40K 5th edition analysis thread

[Eternal_Freedom]

The old Razorback had a single Lascannon with a twin-linked plasma gun in a turret, while newer ones have either a twin-linked Lascannon or heavy bolter.

Given that plasma cannons are Blast weapons and Lascannons have a better AP, I would say that Connor is right on the supposition that Lascannons are more efficient penetrators.

[Rogue 9]

Lascannons and plasma cannons (plasma weapons in general, actually) have the same AP; lascannons have higher Strength. If we're talking tabletop, and referencing the AP stat suggests you are. Curiously enough, in tabletop a weapon's armor penetration value has nothing to do with how well it penetrates vehicle armor (though if its good enough it does effect how much damage its done once it penetrates), since vehicle penetration is a straight Strength roll against the armor value. (In effect, it's exactly equivalent to vehicles having very high Toughness and no armor save.)

[Ahriman238]

Space Wolves do similarly, young recruits are Assault analogs, while their 'Tacticals' are veterans of many campaigns.

I thought Space Wolves had large packs of Blood Claws and used them as cannon-fodder until they narrowed the pack down to the handful with the discipline to become Grey Hunters.


I wonder where the Phalanx sits on the fortress-monastery count. Or the Astartes Praeses.

Chapters can be declared traitors and officially disbanded, but the High Lords would likely not reuse the traitor's seed. Beyond, that, I can think of few reasons a chapter might be disbanded. Possibly, they mean 'lost' like the Astral Knights, Crimson Consuls, Legion of the Damned, or whatever that one chapter that seriously pissed off the Eldar and were wiped out to a man was called.


Ah, Papa Smurf adds his name to the list of honor. Now the only named characters who haven't beat the Avatar like an unwanted stepchild are *checks list* Abaddon, Cypher, Sergeant Kell and... Ciaphas Cain. Somebody get Sandy Mitchell on the line, we need a book with Cain running screaming form the Avatar until it dies in a rockslide or something and its assumed he planned it that way.

EDIT: Also, no love for all the new Thunderhawk variants?

[Cykeisme]

For contrast, here's a rough outline of how individual progression works in a Codex Astartes-compliant chapter, compared to the Space Wolves:

For Codex chapters, this is usually how it goes after the initiate is inducted and passes the initial selection trials:
- Becomes member of a Scout squad. Biological transformation completes here, with the final step being the Black Carapace.
- Becomes a Battle Brother, receives power armor and trains to integrate with it via Black Carapace organ. Usually joins a Devastator squad as one of the additional members without a heavy weapon, lending an extra set of eyes, giving covering fire, and carrying extra ammo.
- Gets rotated to start to heavy weapon duty in the Devastator squad.
- Is transferred to an Assault squad, gets familiar with getting covered in the enemies' blood.
- Gets transferred to a Tactical squad, that engages in both ranged and close combat.
After attaining veterancy, the path of a Battle Brother varies a lot depending on the individual.

For Space Wolves, entire groups of initiates are put into "wolf packs", which they'll stick with from induction until death.
- Packs of young "Blood Claws" are equipped with power armor right off the bat, and mostly close combat weapons, and tend to be like taking risks to prove themselves to their seniors. Packs are large at this stage, around 20 men.
- After several campaigns and lots of experience they become Grey Hunters, which are sort of like Tactical squads. Casualties are expected by the time the pack gets here, so squads will be at ~10.
- The survivors of lots and lots of fighting and dying become Long Fangs, that get the heaviest weapons. They tend to be crusty vets by now, experienced killing machines.
- After this, they usually get promoted to the elite Wolf Guard, attached to their Company Captain equivalent. Those packs that get killed down to a handful -before- they become veterans become Lone Wolves.
- Last survivors of a pack that gets almost annihilated, they work alone, penetrating enemy lines in carapace armor to perform intelligence gathering, sabotage and assassination.
Thus, the progression is much like a reversal of the Codex method.


For Codex-compliant chapters, that's how the Space Marine codex describes it, but novels and other fluff rarely describe it that way. Often we see main characters finishing their Scout tenure and going straight into Tactical squads, and it's rare that Devastator members (even squad leaders) are ever named characters.. so take all that with a grain of salt.

[Eternal_Freedom]

Lascannons and plasma cannons (plasma weapons in general, actually) have the same AP; lascannons have higher Strength. If we're talking tabletop, and referencing the AP stat suggests you are. Curiously enough, in tabletop a weapon's armor penetration value has nothing to do with how well it penetrates vehicle armor (though if its good enough it does effect how much damage its done once it penetrates), since vehicle penetration is a straight Strength roll against the armor value. (In effect, it's exactly equivalent to vehicles having very high Toughness and no armor save.)

I could have sworn Lascannons were AP2 and plasma weapons were AP3. My bad.

[Ahriman238]

For Space Wolves, entire groups of initiates are put into "wolf packs", which they'll stick with from induction until death.
- Packs of young "Blood Claws" are equipped with power armor right off the bat, and mostly close combat weapons, and tend to be like taking risks to prove themselves to their seniors. Packs are large at this stage, around 20 men.
- After several campaigns and lots of experience they become Grey Hunters, which are sort of like Tactical squads. Casualties are expected by the time the pack gets here, so squads will be at ~10.

Isn't that what I said?

The Space Wolves don't follow the Codex Astartes? Color me shocked.


Going by the recent 'Sons of Dorn' book, the Imp Fists jump from Scouts to Battle-Brothers, Tactical battle-brothers. Though they still learn the sword, because Fists all know sword and siege. And the Fists are only slightly less anal-retentive about the Codex then the Smurfs.

[Irbis]

This apparently does not include "crusading" fleets, for some odd reason. Which suggests more than a thousand Chapters.

How? Especially seeing some Chapters have multiple Fortresses.

It specifically says 'fortress monasteries' which isn't the same thing as (for example) Black Templars Chapter Keeps, nor do they have planetary 'fortress monasteries'. It's specifically referring to planetary homeworlds.

That said, looking back on the 2010 update for BFG it says 'few crusading chapters have homeworlds', so I should actually say it does not include the 'majority' of Crusading fleets, actually.

This doesn't really tell us how common crusading fleets are anyhow, and the idea that there are more than 1000 Chapters (or less) is not new, 1000 has always been an approximation anyhow, as the quote below indicates. Same thing with the 'one space marine per world' bit - its not a new comment, but it applies strictly to that 'one million world' idea they spout too even though some other sources say millions or billions - its a generalization.

Doesn't, say, Iron Hands have 10 fortress monasteries, though?

Plus, I don't read that as '1000 chapters that have fortress on the ground, only'. I read that as 1000 bastions. Even if BT Chapter Keeps do not qualify, I'd think Blood Raven's fortress we see in DoW2 would qualify, despite BR being technically fleet based Chapter operating from Omnis Arcanum. I personally think Chapters that are fleet-based only, with no base on the ground are exceedingly rare. Even BT, the most crusading Chapter of them all, maintain whole net of strongpoints.

Duh, 2+ vs AP3

Yeah but thats gameplay, whereas I noted the fluff.

Yes, but it looks like fluff bends to game mechanics. Say, every gun described as breaking power armour will be AP2-3*, unless passage about volume of shots is added.

*Check if not Tanithsue Regiment

Ironically enough, this "rare" variant is about 90% of Razors currently used in Tabletop

In any case, I don't get how replacing lascannon with 2 small plasma guns somehow overloads the system...

I thought it was two plasma cannon? Plasma cannons aren't exactly weak. It might be its a 'stronger than man portable' lascannon or something, although actual yields (and comparison to the plasma cannon) is hard to do. Maybe the lascannon consumes less energy but is more effective due to its design (and has betterp enetration) whilst the plasma cannons consume more energy and generate more excess heat. Of course if THAT were the case, why don't they mount two laser cannons (aside from the fact that makes it a predator annihilator that is.. lol)

No no no. Plasma guns. As in, normal bolter sized weapons, like these even IG gets, mounted in Hurricane bolter-like mount.

Btw, now that I think about it, I can't recall any SM Razorback, Land Raider or Predator ever being armed with plasma weaponry, especially cannons. Maybe Dark Angels do it, seeing their fireworks love, but nothing else comes to mind...

Still very common, it's just Grimdumb.

I wonder which ones use the Rhinos made out of steel and wood ones which are superior to what the Guard have acess too...

Hm?

Also, ironically, in Tabletop Chimera is far superior to any non-BA Razorback or Rhino...

For one, they're cheap Terminator-capable transports

The old Razorback had a single Lascannon with a twin-linked plasma gun in a turret, while newer ones have either a twin-linked Lascannon or heavy bolter.

Given that plasma cannons are Blast weapons and Lascannons have a better AP, I would say that Connor is right on the supposition that Lascannons are more efficient penetrators.

But the point is, in Tabletop, these 'old' vehicles are the only thing Chapters ever field. At all. [In case anyone wonders why, TwinLascannon counts as one gun, Las/TwinPlas as two guns, meaning you can fire 2-3 shots instead of 1 and absorb 1 more Weapon Destroyed result. Ergo, it's not defenceless with one gun blown by enemy fire and isn't blown up by second 'weapon damage' shot result as these become critical damage if all guns are already gone.]

BTW, LAsPlas is far better 2+/3+ armoured infantry hunter, it easily kills 1-3 Terminators per turn, as opposed to 0-1 of TwinLas one, making heavy infantry much more vary of coming closer. So, it's not as clear cut.

Space Wolves do similarly, young recruits are Assault analogs, while their 'Tacticals' are veterans of many campaigns.

I thought Space Wolves had large packs of Blood Claws and used them as cannon-fodder until they narrowed the pack down to the handful with the discipline to become Grey Hunters.

I said 'Assault' analogs because only Blood Claws are insane enough to don jump packs or regularly fight in melee, although the idea is to not get them killed as long as possible.

Ah, Papa Smurf adds his name to the list of honor. Now the only named characters who haven't beat the Avatar like an unwanted stepchild are *checks list* Abaddon, Cypher, Sergeant Kell and... Ciaphas Cain. Somebody get Sandy Mitchell on the line, we need a book with Cain running screaming form the Avatar until it dies in a rockslide or something and its assumed he planned it that way.

Meh, Cain killed more Greater Daemons than Calgar, I bet in his 'Eldar' book he will throw Gunner (First Class) Jurgen at Avatar and while Jurgen burns him with his trusty melta Cain will shove his chainsword into Avatar's unmentionables, causing him to explode from his sheer manliness

- Gets transferred to a Tactical squad, that engages in both ranged and close combat.
After attaining veterancy, the path of a Battle Brother varies a lot depending on the individual.

Um, I thought it's simple? You become Sergeant, and at this point: A) lead your own squad; or B) get promoted to Company's command staff if all sergeant posts are taken; or C) If that is full, too, or you show exceptional bravery, you get promoted to 1st; or D) you can request being reassigned to 10th if you prefer ninja work.

Sometimes exceptional acts or valor land marines in the Honour Guard, or companies 'lend' personnel to depleted units, but the above is pretty much it.

For Space Wolves, entire groups of initiates are put into "wolf packs", which they'll stick with from induction until death.
- Packs of young "Blood Claws" are equipped with power armor right off the bat, and mostly close combat weapons, and tend to be like taking risks to prove themselves to their seniors. Packs are large at this stage, around 20 men.

Technically, all rave ranged guns or even special requisition weapons, thought.

- After this, they usually get promoted to the elite Wolf Guard, attached to their Company Captain equivalent.

Technically, like with Honour Guard, all is needed is act of valour, you can go directly from being Claw to WG if you're good enough. Also, since Wolf Guard is relatively huge compared to HG of Codex Chapter, it's much easier to be picked.

Those packs that get killed down to a handful -before- they become veterans become Lone Wolves.

Though, even veterans can become one, and being one and doing some glorious deed to avenge your squad is actually easiest way to become Wolf Guard.

- Last survivors of a pack that gets almost annihilated, they work alone, penetrating enemy lines in carapace armor to perform intelligence gathering, sabotage and assassination.

If you're talking about their "scouts", I was under impression they're bands of misfits kicked from squads, or marines who preferred ninja work to power armour, not remnants.

[Ahriman238]

"Lone Wolf" SW Scouts are either survivors of destroyed packs, or got kicked out of the one they were in. Which takes some extraordinary effort, given how tight-knit the packs generally are.

The whole system of promotions seems remarkably fluid from Chapter to Chapter, and even within a given chapter. In the Salamanders books Tsu'gan gets promoted from Sergeant of a battle company to a brother of the First. But the Veteran Sergeant who takes over the company came from the First, until he's killed and replaced by a Sergeant from within the company.

[Connor MacLeod]

Next up Dark Eldar codex. notable because this is the first DE update for over a decade (IIRC) and it was actually regarded (again IIRC) as a positive upgrade for the Dark Eldar as a whole. It also did a fair bit to expand on their fluff, although it changed some details (EG like Mandrakes) I'm using this as sort of a chaser after the Space Marines, because there will be laot more Space Marine stuff (Blood Angels, Gray Knights, and Space Wolves, although since I like the SW I can tolerte the last one) It also marks one of the few non-Imperial updates in this edition (aside from Necrons and Tyranids. I suppose ORks and maybe Chaos daemons might be included but I did include those in 4th for some reason.)

Anyhow, single update for DE codex:

Page 5

..because their lives span millenia...

Lifespan of Eldar and Dark Eldar.
PAge 5

While countless generations of physical conflict have ensured the Dark Eldar have better reaction speed and greater physical strength than other elments of the Eldar race, the innate psychic abilities of their forbrears have atrophied.

Given what we know of Eldar aspect Warrior training, this seems rather similar. What the Dark Eldar have done is sort of 'condition' themselves into highly specialized psychic augmentation of their physical prowess, at the cost of losing the versatility of those psychic powers. Aspect Warriors probably need to do something like that to function (channelling and otherwise limiting/blocking their psychic abilities to enable them to be efficient killers. The main diffrence is that the Dark Eldar revel in this sort of thing.)

Page 5

Though it is manufactured instead of psychically grown, the weaponry of the Dark Eldar is just as advanced as that used upon the Eldar craftworlds.

Eldar tech can be constructed to equal quality, the 'growing' is just a matter of choice (or resources, I suppose.) This might mean if they ever could figure it out, they might be better suited to reverse-engineering dark Eldar technology.

Page 5

They rarely sully their tongues with the grunting languages of the lesser races, using translator technology on the occasions that communication is unavoidable.

DE have translation technologies of some kind.

Page 6

The ancient Eldar had perfected their science to such an extent that they could reforge planets to their liking and quench stars at a whim.

Again rumoured capabilites of the 'ancient' Eldar.

Page 6

They relocated their powerbases into the labyrinth dimension known as the webway, for such was their influence that they could command entire sub-realms to be crafted in which to continue their debased works.

Those that would become the Dark Eldar retreated to and exist inside the Webway, probably accounting for much of the interior 'habitability' of said WEbway that is mentioned or depicted in artwork.

Page 6

..the construction of immense Craftworlds, graceful space-cities the size of small moons.

Size of Eldar Craftworlds.

Page 7

Slaanesh's birth-screams were so powerful that tehy destroyed countless billions of souls in a psychic shocwkave that coursed throughout the galaxy.
...
..the new god consumed the ancient deities of the old Eldar empire and scattered their remains to the corners of the Warp.

The catrastrophe unleashed by Slaanesh's birth. the interesting thing is that he not only consumed the Eldar, but he 'consumed' and incorporated their 'Gods' as well. That (probably) means tehy exist, and are either trapped by Slaanesh or corrupted/twisted ino agents of his will.
The exceptions are (probably) Khaine, and Isha, who was taken by Nurgle.
What 'scattering their remains' means I dont know, it may refer to what happened to Khaine, and imply other Gods suffered that fate.

Page 7

..those Eldar who had built their own jealously-guarded empires in the webway remained physically unaffected by Slaanesh's birth.
..
Rather than having their essence consumed in one great draught, their souls were slowly draining away into the Warp - consumed over time by Slaanesh...

The webway provides a measure of innate protection against Slaanesh's connection to the Eldar, but it isn't perfect, and only draws out their 'consumption.' Slavery and torment is largely deisgned to circumvent this. In psychc terms we might figure that their souls have a leak, and they fill it with the psychic stuff of other souls to keep it topped off. In a way, this means they become unwitting agents of Slaanesh and simply strengthen the god through their actions (Slaanesh doesn't care wher the souls tuff comes from, as long as it comes.)
Page 8

Commorragh was originally the greatest of the webway port-cities, able to transport a fleet to any of the most vital planets of the eldar empire.

Commorragh's origins.

Page 9

..dying stars ablaze with poisoned light that were harnessed at the height of the Eldar empire. Though held in sub-realms of their own, these celestial phenomena provide a near-endless supply of energy to the Dark City.
..
Every now and then, a thin solar flare curls from a captive sun out into Comorragh, briefly illuminating the horrors below.
..
... yet it will be barely heeded by the teeming citizens, for they know the suns' claws were blunted long ago.

The Dark Eldar have a unknown number of suns chained inside their domains, tapped to provide power to them (for as long as the stars last). apparently they also have defenses to block solar flares and CME and similar phenomena, which is.. pretty damn cool.


Page 10

Ranged beneath these inner districts are weapon and food factories shocking in scale..
..
These factories ravenously consume millions of workers and slaves each year.
..
..allows Commorragh to wage its ceaseless war against realspace, for without a prodigious output of war material... teh Dark City would soon be forced to feed on itself.

Dark Eldar industry. They seem to need to manufacture and produce things even food and other stuff artificially, although they could very well be luxuries rather than necessities. I'm not sure what 'consume' means in context.. and it oculd mean anything.
Also the industry seems to serve a social tool, focusing Eldar aggression outwards so it doesn't collapse in on itself.

Page 11

Anti-gravity hemispheres and gruelling "living landscapes' ensure each Wych is at the peak of physical fitness.

DE wych training
Page 12

..conventionally born children are rare symbols of status..
...
Though procreation still occurs, artificially grown Dark Eldar are far more commonplace. Once impregnated, a nascent egg can be removed from the womb and implanted in one of the amniotic tombs that honeycomb the breeding-walls of the Haemonculi.
..
..the embryo's growth can be hyperaccelerated within these tubes, each new specimen drizzling unclean fluids before being taken away by Wrack attendants. These 'half-born' are seen with contempt by truborn Dark Eldar..

The DE seem to have turned to cloning to stretch out their numbers, as well as a sort of immortality (a haemonculus and a DE Lord in the Salamanders novels had the ability to be 'reborn' in a sense.) It also creates a rather obvious caste system, which runs in contrast to the more 'equal' attitude amongst the Craftworld Eldar.

PAge 12

The pact states that the Haemonculi will regenerate the warrior's body should he die, and in exhcange, the seeker will leave the Haemonculi a permanant portion of his soul. Even a corpse that has been all but destroyed in the crucible of war can be restored to its former glory - the Master Haemonculus Urien Rakarth once crafted a perfect new Archon Vriech from a single withered hand. Provided this process is enacted within a day or so of the warrior's demise, and his will is strong enough that some of his spirit still resonates within his remains, his animus will slowly regenerate along with his physical form.

Again this is what we witnessed in the Salamander novels, and it shows the extent of Eldar cloning and resurrection technology.

Page 12

The dark Eldar are rejuvenated by witnessing agony, and if saturated with enough of it, they can heal the most grievous wounds.
..
those installed in the cocoons above slowly feast upon the resonant energies, ever so gradually growing back their bodies - skeleton first, then muscle and sinew, then alabaster skin until they are whole once more.

They heal from pain, basically. Which also grants them a sort of perpetual immortality, so long as they continue feeding on pain.

Page 13

there existed a vast portal into the main arterial of the webway within Desaderian space, shielded by holofields that made it appear nothing more than a shimmer in the starlight.

Webway portal masked by Holofields

Page 13

At their heart was the battle barge Vulkan's Wrath an immense hulk of a ship with broadside batteries that could flatten whole cities.

Whether that is cities plural, or city per battery, or city in whole, we don't know .
Page 14

..their power armour rpoof against the splinter weaponry of their foes.

Splinter weapons aren't very effective against Space Marine armor.

Page 15

The ancient Archon struck like a cobra, killing Space Marines with every thrust of his powered blade, until his rampage was halted by a stray blast froma dark lance that vapourised him where he stood.

Dark Lance vaporises an Archon. Single digit MJ (to explode) or hundreds of MJ to reduce to steam.

Page 18

In contrast, the young and dynamic empire of the Tau was absolutely terrified. The sophisticated armed forces of the TAu had barely repelled the ever-evolving Hive Fleet Gorgon and could ill afford anotehr system-wide conflict.
..
The Tau sought to employ every mercenary, ally, and confederate they could find in the war effort..

So they allied with the Dark Eldar, because of their experience of Hive Fleet Gorgon (which also, amusingly, over-taxed them it seems. Highlighting once again just how trivial the tau are on the greater galactic stage. Contrast this with the Imperium mobilizing enitre segmentum to counter the Tyranid threat.
Also this just shows how naive (or utterly overconfident) they are. Similar happened with genestealers too in the Cain novels.

Page 18

The Haemonculi themselves would employ strange and unknowable weapons; gauntlets that turned synapse beasts to dust, flickering ghost-rays that drained life force from Tervigon brood-mothers, and hexrifles that turned serpentine Trygons into gigantic glass statues.

DE vs Tyranids. Note the 'ghost rays' - the Stryxis caravans from the Rogue Trader RPG have something like that.
Page 18

High Command selected a delegation of dutiful volunteers from every other caste, and far above the planet of Vigos, a detachment of Manta Transports made their way into orbit towards a crackling sky-portal...

The Tau willingly sacrificed part of their population (who willingly went along with it FOR THE GREATER GOOD) to the Dark Eldar. you jus know this won't turn out well.

Page 19

Rubikon, the planet the Tau reserve had left behind, was under attack from thousands of sky craft.

Scope of DE attack on the au.

Page 19

Massed pulse rifle fire cut through the invaders until the battlefield smelt of burning meat.

Implying pulse rifles are at least partly thermal.

Page 19

Vect's Kabalites feasted well, each energised and invigorated to such an extent that even a single Dark Eldar wariror proved a match for an entire unit of Fire Warriors.

An indication of how formidable powered up DE are, as well as a strong indication hat their phyiscal prowess is psychic or warp-enhanced (fuelled by pain and torment.)
It also is interesting in how it suggests the tau are psychic enough for he Dark Eldar to feed on.

Page 20

Over time their sovereign estates grow into entire sub-realms, each of which is powered by the energy of a stolen sun. The solar systems plunged into darkness by the Eldar's star-theft wither and die in the freezing cold of the void..

Implies that they still 'steal' suns from time to time. How they do it, or how the ymove them, we dont know.

Page 20

..Craftworlds, gigantic living vessels able to accomodate an entire planet's population.
...
Hundreds of Craftworlds sail into the sea of stars...
...
Most of the Eldar craftworlds are destroyed in the psychic backlash.

This could imply that there were at least hundreds to the start (thousands?), but most of those were destroyed. What 'most' qualifies as... Also each craftworld can accomdoate planetary populations (millions? Billions?) which given how wide open and vast they can be suggests considerable internal volume (thousands of cubic km perhaps?)


PAge 21

Held precariously in the collapsing field of the casket is the unstable essence of a black hole. Kelithresh's entire realm is plunged into a howling, yawning vortex.

The DE have (or had) the ability to make compact black hole bombs.

Page 21

The sculptor has isolated a viral helix that quickly turns living material into crystalline glass.
..
the virus is later weaponised.

One up on Life Eater, in a way.

Page 21

The [ork] corpse sheds millions of spores into the air, each of which bears a cargo of terrible wasting toxins. As the infected spores corrupt the Orkoid reproduction cycle, the population of Graegus grows weaker and weaker.

The DE have corrupted Ork DNA it would seem.

Page 22

..Inquisitor Lord Korscht of the Ordo Xenos second-guesses the Dark Eldar raid upon the industrial world of Demoisne. When the Kabal of Immortality Denied bursts into realspace above the planet's capbital., they are met with not only the firepower of six hundred quad guns and Icarus lascannons, but also the full fury of a company of the Deathwatch. The Dark Eldar withdraw empty-handed within minutes of tehir arrival.

They creatively obliterate the Inquisitor Lord shortly after this. Note as well the 'six hundred quad guns and Icarus lascannon' implying an anti-aircraft lascannon weapon.
Page 23

..perfects a technique he calls photonic transubstantiation, transforming himself into a living beam of light and travelling interstellar distances purely in order to proclaim his genius.

That is.. impressive. Inefficient, but impressive.

Page 26

Much of the bodysuit is held in palce with long metal barbs and hooks that penetrate deep into the wearer's nerve bundles, sharpening his senses with the constant sting of pain.

This is Dark Eldar body armour

Page 26

Each needle shard is impregnated with a wide spectrum of virulent hypertoxins. A splinter rifle slays its targets over several excruciating seconds...

Needle rifles ramped up to 11, in other words.

Page 26

The blaster is a particular favorute, for it can destroy even a Land Raider with but a single squeeze of the trigger.

Haywire blaster. EMP weapon.

Page 26

The sightlinks built into their splinter cannons and dark lances not only improve accuracy, but also allow the wielde rto see the agony-wracked look on his victim's face when each salvo hits home. Enterprising operators use mnemonic scopes to record such moments..

Eldar targeting systems.

Page 29

[REaver] arena champions endlessly modify their craft's vanes and blast-engines, fit targeting holograms for their in-buitl weaponry, pierc their craft's fairings so that the striek of their passage is a different pitch to that of their peers..

vehicle modifications.
Page 30

..their [Beastmaster] masks harbour complex sonic emitters and pheremone traps

How they control their prey, basically.

Page 31

Then they close upon their foe they [Incubi] send waves of neural energy coursing outward from the tormentros mounted upon their chests, leaving their foes wracked with agony..

a DE variation of the banshee helmes or mandiblasers, I guess.

Page 32

..requesting that his bones be hollowed out by the cold metal drills of a Talos, that bands of new muscle be grafted onto his torso, and powerful wings and adrenaline dispensers be attached to his shoulders so that he is capable of true flight.

The transfomration process into a potential Scourge.

Page 32

Scourges also favour the haywire blaster, which releases the electromagnetic energy of Commorragh's captive suns in a powerful burst, and the heat lance, which can atomise a foe wehre he stands.

Haywire blasters either are remotely powered by the suns, or they absorb/capture then release (unconverted) that EM energy. A variation of a laser or heat weapon in this case?

Heat lances which either explode or vaporize a target dark lance style.

Page 33

a Mandrake can pull itslef into reality straight through another being's shadow..
..

Mandrakes exist both in reality and a cursed otherworld..
..
a recently fed Mandrake can channel the energies stolen from his prey into blasts of freezing ice.
..
..to represent the fact they exist partially in a dimension of pure shadow..

Mandrake abilities. Note similarities to Necron Flayers.

Page 34

Each (Archon) wields influence enough to collapse portions of realspace, stall an Imperial Crusade or steal away the populations of entire planets.

Power of an Archon. By comparison to crusade or planets it implies the ability to fight off (or capture) hundreds of thousands or milions of people at least.

Page 37

HAemonculi specialise in body modification and lateration...
...
Some Haemonculi harbour their viscera, lungs and heart in a muscled hunk of meat that sprouts from their shoulders, a rich repository for stimulants and elixirs that often boasts secondary limbs of its own. Others repleace their blood so that searing ichor or even acid flows through their modified veins. Their spines are elongated and extended - from the lower back, their vertebrae meld into whipping prehensile bone-tails that can curl around the throats of their prey.

They also mention they're functionally immortal. Fabius Bile with pointy ears, and greater numbers.

Page 40

Creations of mad genius, each one is part organic and part mechanical, festooned with surgical appartus and horrible looking weapons of war.
..
These semi-sentient constructs drift along with meancing slowness, the whine of their anti-gravitic motors...
...
The bladed forelimbs of a Talos can scissor even an Orgryn into bloody chunks, and the ichor-spewing funnels that siphon fluids from a Talos' thorax can reduce a lightly-armoured victim to primordial ooze.
..
When a Talos catches an enemy warrior, it holds him tight with a pair of grasping steel limbs and begins a rapid and efficient disassembly of its victim with the rest.
..
drawing each constintuent part into itself, stripping and rendering down the physical form of its prey layer by layer until nothing is left..
..
..the constituents of its victims will be siphoned out from within its metallic shell and used to create more potions and elixirs.

A Talos pain engine. DE combat vehicle/construct.

Page 41

..the Cronos drains away not the physical constituents of its victims but their life essence.
..
The name of this terrifying device can be loosely translated as 'spirit-syphon', for it can generate a feedback loop of negative energy that drains the life forces of those caught in its field.
..
The stolen vitality of the machine's victim is then magnified within its shiny carapace, fed through its ribbed capacitor valves and projected from its resonator vanes once more. Pulsing waves of spirit-essence flow outwards to those Dark Eldar standing near the Cronos..
...
.. all Dark Eldar can absorb the life forces purloind by the Cronos, becoming stronger and more vital every time the beast successfuly feeds.
...
..the Cronos are known as 'time-thieves', for they steal youth and vigour from their prey and give it to their sadistic keepers.

Another combat engine type construct. Temporal and life force drainer.

Page 43

Though the Venom's booster engines and anti-gravitic ribbing are similar to those of other Dark Eldar craft, the transport is so deft and sensitive to the commands of its pilot that ic an jink through a storm of incoming fire, its holographic flickerfield confounding enemy marksmen.

Venoms seem to have holofields.

Page 44

All [Raiders[ have certain key features in common - a repulsor keelblade manned by a talented steersman, aethersails to harness the energies flowing from the portal form which they descend..

Features of DE skimmer craft. The intersting thing is how the use the sails to 'harness' energies from the portals. This may help explain how/why Eldar solar sails work at all,

PAge 45

..the targeting arrays of the Ravagers are ouftited with as much information about their quarry as the Kabal can Muster.
..
A Ravager squadorn is fully capable of appearing from nowhere, delivering the death blow to a God Machine of the ADeptus Mechanicus in a single volley, then disappearing over the horizon before the Behemoth has even toppled to the ground.

Ravagers.. the closest to anti-titan weapons.

Page 46

Razorwing Jetfighter, alien aircraft so fast that their fusillades of missile fire can hit home just at the instnat the air is rent by a thunderous sonic boom.
..
Razorwing jetfighters boast an array of diabolically effecitve missiles. When a squadron of RAzorwings looses a salvo it often appears as if the ground is being raked by monstrous invisible talons. Most surgically effiicent of all is the dreaded monoscythe missile, remotely steered by the Jetfighter's pilots into the thick of the foe.
..
..when detonated, they emit not a conventional blast but one that is constrained to a specific plane by complex in-built powershields. A great horizontal sheet of force explodes outward at a certain height, decapitating or even cutting in half everyone caught in the blast zone.
..
At the heart of a necrotoxin missile is a large reservoir of virulent neuropoisons. W hen the missile detonates, it splinters into knife-like shards of jagged shrapnel...

Razorwing fighters and armament. Note their mastery of bizarre seismic charge technology.

Page 47

..it [Voidraven bomber] is still capble of outstripping even the agiel fighter craft of the Imperium with ease.
...
..the Voidraven mounts complex sonic dampers that completely obscure the sound of its engines.
..
The Void mine, delivered with pinpoint accuracy, detonates not with one but two warheads, one a split second before the other. The first has no direct effect, for it merely establishes a sphere of force, a bubble in reality that protects everything outside and condemns everything within. The seocnd contains a particle of purest darklight, released form its containment field by the primary detnonation.
...
If it were not for the force sphere established by the primary detonation the resultant implosion would destroy not only the enemy but also the Voidraven...
...
As it is, though, anything trapped inside the crackling sphere is annihilated. all that is left is a smoking, hemispherical crater scooped out of the earth..

Voidraven bombers. Darklight void bombs which mimic SW Thermal Detonators.
Page 47

Implosion missile: These heavy and menacing looking devices emit a field of molecular dissonance that causes those caught in their path to implode, instantly collapsing in upon themselves and leaving nothing more than a scorched silhoutte..
...
A shatterfield missile actually houses two separate detonator cores. On impact, the first of the core ssucks away all warmth, turning those caught within its blast into brittle statues. An instnat later, the second core sends a blast of percussive force that shatters its frozen victim into pieces.

More DE ordnance. Might explain seismic charges.

Page 53

In the dpeths of the labyrinth dimension, Lady Malys came across a scintillating being of pure light.
..
..Malys held her own against this celestial trickster's incessant riddling, and incredibly she emerged triumphant.

IT left behind its "heart", a lump of crystal that Malys replaced her own heart with. Any bets on whether that was the Laughing God?

Page 56

An agoniser is an extremely sophisticated close combat weapon that drives its victim's sensorium haywiere, cuasing excruciatingly severe pain as nerves burn out with agony.

An agoniser cuases agony. I know, shocking?

PAge 56

The disintegrator cannon fires a particle of unstable matter harnessed from a stolen sun.
..
..it maintains a high rate of fire and always remains cool to the touch despite the ravening energies housed within.

Disintegrator cannon.. what sort of 'unstable matter' it fires I dont konw. Plasma weapon fo some kind probably.

PAge 56

The weapon shops of Commorragh are infamous for their ability to cheat the natural laws of physics in order to design ever more efficient and exciting ways to kill. Blasters and dark lances epitomise this, for they do not employ standard laser technology but instead fire a stream of what is, for want of a better term, darklight.
..
..there are a number of theses claiming it is sourced from black holes, warp storms and other celestial phenomena.
..
Darklight works by reacting catastrophically with its target, proudicng a blast that can bore a massive hole in a vehicle regardless of armour, or vapourise a foot soldier in an instant. Even to perceive a beam of darklight without correct protection leaves permanant slahs-scars upon the retina.

DE weapons and Darklight weapons in general. Sort of 'anti-light' or black hole weapons Can still vaporize targets


Page 57

The long barrelled heat lance combines melta and high-yield las technology into a weapon that has extreme destructive potential.

This seems to suggest some melta technology (the microwave types?) has ties to las technology as well. It may be possible to combine them.

Page 57

a Huskblade instantly evaporates the moisture in anything it touches...

Power weapon. And damn creepy one at that.

PAge 57

The shredder unleashes an expanding mesh of monofilaments with miniscule barbs along their length. The mesh entangles the victim in an invisible net that slices apart the target as it struggles.

So I gather it one ups the Warp Spider weapons by being far more painful.

Page 57

Splinter weapons fire shards of splintered crystal using a powerful magno-electric pulse.

Splinter rifles, it would seem, are EM weapons. That fire crystal.

Page 60

This detestable creation resembles a tighlty packed sphere of sentient barbed wire that can be made to explode outwards, ccaputring its prey and then contracting quickly to cut apart its victim. The psychic byproduct is highly invigorating to those with the strength of will to consume it.

Animus Vitae. When the shredder is too humane for your victims.
PAge 61

A dark gate is a runic tetrahedron that opens a portal to one of the forbidden zones of the webway.
..
Shortly after the dark gate is cast into the fray, a grasping tentacle or flickering pseudopod lashes out from the gate and crushes anyone it can catch..

DE variant of vortex weapons, I imagine.

Page 61

A claw glove crammed with syringe like protrusions and vials, the flesh gauntlet can inject potent electrosteroids that force rapid and unnatural growht. Its victim will literally outgrow its own skin, brusting apart in a welter of steaming, heaving matter.

The Flesh Gauntlet.

Page 62

the Clone field projects several hololight images of the wearer, all indentical in aspect and moving in perfect synchrony.

Variation of holofield technology.

Page 62

Those Dark Eldar who desire substantiala mounts of protection whilst retaining a high degree of mobility sport armour made from hardened resins and shot through with pockets of lighter-than-air gas. Ghostplate armour also incorporates minor forcefield technology..

DE protective armor.

PAge 62

The Shadow field surrounds the wearer in a dark miasma of energy that is almost impossible to penetrate. However should a solid blow connect the shadow field will short out..

Shadow fields.

Page 62

Though soul-traps vary in size and appearance... ... they all have one ghastly function - to capture the soul of a powerful enemy within its confines and empower the bearer with the stolen energies.

as if the DE needed more life draining/capturing technology.

Page 62

This is a portable form of the portals used to link together places via teh webway.

Portable webway portal link.

Page 63

Aethersails are used to capture the aetheric winds that flow out from open webway portals. Many vehicle crews are meticulous in the construction of these sails, incorporating frictionless alloys, vibro-pods and angled booms to enhance their bursts of speed.

Frictionless alloys, and again Aethersails powered by webway portals. This again might suggest eldar solar sails are a variation of this, and that all Eldar propulsion is basically 'external powered' from some pre set mechanism (not unlike Dooku's Gree-based taychon sailer.)

Page 63

Flickerfield: The vehicle has a highly advanced optical force shield that makes it appear to flicker in and out of reality.

Yet another variation of holofields I suspect.

Page 63

The vehicle's deck is covered by a broad spectrum displacement field, enveloping the vehicle in a cold and inky darkness. This has the effect of reducing the range of enemy units..

Shadowfield variant.

[Connor MacLeod]

Back to 5th edition. This time I'm bringing the Space wolves to the table. I liked this codex, because I generally like the Space Wolves. IT was a nice change from the SM codex and the 'scions of gulliman' crap.

I'll probably cover DH and Space Wolves agian later when I get around to it to space things uot. I also have a few other things to toss out in my old spinoff thread and 'extra shit' thread that got all the extra shit like the Sabbat Worlds Crusade book.

This will be an easy update since I didn't type in alot from this book (at least no big quotes.) so you're getting it all at once.

Page 6

The Space Wolves maintain the vigil that began many thousands of years ago at the close of the Horus Heresy, and watch over a hundred worlds besides. Their domain stretches far and wide across the scattered stars that girdle the Fenrisian system..

Scope of Space wolf.. territory. I'm not sure its so much they 'own' the planets, as they have complex ties or oaths with them, like the world Garm from Grey Hunter. It could also reflect the whole 'direct administration' line from the 5th edition codex (EG Space Marine chapters given control over greater portions of Imperial territory to maintain stability.)
in any event, this suggests that despite being 'aberrants' their territorial claims/responsibilitis greatly exceed those of the Ultrasmurfs either wat it makes them more badass. Also it suggests they may have sizable 'garrisons' or detachments across those worlds to oversee and maintain those bonds (again like Garm, but also like the wolfblade.) in addition to the forces in the Great Companies, the pool of freshly raised recruits on Fenris itself, etc.

Pag 6

AS Fenris reaches the point at which it is closest to the sun, the passage of the planet breaks and twists the sub-oceanic crust, exposing the molten core to the icy waters.
..
with explosive violence the world is torn asunder. Blazing islands rise from the sea spewing flame and lava pouring down their slopes. Below the surface the waters boil into steam that engulfs Fenris with its sulphurous fumes. Great tidal waves socur the coasts of Asaheim. Islands created in the upheaval of preceding years are cast into turmoil by this global metamorphosis. Some endure, but many are broken apart or swallowed by the sea, engulfed in the churning oceans and casting their inhabitants into the merciless deep.

Fenris. A fun place to live, as Death worlds go.

Page 8

Each was created differently, with his own unique powers. Some were made so as to resemble humankind, but man were of titanic proportions and strange appearance.

Primarchs, it is implied, were all variable. The interesting thing is that this is implied to be deliberate (EG Sanguinius was supposed to have wings, I guess.)

Page 9

He [Russ] led the Space Wolves deep inside the Eye of Terror in pursuit of the renegade Space Marine Legions. Eventually Russ disappeared altogether, taking only his retinue with him.

And of course the Great Hunts lead to find him. This may be meant as a hint to Russ' location (or where he was lost.) and perhaps explaining why the 13th Company is still in and around the Eye.
Page9

Whereas before the Heresy, a Space Marine Legion might number ten thousand or more warriors, under the new order each Chapter's size was limited to about a thousand.

Legion vs Company. Tens of thousands was more likely.. and then there wer ethose like the Word bearers and Ultramarines who had 100,000 and 200,000 respectively.

Page 10

The [Canis helix] gene works hideous changes on the warrior's mind and body; he reverts to a primals tate where his bones split and buckle, thick hair sprouts from across his body..
...
His body mass grows by up to eighty percent, many of his bones fuse, and fangs sprout from his gums as he undergoes the transformation.

80% increase in body mass. A 80 kg person would weigh 144 kg for example. This is also before the formalized implanting at that, so its a lower limit on Space Wolf mass.

Page 12

Just as a single Fenrisian warrior would be more than a match for several normal men, a single Space Marine could overcome a dozen Fenrisian tribesmen even when unarmed.

This implies a measure of genetic engineering existed amongst Fenrisians in the past, or it might just be due to combat prowess or weird warp shit. An unarmed Marine beating a dozen tribesmen isn't too shocking, although it migt imply Unarmed astartes are dozens of times stronger than a normal person (faster as well?)

Page 12

He can sustain and swiftly heal wounds that would cripple or kill a mortal man.
..
each of the Space Wolves has incredibly acute senses that can detect the scent of his prey in a snowstorm or pick out his quarry's breathing pattern in the midst of a raging battle.

Space Wolf senses and durability.

Page 12

Power armour is made from adamantium and ceramite, two fo the hardest substances in the galaxy, and its inbuilt systems increase the strength of the wearer until he can crush skulls with a single punch and tear throats out of with the swipe of a hooked hand. Clad in power armour, a Space Marine can run headlong through a storm of enemy firepower, jump over yawning crevasses, resist the pressure of the deep ocean or even fight in the depths of the cold void.

Power armor capabilities.

Page 12

Each new recruit is given a deadly chainsword that is capable of chewing through pack ice as easily as it mangles and severs human flesh, or an axe finely balanced enough to cut a man in two with one swing.

Space Wolf melee weapons.

Page 13

Like a dagger driven into the belly of the sky, the Fang pierces the atmosphere of Fenris.
The fortress-citadel of the Space Wolves is one of the greatest bastions of the Imperium, still reckoned the greatest outside Terra.
..
The Fang is clad in armour of immense thickness and strength and is cloaked by void shields more powerful than those found on even the most migthy of the Emperor's warships. Dark shafts cut miles into the mountainside conceal defence lasers that are capable of blasting apart even the most heavily armoured spacecraft. These huge weapons are as ancient as the Chapter itself, the thermal reactors that power them testament to the precious technology from the distant past.

The Fang, and the thermal reactor powered archeotech defence lasers

Page 13

As the process of achieving full consciousness is very demanding, it is only possible to awaken a Dreadnought maybe once every ten years or so. The older a Dreadnought is, the harder it is to awaken, and the longer it takes to recover before it is ready for anothre battle. Although there are as many as a hundred or more dreadnoughts beneath the FAng..

Lots of dreadnoughts, but they're all old and not to be used lightly due to problems waking them.
Page 13

Upon the very tip of the Fang is the Space Wolves' fleet dock, where hundreds of spacecraft are maintained in armoured hangars inside the mountain. Each ship is able to carry enough Space Wolves to alter the course of a war within a single day or to cripple a city with bombardment from above. Were a traveller to somehow penetrate the thick stormclouds that girdle the Fang and shroud it from mortal sight, he would at the very limits of his sight see these starships arrayed around the tip of the Fang, seeming to him by sheer distance no larger than ravens coming in to roost. It is from here that the Space Wolves journey to distant battlefields throughout the galaxy.

In contrast to Gray Hunter, where each Great company had its own ship. These may be the ships 'owned' by the Great Wofl and his company, parcelled out to others as needed. It also implies they are fairly small ships (although 'small' in 40K standards can mean up to 500-1000 m long ships - vessels of those sizes have landed on planets before.) which can also demolish (cripple?) cities with orbital bombardment. They must also not have navigators (unless they use one of thre reserve navigators.)

PAge 14

Each Great Company has its own headquarters and territory within the Space Wolves' massive Chapter-fortress, and has its own spacecraft, armoury, forges and other facilities.

So its not contradictory. The hundreds of spacecraft above was in addition to this.

Page 14

..the Space wolves Chapter is divded into twelve 'Great Companies'
...
In addition to the eleven Great companies there is also the Company of the Great Wolf. When the Great Wolf dies, the entire Chapter selects his successor from amongst the twelve Wolf Lords currently leading the Great Companies.
...
The Company of the Great Wolf is effecitvely another company in itself but it differs form the Great Companies in some important respects. THis company is host ot the Chapter's priesthood..
..
It is also where the Chapters' Dreadnoughts are kept in stasis to extend their already prolonged lifespans.

Organization of the Wolves.

Page 15

Each of the stone slabs is as wide as a batlte tank, and it takes a dozen of the strongest Space Wolves to lift just one.

They're 13 parts of a circle, with the centre circle for the Great wolf. The length is roughly twice the outer width,and the inner width is maybe 2/3 that. No idea on height. Assuming a 2m height, 4m width, and a 8m length it would weigh ~150 tons. Each space Wolf (the strongest, at least) can be expected to lift up to 10-12 tons or so, tops. Which is not minor, considering we're talking a feat many tens or hundreds of times greater than normal people can do.

Page 17

The Great company of Ragnar Blackmane is second only to Logan Grimnar's boasting almost two hundred battle-hardened warriors...

upper limit of 2400 Battle brothers in the Wolves great companies. This would not include the specialists or extras (Rune priests, wolf priest,s iron priests), those dedicated to training and leading their aspirants/recurits, and other 'special' detachments like the Wolfblade or the Garm detachment. And the Wofl scouts of course.
It probably also doesn't include the newly blooded recruits (who seem to remain on Fenris until placed in a company.)

Page 18

Finn is victorious in his early engagements, at one point driving the armoured prow of his Strike Cruiser straight into the weak point of the Ork superkrooza Longtoof and out the other side, breaking it in two.

Strike cruiser ramming tactics. Note that this argues against ships employing mas slightening.

Page 18

Inquisitor Bastalek Grim attends the Great Feast of Gerrod Redbeard, committing the sagas recounted there to his eidetic implants..

eidetic implants.

Page 18

..Throth Half-Head blinds the giant with a plasma blade..

Plasma blade. some sort of power weapon probably.

Page 19

..Daemon-infested world of Yaogedden. Sven Bloodhowl's Great Company, themselves battling the daemonic hordes at Yaogeddon's molten core..

Fighting in the 'molten core' of a planet. at the very least, in volcano-like conditions.

Page 19

..a vast USM-class anomaly breaches the yawning Warpgate of Sloth. Twelve thousand miles of heaving, twisted flesh, the entity defies clsasification untila female xenobiologist realises that the anomaly was once a void whale.
..
As the monstrosity prepares to engulf the astral stornghold of Perillia, the Space Wolves launch towards it in drill-tipped boarding torpedoes. They bargain withou tthe fact that the planet-sized predator has its own ecosystem, and a hostile one at that...
...
...Engir and his men cut their way into the beast's circulatory system and plant thermal charges deep within the behemoth's vital orgasns. They escape with seconds to spare before the beast finally comes apart in a great gout of tainted blood. The Perillian Gas Belt is borne from its remains.

Oh yes, the space Wolves use munitions to blow apart a planet-sized space whale. Possibly reduce it to vapour (given the gas belt.) maybe It was all due to nuclear intestinal gas
Assuming it was just blown apart into chunks like a person with a stick of dynamite, we're probably talking hundreds if not thousands of gigatons worth of explosion Any amount of vaporization can increase that yield considerably.

page 19

almost a year later, the Ecclesiarchy and three orders of the Adepta Sororitas attempt to enter Fenrisian space in Force.

you gotta love how the Ecclesiarchy treats people who don't do what they say. nevermind gets the Sisters in trouble.

Page 20

It is only when Svengar makes a casual pass at one of their women..

Alien woman, but it implies Space Wolves have some kind of sex drive. This would make Space wolves rather unique (or at least unusual) among Space marines, who usually have little need or desire for women.

Page 20

A great gout of flaming acid blinds the Thunderhawk's sensorium, causing it to crash spectacularly.
Thorgir Redhand alone climbs from the wreckage, his Terminatour armour having absorbed the worst of the damage.
..
Thorgir too is buried under hundreds of tonnes of rock, but when the grateful people of Isoulde eventually dig him out, the fire of defiance burns in him still.

Durability of Terminator armor.

Page 20

The Tau Empire, encroaching ever further into Imperial space, mines the bed of the ocean world of Kvariam Alpha. Hidden from the eye of the Impeirum, it takes a full decade for the domes and corridors that stretch along the ocean floor to be discovered by a far-scanning augur probe. With the Imperial Guard unable to engage the Tau forces so many leagues below the sea, the Space Wolves are called in.
...
..launch a massed Land Raider assualt into the depths. They drive deep into the ocean along the sea bed, the adamantium hulls of the Land Raiders proof against ht eterrible pressures of the ocean.

IMperial Guard has no aquatic or amphibious element to it, it seems. Land Raiders, however, don't care about water.

Page 21

..there lies a Climatrope, an ancient STC construct that maintains the planet's climate at more-or-less temperate levels.
...
Over the next few weeks, Elixir's temperature steadily lowers. It is not long before the entire world is consumed by blizzards of snow and freezing rain.

Ancient Dark Age Climate technology.

Page 21 - noted here is that Russ left after having what may have been a vision.
Page 22

A factory world of incredible size and output, Armageddon was and still is the keystone of an entire Imperial sector. As with all the industralised worlds, it teems with billions of souls...
..
..each man, woman, and cild fighting to breathe the same toxic air.

Armageddon is defined as a 'factory world' and an 'industrialised world' and that Armageddon's population is typical for an industrial world (although at the very least we're talking billions on an industrial world.)

PAge 22

.a full half of the Imperial Guard upon Armageddon turned on their fellows..
...
.. the far bank of the mile-wide River Chaeron bristled with millions of reinvigroated Imperial troops.
..
Outnumbered nearly a thousand to one, the Space Wolves took the fight to the Chaos horde.

Scope of the Imperial garrison forcse in the first Armageddon War. Implies millions of troops no matter how you cut it.

Page 22

..a hundred Grey Hunters stood grim-faced as they blew apart those renegades that made it to the other side with interlacing volleys of bolter fire.

Oh yeah and a hundred Grey Knights banished Angron and his hordes. Better than Calgar doing it singlehanded, as the Ultramarines would have probably been portrayed.

Page 23

Millions of those who fought alongside the Space Wolves were forced to live out the rest of their lives in slavery [in Forced Labour camps]. With the hives empty of all save the most wealthy and influential, the Adminstratum imported a new workforce to replace those who had gazed upon the face of Chaos and lived. Those who even mentioned the great war were swiftly taken away to an ignomious end by the hive authorities, and within a month the planet's productivity was back to optimum levels.

The Wealthy survived (due to politics) but the lower classes were purged. This enraged Logan Grimnar and the Space Wolves in general, which lead to no end or conflict between the Adepta and the Wolves.

Page 26

The transition from aspriant to fully-fledged Grey Hunter may take decades or even centruies, but should a Blood Claw not find his death upon the battlefield that transition is all but certain.

Hair greys, fangs grow longer, skin tans and becomes leeathery, and sometimes the eyes become yellow and more wolfish.

Page 27

Not so the Wolf Scouts, who are usually taken from the ranks of the Grey Hunters.
...
It is also common for a Wolf Scout pack to be equipped with rare and priceless plasma pistols, the better to destroy armoured targets. Each Wolf Scout is clad in the carapace armour and duracloth of the lighty armed skirmisher...

Carapace and duracloth armor.

Page 28 - they post the "dying" words of Leman Russ, which I've quoted elswehere. Oh well.
Page 29

Sometimes though, a pack will suffer so terribly that it is reduced to a singel survivor; one who has lost his brothers to a man and yet has not earnt a place in the vaunted Wolf Guard.

Lone Wolves. Dedicated to vengance for their losses. Sort of like the Slayers in Warhammer fantasy if I am gathering it right. They stand somewhat outside the order of things it seems, yet are not outcast but honoured. And if they succeed in some great task they may be inducted into the Wolf Guard.
Page 30

Every Wolf Lord favours his chosen brethren with the best weapons he has at his disposal...
..
..there are few who can turn down the lure of raw power afforded by Tactical Dreadnought Armour.

Wolf Guard. Like any veteran company they get the best ship.
Page 31

Fenrisian Wolves range from man-sized to the size of a snow lion..

Blackmane wovles can exert as much pressure (with thier jaws) as an ice shark.. whatever that is.

Page 34

Thunderwolves are truly monstrous, their anatomies having more in common with a Terran rhinoceroid than with a normla canine. Reaching as much as eight feet in height at the shoulder, Thunderwolves are clad in a shaggy coat of rough fur as tough as matted steel wire, and their jutting jaws are so strong that they are able to chew through steel.

Yet more indications perhaps of bizarre genetic engineering of the Fensirians and their enviroment. I wonder if this is common for deathworlds? Given the insane shit Catachans can do it wouldnt surprise me.

Page 36

A Rune Priest may call upon Grandfather Blizzard to drive shards of ice into the flesh of his enemies, implore the Lord of Lightning to spear his nemesis from above, or compel the rocky jaws of Fenris herself to open, sending the enemy tumbling downward into the planet's molten heart.
None truly know how the spark of psychic ability that controls the elements becomes manifest within the soul.

Rune Priests. because they're space vikings, its all cold and electricity and its TOTALLY NOT PSYCHIC POWERS!

page 37

The Rune Priest slams his armoured gauntlets together whislt shouting a word of power,a nd the noise is magnified a hundredfold. The resultant thunderclap is loud enough to shatter stone and even liquefy the brains of those nearby.
...
Sentient electricigty crackles from the brooding skies, arcing into the ranks of the enemy and grounding on foe after foe until a trail of blackened corpses is left in its wake.
..
In the space of a few moments, howling winds and furious blizzards rage about him in a vortex of ice and snow...
...
The Rune Priest brings the rage of the storm to a roaring climax, frost-fingered wind spirits whipping those who intrude upon their domain out of the skies and smashing them upon the ground.
...
Invoking Freki and Geri from the netherworld, the Rune Priest sets the charcoal black spirits of two of the most exalted of Thunderwolves upon the foe...
...
The Rune Priest bellows and ancient curse and his frosted breath coalesces and grows into a deadly blizzard. within moments, the Rune Priest's foes are all but consumed in a hurricaine of freezing shards, a thousand blades of psychic ice plunging into their flesh.
..
The Rune priest implores the spirit of the world upon which he walks to open its rock fanged maw, and a chasm cracks open under the feet of his enemies...

Space Viking shaman powers.

Page 38

For every Aspirant that succeeds in the Test of the Iron Gauntlet, a hundred will fail. Such unfortunate creatures will be taken into the dungeon and transformed into a creature known as a Thrall Servitor, a grotesque fusion of man and machine.

Success rate for 'aspirants' is 1 in 100.

Page 39

Each Wolf Lord leads a Great Company comprising over a hundred of the most lethal men Fenris can Breed. A Great Company thrives or dwindles as a direct consequence ofits rulers decisions..

1200 men at least.

PAge 40

Razorbacks exchange a portion of their transport capacity in order to mount a twin-linked weapon system atop their hull. This ranges from the standard twin heavy bolter configuration to paird assault cannons to turrets mounting twin-linked lascannons..

Razorbacks.

Page 41

Its armoured hull, a heavier adaptation of the ever-faithful Rhino APC, is proof against all but the most powerful anti-tank weaponry, and small-arms fire patters from its blue-grey hide like ice-sharsf rom the face of a glacier. Even targeting the few vulnerable areas of the Predator is difficult indeed, for the restless metal monster is forever on the move, seeking out new firing solutions...

Predator durability.

Page 41

Like its brother tanks, the Vindicator, the Whirlwind and the Razorback, the Predator is so solid and durable that it can theoretically see millenia of active service and still function at peak efficiency.

More on durability. This must only be true when factoring in maintenance.

Page 41

They bear twin-linked long-barrelled lascannons in their sleek turrets, an armament of such potency that it can tear open even the living metal hull of a Necron war machine with one blinding salvo.

Power of Predator lascannon.

Page 41

Predator Destructors, ont he other hand, fire explosive ammunition from autocannons of such high calibre that their barrels could swallow a Space Marine's fist. Destructor-pattern Predators are versatile and deadly, as capable of hunting and destroying whole squadrons of light vehicles as they are chewing through the elite infantry of the Space Wolves' enemies.

Destructor autocannons apparently have absurdly high-calibre weapons (100-150mm, depending on how big you figure a Space Marine's fist to be.) And this is an antipersonnel/light vehicle weapon. lol.

Page 42

Each [Whirlwind] tank locates its prey with multi-spectrum targeting systems and infra-red analysis cogitators that, if its proud crew are to be believed, can pinpoint the location of a Snotling in a snowstorm over a league away. Some of the more radical Iron Priests hardwiere in Servitor-augmented olfactosenses so that the Whirlwind can literally 'sniff out' its prey.
Conventional barrage doctrine is often ignored by such crew,s who prefer to fire on the move, loosing great salvoes of missiles high into the brooding clouds above and then driving at top speed toward the vector detonation site..

Whirlwind targeting system and doctrine.

Page 42

These include formidable fragmentation missiles each taller than a Space Marine...
...
The Whirlwind is alos armed with Castellan-class incendiary missiles..
..
Each Dragonrager carries a volatile chemical warhead that blossoms into an incandescent storm upon impact, birthing lashing tongues of fire from which even reinfored bunkers offer no protection.

Whirlwind payloads. Note the missiles are bigger than an Astartes.

Page 43

Vindicators make up for their lack of range by packing a punch that would make a Titan think twice.

Implies vindicators pack in enough firepower to (in groups?) threaten a Titan.

Page 43

Vindicators can obliterate entire sections of a reinforced building in a deafening, roaring instant, causing the rest of the edifice to come tumbling down in a spectacular collapse.

more Vindicator firepower.
Page 44

..its four godhammer-pattern lascannons can blast a hole through triple-forged plasteel.
..
..but in truth nothing in the natural world can compare to the fury of its guns and the resilience of its thick adamantium hull.

Land raider firepower and durability. Also plasteel is 'forged'. This means its a steel-like material (in all respects steel, except for being plastic.)

Page 44

..the datacores of each Land Raider are host to a powerful machine spirit. This spectral consciousness was bound within the Land Raider's steel-grey shell long before the memory of living men, hammered into the warrior-tank's mortal form by the ancient ancestors of the Iron Priests. Each spirit is warlike and utterly loyal to the Chapter, able to flow into every weapons system and engine block of its host.

Space Wolf Land Raider machine spirits. They don't sound the least bit organic.

Page 44

..Land Raiders prey upon lesser tanks like a wolf loose amongst the fold of sheep. The line tanks of the foe cannot hope to halt the Land Raider as it growls forward, battle cannon shells and alien ordnance shattering upon the mechanical behemoth's hide.
..
..even smash its way through the rockcrete walls of a fortress without sustaining major damage.

Land Raiders immune to battle cannon.

pgae 45

Redeemers sport large-bore flamestorm cannons that spout billowing tides of roaring promethium.
..
It is said that the flames of the Redeemer are hot enough to liquify plasteel and even the creamite of Space Marine power armour.
...
..flamestorm cannons drawing level with the vision slits of the enemy's boltholes long before each cannon's trigger is depressed. The ensuing firestorm is often so fierce that it melts the rockcrete of the victim's bunker, leaving molten slag where there was once a proud edifice.

Considering it can melt bunkers, that gives you an idea of what is needed to melt plasteel or ceramite.
Page 46

..the Land Speeder is an extremely rugged construction and cna b adapted to fill dozens of battlefield roles. Due to sophisticated repulsor plates on its underside, the Land Speeder is capable of defying the laws of gravity, skimming along above the ground at breakneck pace. OVer short distances, it can boost its anti-gravitic field to allow brief periods of low-altitude flight.

Land Speeders.

Page 47

Drop Pods hurtle down into a planet's stratosphere at incredible velocitie,s their ceramite-laced hulls glowing red with the terrible forces exerted upo them.
...
Just as the Drop Pods seem about to dash themselves apart on the planet's crust, retro-burners fitted to each pod's underside fire up and the craft slows just enough to see its passengers safely intot he designated drop zone.

Drop pods

Page 47

Dreadnoughts are essentially walking tanks, five metres of piston-driven fury that stride across the battlefield with the surety of gods of war.

Dreadnought height.

Page 47

The fallen hero'es remains are pulled apart and his body rewired until vein and tendon fuse with electrofibre and neural bundle inside an armoured sarcophagus.

Not unlike some starship and Titan operators.
Page 49

Then one unfortuante and tragic day, the Primarch stepped atop the vast banqueting table in the Great Hall and, after a long and uncomfortable silence, announced his intention to leave for the Eye of Terror. He took his retinue with him, leaving only Bjorn behind to wach over his Chapter.

This may be similiar to the other scene when he gets the sudden "vision" and leaves abruptly. One wonders if perhaps it was related to some other Primarch who entered the eye of Terror

PAge 50

Ulrik is older even than Logan Grimnar, who has fought in the name of the Emperor for seven hundred years.

800? 900? he'd be bordering on Blood angel ages.

Page 51

Almost all of them made it, but the last dozen Iron Priests turned and stood with Rockfist..

including the senior Iron Priest, that's at least fourteen.
Page52

He has faked a series of transmissions that led directly to an Ork civil war, infected the mainframe of a traitor cell of Adeptus Mechanicus with their own necrovirus..

Space wolf trickster and.. hacker I guess.

Page 52

Only once has Lukas been bested - after an abortive attempt ot cripple the flagship of Prince Sliscus of the Dark Eldar, Lukas was set adrift in space, his heart cut out as a souvenir. Only an Adeptus Astartes could survive such an odreal..

It also shows these Dark Eldar know little about Space Marine physiology, or if they do then their medical/sceintific types don't share that information.
Page 52

Lukas has a stasis bomb wired in place of his secondary heart so that, when his primary heart finally stops beating, he an dthe one who finally bested him can be frozen in time as a gruesome and eternal monument to his own glory.

Ha ha!
Page 53

.. Njal has manifested a psychic talent to rival any in the Imperium.
..
Njal avenged his mentor Heimdall by blasting apart a dread Bloodthirster of Khorne. He then scattered its minions to the four winds with an ice storm that flayed the skin from their wretched bodies.

So he's the equal of all those other badass high end librarians of other Chapters, and equally overpowered.

Page 64

He was about to pounce upon what he believed to be the alpha male of the pack when a long-limbed human slammed into him, pitching over the edge of the cave roof into the circle of wolves.
..
Jorek eventually returned to the Fang... .. he was dragged by the heel across the wastelands by Canis.
...
..Wolf Lord Harald Deathwolf came to investigate.
...
The resultant duel was far more close-fought than Harald expected it to be, but eventually, ..
Canis grudgingly acceded that he had come up against a greate rpredator than himself..
..
The Wolf Priests theorise that Canis was lost in a snowstorm as an infant, abaondoned after hs nomadic tribe were killed in the wasts and raised as a whelp by a brooding she-wolf in whose lair the young Canis sought shelter.

Yep there are fenrisians who get raised by wolves. as if wolf themed characters weren't woflish enough.

Page 56

Logan fought his way trhough the ranks of the Space Wolves under the watchful eye of Ulrik the Slayer. Despite the fact that Logan has seen seven hundred years of warfare, to this day Ulrik calls Logan 'young Grimnar'....

Again 700 years isn't close to the upper limit of Space wolf age.

page 56

He has willingly, some would say, joyfully, led his forces into battle against Imperial institutions whose agendas and actions he deemed threatening to those within his sprawling domain. This has led to many accusations of rebellion, heresy, and treason being levelled at Logan and his Chapter, along with the usual rumours of genetic deviancy.

Like first armageddon. Small wonder they're considered Aberrants and less impressive than the Ultrasmurfs.

Page 57

Many frost blades use the diamond sharp fangs of the Ice Kraken for their chainsaw blades. Frost Axes are sometimes made from energised diamond, giving them the appearance of blades forged from purest ice. Regardless of what they look like, all frost blades or frost axes are power weapons..

Frost Blades. Chainsaw power weapons.

Page 58

Most effective at short range, the meltagun works by means of sub-molecular thermal agitation, literally cooking, melting and eventually vapourising the target. A meltagun can melt plasteel, and its effect on living tissue is horrible indeed.

meltagun fluff.

Page 58

Melta bombs are subatomic charge-powered demolition munitions, their detonation capable of melting through metre-thick bulwarks in an insant. They are much bulkier than krak grenades, with a more sophisticated detonation mechanism.

Assuming a fist sized hole through rock we're talking 36-45 MJ.

Page 58

Though it makes no nosie when fired, the passage of the beam heats the air to searing temperatures, causing a distinctive hiss that becomes a roaring blast as solids are utterly destroyed and moisture vapourises explosively.

More melta stuff.

Page 59

Plasma cannons fire energy 'bolts' of brightly glowing plasma - matter in a super-heated energised state - each appearing like a minature sun. When a plasma 'bolt' strikes a target, energy is released and the target blows apart in an almighty explosion.

Plasma weapons explode targets.
Page 59

Smaller than the plasma cannon, the plasma gun fires several compact 'pulses' of plasma energy. Though shorter ranged, its pulses are just as potent as those fired by its larger equivalent.

Rapid fire plasma cannon.

Page 59

The destructive fury is equal ot that of the plasma gun, although the range and rate of fire are diminished because they are designed to be wielded with a single hand.

Plasma pistol. Which means the pistol is as owerful as a cannon.
Page 61

These suits of power armour, ancient beyond reckoning, are further enhanced with runes of proteciton that bear the blessing of the Rune Priests.

Adds extra physical and psychic protection.

Page 61

..the Crux Terminatus on every Terminator's shoulder plate serves as a ward capable of turning aside attacks from power weapons, melta fire and evne the baleful energies of the warp.

A shield of some kind. Physical or forcefield or both we odnt know.

Page 62

..some of these Fenrisian Wolves are extnesively modified due to battle damage or even forged entirely from steel by the Iron Priests. These metallic terrors are called Cyberwolves.

Not unlike Ork boars or cyboars

Page 62

Though it is not inherently imbued with the power of the Warp, a wolf tail talimsan is still valuable, for the faith that the Fenrisians have in these items is powerful in itself.

Resists psychic powers. Indicates that it acts as a focus for latent psychic powers in Space Marines or other humans.

[Irbis]

The Space Wolves maintain the vigil that began many thousands of years ago at the close of the Horus Heresy, and watch over a hundred worlds besides. Their domain stretches far and wide across the scattered stars that girdle the Fenrisian system..

Scope of Space wolf.. territory. I'm not sure its so much they 'own' the planets, as they have complex ties or oaths with them, like the world Garm from Grey Hunter. It could also reflect the whole 'direct administration' line from the 5th edition codex (EG Space Marine chapters given control over greater portions of Imperial territory to maintain stability.)
in any event, this suggests that despite being 'aberrants' their territorial claims/responsibilitis greatly exceed those of the Ultrasmurfs either wat it makes them more badass. Also it suggests they may have sizable 'garrisons' or detachments across those worlds to oversee and maintain those bonds (again like Garm, but also like the wolfblade.) in addition to the forces in the Great Companies, the pool of freshly raised recruits on Fenris itself, etc.

Um... Nope? Forgotten 'empire' of Ultramar is still much much larger (500 planets) and consists of much better developed worlds. Also, where it says garrisons? Even if they tried to have just 10 Marines on each of these, that would be the only thing Wolves would ever do.

Like a dagger driven into the belly of the sky, the Fang pierces the atmosphere of Fenris.
The fortress-citadel of the Space Wolves is one of the greatest bastions of the Imperium, still reckoned the greatest outside Terra.

Yeah, it's not like Cadia, Mars, or about two dozen other planets exist...

I really fail to see how C:SM even closes in being over the top to this.

The Fang is clad in armour of immense thickness and strength and is cloaked by void shields more powerful than those found on even the most migthy of the Emperor's warships. Dark shafts cut miles into the mountainside conceal defence lasers that are capable of blasting apart even the most heavily armoured spacecraft. These huge weapons are as ancient as the Chapter itself, the thermal reactors that power them testament to the precious technology from the distant past.

The Fang, and the thermal reactor powered archeotech defence lasers

That frankly doesn't sound much more impressive than Vraks, and it was just second grade garrison. Cadia holds off whole Black Crusades, Fenris nearly fell 3 times to much smaller forces.

Each Great Company has its own headquarters and territory within the Space Wolves' massive Chapter-fortress, and has its own spacecraft, armoury, forges and other facilities.

So its not contradictory. The hundreds of spacecraft above was in addition to this.

Well, seeing Thunderhawks and small frigates/escorts are also called spacecraft, too, out of the 'hundreds' I'd say only 10-20% are 'true' spaceships.

Each of the stone slabs is as wide as a batlte tank, and it takes a dozen of the strongest Space Wolves to lift just one.

They're 13 parts of a circle, with the centre circle for the Great wolf. The length is roughly twice the outer width,and the inner width is maybe 2/3 that. No idea on height. Assuming a 2m height, 4m width, and a 8m length it would weigh ~150 tons. Each space Wolf (the strongest, at least) can be expected to lift up to 10-12 tons or so, tops. Which is not minor, considering we're talking a feat many tens or hundreds of times greater than normal people can do.

Why 2 meter height? Not arguing with the number, but the weight seems far too much for SM. Also, 8 meters is longer than Leman Russ MBT, I'd argue 1x3x6 metres, maybe even less to account for triangular shape would be more realistic.

...Engir and his men cut their way into the beast's circulatory system and plant thermal charges deep within the behemoth's vital orgasns. They escape with seconds to spare before the beast finally comes apart in a great gout of tainted blood. The Perillian Gas Belt is borne from its remains.

Oh yes, the space Wolves use munitions to blow apart a planet-sized space whale. Possibly reduce it to vapour (given the gas belt.) maybe It was all due to nuclear intestinal gas
Assuming it was just blown apart into chunks like a person with a stick of dynamite, we're probably talking hundreds if not thousands of gigatons worth of explosion Any amount of vaporization can increase that yield considerably.

It sounds more like blood sprayed from ruptured organs formed the gas belt while carcass remained whole. They used Marine-portable Melta Bombs, not Death Star.

..a hundred Grey Hunters stood grim-faced as they blew apart those renegades that made it to the other side with interlacing volleys of bolter fire.

Oh yeah and a hundred Grey Knights banished Angron and his hordes. Better than Calgar doing it singlehanded, as the Ultramarines would have probably been portrayed.

"Doing so" meaning what?

Calgar "merely" imprisoned Greater Daemon, in this book you have people destroying them with bare hands, which is if anything much worse as it is pretty much impossible to casually do even for Grey Knights.

Rune Priests. because they're space vikings, its all cold and electricity and its TOTALLY NOT PSYCHIC POWERS!

Yeah, they're totally not doing the same thing as Thousand Sons, nope, not breaking any Edicts here

Predator Destructors, ont he other hand, fire explosive ammunition from autocannons of such high calibre that their barrels could swallow a Space Marine's fist. Destructor-pattern Predators are versatile and deadly, as capable of hunting and destroying whole squadrons of light vehicles as they are chewing through the elite infantry of the Space Wolves' enemies.

Destructor autocannons apparently have absurdly high-calibre weapons (100-150mm, depending on how big you figure a Space Marine's fist to be.) And this is an antipersonnel/light vehicle weapon. lol.

Wait, Autocannon was always supposed to be 3-5 cm gun, less in Man/Marine portable versions, not as big as Leman Russ main gun. Even their weaponry is Sue, it seems.

He has faked a series of transmissions that led directly to an Ork civil war, infected the mainframe of a traitor cell of Adeptus Mechanicus with their own necrovirus..

Space wolf trickster and.. hacker I guess.

Weren't normal Marines, much less SW tribesman origin ones supposed to be on 'illiterate' technology proficiency level?

.. Njal has manifested a psychic talent to rival any in the Imperium.
..
Njal avenged his mentor Heimdall by blasting apart a dread Bloodthirster of Khorne. He then scattered its minions to the four winds with an ice storm that flayed the skin from their wretched bodies.

So he's the equal of all those other badass high end librarians of other Chapters, and equally overpowered.

I think I am starting to see what Codex: GK tried to top (and mostly outside of Draigo failed)...

He has willingly, some would say, joyfully, led his forces into battle against Imperial institutions whose agendas and actions he deemed threatening to those within his sprawling domain. This has led to many accusations of rebellion, heresy, and treason being levelled at Logan and his Chapter, along with the usual rumours of genetic deviancy.

Like first armageddon. Small wonder they're considered Aberrants and less impressive than the Ultrasmurfs.

He is also walking around with major Chaos artefact he is constantly using to kill, like that one GK Company Master. Had it been any other Chapter, he would have been a real traitor, but we can't have that in flagship product, can we?

Many frost blades use the diamond sharp fangs of the Ice Kraken for their chainsaw blades. Frost Axes are sometimes made from energised diamond, giving them the appearance of blades forged from purest ice. Regardless of what they look like, all frost blades or frost axes are power weapons..

Frost Blades. Chainsaw power weapons.

Since when diamonds are sharp, non-brittle, big, or contribute anything to power weapon field that merely wraps around them?

Calgar & co don't walk around with sapphire-encrusted platinum swords and yet, they are supposed to be worse somehow...

Melta bombs are subatomic charge-powered demolition munitions, their detonation capable of melting through metre-thick bulwarks in an insant. They are much bulkier than krak grenades, with a more sophisticated detonation mechanism.

Assuming a fist sized hole through rock we're talking 36-45 MJ.

And that's why they can't vaporize space whale, BTW.

These suits of power armour, ancient beyond reckoning, are further enhanced with runes of proteciton that bear the blessing of the Rune Priests.

Adds extra physical and psychic protection.

BTW, one thing you missed - for most Marines, Mk 8 PA is the most advanced their Chapter will use. SW walk around in Mk 12. Even their armour is 50% more Sue

[Zinegata]

Legion vs Company. Tens of thousands was more likely.. and then there wer ethose like the Word bearers and Ultramarines who had 100,000 and 200,000 respectively.

KNF changes the Smurf numbers a bit. There are twenty-five Ultramarine Chapters, each of which has 10,000 legionnaires. For a total of 250,000 smurfs.

Twenty chapters are deployed at Calth (200,000 troops), of whom about 30,000 survive.

[Connor MacLeod]

Um... Nope? Forgotten 'empire' of Ultramar is still much much larger (500 planets) and consists of much better developed worlds.

Is there a source stating they still have all 500 planets? I've seen conflicting accounts of this, because prior to KNF they had a much smaller territorial size in the 41st Millenium. And in any case 10K years is a long time to assume they held onto every bit of territory they initially may have had.

Also, where it says garrisons? Even if they tried to have just 10 Marines on each of these, that would be the only thing Wolves would ever do.

Depends on just how big the Space Wolves Chapter is, doesn't it? It's not like they are close adherents of the Codex.

I really fail to see how C:SM even closes in being over the top to this.

I already covered my issues with the SM Codex. If you disagree about that well... *shrug* that's your choice.

That frankly doesn't sound much more impressive than Vraks, and it was just second grade garrison. Cadia holds off whole Black Crusades, Fenris nearly fell 3 times to much smaller forces.

The Fang is nowhere near close to the idiotic design Vraks was. Vraks didn't even have anything resembling orbital defenses. Just the stupid defense lazors on the ground.

Well, seeing Thunderhawks and small frigates/escorts are also called spacecraft, too, out of the 'hundreds' I'd say only 10-20% are 'true' spaceships.

frigates and escorts, yes, although I wouldn't call that trivial. Thunderhawks would be a new one, since that would be the same as the Navy calling thunderbolts, Marauders, Starhawks and Furies 'spacecraft'. Technically true but unlikely to fit that.

Hell by that standard every of the 'millions' of freighters in the Imperium could also include the small craft that hauled cargo but were sublight. Or any sublight ship for that matter (EG fabrick of the Imperium.)

Why 2 meter height? Not arguing with the number, but the weight seems far too much for SM. Also, 8 meters is longer than Leman Russ MBT, I'd argue 1x3x6 metres, maybe even less to account for triangular shape would be more realistic.

Rough guesstimate of scaling. I hope you aren't treating these calcs as if they have the same degree of precision that RL calcs would. We're lucky if we get within an order of magnitude of the accurate value with any consistency. That was true in SW, ST, etc and its true here too. Moreso really.

It sounds more like blood sprayed from ruptured organs formed the gas belt while carcass remained whole. They used Marine-portable Melta Bombs, not Death Star.

A solid carcass is not exactly going to qualify as a 'gas belt', is it? And if it was completely hyperbole you'd think they'd give some sort of indication. 40K has usually been good about the mythic and waffling crap. Moreover, what makes you think 'thermal charges' are neccearily melta bombs (as opposed to some other melta munition, assuming we are actually talking about melta munitions.) For that matter why not just invoke 'technobabble explosive thermal charges'.

"Doing so" meaning what?

Calgar "merely" imprisoned Greater Daemon, in this book you have people destroying them with bare hands, which is if anything much worse as it is pretty much impossible to casually do even for Grey Knights.

As I recall Calgar singlehandedly kicked the ass of an Avatar of Khaine. Which is, as I recall, also roughly in power to most Greater Daemons

Wait, Autocannon was always supposed to be 3-5 cm gun, less in Man/Marine portable versions, not as big as Leman Russ main gun. Even their weaponry is Sue, it seems.

Autocannons have never had any concrete calibres any more than heavy stubbers have (which have ranged from 7-8 mm to 25mm+) Autocannons have had an even wider range (IIRC in Emperor's Mercy, they had a 105mm autocannon, and 1st Edition likened an autocannon to a tank gun.) It depends entirely on the *kind* of autocannon you're using. Just as lasguns, melta, plasma, and every other weapon in 40K has umpteen kajillion variations of varying degrees because everyone has a different idea about them over different editions and so on.

Weren't normal Marines, much less SW tribesman origin ones supposed to be on 'illiterate' technology proficiency level?

I have no clue what you're even trying to ask with this.

He is also walking around with major Chaos artefact he is constantly using to kill, like that one GK Company Master. Had it been any other Chapter, he would have been a real traitor, but we can't have that in flagship product, can we?

I assume you're talking about his Axe Morkai, except that it's not really a Chaos weapon as we've come to consider it - at least no evidence I have ever seen indicates it behaves like a chaos weapon (say in the sense the Relictors would embrace or use them, or the Grey Knights are purported to do.) The wolves are rather prickly about warp taint and all that.

Since when diamonds are sharp, non-brittle, big, or contribute anything to power weapon field that merely wraps around them?

Calgar & co don't walk around with sapphire-encrusted platinum swords and yet, they are supposed to be worse somehow...

Dude, I think you're not only reading too much into the wording, you seem to be carrying around some sort of grudge towards the Space Wolves cuz of the SM codex.

And that's why they can't vaporize space whale, BTW.

sure, if you assume there's only one class of melta weapon in the whole Imperium. I guess melta torpedoes and melta missiles and stuff all are mounting meltabombs?

[Connor MacLeod]

Next up for 5th edition.. blood angels. YEt more of the DREADED Mat Ward. I probably won't comment TOO much on that because Ir eally didn't find it as horrible as the SM Codex (it wasn't GREAT exactly either.. I mean vampires and coffins.. it was as bad as the wolf shit in the SW codex..)

Single short update. I really wasn't too interested in Space Marine stuff. I never really am. Its actually interesting that the IG codex is (predicatably) a larger update for me (Because I'll be blunt, I'm biased in favor of the guard.) and the Tyranids and Necrons (both of which I generally liked.) after Blood Angels, and aside from those three, we have Grey Knights (euh) and Sisters of Battle (yes I covered that one too.)

So, on we go. ALL HAIL SANGUIONR!

Page 9
I don't really want to give the OOB for the Blood Angels, but suffiecd to say they have 7 Strike cruisers, 16 Rapid Strike vessels, 2 Battle Barges, 36 Thunderhawk gunships, and 3 Thunderhawk Transporters. The Battle BArges are the "blade of Vengeance" and "Bloodcaller." I don't know how this stacks up with the James Swallow novels (Where 2 other bAttle barges were mentioned.)
Also interesting are 5 Librarian dreadnoughts in addition to some 30 Librarians. I'd guess from their organization they have slightly more than 1000 total, maybe 1200-1300.

Page 10

The infant Sanguinius was a prodigy - he grew quickly and learned everything his parents could teach him. After three weeks Sanguinius was as large as a child of three years. It is said that at this age he slew a giant fire scorpion with no weapon other than his bare hands, and that he never once showed fear at the colossal beast's onset. As Sanguinius grew his wings grew also, changing from tiny vestigial things into mighty pinions that could bear him aloft upon the desert air. By the time he was a year old, he looked and acted like a man in his youthful prime. He could walk
without a rad-suit in the most poisonous of Baal Secundus' deserts, and could shatter massive boulders with a single blow of his outstretched hand.

Primarch capabilities. Lifted directly from 2nd edition Angels of Death more or less, I think.

Page 12

One of the peculiarities of their aberrant gene-seed is that it has vastly increased the lifespan of those who bear it, so it is not uncommon for Blood Angels to live for a thousand years. Indeed, the current Commander of the Chapter, Dante, is known to have lived for 1,100 years, and is almost certainly far older.

Which is interesting in light of the fact that Space marines, as per the HH, were effectively ageless. This tends to suggest that perhaps over time this is no longer the case - either mutations degraded the ability (so they only slowly age over time) or the process by which Space MArines were created or maintained got debased to the point they can't be kept 'immortal', and thus that the Blood angels are seen as odd for having a long lifespan. (although its not unusual. The Chapter Master in Dark Creed being 1200 years old.)


Page 12

Perhaps the strangest of all the Chapter's traditions is the habit of sleeping whenever possible in the sarcophagi used to create them. In recent years the Sanguinary Priests have created filters that purify the blood of their Brother Space Marines. While the Blood Angels sleep in their sarcophagi their blood is cleansed and purified. The Chapter thus hopes to slow the process of degeneration brought on by the Flaw.

Because if there was one thing they needed more of, it was space vampire analogies. oh well, stasis crypt or stargate sarcophagus analogue, you decide.

Page 13

All Space Marine Chapters use gene-seed to trigger and control the processes that transform an ordinary mortal into a Space Marine. The gene-seed is encoded with all the information needed to reshape ordinary cell clusters into the special organs Space Marines possess. The gene-seed contains viral machines which rebuild the body according to the biological template contained within it. However, even from the beginning, there was never a set way to activate the gene-seed.

Indeed, at the time when the Space Marine Legions were created, the process was still highly experimental and many different ways of controlling and managing the transformation were tried.

Explaining the otherwise unusual process by which the Blood Angels are made, as well as how it differs from others. It probably explains all the differences (or mutations) or variations that have cropped up in th Astartes ove rtime, as well as variations in lifespan.

Note again the reference to 'viral machiens' - which while probably not nanotech, is an oorganic analogue serving much the same purpose. I guess you could call the astartes 'biomechanical' in that respect


Page 14

Venerable Furioso Astramael assembles all forty-one of the Chapter's functional Dreadnoughts and coordinates the defence of the Fortress Monastery in what will later come to be known as the Battle of Iron.

They have (or had) at least 41 Dreadnoughts.

Page 15

Captain Metraen is charged with destruction of the Eldar Raiders operating from a fortress hidden in the poisonous atmosphere of the gas giant Mel'yanneth.
...
Realising the hopelessness of their situation, the aliens abandon their fortress, although not before sabotaging its gravity nullifiers.

Metraen is forced to retreat as the fortress' remains are inexorably sucked into Mel'yanneth's hungry maw Only the incredible skill of the Blood Angels gunship pilots...

Gravity nullifiers able to hold some sort of space fortress up against the pull of a gas giant.

PAge 16

For three weeks, neither side can seize the upper hand, with Dante's tactical brilliance stretched to its limits in countering the time-space manipulations of the Silent King. The stalemate is broken only when a Tyranid splinter fleet enters orbit, forcing the two armies to break off hostilities and fight the common foe.
..

..Dante and the Silent King go their separate ways, both forces now too battleworn to guarantee victory over the other, and, at least for the Blood Angels, the idea of turning on those they had so recently fought alongside, a rather distasteful one.

The Infamous 'Necrons and Blood Angels joining forces' incident.

Page 17

The first Tyranid strike neutralises the planetary defence batteries and automated sentry guns. The second annihilates the chain of antiquated, but vital, fusion accumulators that provide Hollonan with
much of its power.

'fusion accumulators' and automated sentry guns.

Page 17

At the Chapel of the Emperor's Repose, Mephiston tears a Carnifex to ichor-stained shreds with his bare hands.

Because he's MEPHISTON, and Space Marines didn't have enough over the top badasses in their retinune.

Page 17

The Eldar of Ulthwe, led by the ancient Farseer Eldrad Ulthran, make planetfall alongside the Space Marines, fighting beside humanity for their own enigmatic reasons.
..
Eldrad Ulthran remains just long enough to see Mephiston recovered from the rubble, grievously wounded but alive...

I guess they get along with Eldar too.. and Mephiston is great enough to imrpess Eldread into actually giving a damn about humans for once.


PAge 18

Though the colossal engines would never again move a vessel through the vagaries of Warp space, some fluke of impact with the planet's surface brought them flickering to erratic and unstable life. Uncontrolled, the cascading energies tore a rent in the physical world, creating a pervasive portal to the dread daemon lands of the Realm of Chaos.

Warp engines on a crashing starship malfunction, tearing a portal open into the Warp.

Page 20

Antax's fall was a disaster. The supply lines for hundreds of Imperial Guard regiments and a dozen Space Marine Chapters were now cut, and those same weapons and tanks were certain to be used against their rightful recipients.

"hundreds of regiments' and "dozen" Chapters, icluding weapons and tanks.

Page 28

Terminator armour (also known as Tactical Dreadnought Armour) is the heaviest form of battlesuit available to a Space Marine. It is the zenith of armoured protection, impenetrable to anything less than a direct hit from a lascannon. Indeed, a Terminator is so well protected that even such a dolorous strike has no certainty of causing him harm. Nor is Terminator armour simply a protective shell. Once in motion, the mass of the suit is dangerous enough by itself, for the servos and relays designed to propel the dead weight of plasteel and ceramite plates brook no interference from walls, trees or living flesh.

Termie armour is so badass it has a chance of resisting lascannon fire.


Page 29

Some extremely rare Furioso Dreadnoughts are even guided by the crippled and ancient body of a Blood Angels Librarian. These are perhaps the most fearsome of their kind, combining as they do a Librarian's psychic might with the unyielding body of the Dreadnought.

Psychic Dreadnoughts. When your regular Dreadnoughts aren't over the top enough.

Page 29

Even a Blood Angel wrapped in the adamantium embrace of a Dreadnought's sarcophagus is not immune to the Black Rage.

The onyl thing worse would be a Dreadnought Librarian in a Black Rage, I think.

Page 31

Scouts often carry a locator beacon. a signalling package containing a teleport homer, broadspectrum communicator and geo-positional tracking. When activated, the locator beacon uploads detailed positional information, allowing precision reinforcement.

Scout telemetry gear.

Page 32

Once released, Drop Pods plummet through a planet's atmosphere at incredible velocity, speeding ever faster as the world's gravity takes hold. So fast does a Drop Pod descend that interceptor batteries and even the most agile of fighter craft have little to no chance of landing a hit, let alone of causing significant damage.

Drop pods.

Page 33

Whilst not as swift as a conventional atmosphere-capable fighter-craft, the Land Speeder is far more nimble. By altering the shape and vector of their Land Speeder's anti-grav field, the crew can throw their vehicle into a variety of death-defying manoeuvres...

Land speeder agility.

Page 34

With its durable chassis, armoured hull and almost endlessly reliable power system...
...
Every Rhino contains various fail-safe and backup systems in case of damage, as well as automatic selfrepair technology. Even unsupervised, these repair systems can, given time, bypass all but the heaviest damage to the Rhino's motive units. When overseen by a skilled crew, a seemingly crippled Rhino can regain mobility in mere minutes - a most useful trait for a battlefield transport.

Rhino durability and self repair function. Probably a key advantage of Astarted grade Rhinos.

Page 34

Naturally, the Rhino is not used exclusively by the Blood Angels, or even by the Space Marines as a whole. At one time it was the principle transport vehicle of the Imperium's armed forces, and though not as widespread as once it was, the Rhino still sees a great deal of use across the galaxy. However, it can be truly said that the specific design of Rhino used by the Blood Angels - known as the Lucifer pattern, for the Techmarine who pioneered its creation - is unique to the Chapter.

It implies that other organizations make use of the Rhino in one form or another, and is not even restrcited or limited because of how 'speshul' it is. I can see high end Rhinos being restricted to limited forces, but the low end ones built from common available materials (like steel or shit) and lacking the sophisticated gear of the Astarted variants would not be nearly as special.

Page 34

The Blood Angels Rhino incorporates many of the design upgrades present in the Baal Predator in order to greatly increase the Rhino's speed and mobility. Although these alterations are relatively recent, the Chapter's Techmarines had long experimented with different methods of overcharging their Rhino's engines, but all such trials proved to be unreliable at best, and disastrous at worst.

Implies Blood Angel Rhinos are both faster and more manuverable than normal Rhinos. Not unprecedented - the White Scars are reputed to have done the same to their armour and transports, so as to allow them to keep up with their scout bikes (which suggests speeds on par with a Salamander Scout.)


Page 35

The Predator, in particular, benefits greatly from the Lucifer pattern modifications, with the reverse-engineered heat sinks and recoil suppressors from the Baal design drastically increasing the Predator's rate of fire whilst on the move.

Predator armament modifications. Cannon incorporating heatsinks. And heretical reverse engineering going on at that!

Page 36

It has been in service with the Chapter since the earliest days of the Great Crusade, when the Blood Angels seized its Standard Template Construct from a ruined archeotech vault. In a move that was riven with controversy even then, the victorious Blood Angels did not hand the template over to the Adeptus Mechanicus, despite the dark threats directed at them, but brought it back to Baal to take its place amongst the Chapter's other relics.

Yes, the AdMech get rather angry a people who dare to ignore or violate their technological monopoly.

Page 36

Furthermore, the Baal Predator was also capable of much greater speed and manoeuvrability than previous iterations - a trait whole-heartedly embraced by the Blood Angels and ultimately reverse-engineered and applied to many of the Chapter's other tanks by its Techmarines.
...
Due to its unique configuration, a Baal Predator is far more heavily armed and armoured than other vehicles of a similar size and speed.

So this either means the Baal Predator is more massive than a typical Predator tank and better protected, it means the tank is faster and more agile (like the Rhino - maybe they share teh designs), or both.

PAge 37

Inside its bonded ceramite and adamantium hull, the Land Raider has a sealed-environment transport capacity sufficient for a full ten-man squad of Space Marines, their field supplies, communications gear, munitions and medical facilities.

Land Raider.

Page 37

..try as they might, the Chapter's Techmarines cannot find a way to boost, overcharge or otherwise improve its engines. Unable to customise the Land Raider so it can keep pace with the Chapter's Lucifer-powered Rhinos..

frankly... i'm both surprised and.. not surprised.

Page 38

It has been reported that its Standard Template Construct file was discovered at the start of the 41st Millennium in a forgotten Martian archive, and that the Adeptus Mechanicus refused to begin mass-production until they assured themselves that the schematics were hale, untainted and utterly in keeping with the strictures and covenants of the Machine God. Nonetheless, some records suggest that the Storm raven was in existence even before then, most notably active in the service of the Grey Knights..
...
The Storm raven is not only smaller than a Thunderhawk but. thanks to its array of vectored thrusters, is also considerably more agile.

The storm Raven gunship. Thunderhawk lite (and opposite the Stormbird, i guess.)

Page 38

Bloodstrike missiles have a two-stage solid fuel booster, designed to deliver a punishing blow to an enemy tank..

Specialized anti-ank missiles. Whehter they carry a warhead or are kinetic kill munitions, I dont know.

Page 39

Every twenty years the Chapter's Techmarines walk amongst their Battle-Brothers, gauging which amongst the assembled ranks have the talent and skill to join their enigmatic brotherhood. There is a never a shortage of suitable candidates, for the manipulation of technology is merely another form of artistry, and the Blood Angels have ever shown aptitude and enthusiasm for all manner of arts. It is for this reason perhaps that the Blood Angels are said to have some of the most skilled Techmarines and artificers ofany Chapter...

Techmarine selection.

Page 46

When in full control of his mind and abilities, a Librarian can cause blood to boil in its veins, shatter adamantium plates with blistering bolts of force or choke a foe's mind with an impenetrable cloud of
fear.

Blood Angel Librarian abilities.


Page 47

His gene-seed, dormant these many long years, had awakened and wrought further changes, granting exceptional strength and vigour. Moving with a speed the Orks could not match, Mephiston unleashed a flurry of attacks, every blow pulverising flesh and shattering bone. Five Orks died in as many seconds, and a dozen more swiftly followed.
...
It was not until the reborn angel punched clean through the biggest Ork's chest and tore out his heart that the survivors fled.

Mephiston, overhyped badass of the Blood Angels. I like hi more in the novels.

Page 49

His deep wisdom and canny insights are legendary, and his counsel has proven invaluable time and again. More tellingly, Corbulo shares Sanguinius' gift of the far-seeing eye, and can discern the patterns and shapes of a future yet to come - a gift that has manifested only sparingly through the many generations of Blood Angels.

Implies that some Blood Angels might share a touch of divination or fortelling.

Page 50

...they fight with the weapons traditional to their position - wrist-mounted Angelus boltguns that leave both hands free for the wielding of crackling power glaives. Each guardian's golden armour is a relic of the Chapter, one of a handful of surviving suits from the times of the Great Crusade, whose secrets of manufacture have long since been lost.

The Sanguinary Guard. They aldo have jump packs.

Page 50

The Angelus boltgun is a variation on the ubiquitous Space Marine weapon, used exclusively by the Blood Angels and their successors. Its magazine is loaded with very rare and potent bloodshard shells, whose razor-filament payloads make a mockery of most armour.

angelus boltgun. Armed with, I think BLOOD variants of metalstorm rounds.

Page 51

The Sanguinor is a golden angel of vengeance who descends from the heavens only in times of the Blood Angels' greatest need. To most he is a myth, an honoured part of the Chapter's traditions and mysteries. After all, so dire are the circumstances in which the Sanguinor appears that few behold his glory and survive to speak of it.
...
A few amongst the Chapter Council argue that he is the coalescion of the Primarch's nobler side, the part that kept Sanguinius' darkness in check, and that was lost to the Blood Angels upon his death. The Sanguinary Guard believe him irrefutably to be none other than Azkaellon, founder of their order, preserved against the withering millennia by the Emperor's grace.

...
The Inquisition in particular worry that the Sanguinor is some form of psychic construct, and that his existence proves the Blood Angels to be just as flawed spiritually as they are physically.

The Sanguinor. What the hell he is, why he is, and so on is not known, and the fluff doesn't specify. He might be the Imperium version of a daemonic incarnation (A human champion or spirit manifesting as a tangible being in realspace), an ancient (or insane) super Space Marine, the Space Marine equivalen of a Phoneix Lord.. or something or other. He might also be Draigo for all we know (See Grey Knights codex insanity.)


Page 53

Even Captain Lysander of the Imperial Fists, who was lost in the eddies and tides of Warpspace for a thousand years, cannot recall a time when Dante did not reign supreme over the Blood Angels.

Lysander is (accidentally) a thousand years old or more.

Page 55

Under Seth's leadership, the Flesh Tearers' Chapter Planet of Cretacia has become little more than an automated armoury and recruitment centre.

"automated armory" even for the Flesh Tearers.

Page 57

Blood Angels infernus pistols are amongst the Chapter's most prized relics, for they date back to the Dark Age of Technology. Each infernus pistol is essentially a pistol-Sized meltagun whose fury can pierce the heaviest armour.

Inferno pistols in other words. Infernus sounds more gothicky I guess.

Page 60

The frag cannon is utilised almost exclusively by the Blood Angels venerated Furioso Dreadnoughts Its payload is a pair of double-shotted cylindrical adamantine shells, each the length of a Battle-Brother's arm. When fired, the hollow shell disintegrates into a hail of razor-sharp shards which gout forth from the cannon's mouth to shred armoured and
unarmoured foes alike

Dreadnought cannister rounds, I guess. Or oversized shotgun flechettes.


PAge 60

This Dreadnought weapon comprises a grapple and several yards of tempered adamantium chain. When fired at a vehicle, the grapple's magnetic and gravitic field generators form an unyielding bond with the target's hull, allowing the Dreadnought to 'drag' its prey closer.

A magnetic and 'gravitic' grappling hook. so you don't have to drive closer to hit it with our power fist.

Page 63

The Librarian drives his enemy's blood into a seething frenzy, causing it to burst from every pore with explosive finality.
...
Summoning the indescribable malice of the Warp, the Librarian unleashes a mighty wave of sheer terror, assailing his foe's soul with nameless torment
...
The Librarian conjures a mighty lance, glistening with gore. On a single word of command, the lance flies from his hands, skewering everything in its path
...
The Librarian reaches into the foe's mind, trammelling his soul and crushing his will to fight.
..
The Librarian 's force weapon takes on a violent crimson hue as he infuses it with a sliver of his inner rage.
...
Reaching into the minds of his fellows, the Librarian unleashes the savagery within the Blood Angels' psyche.
...
Two blood-red wings of psychic energy spring from the Librarian'S back, allowing him to fly over the battlefield.

[/quote][/quote]

Librarian vampire-angel themed powers.

[Ahriman238]

In fairness, vampire-angel is sort of a thing for the whole chapter.

I never got that into the "Angels of Death" chapters to be honest, but I can't recall the Sanguinor from before. Is he new to 5th Edition, or something I'd missed previously?

Well, 'Fulgrim' showed us why Eldrad didn't care for or trust humanity, though I'd have to say that one was arguably his fault, and I'd sort of expect a Farseer to be too perceptive and deep-thinking to damn a species for an individual's actions.

I also remember the first time I saw one of the baby thunderhawks, sort of a struggle not to laugh.

[Connor MacLeod]

Ah now we get to gray Knights. and because Its small I'll do sisters of battle. Its even sort of related. First the bad, and then the good. Although I'm not sure I'd call GK all bad.. thats a matter of taste.

Page 6

the Grey Knights first appeared during the tumult of the Second Founding

Origins of the GK.
Page 6

Each name is actually a fragment of magical lore, divined by the labours of the Chapter's scribes to act in perfect opposition to the true name of a particular Daemon. Thus, even the Grey Knight's name is a weapon against his hated foe

Basically even GK names are designed to be anathema to daemons. somehow at least. It either reinforces their anti-daemon nature, acts on the belief-based mechanisms of the warp, or jsut.. whatever. Its magic. Get used to 'its MAGIC' being used to describe alot of this.

Page 6

Malcador the Sigilite, closest of the Emperor's servants, scoured the battletorn worlds of the Imperium for the men upon whose shoulders the burden of the future would be placed.
..
By the time Malcador returned to his Emperor, Terra itself was under siege, and only through the
most artful of subterfuge were the Sigilite and his recruits able to pass unscathed through the battlelines.

Implies Malcador scoured the entire Imperium in a matter of months or years. He must have gone from plant to planet.. which requires very high speed transport. Malcador recruited and formed the first Grey Knights and the Inquisition (at least, the Malleus).. and with his super psyker powers (or magick) could hide them in the warp as well.

Page 6

Of the twelve, four were lords and administrators possessed of inquisitive nature and unyielding strength of mind. The other eight were Space Marines whose abilities were as peerless as their dedication to the Emperor. Some hailed from Legions that had abandoned the Emperor's light in favour of Horus' dark promises, but these Battle-Brothers had never lost, their loyalty and had fought the Heresy from within.
...
The four lords left to lay the framework of the Inquisition - that mighty and secretive organisation charged with keeping watch over all arms of the Imperium..

Like I said... the funny thing is this sounds alot like the stuff that happened in Flight of the Eisenstein and stuff. Were Garro or some of his crowd the genesis of the Grey Knights then?


Page 6

Through sorcerous means, the Sigilite had long ago shielded the moon from the sight and
deeds of loyalists and traitors alike.

Titan was claoked... and the Sigiliate has Sorcery. Of course, if he's soul bound to the Emperor, this probably isn't surprising - soul bonds are basically a form of sorcery, so we're just really talking semantics and the author wanted to go for that 'ye old fantasy' descriptiveness.

PAge 6

Titan vanished completely from its orbit, hidden from Horus in the most unlikely of refuges - Malcador had anchored it amongst the tides of the Warp. Protected by Macro-Geller fields and sigilic rites of Malcador's own devising, Titan rode out the tumult of the Warp whilst the rest of the galaxy endured through the last months of the Horus Heresy and the tragedy of the Emperor's final battle.

Moon sized gellar fields and anchored to the warp. We've known similar things to be done (like the chaos Forge world in Dark Adeptus.) amazing how many parellels to daemon activity are carried out by the Grey knights or in their name.

Page 7

Time had flowed differently in the Warp, and Titan had endured a measure of years far greater tha'l that of the mortal world.
...
..emerged with a full complement of one thousand fully trained Battle-Brothers.

Apparently Malcador had also tweaked things to allow time to run faster in the warp, rather than faster in realspace. So in months of realspace time, an entire Chapter of Grey Knights was formed. Whether they stayed 1000 or so is up for debate.

Page 7

...an oddity, as at the time, there were barely four hundred Space Marine Chapters commissioned.

400 Chapters at the time of the second founding. consdierng there are some 200,000-250,000 Ultramarines probable at that time, they make up more than half of them. Yay. Also greater than 60% casualties in the Heresy.

Page 7

..the Grey Knights were born of a new gene-seed, one without the flaws of those that had gone before. and which carried the gift of the Emperor's own flesh and soul.

The GK are directly 'seeded' from the Emperor, so to speak. This means the eight who were selected are not 'official' Grey Knights, but perhaps were the trainers and educators of those others

Page 7

...each Grey Knight is an accomplished psyker, trained to channel his mental energies into the halo of protective wards known as the Aegis and an array of formidable battle-sorceries. A Grey Knight's psychic presence is anathema to creatures of the Warp...
...

Thusly armoured, a Grey Knight can wield forbidden sorceries, harness tainted artefacts and scour the pages of blasphemous tomes without risk of being overwhelmed by the cursed power at his command.

This is.. an interesting combination. On one hand the idea that they're psykers and their powers are tied into their wards make sense and their presence is harmful to warp creatures. I could even overlook the 'battle sorceries' bit, since that's largely semantics and the 'Emperor given' powers they wield (like the holocaust) could be described as a sort of sorcery (they are supposed to be fanatically loyal and conditoned to the Emperor after all.) But the idea that they would willingly use the forbidden and cursed stuff? That's.. radicalism. and Space MArines aren't radicals by and large.

Best we can do is say that they use some Emperor-sanctioned variants that are borderline risky to use even 'For the Emperor' and only their extreme faith and resilience is what allows them to do it. or at leats that would be the theory, if not for the Daemon weapons...


Page 7

The mightiest Grey Knights of all can banish Daemons with but a touch, restore courage in armies driven mad with terror, or even render themselves immune to the ravages of death itself

Every Gry knight it seems, is Jesus.

Pag e8

Whilst most Space Marine Chapters recruit from only a handful of worlds, the Grey Knights'
Gatherers can induct from any world in the Imperium.
...
..the Gatherers can even recruit directly from the Black Ships...
...
..or from the selection grounds of other Space Marine Chapters.

GK recruit from anywhere. Also it notes that Every chapter apparently has at least a few worlds to draw on, in addition to any homeworld they may have. And in all cases... as usual.. feral worlds are favoured. LMAO.

Page 9

All told, perhaps one in a million novitiates make it through the full gamut of physical and mental challenges to be deemed worthy of receiving the Emperor's gift and begin the transformation from human to Grey Knight.

This is in addition to one in 1000 being space marines (probably less) so the odds of becoming a Grey knight border on the odds of being an untouchable, potentially. That's how super special they are. Intersting that "one in a million" is similar to the ratio of humans to psykers too....

Page 9

Prognosticars are powerful, highly specialised psykers, who are particularly sensitive to fluctuations in the Warp and who read psychic tremors to predict the location and severity of forthcoming daemonic incursions. Whilst the skills of the Prognosticars might seem oracular in form, in function they are much more akin to highly specialised hunting instincts, tracking the unholy spoor of Daemons through the roiling tides of the lmmaterium.

I wonder if these have any ties to those Prognosti-guys the Silver Skulls supposedly use. anyhow, they are basically diviners and precogs, which the Grey Knights and Malleus use to predict stuff pertaining to daemons. I imagine other organizations might use them too (If they aren't a ihghly kept secret or ultra rare)

PAge 10

..it is said that nowhere in the Imperium, save the Emperor's Palace itself, is as well protected as this unholy chamber. It lies behind three sets of adamantium walls, each a barricade several metres thick, protected by sigilite enchantments scribed in languages long dead, anointed with consecrated oils and inscribed with silver seals of warding.
...
..the first is a cipher-locked blast door, the second a spatial displacement field and the third a magickal vortex.

security stuff protecting the forbidden shit the Grey Knights know and probably practise in this codex. also 'magick' Did i mention I hate it when people spell magic with a k?

Page 11

Within the vault lie scores upon scores of tesseract labyrinths, fistsized cubes of an alieo design that are capable of imprisoning beings of pure energy, amongst whose ranks Daemons can be counted.
...

Within the chambers of a tesseract labyrinth though, the Daemon is forever isolated from the Warp.
..
As things stand, the Grey Knights have yet to fully trust the technological solutions offered by the tesseract labyrinths
...
..the chants, sigils and pentagrams used to 'awaken' the tesseract labyrinth now hold far more significance in the user's mind than the simple pushbutton interface that engages the device's zero-point reactor.

Tesserect Labyrinths. Daemon capturing devices. Basicaly something like the Ghostbusters containment units, I guess.

They mention techmarines can't replicate it and the creator race are hostile to the Grey Knights. Those creators are now, we know, the Necrons. Which suggests that the Necrons have zero-point energy power sources (reactors?) Unsurprisingly the GK are all superstitious and shit about it.



Page 11

...it was the mandalas and pentagramic sigils of the Warp Nexus that maintained Titan and the Chapter Fortress amongst the turbulent tides of the lmmaterium.

An escape clause.. although its amusing they can't do it and Chaos cultists (Dark MEchanicum for example) manage to fairly often. Of course Chaos doesnt give a shit if the warp fucks them up in any way, that's a blessing for them. Also mandalas.

Page 11

To meet these needs, the Grey Knights long ago inherited their own Forge World - the moon Deimos, relocated from its Martian orbit to one around Titan by the most hidden and arcane of the Adeptus Mechanicus' technologies.

The GK are so special they have their own miniforge world (moon) that is also super stealthed. I wonder if they have their own Titan legion too? I mean, why not.

Page 11

Its vessels are the fastest the Adeptus Mechanicus can provide and are commanded only by the most trusted captains and the finest Navigators of the Navis Nobilite. This purely mechanical power is further augmented by sorcerous enchantment. Charms of pathfinding enhance the Navigators' ability to steer a true course through the whirling eddies of the Warp, whilst sigils of quickening accelerate the ships to otherwise unthinkable speeds. Such magics are volatile at best, and take a heavy toll on the machine spirits and engines of the vessels in question.

The GK even use magic to make their ships go faster. Why not just pain them red? Silly as all the 'magick' is, the practical side of it is that it probably is some ork-like 'belief based' sorcery crap - only descended fromt he Emperor, which makes it less reliable.

Or it means that Sorcerors have their own little tricks for warp navigation. Eh.

Page 12

Each of the Chapter's eight Brotherhoods contains roughly one hundred Battle-Brothers under arms

It doesn't include the Officers of the Brotherhood, or the Champion or the Grand Master. That's about 800 GK

Page 12

Purifiers are anathema to Warpspawn -tainted creatures wither at their touch. The Purifiers can be considered a separate and entirely unique Brotherhood, albeit a small one. There are rarely more than forty Purifiers at any one time..

they're even MORE pure and resistant to Chaos. Thats 40 more extra special Grey Knights.

Page 12

..the Paladins are its martial champions. Though they act primarily as bodyguards to the Grey Knights' Grand Masters, Paladin Squads are commonly assigned to fight alongside the Brotherhoods

They're super duper fighters.

Page 13

In the aftermath of battle, the Inquisition began a thorough programme of mindwipe and execution of those Imperial Guardsmen and hive defenders who had taken part in the war in order to contain widespread knowledge of both Daemons and of the Grey Knights.

All told, victory at Armageddon was to cost several billion lives long after the campaign had officially concluded.

The aftermath of armageddon. It might include 3 worlds as well as those directly on ARmageddon. The Inquisition are thorough as well as assholish, given it wasn't only knowledge of daemons they were protecting but of the super special Grey Knights. Small wonder Grimnar was pissed!


Page 14

..the planet designated Iori Delta Tove, a world that had long ago passed into legend for its
improbable ability to move between the stars at will. Whereever the world appears, strange happenings occur: memories change, ancient scrolls rewrite themselves and planets shift in their orbit - almsot as if history is being rewritten.

...
The entire planet is an ancient Necron machine, and its inhabitants swiftly awaken to confront the intruders.

This makes what, the second Necron Planet-sized engine? I'm geussing the 'Crons just basically had a shitload of planet sized tomb worlds for the War in Heaven or something. maybe this was their answer to the Blackstone Fortresses.

Also bear in mind its clearly an example of a Necron construct that can teleport around from system to system on its own power, it seems like the power is tied to time travel like crypteks.

Page 14

A score of Purifiers remain aboard the Craftworld, standing guard over the empty halls until contact can be made with another Eldar Craftworld, and the recovery of the remaining spirit stones can begin.

Man for a group of Xenos hating conservatives, Space Marines this edition have done an awful lot to help (and be helped by) the space elves. You'd almost think this was Warhammer Fantasy.


Page 14

Civil war comes to the hive world of Raxos..
...
However, when the insurrectionists seize control of a Deathstrike missile battery, the resulting
bombardment disrupts Raxos' tectonic stability. Millions die in the span of a few days.

Deathstrike battery goes off, causes massive earthquakes, kills millions. I'd guess the size at least implies a powerful earthquake. Megatons of firepower at least I'd guess (in line with planetstrike's statements about causing quakes.) Probably as high as gigatons with a really severe Earthquake? There's also inefficiencies to consider too.


Page 15

Supreme Grand Master Geronitan is slain at the hands of the Daemon Primarch Mortarion.

M41.901. I guess the other Daemon Primarchs still try to fuck up the galaxy. Although Angron seems to be the most successful, considering this action backfires on Mortarion and he not only gets banished, but he gets used as a daemonic memo board.

Page 15

Nonetheless, Darkhammer, a staunchly puritan Inquisitor with a vicious distrust of all things alien, issues the Exterminatus order that reduces Cavlock to a burnt cinder. Of the billions of warriors and civilians still alive on Cavlock at the time of the bombardment, only a few hundred escape. One is Inquisitor Valeria, who is thrown aboard the last
departing shuttle by a faithful acolyte

Exterminatus bombardment burns all life from the planet. What kind of bombardment is not specified.

Page 16

.. fleet of Red Corsairs- led by the infamous Huron Blackheart- arrives in orbit.
...
...the pirate warlord orders the fusion-bombing of Mortain. Caught unprepared for this savage attack, the Grey Knights are all but exterminated. Only Grand Master Mordrak survives.

Fusion bombing attack (energy or nuclear we dont know) wipes out a bunch of grey knights.

Page 16

Though victory has been won, the plague is ultimately deemed too virulent to risk further contamination - before leaving, the Grey Knights subject Curvven to Exterminatus.

Yet another planet wiped out. Man lots of orbital devastation and bombardment in this codex isnt there?

Page 16

Huron Blackheart attacks the Imperial shipyards at Bakka. At the height of the battle, a Grey Knights strike cruiser warps into the heart of the Red Corsairs fleet and begins firing on
the flagship.

Considering that the yards are *probably* pretty deep into the gravity well, this means the Gk managed to pull off an insanely close, and precise jump (hundreds of thousands or millions of km from the inhabited planet.)

Page 17

He makes contact with the Sky Sentinels fleet, who begin a systematic bombardment of the temple site. Protected by their armour, the Grey Knights weather the storm of barrage bombs that explode amongst the ruins - the Tyranids and Daemons are not so fortunate.

more orbital/aerial bobmardment

Page 17

Less than an hour later, Kai's strike force begins the journey home to Titan to cage the Book of Pandegaras in the Chapter's vaults, whilst the Sky Sentinels begin the Exterminatus that will ravage Sondheim V and destroy all the horrors on its surface. In the wake of the Exterminatus, the Sky Sentinels surrender themselves for mindwipe.

And.. another Exterminatus.

Page 18

Caught full in the torrents of twisting Warpflame, the Guardsmen were incinerated to a man.
Proteded by their superior armour, the Invaders fared better, though many were crushed by falling blocks of masonry or lost to the bottomless fissures that tore open the Librarium's
floors.

Ahriman's trap.

Page 19

the Daemon enveloped Varn in a roiling cloud of Warp energy...
...
channel his psychic powers into rein forcing the Aegis - armour alone would only offer so much protection against the billowing Warpfire that burst from the Lord of Change's gnarled staff.

Again the fire came - Varn's armour began to melt and his flesh char.

GK vs Lord of Change.

Page 24

This often manifests m a display of raw psychic might, such as a cataclysmic Warp rift or bolt of eldritch lightning. Yet it is perhaps the Librarians' subtler powers that have the most effect. With a little effort, a Librarian can summon others to his side, cloak them in protective shadow, or imbue them with great strength.

Librarian powers, which include teleportation.

PAge 24

...the six chants of denial, the seven words of life and death, the eight songs of battle, the nine
terrible spells that form the basis of all magick and much
more besides.

Once more: Gray Knights, and Librarians in particular, are sorcerers. Its not even the sorcery per se that I object to (Emperor-based Sorcery is okay) - its that they use 'forbidden' shit because they're so special. That's Radical thinking.

Page 27

Most Space Marine Chapters... ...can count themselves lucky to own perhaps a few score suits of Terminator armour with which to outfit their 1st Company. The Grey Knights, on the other hand. can muster enough Tactical Dreadnought armour to outfit almost their entire Chapter.

Because they're super special.

Page 28

..the Grey Knights of the Strike Squad can unleash a powerful Warp quake to disrupt the enemy guidance systems and send them spiralling off course.

Psychic powers again.


Page 28

Interceptor Squads carry personal teleporters- backpacksized devices that allow the squad to teleport site-to-site, without the massive arrays of machinery employed by conventional devices. Grey Knights equipped with personal teleporters can react to battlefield circumstances on the fly and cover huge straight-line distances by 'shunting' themselves through Warp space.
...
only Grey Knights could hope to utilise such technology. The wearer must possess great fortitude of mind and body to traverse Warp space without the protection of a Geller field. Worse, he must do so without the added protections of Terminator armour. Such wargear is too bulky for the limitations of the personal teleporter...

Personal teleporters arne't super rare (they show up in FFG stuff too) but they aren't terribly common either. Basically it makes the Grey knights like the Warp Spider aspect Warriors.

Page 29

The weaponry wielded by a Purgation Squad is twice as deadly, a hundred times rarer and ten thousand times more valuable than the more commonplace armaments carried by Space Marine Devastators[/quiote[

And, they carry up to four of them, which is why they are super special Purifiers.

Page 29

So it is that those Battle-Brothers who serve in a Purgation Squad hone their minds to see through
the roiling energies of the otherworldly Warp, to perceive the foe and guide their shots upon him, regardless of what might lie in between. This astral vision allows a Purgation Squad to attempt seemingly impossible shots, bending the path of projectiles and even energy beams around corners, between trees and around fortifications mid-flight.
..
Little is hidden from the gaze of a Grey Knight Purgation Squad. Marshalling ancient sorceries, they can mystically guide their shots to the chosen target.

Grey Knights have also mastered the sacred arts of gun-fu. You would wonder if other psykers could do this on a greater scale (aiding in the aiming and accuracy of ordnance, for example. Capital ships could benefit from this.)

Page 33

Alas, in these dark days, when many secrets of the Rhino's construction have been lost,
and countless thousands of the vehicles have fallen into disrepair, only Space Marine Chapters, such as the Grey Knights, can muster a sufficient number of battle-ready Rhinos to suit their needs.

Chief amongst the Rhino's vaunted features is its array of automatic repair circuits. Originally intended to keep an unmaintained vehicle operational on an under-supplied
colony world,,,
...
Those systems that the Rhino cannot mend for itself are likewise straightforvvard and intuitive to repair, allowing those initiated in the Machine God's mysteries to make major overhauls in a comparatively short span of time.

Wait, what? Rhinos are lost tech? Everyone uses them even if you disallow the Guard having them. The Sisters of battle have them, the Arbites have them, Inquisitors have them. And between the fact these versions have auto-repair, and that you can use virtually any materials to repair them.. there's no excuse.

Page 34

...purity of spirit and battle-skill can only carry a warrior so far in single combat with a Greater Daemon of Chaos. After all, such diabolic monstrosities tower over even Terminators, and even the weakest wield the raw might of more than a dozen Space Marines.

Daemons vs Space marines.

Page 34

A Nemesis Dreadknight is a marvel of technology. At its indomitable heart is an adamantium-alloy skeleton, whose great limbs are given life by a compad but powerful plasma reactor. Over this are layered a series of bonded-ceramite plates and armoured control linkages.
...
When matched with the Nemesis Dreadknight's devastating weapon systems and the all but
impenetrable force field that proteds the othervvise exposed pilot...
...
..not all Grey Knights have the strength of mind and subtlety of readion required to master the exoskeleton's many combat stances.

It's also uknown whether they are Archeotech or Xenotech. But aside from its compact plasma reactor it's basically just a AdMech Knight mount with a sillier name, a more exposed pilot, and no powerfields. The thing is rightly mocked.

Page 35

Using the psybercircuitry within its sarcophagus, the Dreadnought can link its own Aegis field with others nearby, creating a series of wards many times stronger than the sum of their parts.

Dreadnoughts can create super wards. At least there's nothing unreasonably silly about this.

Page 36

Bundles of psi-charged circuitry, psycho-reactive armour plates and charged sigils allow the Land Raider's crew to not only control their tank through psychic prompting, but also effed battlefield repairs simply by focusing their mental might. Aegis components, adapted from those found in Grey Knight armour, are threaded throughout the vehicle and offer a measure of protedion against enemy psyker.

Some of the Chapter's Land Raiders have even had a microfilament mesh of iron and enchanted silver injeded into their ceramite armour. thus rendering the hull poisonous to Daemons.

The Admech hate the last bit, but it makes it super magically daemon proof.

Page 37

Its transport compartment can accommodate no less than six Terminator armoured Grey Knights, or twice as many Battle-Brothers in less bulky power armour..
...
..the Stormraven can also carry a Dreadnought in its rear grapples.
...
..is a sophisticated machine spirit capable of operating the craft's weapon systems with all the accuracy and deftness of the crew. However, the Stormraven outguns even the legendary
Land Raider...

Stormraven. Haas more firepower than a land Raider.

Page 40

When the fortress world of Mortain was destroyed at the hands of the Red Corsairs, Grand Master Vorth Mordrak was the only Grey Knight to survive.
..
..Huron Blackheart, the Chaos Lord whose battlefleet had destroyed Mortain.

Sooo.. I guess the planet was destroyed by Huron's fusion bombing. 'battlefleet' suggests dozens or hundreds of ships (depending on how big one defines a battlefleet). Timeframe isnt known, but to wipe out a large number of grey knights implies a fairly short timefrmae (or else they'd get under cover.. such as if you took days or weeks to bombard the place.) Assuming 200 ships and a 2 day bombardment to deliver 1 billion megatons we're talking 28-30 MT/s. More probably, hundreds or thousands of megatons per second at least.. but definitely at least double or triple digit Mts, which isn't bad firepower wise.

Page 40

Given form and voice by Mordrak's own psychic might, Mortain's fallen had become bound to him at the moment of their deaths - a powerful force, but also unwelcome, for their voices still whispered of betrayal and revenge. Mordrak knew that these emotions were not directed at him, for why then would the fallen protect him?

So the GK have in their number a schizophrenic, possessed Grey Knight medium. Apparently these 'dead' are tied to him and through his powers manifest themselves when needed to protect/defend him from threats (like Daemons) - manifesting as Ghost Termies basically.

Page 40

Huron Blackheart is one of the galaxy's most powerful warlords - hiS fleets and armies are said to rival those of the Traitor Legions themselves.

Scope of Huron's power. Of course this depends on what Legion you're talking about...

Page 42

A Daemon weapon of great power, the Blade of Antwyr swiftly corrupted its discoverer's mind and body.
...
It was given over into the wardenship of the Purifiers, who in turn placed the blade into the hands of their Brotherhood Champion.

Yes. That's a Grey Knight wielding a daemon weapon. Why, I don't know. They apparently think he can wield it without being corrupted.

Page 43

Hours earlier Thawn's shriven body had been cold and lifeless. Yet now he walked amongst his Battle-Brothers once again, as hale and hearty as any of his fellows, his skin unmarred.
...
He has died several times. but on each occasion he has returned to full life and vigour within days, hours or even minutes of his passing.

Yep, an immortal Grey Knight. I guess this makes him like all those others who refuse to die easily (like some living saints that I recall.)

Page 44

Within the Inquisition there are a number of Ordos that specialise in particular kinds of threat There are many dozen branches, some so small that their role and rosters have been forgotten, or else purposefully hidden from the wider
Imperium.

Ordos.

Page 47

The recovery of the Dimensional Forge was to have been the crowning glory of Valeria's life's work. According to the Iron Grimoire, the device was discovered by Janus during one of his earliest battles. Legend recounts that it could project a null zone - an area of space into which Daemons could not enter - many light years in diameter.

Not unlike the Nexus Arrangement in the Word Bearers trilogy.

Page 47

...Darkhammer nevertheless had ample time to issue an Exterminatus order under the pretext of preventing the spread of daemonic corruption. As Valeria watched from orbit, Cavlock, and its secrets, were reduced to cinders.
..
In truth, Valeria cared little for the billions slain at Darkhammer's hand...

A planet destroyed in a matter of hours, or minutes. Even assuming hundreds of ships involved we'd still be talking hundreds of megatons a second per ship.

Page 48

Augmented with extensive physical surgery and mental reconditioning, an Arco-flagellant's body is implanted with chemical stimm-injectors, and a lethal array of adamantium flails, blade and whips. A pacifier helm projects soothing hymns and the images of saints into the Arco-flagellant's brain to keep him sedated and under control until a trigger word is spoken. Once the word is given, the Arcoflagellant's body is pumped full of combat drugs that heighten his senses, stoke his ferocity and numb the pain from his wounds.

Arco-flagellants.

Page 48

Crusaders from the honour guard of the Cardinals Crimson -that most mysterious of all the
Ecclesiarchy's many orders.
..
Most are inducted from the Schola Progenium, selected for their unflagging devotion to
the Emperor.
...
..such a calling guarantees the opportunity to test sword and shield against Mankind's
greatest enemies.

Crusaders. Human holy melee knight type things.

Page 49

A Daemonhost is a Warp spirit bound by rite and ceremony to the body of a mortal man. Some are created merely so an Inquisitor can interrogate daemonic entities about the Warp and its powers, others are indentured minions...

Daemonhosts

Page 50

Jokaero are technosavants without peer and have an instindive understanding of machinery and technological systems. Given sufficient time and fragments of alloy and circuitry, a Jokaero can make almost anything, from a spaceship to a food synthesizer. If a Jokaero can be lured into an Inquisitor's service, it will swiftly make its mark on the retinue's weapons and wargear, performing minor (and often perplexing) upgrades. Not all such modifications will improve the efficacy of the customised equipment - sometimes they just make the item in question 'feel' right to the Jokaero.

Tech monkey engineers have been resurrected again. not bad really, i always liked the Jokaero. Give a clarification of 'techno-savant' (a term used to describe other non AdMech humans I believe) as well as mention of food synthesizers.


Pge 50

The Jokaero's backpack is actually a control and fabricator array for a cloud of energy-refractive orbs that swarm about the Jokaero and move to intercept incoming fire.

Interesting defense system.

Page 50

Mystics are minor psykers, chosen for their unyielding willpower and utter reliability in the face of daemonic temptation. Though a Mystic lacks the mental fortitude to summon the destructive fury wielded by other psykers, he can nonetheless conjure a steady psychic signal.

Though infinitesimally weaker. this signal is not dissimilar in nature to that projeded by the Astronomican, and can be used as a guidance beacon for troops answering an Inquisitor's summons.

Bascially the psyker version of a homing beacon.

Page 51

An Inquisitor can call upon almost any conceivable form of ransport, from courier-craft, to Rhinos, to atmospheric shuttles and the colossus Capitol lmperialis.

That means the Capitol Imperialis is around still.

Page 52

Synskin is a rubbery 'second skin', which the Assassins spray onto their bodies to form a close-fitting suit which enhances the shape and function of the muscles below. Synskin also acts like armour, absorbing the blows and dissipating the energy of a hit.

Spray-on Assassin Synskin.

Page 53

However, when his target is near, the Culexus wills the animus speculum's eye to open. As the ghastly light boils forth. waves of anti-psychic energy flow across the battlefield, tearing the foe to bloody scraps of flesh .

Culexus weapon.

Page 54

The blade is tempered iron, flecked with shards of silver and inset with ancient runes of daemon-slaying. In contrast to these primitive materials, the haft and hilt of the sword contain advanced power field generators.
..
A Nemesis halberd comprises an iron and silver blade set atop a long adamantium haft.
...
The Nemesis doomfist is a Dreadnought-sized power fist, ugmented by Nemesis circuitry.

Nemesis force weapons.

Page 54

By triggering the monofilament circuitry within his Nemesis falchions, a Grey Knight can wield these blades with incredible speed, striking several blows in the time it would normally take for
one to fall.

Why this is we dont know. Antigrav magic (or just magic maybe)


Page 54

The hollowed-out haft of the stave contains several refractor field generators, which the wielder can prime with a charge of psychic energy.

Psychically controlled refractor fields.

Page 55

...multiple barrels of an assault cannon unleash a storm of shells, each one capable of shredding a man.
...
..an assault cannon can be turned against infantry or even vehicles, where the overwhelming salvo of shells is capable of shredding even the heaviest armour.

Assault cannon firepower.

Page 55

Incredibly rare pre-Heresy artefacts, conversion beam projectors fire an energy burst that induces a controlled subatomic reaction in the target, converting its mass into energy.

Conversion beamers.

Page 55

..combines a boltgun with a single-shot crossbow armature.

Though archaic in appearance, the crossbow fires a silver stake engraved with sigils of disruption that destabilise a psyker's connection with the Warp.

Crossbow-boltgun.

Page 56

...the hellrifle closely resembles an antique firearm. In reality, it is a highly sophisticated weapon that employs an array of containment shielding and galvanic impellers to fire razor-sharp shards of daemonic matter.

IT SHOOTS DAEMONS!

Page 56

The hot-shot lasgun is a powered-up version of the Imperial Guard's standard-issue lasgun. It uses an external energy cell to produce an energy blast capable of penetrating most types of armour. These weapons are incredibly expensive to produce, and their energy cores burn out very swiftly.

hotshot lasguns.

Page 57

An incinerator is a heavily modified variant of the heavy flamer, its fire projectors and containment vessels significanty altered in order to accommodate psychically impregnated promethium fuel. When triggered, the weapon gouts forth an incandescent torrent of azure flame that burns far hotter than any 'normal ' combustion ever could.

Incinerator using psychically enhanced flamer fuel that makes it burn hotter (pyrokinetically enhanced efficiency?)

PAge 57

Within the gun is a laser chamber that charges an energy blast capable of shattering any enemy vehicle with a single shot.

Lascannon. implies explosive/mechanical effects.

PAge 57

Mindstrike missiles contain clusters of psi-reactive munitions. They're effective against hordes of light troops, and deadly against psykers

Psyker homing munitions? Or maybe designed to block their powers.

Page 57

Melta weapons are lethal anti-armour guns, used when undertaking assaults against heavily fortified defence lines and bastions. Most effective at very short range, melta weapons are capable of reducing rock, metal and living material to molten slag or ash.

Melta weapons make no noise when fired. but the super-heating of the air produces a distinctive and sinister hiss. Should the weapon's beam strike a living creature, the target's body moisture vaporises in a memorably explosive fashion.

Predictable melta effects/firepower.

Page 57

The needle pistol is a small and elegant weapon of clouded origins. It is a relatively lightweight gun that fires monomolecular darts imbued with the most potent of venoms...
...
So subtle is the payload of a Needle Pistol that ohentimes the victim is dead on the floor before he has noticed his wound.[/qote]

Needle pistol. Note taht it fires mono darts rather than crystallized toxin.

Page 57

This obsidian rod perpetually crackles with anti-magic energy, nullifying the warp-spawned powers of psykers. Even a glancing blow from such a weapon can provoke a cataclysmic neuron failure in a sorcerer or mystic. At the end of each battle, the null rod must be drained of the energy it has absorbed, lest its captured power open a Warp rift.

null rod. Another resurrected bit of early fluff.

Page 58

To ensure accurate orbital barrages, Grey Knights often carry an orbital strike relay to provide the fleet vessels with targeting data.

homing beacons basically or maybe telementry feeds.

Page 58

There are perhaps only a few score psycannons in existence at the close of the 41st Millennium. Many have been lost or destroyed since their creation in the Dark Age of Technology, and the secret of their forging has long since been lost to the Imperium. Those psycannons that have endured the passing aeons now remain in the custody of the Grey Knights. Only they, of all Mankind's defenders, have sufficient strength of mind and will to activate the psychically-charged payload.

Psycannons are SUPER RARE. Except that Ravenor can mount two of them on his chair. OOPS

PAge 58

A psyocculum's visor contains an arcane assembly of mystically-treated lenses, image enhancement circuitry and low-light amplifiers. It allows the bearer to track psykers by their psychic emanations, rather than by vision alone.
...
With proper modification, its datastream can be linked into more conventional targeting
devices..

Psyocculum. basically a psyker-specialized gunsight.

Page 60

Blind grenades are a sophisticated type of smoke grenade that release a cloud of smoke, infra-red baffler and broad spectrum electromagnetic radiation. It is almost impossible to see through blind-smoke with normal eyesight, and even artificial sight aids like infra-red vision, scanners and targeters are of little use.

blind grenades.

Page 60

Empyrean brain mines are based on captured Ghost World technology. When triggered, they latch onto the victim and send a pulse of energy directly into his brain, momentarily stilling his motor functions and leaving him unable to act. The effect is only temporary, as the brain mines are prone to burning out after a few seconds' use, but leave an enemy
incredibly vulnerable in the interim.

Sounds like a short use mindshackle.

Page 60

Melta bombs are subatomic charge-powered demolition munitions, capable of melting through even the most heavily armoured targets, such as bunkers and battle-tanks.

Melta bombs.

Page 61

Psyk-out grenades are produced using an extremely rare substance thought to be a by-product of the esoteric processes that sustain the Astronomican. Upon detonation, each grenade scatters a dense cloud of psi-refractive particles across the target area. Psykers and Warp entities caught in the blast zone are momentarily stunned, leaving them helpless before the onslaught of the Grey Knights.

Psyk-out grenades made from Astronomican byproduct (dead psykers?).

Page 61

Rad grenades detonate in a shower of tiny contaminated fragments. Each particle's radioactive emissions have a millisecond half-life, ensuring that the thrower can charge in without exposing himself to contamination. Nevertheless, those enemies caught in the initial explosion will feel the rad grenade's debilitating influence for some time afterwards.

Rad grenades.

Page 61

It takes incredibly rare and intricate technology to protect something as small as a Land Raider or Dreadnought from the rigours of Warp travel, but it can be done. Such devices are used rarely, for once destroyed they can never be replaced

Warp stabilisation field (gellar field?) allows dreadnoughts and vehiclse to be teleported close via Librarian.

Page 62

..Servo-skulls are nonetheless essential tools for many Inquisitors and Grey Knights. Kept invisible by sensor-stealthing, they can be seeded across an area before battle begins, there to relay a continual stream of sensor information back to their controller.

Stealthed servo skulls provide recon data (EG Drones)

PAge 62

This peculiar array of alien crystals creates a distorting resonance on the frequencies used by plasma weaponry, causing such guns to fire much more wildly, making it almost impossible to keep them on target.

Plasma Syphon. not only is it alien tech, it messes with magic plasma weapons.

Page 62

A storm shield is a solid shield that has an energy field generator built into it. The energy field can deflect almost any attack, even shots from mighty lascannons and close combat strikes from power weapons.

Storm shields deflect lascannon fire.

PAge 62

Psybolts are silver-tipped, psychically charged shells, used in storm bolters and similar weapons. When fired, each bolt becomes imbued with a portion of the Grey Knight's innate psychic power, causing it to glow with an eerie blue light, and strike home with significantly greater force than an ordinary round of its type. Psybolts are difficult to produce and incredibly wearing on a gun's inner mechanisms, but provide the Grey Knights with a relatively straightforward method of
enhancing the power of standard-pattern weaponry..

Psbolts.

PAge 62

With a little effort, flamer weapons can be modified to use the same psychically charged promethium as the Incinerator

Psyflame ammo

Page 63

Less bulky and ponderous than Terminator armour, but offering more protection than the power armour commonly employed by Space Marines, the artificer armour's super-dense construction
materials and damage control devices enable the wearer to shrug off strikes from anti-tank rockets and even direct hits rom battle cannon shells.

Artificer armour can survive battle cannon and anti-tank muntions. An indicator of high end (albeit rare) Imperial materials science.

Page 63

The standard-issue armour in the Imperium, flak armour is primarily designed to be cheap and easy to produce. As such, the level of protection provided to the wearer is far from perfect, but its ablative layers of thermoplast and impact absorbent carbifibres can mean the difference between life and death in a firelight.

Flak is made of carbon fibres and ablative layers.

Page 63

The ceramite plates can deflect most conventional assaults, whilst the Crux Terminatus on every Terminator's shoulder plate serves as a ward capable of turning aside even attacks from power weapons or melta fire. It is even said that Terminator armour can withstand the titanic energies at a plasma generator's core, and that this was in fact the armour's original purpose.

Terminator armor.

[Connor MacLeod]

And SoB 5th. Poor sisters are still being treated poorly, and haven't had it good since 2nd edition.

The perfervid, unquestioning nature of this faith as potent weapon, manifesting as divine inspiration that drives the Adepta Sororitas to unprecedented feats of prowess. Sisters of Battle gripped with holy fervour banish fears irom their minds, shrug off wounds and summon great strength to smite their foes.

Comment on faith and miracles possible by sufficiently devout humanity.

During the 36th Millennium, the power of the Ecclesiarchy was absolute. Its authority was virtually unchallenged, though the Administratum had fought for centuries against this dominance.

Political infighting btween the different arms of the Ecclesiarchy. Considering this leads straight into the Age of Apostasy/Reign of Blood, we can see that tapping into the collective psychic gestalt of humanity can be both bad and good.

Site of the Synod Ministra, its surface is covered in mile-high cathedrals and gothic bell towers linked by avenues lined with statues of the Imperium's thousands of saints.

Size of churches on Ophelia VII

One of the first acts of the new High Lords of Terra was to pass the Decree Passive, which forbade the Adeptus Ministorum from controlling any 'men under arms'. Never again would the Ecclesiarchy threaten the rule of the Administratum. Due to its all-female membership, the Daughters of the Emperor did not technically break this ban and were incorporated into the ranks of the Adeptus Ministorum.

This tends to suggest the Decree Passive was an attempt by the Administratum to break the church's power for good. As it turns out it only forced it to become subtler.

The Adepta Sororitas were split between the Convent Priorison Holy Terra and the Convent Sanctorum on Ophelia VII. Both Convents were massive fortresses housing tens of thousands of Sisters. In t ime, the Orders Militant grew into larger and more powerful organisations and Sebastian Thor's successor, Ecclesiarch Alexis XXII, decreed that the two Convents each be divided into two Orders Militant. The Convent Prioris was split to become the Order of the Ebon Chalice, whose founder was Dominica and the Order of the Argent Shroud, led by Silvana. The Convent Sanctorum was divided into the Order of the Fiery Heart led by Katherine, and the Order of the Valorous Heart, led by Lucia. Though all could trace their origins back to the teachings of the Daughters of the Emperor, small variances' began to manifest as the outlook and persona of the founders asserted itself. The Order of the Fiery Heart, for example, started to reflect the vengeful nature of Katherine, while the Sisters of the Argent Shroud became renowned for their heroic acts of self-sacrifice, echoing the selfless nature of Silvana.

By late M36, the Sisters of Battle had become synonymous with the power of the Ecclesiarchy, enforcing its dogma and prosecuting its wars across the galaxy. The Orders Militant spread, establishing subsidiary convents on key worlds across the Imperium.
...
In mid M38, Ecclesiarch Deacis VI created two more Orders Militant based at the Convents Sanctorum and Prioris. Both were formed from groups of Sisters who venerated the remaining two companions of Dominica - Mina and Arabella - and although these long-dead martyrs never led their Orders in battle, each was founded in one of their names; the Order of the Bloody Rose in honour of Mina, and the Order of the Sacred Rose after Arabella.

During this time numerous other Orders Militant - the Orders Minoris - were founded across the Imperium with their own traditions, doctrines, livery and titles. The Orders Minoris vary in size, and though some only number as few as a hundred or so Battle Sisters, each is an elite military force dedicated to destroying the Ecclesiarchy's enemies.

A long winded way of basically saying 'there's way more than tens of thousands of sisters'. Technically it says tens of thousands per Ophelia VII and Terra, but that was a lower limit, and it expanded since then, especially with the inclusion of the two other Major Orders and the minor ones. Hell, given that there are thousands of sectors, tens of thousands of subsectors, and countless thousands of Ecclesiarch-controlled planets, there have to be way more sisters than a few squads per sector. Given what we see them doing (protecting Ecclesiarchal territories, providing escorts and guards for important priests, and at least in one case - Legion of hte Damned - providing a guard on a fucking tomb - there have to be at least hundreds of thousands of them. More probably many millions.

The surviving Battle Sisters withdraw to orbit with their prizes just as a fleet of Grey Knight vessels arrive and lay waste to the planet with cyclonic torpedoes.

Fleet cyclonic bombardment.

The Seraphim's pistols blast a bloody path through a score of black-clad Eldar before the Sisters are engulfed in a hurricane of psychic lightning. Though many of her companions fall,Amelda refuses to yield and defiantly advances through the eldritch storm, slaying the Eldar Farseer with a single bolt round to the head.

The protective benefits of SoB faith against direct attack.

Lord Gralastyx - the Daemon Prince leading the Chaos forces...
...
However, the alliedforces are saved when SaintCelestineappears, fa lli ng upon the Chaos horde like an avenging angel. The Living Saintcarves a path through the horde towards Lord Gralastyx, before plunging her blade through his heart. With the death of Gralastyx, the Chaoshorde is destroyed, but of Celestinethere is no sign, for she vanished as mysteriously as she appeared.

SoB version of the Sanguinor/Dragio/random warp champion for Order of your choice. I imagine for the IG this would be Saint Ollianus Whether she has an actual body or not is up for debate (discussed later.)

Anyhow living saint is able to fuck over Daemon Prince.

Absolute belief in the Imperial Creed allows the Sisters of Battle to perform the seemingly impossible. Yet miracles are not to be relied upon. At the heart of the Imperial Creed is the belief that the divine Emperor relics on his followers to create their own salvation, but also that if the situation is sufficiently bleak, he will intervene to deliver his true servants.

Basically this is probably the human equivalent of the WAAAAGH effect. It enhances their capabilities, generally. However the typical human mind is much messier than an Ork's so it cannot draw upon such power as consistently. SoB can because their faith (after a fashion) emulates that Orkish 'simplicity' - lack of doubt or resolve or even fear can have benefits where the Warp is concerned.

The Sisters of Battle are taught that faith is a shield stronger than any armour. Such is the power of their belief that the Emperor will protect them from mortal injury that the Adepta Sorori tas can shrug off the most severe of wounds.

Rathre than some sort of physical or psychic barrier it just either enhances physical resilience or makes the pain/shock of wounds ignorable.

Ecclesiarchy priests often accompany the Orders Militant into battle and it has even been known for them to lead Wars of Faith.
..
..their role on the battlefield is the same: to harness the faith of the troops to smite the Emperor's foes.

Confessors are extremely powerful and influential leaders within the Ecclesiarchy, and wherever they tread, a bodyguard is rarely far away. Some prefer fiery speeches and rabble-rousing to incite a population into religious fanaticism, while others are more subtle, manipulating civic leaders to form coal itions against the foe. Confessors are also charged with the training of more junior Ecclesiarchy priests, of which Preachers are the most common rank.

In purely cynical terms, I see this as a means by which the Ecclesiarchy tries to bypass the Decree Passive by 'unofficially' recruiting and influencing military action via religion. Cardinal Gurney and the Damocles Gulf crusade might be one such example. And there is of course the fact that the priests themselves are armed (plus that bodyguard thing, discussed below..)

Ecclesiarchy priests often gather a band of bodyguards to assist them in the execution of their duties (and heretics). Known as Battle Conclaves,these groups are necessarily small; anything larger would breach the prohibition of 'men under arms' as laid down in the Decree Passive. Even so, the Inquisition covertly monitors Battle Conclaves to safeguard the spirit of the Decree Passive, if not its letter.

I'd say that the priests push the letter (and ignore the spirit) whenever and however they can. Frater Militia, bodyguards, the Sisters themselves, they all seem to be (barely tolerated) violations of the 'spirit' of the Decree. One imagines that the Inquisition permits this because it suits their own purposes and it acts as a justifiable threat they can dangle over the priests (as we saw in Legion of the Damned, the Sisters are quite aware of and conspicuous about the Decree Passive.) Again its a good example of how politics is the true power in the Imperium, and how even the absolutes can be flaunted via politics.

In game terms a 'bodyguard' can include up to 10 people, but I'd treat it as a lower limit, which means there can be millions, if not billions of troopers (male and female) designated' bodyguards' at the beck and call of the Ecclesiarchy.

Crusaders are recruited from the honour guard of the Cardinals Crimson, an ancient and mysterious order famed for its unflagging devotion to the Emperor. Crusaders dedicate their lives to martial perfection, making them ideal bodyguards.

Crusaders are relatively new, but they mark a rather blatant (if specialized) violation of that Decree. Of course since (IIRC) the Inquisition also uses Crusaders (the same way HEreticus makes use of the Sisters) we might see this as a 'tolerated' breach.

Arco-flagellation is a punishment carried out on those found guilty of crimes against the Ecclesiarch. Augmented with extensive physical surgery and mental reconditioning, their bodies are implanted with weaponry. Pacifier helms project soothing hymnals until a trigger word is spoken. Once activated, an Area-flagellant turns into a berserk killing machine.

Arco-flagellants. Ecclesiarchy version of servitors, I suppose.

Death Cult Assassins are amongst a Battle Conclave's most outlandish agents. Though many Death Cults are Chaos-spawned, others are fanatically dedicated to the Imperial Creed and offer up those they slay to the Emperor. Death Cult Assassins have perfected the art of blades, which when combined with their deep-rooted devotion to the Emperor, makes them lethal and loyal followers

Death cults. Proof of just how variable (and gross) worship of the Emperor can go, as wel as representing a viable cadre of Assassins for the priests (although the Inquisition uses them as well, so again.. 'tolerated' breach of the spirit of the Decree...)

I imagine the fact they blur the line between Chaos and Imperial worship shows how things like bloodshed and murder as acts of faith can be perverted to the purpose of the Emperor (EG mayhem is okay as long as its for the Emperor rather than Khorne.)

Many of the unfortunates sentenced to pilot a Penitent Engine were once members of the Ecclesiarchy; Prients fallen from grace or Battle Sisters who have, through failure of duty or faith, caused the deaths of their fellows. A multitude of wires and chemical injectors are implanted into the pilots' spines, and when they are not ripping through the ranks of their enemies, lances of pain and images of guilt shoot directly into their brains, reminding them of their sins. Driven by their pilot's frantic need for forgiveness, Penitent Engines charge towards the foe heedless of danger, knowing that only in death, theirs or the enemy's, can forgiveness finally be earned.

Priestly version of Dreadnoughts, although in practice more akin to the insane, chaos variety. Actually a bit of a cross between a dreadnought and a Sentinel, givne the rather (obviously) exposed pilot. You'd think they'd armor that...

It also shows that making some sort of MIU-controlled mecha doom bot is not TOTALLY rare.. just making one of Dreadnought quality, I suppose.

The vast majority of the Orders Militant is made up of Battle Sisters. Every Battle Sister is an orphan raised from birth by the Schola Progenium to believe in the righteousness of their cause. They are the most physically adept and martial members of the Adepta Sororitas, and they form the mainstay of the Ecclesiarchy's fighting forces.

I'm not sure whether 'vast majority' refers to Battle Sisters instead of the specialized types (Celestians, Domnion, Seraphim, etc.) or if it means they have other non-power armoured troops but in a minority.

Celestians are the finest and noblest warriors of their Order...
..
Their presence does much to bolster the fighting spirit of nearby troops, and as such the Orders allow these distinguished veterans to bear devotional markings.
...
These elite warriors are deployed together where their superior experience can turn the tide of battle. Amongst their number are those who once served as Dominions and Retributors, meaning that Celestian Squads are supported with the weapons and wargear necessary to face a wide variety of threats.

Much like Astartes, Sisters of Battle (Celestians particularily, as the quote notes) can be said to serve a vital psychological purpose on the battlefield, acting as symbols of Imperial Faith. The fact that they are (more than probably) more numerous, and more easily created than Astartes can further bolster this effect. Not to mention giving the Ecclesiarchy a potent tool for political (and similar) reasons.

Battle Sisters who utilise specialised weaponry are known as Dominions.
...
Dominion Squads are the Sisters of Battle's shock troops and they are tasked with leading the vanguard of the assault, breaking through enemy frontlines, destroying fortifications and blunting any counter-attacks. The importance of such missions is commensurate with the dangers involved, and so Dominions typically ride to battle inside Rhino or Immolators, protected from the worst of incoming fire. These tanks rumble to a halt mere yards from their target and within seconds a fully armed Dominion Squad is storming their objective, annihilating the enemy with a deadly combination of bolter rounds, melta beams and searing flames.

Dominions do not hold objectives; their task is simply to clear them as quickly as possible and to lay down covering fire whilst other squads move into position.

One of the 'faith' based abilities unique to them is to increase their firepower through.. prayer I guess. Increased ROF osmehow or whatever. Anyhow, Dominions seem to be a combination of 'speical weapons' troopers as well as duplicating the close combat aspect of Assault Marines (minus the jetpacks.) although having the Rhinos helps compensate quite easily.

...there are those Battle Sisters whose faith burns so brightly that it appears as if the Emperor himself guides their actions. These angelic warriors are known as Seraphim, and they are exclusively trained to use jump packs as well as the coordination, dexterity and control needed to fire two pistols at once.

Seprahim can apparently make their shots more lethal somehow through faith. Jetpack infantry for the Sisters, although like the old 'assault' Guardsmen (or Marines) they used twin pistols.

Retributors are armed with the Order's heaviest weaponry.
...
Retributors are commonly armed with heavy bolters to provide long-ranged support...
...
...in the close confines of urban warfare, Retributors prefer to rely upon heavy flamers, unleashing infernos to burn their foes from cover and reduce them to charred corpses. Finally, completing the holy trinity of bolter, flamer, and melta, Retributors are also adept at wielding deadly multi-meltas, which can reduce the mightiest of tanks into molten slag.

Sororitas version of Devastators. More like their Marine counterparts. Note multimeltas reducing 'mightiest tanks' to slag. ASsuming this means melting something on the order of a baneblade, and assuming iron we're talking a good 300-400 GJ fo energy, although over what timespan we don't know.

Although it is usual to attach individual Retributors to Battle Sisters squads, many Sororitas Commanders maintain a core of dedicated heavy weapon squads.

Retributors have some means of miraculously guiding their shots more accureatley onto target or hitting weak points. Apparently also some sisters in a squad can carry heavy weapons or be in speicalized squads of their own (not unlike heavy weapons teams in the Guard.)

...a vehicle that unleashes volleys of explosive, armour-piercing judgement upon the foes of the Imperiuum.

They are, however, unpredictable machines that are only vaguely understood by the Tech Priests who must continuously service them.
...
The Exorcist missiles fired by these revered vehicles are capable of splitting open enemy battle tanks or destroying entire squads of heavy infantry in one punishing salvo, provided, of course the Exorcist's temperamental machine-spirit does not malfunction.

Apparently there are two Exorcist versions. The first is the GW one where the missiles laucnh from what is visually a pipe organ, and the Forgeworld Exorcist, which more closely resembles an Astartes Whirlwind. Presumably the abilities remain roughly the same.

This also reflects the church having (perversely) ties to the AdMech to maintain their gear, even though the AdMech has its own cult that effectively clashes with the dictates (and political desires) of the Ecclesiarchy.

Most vehicles in the Sisters of Battle's armoury serve multiple purposes, for in addition to being weapons of war, they are mobile shrines adorned with devotional icons and carvings.

Unsurprising really.

The Immolatoris a design exclusive to the Adeptus Ministorum, based upon the ubiquitous Rhino chassis. Immolators carry deadly, short-ranged heavy flamers to cleanse the battlefield...
...
..some Immolators are armed with a pair of multi-meltas instead of heavy flamers, whilst others mount heavy bolters loaded with deadly incendiary rounds.
...
...in addition to their prodigious armaments, they can carry squads of Battle Sisters...

It says 'six models, but a squad can be up to ten so...

Immolators seem to be better than the Razorback when it comes to this, although not quite up to Chimera standards of multi-purpose-ness (at least if we take the 'models' bit sriously.) Like the Hellhounds and Razorbacks it comes in variants.

Arch-Confessor Kyrinov has been the scourge of blashemers and heretics across
a hundred worlds.

I wonder if this might qualify as a sector or subsector?

Kyrinov's wild gestures and melodramatic acts of faith hide a very cold and logical approach to defeating his foes. The Arch- Confessoris a prime manipulator of people a dangerous foe who is almostimpossible to out-think or placate.

I'd say this is true of MOST priests. They no longer can directly wield power or control, so they have to rely on more indirect and subtle methods to achieve their ends, including military.

Very littleis known of Celestine's life before she was declared a Living Saint, but following her apotheosis during the Palatine Crusade she became a warrior imbued with divine power who appears in times of great need.
...
It is said that she has fallen in combat several times, having been dealt a mortal blow by one of the Imperium's many enemies. However, each time she has miraculously returned to life for Celestine will die only when the Emperor himself claims her, and not a moment before.

Sounds quite a bit like Saint Sabbat from the Ghosts novels, doesn't it? In practice this is the SoB version of the 'mystic defender' like Draigo or Sanguinor as I noted, although its more probable that she is an actual person, with a body than those others are. Indeed we have very little reason to believe she is the only living saint (Sabbat again, or the one who shows up in Atlas Infernal, with the funky regenerative powers.)

Exactly how/why the Living Saints come to be and what they represent is up for debate, but I'd guess they don't follow any particular pattern,. Some (many) may be the result of extreme faith (a less goofy version of weirdboyz perhaps?), whilst others might be psykers of some kind (perhaps like Ephrael Stern - I've long believed that the difference between a Saint and a Sorceror/psyker is simply point of view.) others may be some form of mutation (Warp based or otherwise) - the 'Living Saint' in Atlas Infernal seems to fit into that possible category. Some may even be some form of possession (one thing I suspect may be what Saint Sabbat is.. imbued with the warp spirit/being of the Saint herself, which makes her akin to a daemon.)

..combines a boltgun with a single-shot crossbow armature. Though archaic-seeming, the crossbow fires a silver stake engravedw ith sigils of disruption that destabilise a psyker's connection with the

Warp. A direct hit from the crossbow will therefore not only deal a severe wound to a psyker, it will also send his power spiralling out of control to consume its user.

I suppose a chainsaw bayonet was out of the question for a bolter. Or maybe a Powerfist bayonet? Given the hints in 'Know no Fear' about the possible value 'primitive' weapons may have against creatures of the warp (blades and such better suited to killing daemons through their symbolic value) its possible the crossbow benefits from similar.

The Repressor is a long-ordained variant of the Rhino STC whose role has been reserved for paramilitary and civi l enforcement forces by Imperial edict. Both the Adeptus Arbites and the Sisters of Battle make use of the Repressor in this capacity,

Unsurprising. The Arbites/Sororitias/Astartes always get the good stuff.

Toting the deadly Exorcist missile launcher, a potent weapon that fires anywhere up to six missiles at a time..

Some exorcists have a non-organ style missile launcher.

[Ahriman238]

Ah Connor, without you I wouldn't know where to begin looking for these absurdities. We really have not one, but two elite groups of Grey Knights now? Grey Knights recruit even from the pools of other chapters? Since when? How does that work if the GK are still a secret even to the majority of chapters?

On the other hand, it's entirely in keeping with Imperial themes for them to have a relatively safe way of containing Daemons that they don't use because it's foul xenos tech and untrustworthy.

[Black Admiral]

Ah Connor, without you I wouldn't know where to begin looking for these absurdities. We really have not one, but two elite groups of Grey Knights now? Grey Knights recruit even from the pools of other chapters? Since when? How does that work if the GK are still a secret even to the majority of chapters?

They're not, not exactly - Chapter Masters know about them, and at least in pre-Ward sources they were various levels of known to the lower-ranking personnel (if not well known in specifics).

Then, pre-Ward, the GKs weren't Chaos worshippers either.

[Irbis]

Ah Connor, without you I wouldn't know where to begin looking for these absurdities. We really have not one, but two elite groups of Grey Knights now?

How pray tell these groups differ from Librarium (Purifiers) and 1st Company (Paladins) found in normal Chapters?

Grey Knights recruit even from the pools of other chapters? Since when?

Since ever? GK recruit from Psykers - they have always been collected by Black Ships from everywhere in the Imperium, sometimes psyker gets inducted into the Chapter (but even then Chapters knowing about GK often give him as a gift if he is not full fledged SM by then) but usually, he is grabbed by usual means and GK, having ties with Inquisition, can pick any they consider suitable.

On the other hand, it's entirely in keeping with Imperial themes for them to have a relatively safe way of containing Daemons that they don't use because it's foul xenos tech and untrustworthy.

Ironically, GK cooperate with Harlequins (their Eldar equivalent) albeit very loosely. This is why they liberated the Craftworld, for example - returning favour. It is implied they they do have some xeno artefacts they use, albeit sparingly due to them being unproven quality.

Then, pre-Ward, the GKs weren't Chaos worshippers either.

As they are not post-Ward, too. YPB?

[Rogue 9]

Post-Ward they make blood sacrifices of the Emperor's followers and wield daemon weapons, that's his point.

[Black Admiral]

Eyup. The whole "Sisters of Battle as hats" incident, especially considering that in addition to being stupid (seriously - blood magic, against a daemon of the Blood God? WTF are they teaching on Titan these days?- and pretty much Khorne worship, it was totally unnecessary even within the narrative set up to justify it, is pretty damning on that score.

Fortunately, The Emperor's Gift pretty effectively rubbishes that one, as Angron and the twelve most powerful Bloodthirsters (well, eleven, if An'ggrath's hanging around) couldn't "Bloodtide" (god I hate that stupid phrase) GKs lacking the dubious "protection" of any innocent-murdering-&-wearing-as-hats.

[Zinegata]

I'm pretty sure GKs can never recruit from other Chapters, because they're supposed to have super-special gene seed that may or may not have come from the Emprah himself (although current fluff indicates the gene seed comes from certain Loyalist Luna Wolves, Death Guard, etc). Kinda hard to pull out the existing gene seed to replace with the special GK one.

I suspect some fluff writer may have gotten confused by the other Astartes organization in the Inquisition - The Deathwatch - which is exclusively composed of recruits from other Chapters.

[Connor MacLeod]

Three more codexes to go. Actually the largest updates. Codex Tyranids, Necrons, and IG. IG ended up the biggest by 2k (bigger than the Necron one) because I'm clearly an IG fanboy and tend to devote more detail to them as a rule, whilst Necrons because they were last and got much more revision. Tyranids got a fair bit of revision too but I've always kinda liked them too. SoB got shafted all around so they didnt have enough to make a chunky analysis, I got tired of Space Marines rapidly period, and I never much cared for DE in the games (I like the Andy Chambers novels though...) So there ya go.

So, Codex, Tyranids, and one step closer to freedom from this

Page 6

The Tyranids are not native to our galaxy. They have travelled through the bleak intergalactic space between galaxies for countless millenia. Whether the Tyranids made this perilous journey because they had already consumed everything of worth in their home galaxy or flight of another, even more fearsome race, is unknown.

Origins of the 'Nids.

Page 6

Soon the prey world is seething with Tyranid bioforms. The ravenous hordes spread across the landscape, slaughtering the planet's inhabitants like cattle. Many of these creatures are expended by the billions so the whole might endure. As a result, the Tyranids require an endless supply of biomatter from which new organsisms can be grown, biomatter that can only be taken from worlds rich in life.

Tyranoforming. I'm really not sure why they can't use cloned or replicated matter.. you'd think its the same thing. Or why they don't 'breed' stock to consume. Then again there's alot about 'nids that isn't very 'organic' despite being made from organic matter. I mena some of their forms can clearly reproduce in some way or another (Gaunts, for example) but not others. Maybe its how they're 'programmed' - everything about the Tyranids poitns to an artificial origin, and they act like a weapon out of control. So they can be clever in some ways (in very narrow ways, in fact) but incredibly stupid in others. If they're 'programmed' to only think in certain ways then certian facts probably would not occur to them (which is probably a good thing, actually.)

And still yet, if they strip off every biological resource (or potential resource) breeding or growing it probably doesn't mattere.

Page 6

Writhing tides of feeder organsims.... .. flood across the defencesless planet, consuming every scrap of flesh and vegetation.
..
..Tyranids return to large digestion pools where they, and the biomatter they have devoured, are dissolved into a rich biological gruel that is funnelled up through vast capillary towers and absorbed by the Tyranid hive ships.
..
..leaving a scoured, lifeless wasteland in their wake.

More Tyranoforming.

Page 6

Tyranid Hive fleets consist of millions of many-tendrilled spacecraft.
...
The Magos Biologis of the Imperium categorises each Tyranid incursion as a separate force, an individual fleet that works to its own agenda and competes with other Hive Fleets for resources. Indeed, the separate Hive Fleets appear to be self-sufficient, exhibiting different, characteristic strategies and developing unique creatures to overcome their pray.
..
..each Hive Fleet is but a splinter of one greater assemblage...

The hive fleets. Each hive fleet in a way seems to represent an 'experiment' or a different approach.. Much as you have individual troops or component forces which might test or probe the enemy even at the cost of their own lives, one could imagine the hive mind sacrificing whole fleets or parts of fleets (at least small ones) to learn more about the Imperium before making the decisive strike. A splinter of a splinter of a splinter so to speak.

The other obvious part is that hive fleets fight each other in a darwinian fashion to improve, and this too seems to serve the Hive Mind's goals despite seeming contradictory. And lastly (albeit not mentioned) it's quite possible those hive fleet incursions represent vanguards designed to acquire and deliver initial resources to fuel the main attack - one question that has always cropped up regarding the Tyranids is what happens to the bulk of the mateiral they strip off worlds - they never use it to overtake the galaxy, so it must be sent elsewhere. And to ther est of the fleet makes frightening sense.


Page 6

It [Hive Mind] is a single coordinating sentience formed from untold billions of individual consciousnesses, each of which is a Tyranid. Whilst some individual Tyranids are capable of rational thought, most have no distinct minds as humans and other creatrues would understand it.
..
Larger and more complicated beasts are able to make limited decisions appropriate to their situation...

I left out the bits about Synapse creatures, since that's been well established and everyone should be familiar with that by now. And we know that 'nids vary in levels of intellect and self awareness, all linked to and feeding into the Hive mind.


Page 7

The coming of a Hive fleet is preceded by a smothering psychic signal...
..
For creatures without a latent psychic ability, this mental miasma manifests as a pervasive dread...
...
For highly psychic races such as the Eldar or luckless psykers... .. the horror is magnified tenfold. Should the psyker attempt to use his otherworldly abilities, the cerebral cacophony worsens even further, pitching all but the strongest into incurable insanity...

The Shadow in the Warp. Both psychic barrier and a psychological terror weapon.


Page 7

Indeed, it may be argued that the most sophisticated of technologies and manufacturing techniques utilised by the races of the galaxy pales in comparison to the organisms created by the Tyranids.

I'd bet the Eldar and Necrons would argue.


Page 7

... the Hive Fleets emit no electromagnetic signatures, making it all but impossible to spot approaching bio-ships with conventional scanners until it is too late.

Hive ship stealth capabilities. In a sense they should at least emit heat, since they are living beings, and that would be an EM signature but...


Page 7

..their armies contain a creature specialised to every conceivable facet of warfare. These creatures can be altered and regrown to suit the Hive Fleet's needs in a short span of tme.
...
..simple organisms, grown in vast numbers to seek and destroy pockets of resistance. Should the opposition prove too much for these creatures, the Hive Mind will deploy larger and altogether more ferocious monsters.
...
..Tyranid Warriors and Hive Tyrants who oversee the assault... ... lending their innate guile and tactical instincts to the naked ferocity of the swarm's minions.

Tyranid adaptive and growth abilities. This is in small part why they are so suited to atttrition fighting.


Page 7

..thousands of worlds have been stripped bare of life.
..
With every passing year, the tendrils of the Hive Fleets push deeper into populated space, whilst yet others approach from the intergalactic void, their vanguard elements just now beginning to penetrate the galaxy.

That'd be at least e21-e22 kg of biomatter, and e29 kg of water. Overall thats alot of resource.


Page 8

.. these explorators discovered whole worlds scoured of life. Verdant planets known to have been teeming with flora and fauna were now reduced to scorched and barren rock. Not one creature, not even the simplest of bacteria, remained.
...
..the Tyranids had consumed only isolated worlds with no intelligent life, replenishing the reserves of biomatter expended during the long, slow crawl through the interstellar void.

Explorators and Tyranid feeding even down to the bacteira level and even the nutrients of soil (or the soil itself. Furthermore they do consume matter as they travel through the void for some reason. How, or why, and how much is not known. maybe their organic matter wears out over time (like the dead flesh of a servitor?)


Page 8

Given Tyran's position on the edge of known space, and its extreme separation from the Imperium's other worlds, it had been founded with armament deemed adequate to deter the attentions of piratical raiders or repel an aggressive alien presence.

Four giant defence lasers stood guard over the Tyran Primus base, themselves protected by hardened ceramite silos and void shield generators. This already formidable firepower was further complemented by three dozen autocannon and lascannon interceptor emplacements, an overlapping network of defence bastions and Proteus-class bunkers.

Defenses of the Tyran AdMech research outposts.


Page 9

..Tyran boasted three full wings of Thunderbolt fighters, three Endeavour-class cruisers and an entire infantry regiment of the Imperial Guard.
...
Such was the standard for a frontier outpost of the Imperium...

There's also Skitarii. I'd guess "outpost" means stuff like Research outposts, but it might also mean frontier colonies. This could easily come out to hundreds of thousands of regiments, hundreds of thousands of cruisers, etc. Endeavour class light cruisers are Voss pattern ships of the Armageddon sector. Apparently the AdMech like them enough (as do other parts of the Imperium) to use them as system defence ships. It's actually pretty impressive truth to tell, that even colonial worlds can have warp capable light cruisers as part of its defensive complement.


Page 9

Tyran's defence lasers opened fire the moment the first alien ships made orbit. For more than an hour, the storm-wracked skies of Tyran were split again and again by incandescent blasts as the base's gunners desperately fended off the descending invaders. Then, just as the cooling systems of the defence lasers bgan to glow white and overheat, the invaders iwthdrew.

Defenders vs 'Nids.


Page 9

Penetratijng the spore cloud that masked the alien fleet, the pursuing vessels discovered that fewer than a dozen of the strange vessels had been destroyed out of a fleet of several thousand.

Size of the Tyranid fleet and the number destroyed in an hour by the defence lasers.


Page 9

The Hides of the smaller beasts were of scant protection against the torrent of lasgun fire, and offered no defence at all from teh booming autocannons of the interceptor grid. Wave after wave of Hormagaunts and Genestealers were torn apart, their corpses choking the rain-lashed killing zones between the bastions.

Lasgun and autocannon fire tearing apart gaunts and Genestealers.. I guess the lasguns are effective against Genestealer bodies, which seems counter-intuitive unless the AdMech had a hand in that (powered up lasguns perhaps, or hotshot packs.)


Page 9

Thousands of gargoyles had mindlessly thrown themselves into its [defence lasers] throat, clogging the massive beam projectors with their incinerated corpses.

Badly burnt rather than cremated possibly.


Page 9

..found many months later by one Inquisitor Kryptman..
...
Kryptman found a blasted and sterile planet, now unrecognisable as the teeming ocean world it had once been. THe planet had been sucked dry, every scrap of vegetation and every drop of water consumed.

IIRC Kryptman cam from Terra to Tyran 60,000 LY in months.

Again Tyran had been striped completely bare.. (sterile) every bit of water and biomass gone - as effective as Exterminatius, as put in Warriors of Ultramar.


Page 10

Several decades after the death of Tyran, Hive Fleet Behemoth reaches the heart of the Ultramar Sector.
...
Though modest in size compared to the invasions that would follow, Hive Fleet Behemoth brought ruin and dismay to hundreds of star systems.
..
Later hive Fleets would be more cautious, picking off minor worlds and conserving valuable biomass for a concerted assault..

Behemoth was judged (relatively speaking) as a faster moving Hive Fleet compared to later waves, although it wasn't as subtle or clever. The Direct approach failed, so they tried something different. We see the Hive Mind adapting its strategies at varied levels.


Page 11

Unable to find other nutrient-rich prey worlds in the immediate vicinity, these tendrils lapse into a state of hibernation.

Hibernation seems to be their 'standby' mode.


Page 12

This was no frontier world, neither was it an isolated and ill-defended mining outpost to be overwhelmed...

Kinda reinforces Tyran's status, as well as the relative unimportance of minor frontier worlds and minin goutposts.


Page 12

If the Tyranids could not be stopped at Macragge, the Imperium would likely not get another chance for several hundred light years.

This reminds me of Rynn's world and the difficulties in amassing fores to stop the Ork WAAGh. I mean its possible that that means 'next sector over' but I'm pretty sure its not their only hope.


Page 12

Dozens of warships hung in orbit, augmenting the already formidable firepower of Macragge's Starnova-class orbital weapons statsions. In the weeks leading up to the Tyranid's arrival in the system., Calgar had requisitioned every space-worthy vessel capable of fighting.
In addition ot the Battle Barges of the Ultramarines and heavy cruisers of the Ultramar Defence Fleet, there were lightly armed merchantmen and privateers of all sizes.

The Defences of MAcrragge. Note the Starnovas.


Page 12-13

..Genestealers burst from the sewers beneath Sirocco Starport, slaughtering defenders and pilots alike..
...
In one fell swoop, much of Calgar's shuttle fleet had been downed. He still had access to sufficient Thunderhawk Gunships to supply and manoeuvre his Ultramarines, but not the Auxilia Forces that made up the bulk of his forces. with all other options denied him, Calgar made a fateful stand at Cold Steel Ridge.

Genestealer infiltration and ambush. Without the shuttles the Auxilia has no mobility too.


Page 13

..the Hive Mind had learnt much from teh tactics employed by the Master of Macragge. Having identified Calgar as the main threat to the Tyranid advance, the Hive Mind now despathced... ... the Hive Tyrant later classified in many Imperial records as the 'Swarmlord.'
...
It was the Swarmlord who had led the final assaults on Tyran and Thandros, honing strategies of encirclement and misdirection against human opponents.

hive mind adaptability, in the guise of the Swarmlord.


Page 13

..left the Swarmlord's true target- the mighty Baneblade Pride of HEra - open to attack.
..
..the Swarmlord unleashed a wave of Carnifexes to tear the super-heavy tank apart.
..
Gargoyles and Harpies descended upon the surviving auxilia units, always preying upon officers and sergeants, shattering the chain of command..
..
Biovore bombardments forced the defenders to spread out to minimise casualties, but this in turn left stragglers vulnerable to roving Mawloc and Trygon attacks.
..
Under the Swarmlord's dominion the swarm adapted to defeat Calgar's tactics...

Swarmlord vs Calgar.


Page 13

Not all of the Hormagaunts on the left flank had been slain as previously thought - many hundreds were lying dormant amongst the corpses of their kin, ravenous instincts suppressed by the Swarmlord's dominating will. As the Swarmlord charged forward, he released the Hormagaunts from their slumber.

more delay and distraction.


Page 14

..claimed the mighty Battle BArge Caesar, a shoal of Ramsmiter Kraken weathering the noble vessel's incredible firepower before driving their bonerams forward to buckle and penetrate its hull. The third wave saw the destruction of the better part of the merchant fleet as a swarm of Void Fiends slipped through...
..
By the time the ninth wave was launched, Macragge's Starnova stations were bloody tombs, mere hunks of debris left spinning in space. When the dozenth Tyranid assautl wave had spent its ire, the orbital defences of Macragge were all but obliterated. A handful of crippled Imperial vessels endured amongst the wreckage...

The Void war. It seems like the Tyranids are relying a great deal on kinetic attacks and ramships.


Page 14

Both sides planned an ambush at Circe. Calgar had finally received word from the Tempestus Fleet and wasted no time in coordinating a combined assault on the Hive Fleet. The Tyranids, on the other hand, had a second fleet of bio-ships concealed amongst Circe's rings.
...
Scarcely had the first salvoes been exchanged when the Tempestus Fleet entered real space - now it was the Tyranids caught in the jaws of a trap.

We know of course that the Dominius AStra used its warp dive to destroy the hive fleet.


Page 14

Kraken bio-ships act as scout vessels, and range far from the Hive Fleet in search of prey. Being entirely spaceborne, Kraken ships represent no direct threat to a planet, but wreak havoc on space stations, shuttles, and military vessels.
Ramsmiter Kraken are the most common. Each has a hook-like proboscis capable of piercing even a capital ship's armoured hull. As the Ramsmiter sucks digestive material out of the vessel and into its digestive tract, it simultaneously vomits broods of Genestealers and Hormagaunts into the the very heart of its stricken prey...
...
..a Doomripper Kraken has a maw alive wit dozens of writhing, muscular tentacles. Each tentacle is incredibly strong, and the Doomripper uses them to bind itself to a preyvessel before gnawing through the hull and feasting on its innards.
...
Rarest of all Kraken is the Hellblaster. This beast's sole objective is to contact with the hull or shields of an enemy ship and discharge a massive burst of electrostatic energy. Powerful bolts arc through the hull of the prey, overloading its power systems...

Tyranid escorts. All seem to be close range 'melee' types. One also has tow onder how the escorts get between system to system. warp drive?



Page 15

..the armies and fleets of Ultramar reduced almost to nothing.

It would take the better part of a century to rebuild both, I gather.


PAge 16

..Hive fleet Naga (known to the Eldar as the Shai'naid - the Endlessly Winding Serpent) was thought by the Imperium to merely be a splintered tnedril of Hive Fleet Behemoth....
...
..the area of Hive Fleet Naga's predations had but lightly encroached upon Imperium-hled worlds.
..
Though the Tyranid swarm touched little on Mankind's worlds, countless alien domains suffered from its embrace. The Eldar lost two maiden worlds, and seven Exodite worlds to the Hive Fleet's rampage, and nearly three dozen minor civilizations were extinguished by the Tyranids - had Naga entered the galaxy further south along the galactic plane, it would likely have erased the emergent Tau from existence.

This suggests it was smaller than Behemoth, and likely explains the 200 year gap between Behemoth and Kraken ( the 'Nids were busy eating others.)


Page 16

The hard-pressed armies of Crimsonfall receive reinforcements from the nearby hive world of Tern, including a company of neglected but servicable Cadian Baneblades, abandoned some five thousand years earlier.
..
.. a Tyranofex brood reduces the entire Baneblade Company to scrap.
...
The governor of Silax refuses to send aid to his embattled neighbours.
..
Tern sends further reinforcements to Crimsonfall, but the troopships are ambushed by Dark Eldar Raiders.

The 'Nids eat the Dark Eldar AND the human troops. The question is did Tern send PDF troops or IG garrison forces? The latter is implied (or ta least that its enitre PDF and milita force was conscripted and transported.) This would be many tens or hundreds of millions, evne billions of soldiers transported via transport.. not a trivial undertaking.,


Page 17

Having sent many of its warriros to the aid of Crimsonfall , Terns defenders are swiftly overwhelmed. within a week, the planet has been devoured by Hive Fleet Naga.

Again the Hive Wrold seems to have stripped its immediate (short term) defensive resources bare, leaving it victim ulimately to the Hive Fleet. This also implies that the planet had considerable warp capable transport capacity.


Page 17

..Yriel orders the Iyanden fleet to scour all life from Halathel. The surviving vessels of the Craftworld Malan'tai fleet arrive at Halathel and join forces with Yriel's forces.

Eldar can depopulate a planet via bombardment.


Page 18

Gorgon was a relatively small Hive Fleet, but exceptional in its ability to adapt to new circumstances on a biological level. In its two year-rampage through the Tau Empire, Gorgon manifested more bioform varieties than any other Hive Fleet before or since. With every battle, fresh iterations of Tyranids emerged, each new variant perfectly adapted to overcome a particular foe or circumstance.
...
..a more likely explanaiton lies elswhere. In their way, the Tau are no less dynamic than the Tyranids, for they are ever able and willing to adapt.
..
The fact of the matter remains that the Tau proved an altogether differen foe for the Tyranids to overcome, one less hidebound to martial tradition and doctrine than the Imperium of Man or the enigmatic Eldar. As such, Hive Fleet Gorgon may simply have had to adapt even more rapidly to defeat this new foe.

They largely indicate that the Tau's "dynamic" tactics (which were basically still their same Kauyon/Mon'ka stuff.) proved pretty fruitless aginst the "dynamic" of Gorgon. I think its funny that a tiny, rapid adaptiving hive fleet ended up getting chucked at the Tau. What's more, as I recall matters from the DE Codex they just barely managed to fend it off, and seemingly exhausted themselves in doing so. Contrast this with the Imperium fending off Behmeoth, Kraken, and all those other 'minor' hive fleets with one Segmentum's worth of resources.

Also we get more about 'dynamic' this and 'dynamic' that and how tau are inherently better/superior than imperium OR Eldar. And how the Tyranids are JUST as Dynamic. blah blah blah... nothing to see here ,move along.


Page 18

The Tyranids adapted to more than just his doctrines and deployments, they moved to counter the Tau weaponry itself. In response ot the powerful pulse rifles of the Tau Firewarriors, carapace was restructured, bone recombined and tissue reknitted, dramatically increasing the Tyranids' resistance to tau ordnance. In reply, the Tau reconfigured their weaponry load-outs, retro-fitting pulse rifles to use new prototypes or older ammunition, ballistics which the Tyranids had not before encoutered and hence had not yet adapted to. However, each time a weakness was found, the Tyranid biomatrix shifted once more.

The 'adaptation' is basically just armoring them better (trading mobility for durability) and for some reason the vaunted Tau firepower couldn't cope with it. Nor, apparently, could they out manouvre them.
It is interesting that they devised 'new' pulse ammo rounds, as well as using older ammo 'ballistics' like bullets I guess?


Page 19

.. through forestcraft and ferocity, the Kroot mercneiares held the Hormagaunt swarms at bay.
..
The Hormagaunts that led the second invasion were noticeably lither than their predecesors, able to dart through the gnarled and twisted undergrowoth without becoming entangled.
..
Though no differences could be visually discerened, there were subtle alterations to the musculature and poise of the latest generations. These changes had but one goal - to increase the efficacy with which the Hormagaunts could pierce and tear Kroothide.
...
However, the changes to the Hormagaunt bioform had weakened the beasts' own reisstance to injury.
...
..the Tau defences, prepared with time bought by Kroot blood, had little difficulty blowing them apart.
..
Once more did the Tyranids' hides thicken to face this new challenge, reaugmenting the swarm's resilience to better weather the firepower of the defenders' pulse rifles.

The second wave was stopped, but with considerable Kroot casualties. The third wave massacred them, albeit with the aforementioend tradeoff. Note again how the super adaptive hivefleet changes itself specifically to meet the threat of the Kroot and dealing with them, making them more like the Kroot to fight the Kroot. This unfortunately had the tradeoff of reducing durability, which again made them vulnerable to tau weaponry. Once that happened, the heavier armour reappeared.



Page 19

..Hive Fleet Gorgon's super-adaptable capacity also proved to be its chief weakness. Though the Tyranids' advance had been swift and savage enough to keep the Hive Fleet supplied with sufficient biomass to replace its losses, the rapid cycle of adaptation and replenishment had forced the Tyranids to rely on smaller, less complex organisms that could be bred swiftly. What larger creatures Gorgon had at its disposal were few, and far harder to replace. Once the Tau learned of this and set the elimination of such creatures as a priority, the course of the war shifted in their favour.

Drawback to 'adaptation' Speed was required and that meant smaller forms.. bigger forms were slower to build, harder to replace.


Page 19

When the Tyranids fell upon the system, Castellan Crask, commander of the Cadian XVIIIth, temporarily put aside his orders to exterminate the Tau and joined with them to shatter Hive Fleet Gorgon.
..
Although Hive Fleet Gorgon wrought havoc across a sizeable swathe of the Tau Empire, the Imperium of Man considered it to have beena minor threat. The Tyranid forces encountered by the Cadian XVIIIth army on the surface of Kel'shan were but a tiny fragment of the Hive Fleet's former strength...
..
This viewpoint, and the willfully misinterpreted conclusions that fed it...

Basically the Tau had wiped out the majority of the fleet on its own, exhausting itself to do so, which left the Imperium with the impression that Tau (and the Tyranids) were a minor threat. Of course, to the Imperium, Gorgon would have been a minor threat. Basically setting things up for the Imperium ot get its ass kicked by the tau again I imagine (vastly underestimating the Tau.)

amusingly these Cadian forces had been meant to be deployed in the Damocles Gulf Crusade.


Page 19

..three Hive ships broke off from the main fleet...
...
Thes Hive Ships carried with them the full span of Gorgon's experiences in battle wiht the Tau, teh taste of their weaponry and the potential of their flesh. The Tau erroneously believed that this knowledge could only be transferred if the Hive Ships survived to make contact with the other Tyranids that even now advanced upon the Tau empire.

Poor tau. They don't seem to realize that the warp can be used for psychic FTL communication. I suspect this also means they dont know about or dont believe in Imperial astrotelepathy.


Page 19

Tyranid Hive Fleets do not travel through Warpspace.

They did up until 5th edition. Then again nothing rules out them doing so still, its just that the fleets as a whole might not do so. Scouts could (and probably do, how else are they going to get around? A Narvahl is not exactly *stealthy* travel.


Page 19

Whilst it is true tha tthe Tyranids are constrained by sublight speeds whilst within the borders of a planetary system, they are capable of far greater velocity when traversing interstellar space.
..
...Narvhal is almost completely defenceless, with little in the way of bio-weaponry and a comparatively thin protective carapace. A cluster of monofilament spines on the Narvahl's bow enable it to interpret a wide range of sensory input, including an unbelievably broad spectrumof gravimetric signals. Using these senses, the Narvhal can detect planetary systems at incredible distances. It can then harness that system's own gravity, creating a compressed space-time transit corridor through which the Narvhal, and nearby vessels, can cover vast distances. This method cannot be employed near to strong gravitational forces, as they drown out the more subtle traces that the Narvhal uses to navigate. As a result, a Tyranid fleet must rely on more conventional propulsion in the final approach, in some cases slowing their arrival by years, or even decades. Whilst this combined propulsion method is slower than Warp travle, it is infintiely more reliable...

Not ionly do the Tyranids have some bizarre 'gravity-manipulating' fold space ability, they apparently have some sort of FTL "lock on" ability tied to gravity also in order to locate systems. It also apparently can complicate close emergences, but the 'combined' approach is slower, yet more reliable than warp drive. It gives the Tyranids some more flexibility.


Page 19

The Narvhal's manipulation of a star system's underlying forces is not always without side effects. A prey planet will sometimes be subjected to earthquakes, solar flares, tidal waves and other natural disasters in the time between the Narvhal casting its gravitic snare and the Hive Fleet actually arriving. This only benefits the Tyranids' efforts, guarnateeing as it does that the defenders of the target world will still be wrestling with planetary disaster when the swarm arrives in orbit.

a rather useful, if unsubtle, side effec to Narvahl travel.


Page 20

All contact is lost with the Outbound Brotherhood when a Tau explroer fleet strays into the path of the Tyranids. not one message of warning escapes.

I wonder how they kept contact.


Page 20

A new strain of Gargoyles attacks Sha'draig's lunar complex. The interceptor screen opens fire once again, but the fury of the strike is lessneed by a refractive mucous that coats the Gargoyles' chitin. Their chief weapon denied to them, the lunar shipyards are overwhelmed.

'refractive mucous' - I'm guessing its a variation of tyrgel. Or maybe they just have really energy weapon resistant snot.


Page 20

Following heavy losses by Tau Firewarrios, the Hormagaunts and Termagnats of Hive Fleet Gorgon quickly develop an almost total immunity to pulse-rifle fire.
...
Stealth Teams recover several hundred Kroot rifles from the ruins of Pechallai's defences. The retrieved weaponry is distributed amongst Vorach's surviving Fire Warriors.

'near total immunity' to pulse fire. Apparently grabbing Kroot rifles (with solid bullets) helps.


Page 20

Fresh Broods of Hormagaunts and Gargoyles are spawned with chameleonic hides that blend in with their surroundings. They are now all but undetectable ot the naked eye - only Battlesuit sensors can be sure of detecting them.

Stealth capabilities. apparently it also blocks IR and low light emisisons since only sensors can find them.


Page 21

Vorach's cadre abandon the near-lifeless planet shortly thereafter, taking solace in the fact they have denied the Tyranids some of Sha'draig's biomass.

A Partial victory at best.


Page 21

Dozens of Hive Ships separate from the main body of Hive Fleet Gorgon and descend upon the Tau colony of Ka'Maise. Bitter fighting erupts as a fleet of Necron starships unexpectedly emerges from Ka'mais' dead moon. The outnumbered Tyranid ships are destroyed.
..
Aun'taniel is slain by the Necron invaders. The harvest of Ka'mais begins.

Poor Tau. Saved by the Necrons only to be harvested by them. this just isn't their day. First Nids, then Necrons, and then Cadians. all they need are the Orks to round it out.


Page 21

The Kel'shan Ethereal council orders the evacuation of the colony worlds that lie between Ka'mais and Kel'shan.
...
The great evacuation fleet of Ho'sarn is ambusehd by Tyranid Prowler drone ships. More than three hundred Tau vessels are lost in less than three hours. A handful of ships escape to the abandoned mining facilities..

300 ship evacuatlion fleet evacuating multiple colony worlds - millions of colonists perhaps. AS well as a lower limit on tau fleet resources in this area.


Page 21

Kor'O'Vanan's fleet engages Hive Fleet Gorgon as it leaves the Ka'mais system. The battle initially goes well for the Tau, but they are forced to withdraw after encountering a cluster of Ramsmiter and RAzorfiend bio-ships with nigh-immunity ot the Tau's ion weaponry.
...
..they succeed in killing many of the Gorgon Narvhals. hoping to buy additional time for Kel'shan to fortify against the Tyranids.

Interestingly, by the timestamps it would seem the Tyranids consume at least one other planet before reaching Kel'shan, jumping between two systems in less than that time, despite the "years or decades" bit. Guess it isn't always going to happen like that.


Page 21

Heavy retrofitting work is begun [on starships] in an attempt to overcome Tyranid immunities.

Tau being 'dynamic' again.


page 21

..the remaining bio-ships conitnue to flee, drawing the Tau even further from sept worlds tha are left unguarded in their absence [by the fleets]

Remember that divide and conquer strategy the 'Nids like?


Page 21

With the destruction of their main fleet, the Tyranids have no reproductive capacity on Kel'shan aside from a single Dominatrix and a handful of wounded Tervigons. That, combined with the disparate nature of weaponry and tactics employed by the Tau and Imperial Guard, prevents the rapid adaptation that plagued the Tau in earlier battles.

It's interesting how this 'weapons immunity' occured with the tau but not so much with Imperial weaponry. It could be attributed to Imperial weaponry usually being a bit more varied than Tau arms (who use mainly energy weaponry.) It also doesn't hurt that the Imperium knows 'shoot where the carapace isn't.' but the Tau probably would not think to do this (or be able to) because they favor long range combat and staying at long range. That makes accurate (sinper) shooting difficult.

The funny thing is - why werne't they employing more rail rifles? Tyranids over-carapacing would be the sort of enemy that weapon is ideal for.

Of course who knows? the whole 'carapace resistant to anything but anti-armour weapons' could have stemmed from this very fact, and only the Imperium's emphasis on equipping infantry with substantial heavy and special weapons compensated (That and their willingness to get in closer and risk losses.)


Page 21

The Dominatrix is a colossal creature of the Tyranid swarm.
...
..its sheer mass and panoply of bio-weaponry dwarf that of an Imperial super-heavy tank.
...
- its level of intelligence is akin to that of the Hive Tyrant, and its link to the Hive Mind surpasses even those mighty creatures.
...
.such beasts are extremely rare in all but the most advanced Tyranid swarm..

I suspect there is some sort of size/power relationship for synaptic beasts, as the larger ones tend to do a better job, have better skill and effiiency, etc. I wonder if this is because a larger creature is better able to handle a greater portion of the Hive Mind directed through it.


Page 22

..several Hive Fleets passed into the galaxy in that time, they primarily vented their fury on alien worlds..
...
Kraken was actually a series of smaller fleets that moved to attack many worlds simultaneously. Not only did this compound the Imperium's difficulty in opposing and destroying the Hive Fleet, but it increased the Shadow in the Wapr tenfold. amost overnight, an etnire sector was silenced...
..
Whole population centres had been wiped out in scant hours...

Hive fleet Kraken. wiping out worlds in hours, blocking off an entire sector within a day.


Page 22

Another dedicated merchant captain helped evacuate millions from the mining worlds of Devlan before it was consumed. The extensive system of Novastorm space stations around Devlan held the Hive Fleet long enoughf or a fleet of giant freighters to escape.

Mercahnt ships evacuating millions.


Page 22

No communication was forthcoming from the vessel and it made an automated landing far from habitation.
..
Men, women, and children had been mercilessly butchered in their hundreds, perhaps thousands.

Automated landing ship. Carried thousands.


Page 22

Seen on a galactic scale, Hive Fleet Kraken was attacking across a front that covered many thousands of light years. Worlds were often bypassed, isolated, or attacked unexpectedly, making a cohesive defence almost impossible to mount. The Imperium was forced to concentrate its forces on the most strategically important forge worlds and hive worlds, whilst it evacuated or simply abandoned others to their fate.

Scope and tactics of Kraken. Note that rather grimdarking the whol ething, they made efforst to evacuate populations rather than abandon (probably for biomass denial, but those people could be useful to the war effort too.) Hive and forge worlds were fortified.


Page 23

... not merely the Termagants and Gargoyles that had compsoed the vanguard of a thousand assaults, but monstrous Carnifexes and Tyranofexes as well. Worse still, gigantic Hierodule and Hierophant bio-titans now stalked across the surface of the beleagured planet.

tyranid assault forces. note the so called 'bio-titans.'


Page 23

Running battles with the splinter fleets continued for many years after Kraken's passage, draining the defences against later incrusions.
..
Splinter fleets comprise as few as a dozen Hive Ships, but even a dozen ships are more than capable of overrunning a world and harvesting its biomass to become a yet greater threat. Some have become so large as to be classified as a new, distinct Hive Fleet. Indeed, Hive Fleet Magalodon is grown from one of Kraken's sundered tendrils..
..
Doubtless the Tyranids have learnt much about the inner galaxy's defences from these splinter fleets. Every battle the Tyranids engage in, won or lost, adds to the Hive Mind's ever growing understanding of its prey.

The lingering problems of splinter fleets.. resource depletion (for the defenders) as well as deep penetration scouting. Its even sprouted hive fleets from those component forces, it would seem.


Page 24

By then, the craftworld had already been isolated for over a week by the Shadow in the Warp. The Tyranids approahced the giant craftworld like a shoal of sharks, thousands upon thousands of drone ships and hive-vessels.
..
..the ability of the craftworld's forges to repair and replace lost spacecraft was being outstripped by the deep space battles that surrounded Iyanden.

Implies fairly fast construction rate for at least some kinds of Eldar spacecraft.


Page 24

Carnifexes wrestled with ancient Wraithlords as Dire Avengers fought bloody battles with vast numbers of Termagants, shuriken fire and fleshborer maggots screeching through the air with equal lethality.
..
Graceful Phantom titans did battle with grotesque bio-titans..

Eldar vs Tyranid.


Page 25

Neither shuriken nore sword blade could pierce the Tyrant's hide.

Page 25

..a dozen thundering Carnifexes stampeded towards the fiery warrior. Under such an assault, not even the embodiment of the Bloody Handed God could prevail.

And once again a Avatar dies like a bitch. Of course this is more respectable than dying to Marneus Calgar. Or Gabriel Angelos (even if the latter doesn't have its signature weapon.)


Page 25

..wielding the cursed Spear of Twilight. This ancient weapon,locked in stasis by IYanden's seers, was a weapon of such power that it would evnetually burn out the life-force of any who wielded it.

The eldar seem to have alot of ancient, cursed, super weapons around.


Page 26

So it was that Hanroth's fleet boasted not only the finest ships that the dockyards at Bakka and Sodremund could provide, but also a loose alliance of vessels from smaller worlds.
..
..fought in the lee of the Imperial Fleet's colossal Grand Cruisers and Space Marine Battle Barges. Some reports maintain that a pair of Demiurg commerce vessels fought at Hanroth's side.

the Imperium allying with aliens to fight Tyranids. also apparently they're building grand cruisers again.


PAge 26

Telepathica officers, many of whom were driven insane by the ordeal, located crucial node-ships in the Hive Mind's synapse web.

proably in psychic scouting missions.


Page 26

Jormungandr had not begun life as a particularily large hive fleet, but by preying initially upon unprotected worlds, it swiftly built up a massive pool of biomass from which it would fund its later actions.
..
..Jormungandr spread out around the Thalassi Sector like some monstrous serpent, using its very mass to draw a tight noose through which none could escape. Less than two years after its first recorded attacks, Jormungandr had effectively sealed off the entire sector, leaving hundreds of worlds severed from the rest of the galaxy. So did the situation remain for nearly three months, the sinuous span of Jormungandr twisting slowly in space..
..
..the coils of Jormungandr began to constrict.

Yet another subtle but indisous and effective 'adaptation' of a Hive fleet. Start small, build big, then surround and isolate. Note a sector is 'hundreds of worlds.


Page 26

Jormungandr favoured subtler methods than the siege tactics displayed by other Hive Fleets.
..
..the Hive Ships snared asteroids and other space debris, hurling them at the target world. The planet below was unprepared for an orbital bombardment, indeed none would have given credence that the Tyranids were even capable of such action. The strikes caused massive devastation and, more importantly, for Jormungandr's purposes choked the skies with potential targets for a defence system to track and destroy. By launching Mycetic Spore waves in concert with these bombardments..

The forces in question were such that could burrow undegrround and go inert for up to weeks at a time, waiting for a signal to attack. The really interesting bit is the orbital bombardment/kinetic strike tactics - they normally use mycetic spores and similar for this , but asteroid/debirs strikes is larger scale.


Page 27

Mawlocs gnawed through Sephrax as maggots through rotten fruit, shattering the foundations of hive cities and fortresses. Billions perished...

Undermining of an.. epic scale.


Page 27

On the forge world of Megyre, the Imperial Guard garrison regiments defended their sacred manufactorum complexes with all the weird and arcane weaponry at their disposal. The defenders erected massive force pylons to keep the swarm at bey, but the Tyranids burrowed through the armour-plated crust of Megyre and destroyed the pylons from below. The garrison brought up thermal cannons, pulveriser whips, shatterstorm rifles, all manner of experimental and blessed weaponry, but the swarm weathered everything that was hurled in its direction..

Yet another forge world with Imperial Guard tithes or garrison forces. Or maybe its a Quasi-Forge like dolumar (maybe industrial worlds can also be partial Forge worlds. I mean the Grey knights got themselves a mini forge-moon all their own..)


PAge 27

Scarcely had the Legion's Princeps the chance to revel in their victory than a new threat emerged - a gargantuan creature that resembled a TRygon. Its sinuous body the size of a Reaver-Titan and its fanged maw dripping with acidic venom. The hideous bio-titan ripped a warhound Titan apart, tseemingly without effort, and then tore a ruinous path through the remaining war engines of LEgio Annihilator, dartin gthrough the torrent of fire aimed its way with impossbile ease.

Page 27

Countless thousands of Jormungandr's children still slept beneath the soil of a hundred worlds...

Infiltration of this manner (genestealers, breeding gaunts, etc.) seem to have become standard tactics for the Tyranids.


Page 28

.. the last and greatest of the Hive Fleets descended upon the galaxy. The Hive Mind had learnt well the lessons of its earlier invasions, and this new fleet, LEviathan, employed these teachings to the detriment of all other life.
..
Leviathan had intiially skirted the galactic rim, and struck upwards trhough the galactic plane/

Leviathan therefore seems to be the main thrust of the whole Tyranid invasion of this galaxy, the destination of much of the biomass consumed from hundreds of planets up to this point, and the actual attack (whereas every hive fleet up to this point was a probe or a raid.) Which may also suggest Leviathan could apply everything it has learned from the previous hive fleet assaults up to this point. Depending on its actual size and numbers, this could be rather serious.


Page 28

Little do the High Lords know that it is the AStronomican itself that lures the Tyranids towards Terra..

Oh, the irony.


Page 28

As with Kraken and Jormungandr before it, Leviathan did not focus its forces into a single killer blow, but attacked across a broad frontage.
..
..the Shdow in the Warp that heralded its coming had orphaned thousands of worlds, severing them from Astropathic communication. As time went on, the tally of lost or destroyed worlds would only grow...

As noted Leviathan seems interested in applying all that it has learned from testing the galaxy up to this point. 'thousands' of worlds are Orphaned, suggesting the threat is perhaps at least an order of magnitude greater than Kraken was (depending on how many thousands we're talking. Considering that Leviathan is spread out across 3 segmentum from the galactic plane, there's alot of potential real estate to threaten, both human and alien.)


Page 28

Bloodthirsters and Carnifexes batlte throught he twisted and skull-strewn streets, whilst Lords of Change and Zoanthropes conduct psychic duels...

It seems that the Tyranids can duke it out on an equal footing with Chaos Daemons even.


Page 28

It's [Gryphonne IV] Skitarii legions were widely envied for their discipline and precision, its Titan Legions feared for their worldbreaking firepower...
...
..The Titan Legions torn asunder by Tyrannofexes and bio-titans.

Also, no more Gryphonne IV pattern Vanquishers. GRIMDARK!


Page 28

Inquisitor Kryptman orders the destruction of a dozen worlds to create a cordon to slow the advance of Hive Fleet Leviathan..

...
Kryptman's butcher's bill is deemed intolerably high by his peers and despite prostetations that such sacrifices are necessary he is cast ou fo the Inquisition.

Gone rogue, so to speak. I think he's still got Deathwatch teams with him too, which tells you how independent that group can be. And we know that a rogue Inquisitor is not exaactly without resources, given how sluggish or fragmented Imperial communications can be.
Also I recall him exterminatus'ing hundreds of worlds as a firebreak, not a mere dozen.


Page 29

Leviathan's swiftest and greatest victories occur along a spine of worlds in the Hodur Sector.
...
In the span of four months, the Swarmlord oversees the absorption of two dozen worlds, including Talon, the Chapter Planet of the Storm Falcons, and Endragiga, one of the region's major shipyards.

Speed/scope of the Tyranid advances into a sector. 2 dozen worlds, including an Astartes homeworld and a Shipyard.


Page 29

Hive fleet Medusa, mistakenly thought by the Imperium to be another tendril of Leivathan, invades the isolated ice world of Shadrac.

Apparenlty its beyond the edge of the Imperium as well. Also we get Tyranid 'hive fleets', including any number of splinter fleets and whatever remnants from past invasions remain, causing any amount of trouble in the Imperium at the behest of the Hive mind.


Page 29

Hive Fleet Moloch's inexorable advance from the galactic north gathers momentum as first the Kiltor Sector and the Tarellian Civilisation are devoured...
..
Long dormant remnants of Hive Fleet Jormungandr stir to life, bringing several Imeprial worlds to the brink of destruction...
...
Hive fleet Leviathan descends upon Tarsis Ultra...

Jormungandr still seems to be around, and there is a Hive Fleet attacking from Galactic north (meaning it must be coming thoruhg Obscurus, which should be interestingf given the 13th Black Crusade is still ongoing. The Tyranids seem to be not only interested in infiltration and internal disruption, but surrounding the imperium and attacking from multiple angles. I wonder if this means PAcificus is at threat (or will be) at some point as well, or if Moloch is designed to draw forces away form the Eastern fringe?


Page 29

..Tarsis Ultra is saved not by force of arms alone, but through a biological plague created by Magos Locard...
...
The plague outstrips even the expectations of its creators, collapsing the synaptic web that binds the Tyranids ctogether...

More heretical 'progress' undertaken by the AdMech in order to combat the Tyranids. This was the plot of Warriors of Ultramar, as I recall.


Page 29

Space Marines of the Death Spectres and GEnesis Chapters conduct a series of Extermintatus Missions against worlds not yet consumed by Hive Fleet Leviathan. Their hope is to deny bioresource to the Tyranids,t hereby weakening severla of the more outflung tendrils.

I wonder if they're taking out human or nonhuman worlds?


Page 30

Kryptman destroyed the moon of Gheist, and in doing so diverted the passing hulk's trajectory directly towards the OCtarius systme..

He did this by using a Deathwatch strike cruiser's teleporters to teleport 'megatonnes' of explosive into the core of the moon or something, as I recall from the codexes.

Funny thing is he still seems to be both alive and active at this time... I've seen him connected with the Macharian heresy in various ways, which suggests he was alive at some time around the early 41st millenium, and has been alive for close to 1000 years. Whether this is because of time dilation effects, juvenat, or whatever, we don't quite know.


Page 30

..the bio-ship rained thousands of Mycetic Spores onto the world's equatorial planes, infesting the planet below in their death throes.
...
For the first time since the Tyranids had invaded the Octarius Sector, they found themselves vastly outnumbred by their prey. Skarfang's horde was mighty indeed and somehow the Tyranids sensed that a war of attrition would only end in their extinction. In response, the Ghorala swarm adapted in order to survive. At first, the Tyranids stalked and preyed upon isolated Ork patrols...
...
Forced to abandon their guerilla war, the Tyranids adopted an altogether more cunning strategy and engaged the Orks in the open. The Tyranids attakced without thought of survival, every action aimed at maximising the carnage.
..
Whenever the Tyranids were on the verge of being overrun, the broods would, in eerie unison, switch from hyperactive slaughter to disciplined retreat. The Tyranids lurked in nearby caverns or burrowed beneath the soil to shetler from pursuant search parties. In the dead of night, synapse creatures re-mustered the scattered swarm to the corpse-choked battlefield. There the Tyranids fed on Ork cadaver and Tyranid carcass alike before returning to the digestion pools secreted in the planet's rocky mesas. Slowly but surely, the Tyranid's numbers started to grow.

Orks vs Tyranids... the endless struggle. They continued this as their numbers increased, seeking larger battles for more casualties, to gain more bioresources. Still the Orks kicked their asses whislt the Warboss was active.

It's also more than a little interesting how the Orks were able to (in short order) outnumber the Tyranids, who usually enjoy the numerical advnatage (against humans, at least.) When faced with the Ork threat the Tyranids naturally adapted, seeking to inflict casualties in order to retrieve the corpses and expand their forces.


Page 31

..the Tyranids created Lictors with the express purpose of eliminating Skarfang.
..
Although eternally patient, lying in wait for a chance to strike down their target was a luxury the starving swarm could ill afford. Instead, the swarm created an opportunity.
..
..Tyranids repeated these feints, approaching from different directions...
...
On the Tenth such retreat Skarfang's temper could take no more.
..
The Tyranids had succeded in goading the Warboss, separating him from the bulk of his forces. Now they lured him into an ambush.

The tyranids had spawned broods of Venomthropes to blanket the greenskins in a thick, toxic fog.

Tyranid tactics to take down the Warboss. His band was slaughtered by Lictors in the fog, which then slaughtered the warboss. The Orks fell to infighting and division, and the Tyranids fell on them.

Also apparently Tyranid fleets CAN 'starve'. This implies a certain measure of biomass is required to sustain their forces in some measure whilst 'active' (EG not hibernating.) - given their propensity for boosted/accelerated metabolisms this peraps is not surprising.


Page 31

Within weeks the Orks on Ghorala had been slaughtered like cattle nad the Tyranids gorged on their flesh.
From the digested remains of the prey world the swarm created new Hive Ships.

They mangaed to take two more Ork worlds in the process, so it must be a fairly numerous fleet by this point. Also the creation of new hive ships (fleets) seems to occur with every world destroyed, although the numbers they do make tend to be minor relative to the actual biomass they consume.


Page 31

The Imperium is reinforcing whole systems, raising thousands of armies and dozens of Space Marine Chapters to combat the Hive fleet. Several Eldar Craftworlds have begun to burn entire worlds to a cinder, employing ancient weapons of destruction not used in millenia.

the Imperium has raised 'thousands of armies' (assuming an army of millions we might be talking billions of troops) and 'dozens of space marine chapters' (which implies new foundings specifically to tackle the Tyranid threat in recent times.)

The tau are 'burning' whole worlds, apparently utilising their own (specialised?) exterminatus weaponry to do so. I guess this may mean they're normally less reluctant to take this approach compared to the Imperium.


Page 31

Nor is it only Leivathan that is assailing the galaxy. New Hive Fleets are even now beginning to emerge form their cold sleep through the inter-galactic void and the surviving remnants of defeated Hive Fleets continue to invade isolated worlds. Hive Fleets Scylla and Charybdis are carving parallel paths through the Segmentum PAcificus.
..
A splinter fleet of Hive Fleet Krkaen has awakened from hibernation around the Vidar Sector. This war torn region will provide the Tyranids with rich feeding rounds and the means to reinvigorate itself. Rumorus abound that Hive Fleet Colossus has arisen, despite its apparent destruction during the Helican Crusade.

Well as I suspected, Pacificus seems to be facing its own threats.. meaning the Tyranids are basically threatenting the Imperium from almost every direction, execpt from directly above the galactic plane. The main thrust coming from below and threatening Solar, Tempestus and Ultima (the latte rof which has borne the brunt of a good many invasions already, and must be suffering from their remnants springing into action again.) Moloch attacking from the North, and Scylla/Charybdis attacking from the west. This effectively makes the Tyranids the biggest current (major) threat the galaxy faces - moreso than the Orks, Necrons, or even Chaos (Chaos is in one sector alone, and the Orks aren't unified enough to be a threat.

And also as I noted, the Tyranids are using what's left of what came before to stir up more trouble. Which means splinter fleets, Genestealers, etc.

[Connor MacLeod]

Part 2
Page 33

Tyranids flood the batltefield with the psychic signature of the Hive Fleet, overwhelming the minds of enemy psykers and interefering with their mystical abilities. Many are driven insane or suffer massive neural damage...

Psychic/psychological attacks of the Nids.


Page 35

All Hive Tyrants are massively powerful cratures, hulking monsters three times the height of a man. Though individuals display a wide variety of physical characteristics, all are brutally strong, able to tear through plasteel and shatter ferrocrete as easily as if it were glass.
..
..their relationship to the Hive Mind is closer than that of any other known bioform.
..
They are the primary conduits through which the Hive Mind enforces its will. As a result of this connection, Hive Tyrants are able to manifest potent psychic powers in battle, harnessing tiny slivers of the Hive Mind's terrifying psychic potential to invigorate the swarm, shatter the foe's moreale or shred the minds of the enemy.
..
Hive Tyrants are incredibly intelligent and completely self-aware. Whilst they are still slaved to the gestalt consciousness of the hive Mind, they are permitted far wider latitude in achieving their goals and can learn from their mistakes. This goes some way to explain why the Tyranids can rarely be defeated the same way twice. Should a Hive Tyrant be slain, the Hive Mind can simply grow a replacement, imbuing it with the same experiences, character, and knowledge as its predecessor.

The Hive Tyrants.. one of the more powerful and major synapse creatures in any invasion. They are sort of lesser Swarm Lords, with many of the advantages (a sort of immortality) but more common. This also makes them pretty much the 'must kill' creature in an invasion, since they are literally its lynchpin (not an irreplacable one, but it can fuck up an army fast to have them wiped out - without them the fleet can lose a great deal of focus.


Page 35

Their bulky bodies are protected by iron-hard exoskeletons covered by interlocking layers of impenetrable chitinous plates. As such they are all but impervious to small-arms fire.
..
Should heavy weaponry be brought to bear, several salvoes are required to fell even a single Tyrant Guard, for their bodies have developed an incredible resistance to injury. They are, at best, only dimly aware of pain and shrug off terrible wounds that should, by rights, have blown them apart.
..
Their instincts tend not towards self-preservation, but to the defence of the Hive Tyrant to which they are bonded.

They also have no eyes, but since they are extnesions of the Tyrant, they don't need them. Tyrant Guards are perhpas the most durable Tyranid form (for their size) around, moreso even than Carnifexes, and probably only outdone by biotitans due to sheer size. They are also a more extreme sort of speicalization of course.



Page 35

..the Tyrant Guard's reaction is part of the coldly calculating strategy of the Hive Mind.
..
..if the enemy finds a way to bring such a beast down, the Hive Mind does not want knowledge of how the feat was accomplished to survive th battle. The ensuing Tyrant Guard stampede is merely a conditioned response designed to slaughter the perpetrators so that the strategy cannot be passed on.

Sneaky. Although making them detonate might be more effective.


Page 36

A Tyranid Warrior stands twice the height of a man...
...
Tyranid warriors have the mental flexibility to employ wide vareity of weapon-symbiotes.
...
..with its consciousness permanantly bonded to the ageless Hive mind, the Tyranid Warrior can draw upon a vast reservoir of knowledge and experience should its own prove insufficient to the task at hand.

A step down from the Hive Tyrants.. the lesser 'officers' of a Tyranid force. Trades some flexibility and independence for their numbers and the redundancy this brings. Note that all Tyranid 'synapse creature's seem to be able to share the knowledge of the hive mind as a whole, although their ability to 'hold' and process such information (as well as their ability ot make observations, analyze, and apply that knowledge based on what their senses tell them) can differ. Also, their mental flexibility/freedom can vary (Hive Tyrants can consider tactics or options that might otherwise fall outside the interests or rules of the Hive Mind, which a Warrior wouldn't.)



Page 36

Tyranid Shrikes are an adaptation of the Tyranid Warrior Bioform, with leathery wings that allow them to swoop and soar...
...
Though more lightly armoured than Tyranid Warriors, Shrikes more than mkaeu pfor the disadvantage with their ability to redeploy at amoment's notice.

They're still synapse creatures, so this design plays well into that role. We learn from many sources (this codex, IA, FFG) that there are LOTS of Tyranid Warrior variants.. only outdone I think by the gaunts in this regard.
There are also warrior variants called "Tyranid Primes" which are the apex of the Warrior strain.


Page 37

A Ravener's hearing and vision are sensitive to a broad range of vibrations and energy bands. As a reuslt, a Ravener can hear the smallest tremors on the surface and it can 'see' the energy forms emitted by vox transmissions, sensor-stealth technology and even the emissions of teleport homers.
...
.. a small brood can effectively seize upon an unguarded signal, instincitvely tracking its point of origin and following the electromagnetic spoor to its source.
..
Without the Hive mind's constant supervision, a Ravener was incapable of processing the full spectrum of data provided by its incredible senses. This apparent cognitiive shortfall was believed to render the Ravener unable to detect stationary creatures. Of course, this theory was untrue...
...
The truth is that a Ravener is perfectly capable of perceiving an unmoving quarry but, unless directed by the Hive Mind, its innate predator's instincts cannot resist chasing a panicked foe.

A glimpse at the potential 'sensory' capabilities of Tyranid creatures, which includes 'seeing' warp phenomena as well. They still need the Hive Mind to make sense of the information though it seems (The Hive Mind, unsurprisingly, can augment the intellect of its components to varying degrees.)


PAge 38

The hormagaunt is a highly specialized iteration of the Termagant bioform and one that is utilised by the Tyranid Hive Fleets in their billions.

It is perhaps one of the msot common (and expendable) Tyranids.


Page 38

..a Hormagaunt will hungrily feed upon its prey's remains, tearing hunks of bloody flesh from the slaughtered corpse with razor sharp teeth. Such a feast seldom lasts long, for the Hormagaunt's voracious metabolism dirves it to constantly seek out fresh prey.
..
Hormagaunts have fearsome hunting instincts and require little direction form the Hive Mind. Once the assault begins they are mostly left to their own devices.

The metabolism is partly due to their expendability, but they sometimes can and will be directed towards a specific target if need be. Hormagaunts also seem to be the variants most commonly given more 'natural' abilities - the ability to feed on other creatures (rather than some specially provided organic foodstuff to suit otherwise specialised biosystems) as well as breeding (as we learn later.) This more generalized and 'normal' configuration deprives them of some of the advantages the more specialized and killy warrior forms have, but it makes them more adaptable and suited to general infiltration and disruption missions (much like Genestealers.)



Page 38

Hormagaunts are often dropped onto a prey planet in Mycetic Spores.
...
..unlike most other Tyranid bioforms, Hormagaunts are able to reproduce independently, and lay hundreds of eggs just below the surface before their short, hyperactive lifespan is over. No sooner has one wave of ccreatures been exterminated than a fresh swarm has hatched and grown to maturity..

As I noted, Hormagaunts can reproduce. This makes them effective infiltrators and sabotage forces when inserted onplanet and allowed to breed. Probably quite useful when utilised alongside Genestealers and Lictors.



Page 38

The tendrils of Hive Fleet Hydra are only now beginning to stir from their aeons-long hibernation.
...
Prematurely awakened from its slumber, Hive Fleet Hydra has accelerated its advance into the galaxy to slake its hunger.

Yet another Hive Fleet.


Page 39

They (termagants) are amongst the smallest of the Hive Mind's warriors, little more than two metres from head to tail...
..
In planetary invasions Termagants accompany Tyranid warriors, scuttling forwards on four legs whilst unleashing torrents of fire from their anti-personnel bio-weaponry...
...
..Termagants react instantly to any enemy that threatens its larger kin [Warriors]...

Termagants are the 'smallest' Hive mind soldier, yet they're taller than humans, weigh considerably more, and are doubtless stronger and faste rand tougher. If they're anything like Hormagaunts they probably mass a good several hundred kilos. They are the ranged 'cannon fodder' troops to the Hormaguants 'close combat' cannon fodder, and also act as guardians for Tyranid Warriors.
Note as well that the fact the gaunts can carry guns automatically makes them more versatile than Zerglings.


Page 39

Where a Hormagaunt is instinctively vicious and easily baited into a trap, a Termagant's cunning is honed by a desire for self-preservation, and it will commonly find a way to skirt an ambush and assail the foe from an unexpected quarter.

Their self preservation instincts can be suppressed to make them cannon fodder, but without guidance it will drive the Termagant to seek shelter and abandon fight. This is not wholly bad from the hive mind POV.. as it can scatter Tyranid troops about, which must then be hunted down lest they cause trouble later.


Page 39

..the spike rifle is a bony muscle-lined tube that contains a row of harpoon-like spikes. These are launched over a considerable range whilst maintianing sufficient force to puncture their target's flesh. Those not killed outright will quickly bleed to death if the spieks are not removed carefully as its barbs cut and stear at its victim's arteries.

Basically a spear/bolt throwing weapon. They're longer ranged than pistols, shoter ranged than rifles. They also use strangleweb/stranglevine weapons (The strands that spray out and constrict, hardening and compressing tighter the more an enemy struggles, if it doesn't cursh them to death.)


Page 40

..not only are Genestealers highly intelligent, but they possess a form of brood telepathy that allows them to function independently of the Hive Mind. This independence, combined with a relentless willt o survive...
..
Genestealres destroy through guile that which cannot be defeated through numbers alone. Many a bastion has fallen because a handful of Genestealers scaled the walls during the dead of night. Wrose, this survival instinct drives gEnestealers outwards and onwards from the oncoming Hive Fleets. In the chaos of a tyranid assault there are opportunities aplenty for Genestealers wishing to avoid desturction.

The rest of the Genestealer MO is unchanged, and so I won't comment here. They're a definite step up from Gaunts, yet are also still considereds shock troops (and expendable) as well as their infiltrator role. The Curious thing (for me) about the 'Stealers is the total lack of any ranged-weapon variant (like the way there are termagants and hormagaunts).


Page 41

Lictors rove ahead of the swarm, seeking out pockets of resistance to be eradicated and native life forms to be absorbed. Able to move swiftly and without sound through even the densest terrain, and concealed by a chameleonic carapace that renders it all but invisible to the naked eye...
...
It can wait motionless for days...
...
..the Lcitor can swiftly devour its brain and absorb its memories. Thus, in death, the enemy reveals more to a Lictor than it ever did in life...
...
Lictors exude a pheremone trail which draws other Tyranids; the larger the concentration of prey, the stornger the respons eand the more irresistable the lure.

Lictors seve the role as scouts/pathfinders, infiltrators, spies, and assassins. Basically the ninjas of the Tyranid forces.


PAge 42

Gargyoles also spit a cuastic venom that burns at skin. The GArgoyles aim for their prey's eyes, blinding their foe..
...
..they can squeeze through gaps seemingly far too small to permit passage.

Gargoyles it turns out are yet another gaunt variant, exceprt with wings.


PAge 43

In order to more efficiently harness thermal currents in flight, the Harpy is hollow-bodied. Compared to creatures of a similar size the Harpy is therefore a relatively fragile Tyranid biofor,.
..
The Harpy can jink and dive with a deftness and agility unattainable by even the most sophisticated fighter craft...
...
..th HArpy appears to utilise a wide array of weaponry...
...
..several pairs of sychting talons,
...
..bloated cysts on their undersides that rain clusters of Spore Mines..
...
..the forearms of each Harpy have melded to cradle large bio-weapons, most commonly stranglethorn or the dreaded heavy venom cannon.

Harpies.. Tyranid air support. What they lack in durability and speed is made up for in agility and firepower.


Page 44

Zoanthropes are created solely to harness the psychic potential of the hive mind and their entire bodies are perfected towards such a function.
...
..the Zoanthrope can generate a potent warp field to preserve itself from harm..
..
..it can project a bolt of corrosive energy that can boil through adamantium plate with as much ease as it can disintegrate flesh. A brood of Zoanthropes can even fell a mighty battle Titan..
...
..the Hive Mind can use a Zoanthrope to extend its control range, utilising the beast's vast cerrebrl capacity ot relay its instructions to the swarm's lesser creatures,

Tyranid psychic artillery. Think of a Weirdboy whose head doesn't explode, and actjuallty has some idea of what it is doing.


page 44

Zoanthropes project a constant psychic barrier to protect themselves, absoribng and deflecting incoming attacks. THese mental shields are invisible but for a slight shimmer when small-arms and heavy-weapons fire allike patterns harmlessly against them.

Zoanthropes can generate their own psychic shield. This isnt te only creature known to do it, but usually those forms take time (and luck perhaps) to evolve the defense (Eg the super Gaunt in one of those 40K short stories.) Tyranids do have more than psychic shielding as well, however.


Page 45

its heavy carapace conceals a network of bulging, gas-filled bladders allowing the Venomthrope to float ponderously across the battlefield, using its clusters of tendrils to steer itself..
..
..They emit a spore cloud that that resembles a sickly sweet yellowish vapour that conceals a highly sophisitcated phage organism, inimical to non-Tyranid life. Brief exposure causes nausea and uncontrollable muscle spasms..
...
..exposed to the Venomthrope's emissions for mor than a minute or so, the phage gains a foothold in its body. Reproducing at a horrific rate, it spreads through the victim's system, breaking down organic tissue. The victim ultimately drowns in its own frothing and infected bodily fluids.
...
A Venomthrope's entire body is coated in alien poisons but its writhing tentacles exude the most lethal of all Tyranid Toxins, a venom so virulent it causes flesh to wither and slough from bone.

They'll also consume parts of their victims. Why venomthorpes can float isn't quite explained, but then again there is little about TYranid biology that is sane - it can make a sort of sense in how it uses its abilities, but those abilities themselves tend to border on the magical.
anyhow, Venomthorpes seem to be floating, sentient virus bombs.


Page 45

Within some of the spacecraft ot the Tyranid Hive Fleets are huge chambers many hundreds of metres high. within each is a creature so vast that its great, pulsing bulk fills almost the entirety of the immense structure.
..
The Norn Queens are great biological factories and their entire function is to create other Tyranid life forms. They are able to assimilate and manipulate biomass in infinite ways to better adapt the Tyranid rce.

The norn queens- the 'designers' as well as the producers of new Tyranid forms. Implies that starships in the hive fleet are at least hundrds of meters across.


Page 46

The Carnifex is a living engine of destruction, evolved for use in shock assaults, spaceship boarding actions and massed battles..
..
..only a hardened fortress wall or super-heavy tank has any hope of surviving the impact or stalling the Carnifex's stampede. Sometimes, not even this proves sufficient...

The Carnifex.


Page 46

Frag Spines: Many Carnifexes have carapaces studded with explosive spine banks or other extremely short ranged bio weapons...
..
forcing their prey to take cover or eslse be lacerated by hundreds of chitinous shards...

Frag/flechette weapon analogues seem to be a favorite weapon for the 'Nids, well next to living ammo.


Page 47

Towering spore chimneys burst from beneath the churned ground to belch their poisonous spores into the air and capillary towers are grown to funnel the digested gruel of the planet's biomass to the Hive Ships in space.

They serve both a biowarfare (by fucking up the enviroment and the climate) as well as the harvesting role.


Page 47

It [Hive Guard] is essentially a gun-beast, with a heavily armoured centauroid form providing a durable and stable firing platform for the massive impaler cannon..
..
By bracing its powerful lower limbs, the Hive Guard is able to contain the impaler cannon's prodigious recoil, allowing a continouous and highly accurate strem of fire.
Though not as developed as that of the synapse creatures, Hive Guard possess a low-level telepathic ability that allows them to 'see' through the eyes of all other Tyranid organisms, giving them unconscious access to a wealth of tactical and targeting information that would overwhlem even the most sophisticated cogitators. Furthermore, a Hive Guard is even more closely bonded with the shard-beasts that comprise the ammunition of its impaler cannon.

One sort of Tyranid artillery, although its more of na assault gun with extended range indirect fire guided munitions. What's interesting (and crazy) about the creature is how it is an organic emulation of Tank/artillery guns, up to and including the psychic 'spotters' and data/telemetry relay ability. Imagine the implied command and control for Tyranids on the larger scale implied in this (or at least the possible C&C cpaability - just because one form uses it doesnt neccesarily mean all automatically do. We dont quite know what tradeoffs it engenders.)
And if that wans't enough, the Hive Guard impaler cannon apparently has a high ROF (for a cannon.)


Page 47

Through a complicated series of mental stimuli it can command the shard beast to change vector whilst in flight.
..
The combination of these two abilities means that a Hive Guard need not neccesarily see a target itself to engage it.

Another form of living ammo. The shard beast is basically the nasty projectile the Impaler cannon launches. Take note of the indirect fire capability and the limited guidance (probably sharing in the data link the Hive Guard has with other units.) This capability is actually superior to a number of Imperial gound vehicle capabilities.


Page 47

Without the direct goading of the Hive Mind, a Hive Guard is content to stand motionless, waiting for prey to come within range. Only when a Tyranid swarm encounters a heavily mechanised foe will the Hive Mind suppress the Hive Guard''s natural imeprativs and drive them forwards to the front lines.
..
Hive Guard have an incredibly short incubation cycle and can be maintained as end-stage larvae almost indefinitely. This means that rather than wasting precious biomass by creating and sustaining protectors that will stand idle, the Hive Mind can swiftly spawn Hive Guard whenever its advance is threatened..

The defensive nature of the Hive Guard. Which is what makes it ore like artillery or an assault gun than a tank.


Page 47

Impaler cannons are large bio weapons that propel bony spines as long as a man is tall. These spines are propelled at such high velocities that they can punch through plasteel and skewer a battle tank as easily as they can flesh or bone. At the base of each spine is a small Tyranid creature known as a shard-beast..
...
..each quill-like spine. The shard beast uses thin menbranous fins to steer the spine towards its target. The shard-beast has but a few moments to veer the projectile before it withers and dies, for its own innards are torn from its body when the spine is fired.

Basically a guided, living KEP round. We dont know the velocity but the range of the projectile is at least 'a few moments' - and the ability to fire indirectly may suggest beyond the horizon capability, which could suggest definite tank like or railgun-like velocities (2-3 km/s or more)


Page 48

..Spore Mines - living bombs that blanket the enemy in acids, poisons, and shrapnel-sized pieces of chitin.

Combining a fragmentation weapon with an explosive, chemical and biological weapon. What's even scarier is that some spore munitions can be nukes (more or less.. thermonuclear as I recall.)


Page 48

The Hive Mind is nothing if not pragmatic. Whilst battles could be won in close quarters, the Tyranids had no need of the ability to attack prey at such extreme range. Yet, as the Hive Fleets pressed ever deeper into the galaxy, their victories were much harder won as their enemies began to concentrate on destroying the swarm from great distance. Before long, the Hive Mind recognised a need for a creature that could neutralise the enemy's long-range eaponry.

Biovores. Another form of Tyranid artillery adapted as a counter to other artillery platforms.


Page 48

Spore Mines are not only launched by Biovores - clusters of them are often seeded directly onto worlds from orbit.

probably the analgoue to missiles or bombs, the way Mycetic spores can be a asteroid/kinetic impactor analogue.


Page 49

A Pyrovore's maw drips with corrosive ascids that are powerful enough to reduce armour, flesh and bone to a gooey, smouldering mucous, ripe for consumption by other Tyranids.
...
..the weapon symbiote sprouting from its back. When confronted by a foe, the Pyrovore launches forth an incandescent fireball from tis dorsal bio-weapon.
..
..the last thing a Pyrovore's victim will ever hear before a curtain of searing flame reduces them to a pile of burning ash.

A Tyranid flamethrower beast. Basically easily and rapidly cremates its target. May be a living plasma weapon or a flamethrower, or both. Or perhaps even al iving meltagun. Given that both plasma and melta weapon have been given flamethrower like properties the differenes are minor.
This may also be a vehicle/ground version of the capital ship pyro-acidic batteries from BFG.


Page 49

..they feast on the bodies of the dead and wounded, the Pyrovore's complex array of bladders and stomachs breaking down the corpses' fleshy tissues into flammable gasses. So pwoerful are the acidic fluids inside a Pyrovore that they even feast on metals and rocks, any mineral the Hive Fleet may require. If undisturbed,a Pyrovore can continue to gorge itself for hours, even days..

Pyrovores apparently can create their 'fuel' from alot of things, suggesting there may be differnet kinds of Pyorvores or they an fire differnet kinds of 'flame'. They also seem to serve a reclamation/comsumption function for the Hive Fleet in this as well as a support combat role.
And we get mention of Tyranids using metals and rocks as well as other minerals in the 'creation' process as hinted at in other novels (such as Black Tide.) Makes sense given their unnatural durability as well as mention of silicate/rock like carapace.


Page 49

..the Pyrovore and the flamespurt creature function independently of each other.
..

Ultimately it matters little if a Pyrovore feasts on the living flesh of its prey or the smouldering ashes of their burnt remains - one way or another, they will be consumed.
..
If wounded, billious and brackish liquids seep from its injuries, spraying nearby enemies with the acidic contents of the Pyrovore's various stomachs. Worse, if a Pyrovore is slain outright, the deathblow has a good chance of igniting the volatiel ichors contained within, sparking off a tremendous explosion that leaves only a few charred and dessicated craps of flesh and a terrible smell in it swake.

Apparently it has flame and acidic atack capabilitie, as well as being an impromptu incendiary device. Also it allows the Hive Fleet to apparently reclaim burnt or cremated bodies for their use - I suspect this is less 'efficient' than consuming the intact flesh (lacking moisture and many of the normal components that make living flehs useful.) But it can show yet again why even Exterminatus won't always work.


Page 50

..it [Trygon] towers over even the mighty Carnifex. It is a heavily armoured beast...
...
As the Trygon moves, these [plates] become agitated, generating a bio-static charge that courses along the beast's body and wreathes its forelimbs. By exhaling an ionised spray from its gills, the Trygon can direct this energy as lethal high-voltage discharge.
A tRygon's claws are not only fearsome weapons in close combat, they also allow it to burrow through practically any material.
..
Once the beast emerges, only focused heavy-weapons fire can be relied upon to bring it down..
...
Trygons excavatea massive network of underground tunnels. Other Tyranid creatures use the tunnesl left in the TRygon's wake..

Trygon. One of a number of 'burrowing' creatures used as infiltrator and ambush creatures as well as a menas of establi9shing safe means of travel for Tyranid troops. They're also quite tough and can generate their own electrical attacks.


Page 50

These beasts have elongated jaws and containment spines running the length of their sinuous bodies, to better harness and direct their bio-electric discharges. Trygon PRimes unleash searing arcs of lightning, leaving those caught in its pasth little more than a charred pile of scorched bones.

Trygon Prime. Like the Pyrovores they seem to be able to incinerate bodies. Its noted that both sorts of Trygon (the regular and Prime) can shield themselves with EM fields/energy as well.


Page 51

..the Mawloc is almost entirely blind, and thus relies on information provided by a series of pressure-sensitive organs that run the length of its flanks.
So delicate ar ethe Mawloc's that they can absorb and decipher pressure waves as they travel through both solid and fluid matter, creating a many-layered and ever-changing picture of the world around it.

Otherwise they're glorified sandworms. Yet another burrowing/mining enemy.


Page 52

its carapace conceals banks of cluster spines that can be fired at considerable distance.
..
Each Tervigon is a living incubator beneath whose lumpen carapace dozens upon dozens of Termagants slumber in a state of near-life. The Tervigon can spanw its dormant broods at will...

More flechette weapons, as well as the Tyranid equivalent of an APC.


Page 53

Clad in a dozen layers of ablative chitinous armour and supported by three pairs of massive legs, it is as unyielding as any war engine constructed of steel or born of more conventional technology.
...
..its weaporny eclispes that of its foes most powerful battle tanks in both quantity and devastative potential.
..
Worse, its body houses several breeding chambers. Here, the Tyrannofex nutures all manner of ferocious organisms that it can unleash onto any enemy.
...
The Tyrannofex's main weapon, however, is a massive cannon fused with its torso, the largest and most destructive of any Tyranid weapons to be carried by anything smaller than a bio-titan. The preicse nature of this weapon is diffrent from creature to creature..

The next step up from a Carnifex, but still not Biotitan level ( I think.) Note tha ablative chitin as well as its own ability to 'manufacture' organisms. A Tyranid superheavy tank.


Page 53

Each time the rupture cannon fires, two different cannonball-sized projectiles are launched in quick succession. The first is a bloated tick that bursts upon impact, showering the target in a thick oily substance. The second is a seedpod with a virtually impenetrable shell. As the seed smashes into the target, it is coated in the viscous remains of the tick. The seemingly inert fluid dissolves the toughened shell in a fraction of a second resulting in a massive implosion powerful enough to wrench armoured vehicles inside out.

Nasty.


Page 53

This weapon stores huge reservoirs of caustic digestive fluids used to break down organic matter at a horrifying rate. This acrid concoction is sprayed over the Tyranid's victims, melting through body armour with shocking ease and reducing victims to shapeless gobbets of liquefied flesh.

They also have fleshborer hives that can eject thosuaands of the buggers at once. Gotta love the antipersonnel weaponry they devise.


Page 54

These ablative bio-constructed shells are launched by their thousands into the world's atmosphere by orbiting hive ships. The fleshy pods are specifically designed to endure the stresses of oribtal insertion and protect their lethal payload from planetary impact.
...
recent strains have a shield of ablative chitin over sensory nodes. This burns away during orbital insertion, allowing the Mycetic spore to draw in on Lictor pheremone trails during the final stages of descent.
..
Other iterations are compsed of two layered bioforms. When the Mycetic Spore impacts a planet's surface and the outer shell dies, its sides peel apart ot reveal a symbiotic organism that draws sustenance from the slain parent to fuel a powerful bio weapon.
..
The hive Mind is now able to reinforce key areas with astonishing swiftness and shield crucial elements of its assault force from incoming fire until the very last moment.

Mycetic spores. Drop pod, munition, and deathwind drop pod. Note that Lictors can be used to 'guide' spores onto their target via pheremones.


Page 55

From the moment a Tyranid Hive Fleet makes planetfall, billions of voracious organisms are released over the planet. Most numerous amongst these are the Rippers.
...
Rippers are eventually reabsorbed by the Hive fleet. They throw their own engorged bodies into large digestion pools where they, and the biomass they have feasted upon, are broken down into a thick gruel used to feed the orbiting bioships...
...
..Rippers are the primary means by which the Hive Fleet Devours planets...
....
..devoring every scrap of biomass, every drop of moisture, leaving only an empty and desolate wasteland in their wake.

Ther eare airborne variants known as Sky slashers too. Combat is secondary, they're basically reclamation and consumption elements of the Hive Fleet invasion.



Page 56

Amongst the billions of creatures created by the Hive Mind, there eixsts one as old as the Tyranid race itself. This creature is the very pinnacle of the Hive Tyrant bioform, the ultimate conduit through which the Hive Mind's implacable will is enforced. This creature is to a Hive Tyrant what a Hive Tyrant is to a Termagant.
...
It would appear that the Swarmlord's link with the Hive Mind is so strong as to transcend the physical limitations separating the different Hive Fleets. If the Swarmlord perishes on the battlefield, the Hive Mind reabsorbs its consciousness through the synaptic web. The Swarmlord is therefore dethless, and can be re-grown to face the enemy again...
..
The reincarnation of the Swarmlord appears to be a stress-induced response by the Hive Fleets, one triggered when its prey cannot be defeated through physical and biological adaption alone. Indeed, the Swarmlord was crreated with the express purpose of out-thinking the enemy and developing new strategies. To this end, the Swarmlord possesses a glimmer of autonomy, more so than any other Tyranid Creature. The Swarmlord combines its own resourcefulness with tactical knowledge accumulated through aeons of bloodshed.

Andddd.... the Swarmlord. The 'champion' of the Tyranid forces. Well one of the unique ones. And it only is created (reflexively) when needed. Again this highlights the primarily reactive nature of the Tyranids - they don't seem to take proactive measures, but base their tactics and policies purely on adapting to what they face. This isn't always a problem because their ability to grow and replace losses as long as biomass exists allows them to expend troops and fleets in 'probing' an enemy to force a repsonse, which in turn triggers the Tyranid's adaptive capabilities.
The obvious downside to this is, if the enemy is powerful enough they can cripple or destroy the Tyranids with overwhelming force long before they can react.


Page 57

Only the most powerful of weaponry slowed the beast down...
..
foremost amongst these (injuries) is a plasma burn running across its armoured skull, a testament to the courage of a long-forgotten hero fo the Imperium who fired a plasma pistol through the beast's eye and into its brain. It was this very shot that brought the CArnifex's rampage to a dramatic halt, the first time such a feat has ever occured.
...
..they Thawed the Carnifex out, but even as they did so its grievous wounds began to heal.
..
If all the tales are true, Old One Eye has been killed more than a dozen times...

Given the Swarmlord, it seems rather likely that the Hive Mind simply incarnates a new one, using the Carnifex as a potent psychological weapon as well as a phsyical one.



Page 58

The Doom of Malan'tai was a unique adaptation of the Zoanthrope. Its vast cranium and frail body were supported by a lage, spine-like growth that emerged from its back.
..
Using this strange architecture, the Doom of Malan'tai focused its considerable psychic might and absorbed the life energy of all those arond it. Being a highly psychic race, the Eldar were more suceptible to the Doom of Malan'tai's predations.
..
The life energy it had abosrbed lended it bountiful reservoirs of power on which to enahnce its already fearsmoe psychic might.

It even ate the infinity cricuit. Our token super-Zoanthrope 'character.


Page 59

Deathleaper was created to be a terror weapon, one created to utterly undermine the enemy's morale and break their will to oppose the Swarm. on St Caspalen, Deathleaper instincitvely sensed that the execution of the planet's spiritual leader, Cadrinal Salem, would have only accomplished the creation of a martyr...

Instead, it infiltrated the Cadrinal's bunker, slaughtered his bodyguard and aides, and then left. It did this again ten days in a row to break the leader.
As noted in Fall of Medusa V, Deathleaper was a new, advanced Lictor strain that was effectively undetectable. IT seems to have become more than that, although its existence seems more limited than Medusa V feared/implied (indeed it may be unique like Old One Eye or the Swarmlord.)


Page 60

..the victims were injected with dozens of ripper parasites, each teh size of a man's finger. Though a few of the implanted organisms lay dormant within the flesh of their victims for many ouhrs, many reched maturity in a few heartbeats, devouring their hosts from the inside out.
..
The Paraiste of Mortrex pierced armoured hides with its diamond-hard mandibles and rippers flooded into the breech.
...
..Guardsmen were torn to shreds as ten thousand fangs...
...
Two weeks later and the planet of Mortrex was completely overrun by vast, ravenous tides of Ripper Swarms,

another 'unique' - with a rather nasty way of attacking.


Page 61

Genestealers are known to change over generations. The variations and adaptations between broods can be marked indeed, but Ymgarl Genestealers are unique in that they can alter their own alien flesh in a matter of moments. Their claw-tipped fingers can quickly elongate and fuse together to form curved blades and barbed hooks, or split apart as ropes of sinewy tendon to slash and ensare victims attempting to escape. When the brood comes under attack their Chitinous carapaces thicken and their leathery hides adapt to absorb the energy of the incoming attacks. There have even been reports that tehse cretures can change hue and colour, the better to go unseen in the darkness of night.
Ymgarl Genestealers' extreme adaptability comes at a price; they must feed, and feed often.
..
they pierce a their prey's flesh and gorge upon their life blood - the brood's sole source of nourishment. Those that cannot sate their bloodlust are forced to enter a state of dormancy or starve.

Attempts at Genestealer retconning and name dropping. The interesting thing here is the extreme ends this implies for their metabolic/adaptive/regenerative abilities (and the tradeoffs in material it requires.. eg they're 'always hungry'.) It shows prehaps why the Tyranids are so reactive and on the whole conservative, even in the use of attrition and human wave tactics - if they engineered every Tyranid to be super killer warrior with perfect healing and adaptive qualities, they'd probably have problems feeding and maintaining them.


Page 61

...whilst the survival instincts of other Genestealer broods leads them to flee their parent Hive Fleets, the Ymgarl Genestealers acttively seek them out, as if wishing to rejoin the Hive Mind.
..
However, the Hive Mind has no wish to reabsorb their biomatter, lest their uncontrollable instability spread amongst the Hive Fleet. AFter a world has been scoured of biomass, the Ymgarl brood is abandoned, forced again to enter a state of dormancy.

Apparently there are limits to the adaptability even of the Tyranids. This suggests that like with the Kroot there might be Tyranid version of evolutionary 'dead ends'. although it is odd that they cannot isolate or othrewise purge the abilities that the introduction of Ymgarl genestealers might create.


Page 62

The psychic presence of the Hive Mind radiates from the Hive Tyrant, flooding the minds of the enemy with an unfathomable sentience so alien that they quail against it and panic.
..
The Hive Tyrant rips the life force from its enemy, feeding upon it in order to reinvigorate and regenrate its own flesh.
...
The Hive Tyrant debilitates its enemies by triggering every nerve and pain receptor in their bodies, overwhelming their senses with wracking fits of agony.
..
The Hive Tyrant unleashes a piercing shriek of psychic energy that shreds the minds of the weak willed, reducing all but the strongest to insanity.

Psychic powers of a Hive Tyrant.


Pgae 62

The power of the hive mind infuses the organisms under its control, flooding their systems with such unnatural vitality that they can ignore the most grievous of wounds.
..
The TErvigon uses its prodigious psychic strength to channel and amplify the will of the Hive Mind.
...
The Tervigon seizes control of its minions' weapons symbiotes, guiding their fire whilst simultaneously dirving the swarms toward the enemy at a relentless, breakneck pace.

Psychic power of a Tervigon.


Page 62

The Broodlord projects an aura of raw alien hostility, a psychic shroud that disrupts the enemy, sapping their will to fight whilst simultaneously heightening their greatest fears.
..
The Broodlord subverts its prey's willpower and smothers its conscious mind, leaving the victim enthralled and completely at its mercy.

Psychic powers of a Broodlord.


PAge 62

The Zoanthrope focuses the warp power it has harnessed into a more contained stream, firing a single devastating bolt that can punch through fortress walls and vapourise a battle tank.

Psychic power of a Zoanthrope. They can vaporize shit (even tanks) melta syle.


Page 81

upon firing, the strangler seed pod grows to maturity in seconds, spreading out in all directions with blinding speed, sending out hooked tendrils to bind and tear at its prey. Should the seed pierce flesh befor reaching maturity, the unfortunate victim is ripped apart in an explosion of gore...

strangler seed pods. Explosives analogue, I guess.


Page 81

These [cluster] spines are hollow tubes made of brittle, chitin-like material that explodes on impact, shattering into thousands of shards. Fired in densely packed groups, these spines satureate large areas with needle-sized slivers.

Not unlike a Space Marine metal storm bolter round or any other fragmentation weapon. The Tyranids love frag weapons.


Page 81

Princeps Goethe of the Imperator Titan Mettalum Olympus single handldly managed to hold back a Tyranid invasion..
..
..a brood of Hierophant bio-titans pounced on the noble machine like a pack of wild dogs. In the frenzied attack, Mettalum Olympus' plasma reactor was breached and the resultant explosion vapourised everything for a kilometre around and left a crater that is still visible from orbit...

Implies perhaps a km or two diameter crater.. definitely single or double digit MJ explosion for that kind of crater.


Page 82

Heavy Venom cannon: these weapons are far larger and more deadly than normal venom cannons, launching forth a greater crystaline payload to supersonic speeds. THe projectiles collide with enough force to cave in an enemy battle tank and are accompanied by a lethal blast of electrical energy - a residue of that used to fire the weapon.

Supersonic projectiel weapon that discharges electrical effects.


Page 82

Stinger salvoes are simple but effective weapons that fire rows of metre-long, razor-sharp spikes that are often embedded within the carapaces of the largest tyranid creatures. These spines are typically envenomed..

Yet more Tyranid speargun weapons.


Page 82

STranglethorn cannons are heavier versions of the barbed strangelr...
...
The Growing pod's writhing mass of barbed tentacles can tear apart vehicles as they work their way in through vision slits or chinks in the armour plating, shredding its target from the inside out.

Yet more area-effect crusihing/teraring weapons.


Page 82

As they writhe and squirm, the segmented plates of the electroshock grubs create an electrostatic jolt. Powerful bolts of electricity arc betwene the teeming hordes of grubs, reducing anything caught inbetween to a charred ruin.
..
Dessicator larvae latch onto their victims with hollow fangs. within seconds every drop of moisture is ripped from the victim's body and nothing remains but a dry, shrivveled husk.
...
They [shreddershard beetles] instinctively try to crawl into any nook or creivce they can find..
..
Shreddershard beetles cannot live for long outside their host and as they die their bodies literally explode, covering those nearby in a shower of needles.

Thorax swarms.. basically clsoe in shotgun like attacks,


Page 82

The venom cannon is a long-powerful bio weapon that fires salvoes of highly corrosive crystals coated with a metallic, venemous residue. The weapon fires these projectiles at tremendous velocity using an electrostatic charge. A target that is not killed outright by the impact will be shredded by a hail of shards as the crystals shatter. Even vehicle armour can be punctured by these shards, although the lack of explosive impact considerably reduces the damage inflicted.

The Tyranids seem to have evolved some form of EM gun or perhals electrothermal gun technology.


Page 83

Boneswords are living blades of chitin that continuously grow to repair any damage and retain a monomolecular edge.
..
Boneswords crackle with psychic energy, and can drain the life-force of their victims. This energy is amplified when a bonesword is in close proximity with a nother of its kind, each feeding off the power generated by the other and growing in potency.

Tyranid monoedge and power/force weapons.


Page 83

..the claws and talons of many Tyranid creatures are tipped in extremely dense diamond-hard chitin. When combined with the overdeveloped musculature and steel-like tendsons of the Tyranids, these claws are capable of crushing reinforced ceramite..
...
Each [scything] talon is powered by whipcord muscles, allowing the Tyranid to eviscareate its victim sin a single, lightning-fast swipe.

Tyranid claws.


Page 83

Chitin: Even the most basic Tyranid life forms have tough leathery hides and a beetle-like carapace that covers the creatur's vital spots. This chitinous material is tough enough to turn aside blades and even glancing small-arms fire. The outer body of a Tyranid is coated in a waxy slime that allows the organsim to surivve for short periods of time in a vaccuum.

Tyranid Flak, in other words.


Page 83

Reinforced Chitin: The carapace plates of these Tyranid Creatures continously exude a sticky, resin-like substance. These secretions quickly harden, creating an additional self-healing layers of ablative armour that allows the Tyranid greater protection against incoming attacks. This material has also proven effective at attenuating the worse effects of intense heat and radiation.

Tyranid version of mesh I'd guess, which also shows how the 'adaptive' capabilities come into play - (not only granting healing/self repair, but the enahncement functions that can thicken the carapace or improve its ability to resist attacks.


Page 83

Hardened Carapace: The creature's carapace is made of denser, strengthened chitin, able to absorb kinetic impacts that would shatter or punch through lighter armour.

Carapace basically.


Page 83

bonded exoskeleton: Almost every bony-like plate and chitinous segment of these TYranid organisms' exoskeletons has grown and fused together to form a tough and virtually impenetrable sheathing.

Self contained power armour, although I suspect it would hamper mobility like that.


Page 83

Armoured shell: The largest Tyranid organisms are akin to walking battle tanks, with an armoured shell tougher than ceramite. Anything less than anti-tank weaponry patters harmlessly off these seemingly invulnerable monsters.

Terminator/artificer armor.


Page 84

Acid blood: the alien blood spilt from certain Tyranid life forms is so corrosive that it can eat through ceramite armour and dissolve flesh in mere moments..

Tyranid acid adaptation.


PAge 84

Adrenal glands are common amongst the front line creatures of a Tyranid swarm, saturating the bloodstream with chemicals to boost the creature's metabolism to a hyperactive state of frenzy.

Providing a short term boost/enhancement effect.


Page 84

Regeneration: Some Tyranids have shown the ability to heal from horrendous wounds and injuries tht should have proven fatal. Flesh and organs grow anew whilst bone and chitin knit together at an alarming rate, leaving little more than a scar as evidence of dany damage.

An in combat ability, meaning its pretty damn fast. (Eg less than hours or days) I'd imagine the tradeoffs can be severe for extreme cases.


Page 84

Some Tyranids have large vents sprouting from their backs from which toxic gasses poison a prey world's atmosphere. E ven brief exposure to these fumes can cause a victim to choke to death on its own blood.

More Tyranid biow warfare tricks.


PAge 84

Toxin sacs: These parasitic glands feed off their host and secrete vile fluids, coating the Tyranid's claws, fangs, and talons with lethal alien poisons. THese can vary from agonising necrotic venoms to toxins so deadly they can boil a victim's blood in its own veins.

Gotta love the Tyranid poison/toxin fetish.