which the Iron Hands could be guilty of if my memory serves me right, but it's the legion-building thing that's a really big no-no). The watchdogs of the Imperium aren't going to be putting the boot in over a chapter having a larger than usual fleet of Rhinos but eschewing the use of bikes and jump packs for mobile assaults, even if some might disagree with it on a tactical level. They might get suspicious over Rhinos being equipped with unusual engines that they won't share with other Imperial agencies (the Blood Angels do this with their Lucifer-pattern engine, much to the Mechanicum's chagrin), and they'll definitely raise some eyebrows if they field more Rhinos filled to the brim with Marines in a single battle than most Guard regiments could field Chimeras packed with Guardsmen, but simple preferences towards certain styles of warfare are not only permitted but, contrary to popular belief, encouraged by the Codex, which IIRC even has a "most important rule" that it is ultimately a set of guidelines to defend the Imperium and not to be taken as sacrosanct in and of itself.

 

But anyway, to summarize, the Codex-compliant chapters comply with the actual rules of the Codex, even if they may play fast and loose with the less important guidelines. The Codex-divergent chapters who historically got their own IRL Codices break or at least don't fully follow the core rules of the Codex, and are permitted to do so due to extenuating circumstances, convenience, a benefit in allowing them to operate outside the rules, lack of common knowledge of their antics or having more to lose than gain by trying to wrangle them into following the book. The only exception being the Iron Hands, who historically never got a Codex because they had precious little fluff to begin with, and probably didn't get a dedicated Codex afterwards due to the bad taste in everyone's mouths from the sheer quantity of heavy metal contaminated groxgak that IH armies brought to the table (and the questionable quality of the fluff, depending on your tastes).

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

51 minutes ago, Evil Eye said:

It absolutely is. The Blood Angels have to deal with the ever-present risk of battle-brothers going irrevocably insane, and those not so far gone that the best they can hope for is a merciful death have to be dealt with somehow. They're not fit to serve as part of the regular chapter (for obvious reasons) but the decree against legion-building in the Codex is quite strict. The Blood Angels are only allowed to have the quite significant extra manpower by virtue of said extra manpower being doomed to die, and even the Inquisition not being quite cruel enough to declare one of the most loyal and beloved First Founding chapters, the sires of a Primarch so well-loved that he has Space Christmas named after him, Excommunicate Traitorius because they give their cursed brothers a chance at a glorious death in battle rather than ignominious euthanasia. But theirs is definitely a special case; if Chapter Master Joseph Bloggephes of the Demonstrators chapter said "Yeah, we know you're not allowed more than 1000 Marines but the 5th company's ceremonial mascot hamster died last week and they're still in mourning for poor Brother Chubbius, so we had to recruit an extra company to make up the shortfall, that OK with you?" then I suspect there would be questions being asked. The Blood Angels are allowed to break the norm of the Codex Astartes because of their unique predicament with the Flaw- hence, not Codex Compliant.

 

As far as the other non-compliant chapters, the Black Templars, as mentioned before, are tolerated because of their fanatical loyalty and tendency towards going on big crusades making them extremely unlikely to pull a Huron Blackheart, the Dark Angels are tolerated because nobody knows what they're actually up to regarding their shenanigans (something tells me if the truth of their skullduggery was fully outed, the defence of "well we weren't TECHNICALLY breaking the rules" would be responded to with "Well we won't TECHNICALLY erase you from existence by arranging accidents for every single Dark Angel and successor in the galaxy" (not that anyone would be foolish enough to try) , and the Space Wolves are tolerated because A: they can't actually sire successors conventionally, forcing them to effectively operate as a split-up legion, and B: nobody is stupid enough to try and take on a full-strength chapter of some of the scariest Marines to ever stride the stars, who are also very popular with their allies (of whom they have many) and ALSO take residence on one of the most un-invadable and inhospitable planets in the entire galaxy this side of Catachan. There's a reason the Inquisition were less than thrilled when the Celestial Lions got cozy with the Wolves after all, as the chapter they tried to destroy is now under the unofficial protection of a bunch of not especially reasonable space vikings who already didn't like them very much, and CERTAINLY don't like them after finding out that they tried to bump off their fellow Astartes over seemingly nothing.

 

As far as the other Chapters go, the Ultramarines wrote the Codex (which is actually pretty lenient aside from basic organization, code of conduct and the no-legion-building thing), the Raven Guard and White Scars don't actively deviate from it so much as simply don't use the bits they don't find useful, the Salamanders are pretty conventional in terms of organization even if they tend towards specific tactics and weaponry, and the Imperial Fists begrudgingly follow the Codex relatively closely, with the caveat that the Last Wall Protocol exists as a fairly reasonable "in emergency break glass rules" response in the event things go TOTALLY pear-shaped and there is a need for a combined Legion-strength force to counter an existential threat. And even then that skirts around the issue by being an explicit "Imperial Fists successors will cooperate closely with each other in times of great crisis, reinforce each other if necessary, and disband the alliance as soon as the threat is over" arrangement ala Roman Dictatorship (a similar concept where regular protocol is surrendered in times of emergency, giving supreme power to the Emperor until the crisis ends, upon which the Emperor willingly steps down from dictatorship, and indeed did so every single time) rather than the Dark Angels, who technically don't operate as one giant spread-out legion, they're just really good friends and keep in touch with each other at all times, totally different you see?.

 

The Iron Hands are the odd man out and could justify a separate Codex if their newer fluff is what we're going forward with. Hell, I'd be down for some interesting tank and Dreadnought variants exclusive to the Iron Hands. The thing with them is, to the best of my knowledge, whilst their internal organization is pretty different from other chapters, and they have access to a variety of rare wargear, they don't violate the legion-building decree at all. The Iron Hands are capped at the normal size, and they don't operate as a weird space mafia with their successors. They're definitely heavily deviant from the Codex, but they're not (AFAIK) actively bending or breaking any of the key important tenets of Bobby G's Big Book of Battle, specifically the ones that the book was written for. Most of the Codex are guidelines on strategy and tactics, with even some of the organizational elements being intended to provide favourable results, and the really important rules being "don't legion build", "don't withhold your tithe of geneseed" and "don't unnecessarily hoard technology from the rest of the Imperium" (which the Iron Hands could be guilty of if my memory serves me right, but it's the legion-building thing that's a really big no-no). The watchdogs of the Imperium aren't going to be putting the boot in over a chapter having a larger than usual fleet of Rhinos but eschewing the use of bikes and jump packs for mobile assaults, even if some might disagree with it on a tactical level. They might get suspicious over Rhinos being equipped with unusual engines that they won't share with other Imperial agencies (the Blood Angels do this with their Lucifer-pattern engine, much to the Mechanicum's chagrin), and they'll definitely raise some eyebrows if they field more Rhinos filled to the brim with Marines in a single battle than most Guard regiments could field Chimeras packed with Guardsmen, but simple preferences towards certain styles of warfare are not only permitted but, contrary to popular belief, encouraged by the Codex, which IIRC even has a "most important rule" that it is ultimately a set of guidelines to defend the Imperium and not to be taken as sacrosanct in and of itself.

 

But anyway, to summarize, the Codex-compliant chapters comply with the actual rules of the Codex, even if they may play fast and loose with the less important guidelines. The Codex-divergent chapters who historically got their own IRL Codices break or at least don't fully follow the core rules of the Codex, and are permitted to do so due to extenuating circumstances, convenience, a benefit in allowing them to operate outside the rules, lack of common knowledge of their antics or having more to lose than gain by trying to wrangle them into following the book. The only exception being the Iron Hands, who historically never got a Codex because they had precious little fluff to begin with, and probably didn't get a dedicated Codex afterwards due to the bad taste in everyone's mouths from the sheer quantity of heavy metal contaminated groxgak that IH armies brought to the table (and the questionable quality of the fluff, depending on your tastes).

No it’s not a part of the chapter’s organization or structure.

if you believe so tell me who is in charge of the death company company, which number is the death company company.

 

what extra man power? You literally have no clue about how the black rage, and the death company work.

 

as for the BT they’re not tolerated because of their fanaticism, no body really knows how many there are outside of the high Marshall because there’s so many individual crusades it’s impossible for anyone else to get an accurate count.(unless I missed a retcon)

 

the inquisition has also tried to kill of the SWs multiple times, at least twice iirc…so you’re claim no one is crazy enough to mess with them so they get left alone is also wrong.

 

idk how long you’ve been in the hobby, but you have a very clear misunderstanding of the lore.

Edited February 13 by Inquisitor_Lensoven

[VengefulJan]

11 minutes ago, Inquisitor_Lensoven said:

You clearly don’t understand how the blood angels chapter and all of their canon successors are structured and organized.

Question, is it not part of the organizational structure of the Blood Angels Chapter to have a militant formation of Astartes who have succumbed to the black rage?

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

9 minutes ago, VengefulJan said:

Question, is it not part of the organizational structure of the Blood Angels Chapter to have a militant formation of Astartes who have succumbed to the black rage?

No.

first of all can you explain how you think the black rage works?

 

this is how it actually works.

on the eve of a battle or even during a battle brothers begin showing signs of falling to the rage. 
If it’s early enough before battle, their armor is painted. If they survive the battle they’re killed, ostensibly by astorath, if not by someone else in the chapter. Typically only a few fall at a time, but occasionally larger numbers will.
 

there is no standing army of black ragers just waiting to be used in battle.

Maybe you’re thinking of the mutated brothers in the tower of amaero, but they’re lost to the thirst and literally have only ever been released once in canon, and are in no way part of the chapter, and afaik the inquisition knows nothing about them.

 

until guilliman came back and loosened the rules about 1000 marines per chapter the BA held their numbers at 1000 battle brothers counted as the codex astartes prescribed. The BA have no ‘extra’ brothers in waiting.

Edited February 13 by Inquisitor_Lensoven

[SvenIronhand]

An ad hoc formation is still a formation.

[Evil Eye]

23 minutes ago, Inquisitor_Lensoven said:

what extra man power? You literally have no clue about how the black rage, and the death company work.

Marines that fall to the Black Rage are considered "lost" and consigned to the Death Company, and thus replaced in the company they came from, but they're still technically part of the chapter. Thus the Blood Angels could be at full strength but be pushed over the 1000 maximum fieldable Marines by virtue of the Death Company, who being dead men walking are ignored for the purposes of counting their numbers despite being combat-capable Marines.

 

Let's assume that the Blood Angels are at their full strength of 1000 Marines. A particularly bad day sees 75 Marines consigned to the Death Company, and are sent off to the Tower until they are called upon to fight, which already had 15 inmates. Those 75 Marines are swiftly replaced (Blood Angel gene-seed working with basically anyone, allowing quick replenishment of ranks). The proper companies have the full 1000 Marines, but the Death Company pushes the total number of combatant Marines up to 1100. As the main aim of the Codex is to avoid legion-building and imposes a hard cap of 1000 Marines at a time in any one chapter, the tolerance of the chapter being technically overstrength (due to the special case of the Flaw meaning the "extra" Marines are not an intentional extra garrison so much as a means of giving afflicted Marines an honourable end) is a sanctioned divergence from the Codex. The violation (permitted due to exceptional circumstance) isn't the unusual extra company; if another chapter had 20 companies but they were all half the size of a regular one that would be unusual but not breaking the legion-building edict. The permitted violation is having more than the Codex-sanctioned maximum of 1000 Marines in one chapter. 

 

This is something unique to the Blood Angels (and their successors) due to the Flaw, and permitted as an exception to the Codex's hard limit as a result; if any other chapter tried making an excuse for having more than 1000 Marines, they'd be told to knock it off and found a successor chapter for the surplus.

 

(Of course, the precise details of how the Death Company work have changed from edition to edition, but it certainly used to be the case that Black Rage sufferers were locked away until it was their time; Mephiston being the one singular Blood Angel who ever came back from the brink. Retcons may have changed this, but as the precedence for the Blood Angels having their own Codex dates back a long, long time it's definitely worth bearing in mind how old fluff portrayed it, especially regarding the subject of the Blood Angels' divergence giving them their own book.)

Edited February 13 by Evil Eye
Added extra point re: retcons

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

Just now, SvenIronhand said:

An ad hoc formation is still a formation.

Great? There’s no prohibition against ad hoc formations in the codex astartes, and they’re not a standing formation. It exists for 24 hours at longest in most cases, and has nothing to do with how the chapter is organized or structured.

Someone please show me where in the organizational chart where the death company is.

 

 

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

From the 10th edition supplement, please point out where the death company company is located in this organizational chart.

 

 

[SvenIronhand]

6 minutes ago, Inquisitor_Lensoven said:

Great? There’s no prohibition against ad hoc formations in the codex astartes, and they’re not a standing formation. It exists for 24 hours at longest in most cases, and has nothing to do with how the chapter is organized or structured.

Someone please show me where in the organizational chart where the death company is.

 

 

It’s not prohibited, but neither is it prescribed by the Codex, which mandates a 10-company structure of interdependent  formations. It not being part of the permanent, probably outward-facing TO&E is inconsequential. The German Kampfgruppen or modern battlegroups are not standing formations either.

Edited February 13 by SvenIronhand

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

The only true deviation from the codex is that the apothecarion is on equal footing as the reclusiam.

source:10th Ed supplement pg 21 par 4&5

 

 

Edited February 13 by Inquisitor_Lensoven
Correction to page number

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

3 minutes ago, SvenIronhand said:

It’s not prohibited, but neither is it prescribed by the Codex, which mandates a 10-company structure of interdependent  formations. It not being part of the permanent, probably outward-facing TO&E is inconsequential. The German Kampfgruppen or modern battlegroups are not standing formations either.

It’s literally random marines from various squads thrown together.

 

that happens in many battles for every chapter. Hell it happens with marines of different chapters coming together to form ad hoc squads on the battlefield.

 

if the codex doesn’t prohibit it, it’s ok for them to do meaning they’re compliant with the codex.

 

please cite a source for your claims that ad hoc formations are not prescribed by the codex.

because GW had been very vague about what the codex astartes actually says, and from what I’ve seen over 20 years they’ve released nothing saying the codex astartes and ad hoc formations.