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I'm curious to know how people choose their army "sub-faction". By sub-faction, I mean like Black Legion or Alpha Legion for CSM, Hivefleet Kraken or Hivefleet Leviathan for Tyranids, etc.

Do you use one of the sub-factions explained in detail from your codex, one of the sub-factions vaguely referred to in your codex, or something else entirely?

I usually make up something new as it is fun, and the only way I will get 'my guys' to be exactly like I want. I always do this unless there is an already existing chapter/warband/whatever that I really like.

I decide on whatever paint scheme I like best. Only then do I start looking for a sub-faction that wears those colours.

I chose Black Templars after flipping through the "How to Paint Space Marines" book and really liking their scheme.

I chose Crimson Fists because their fluff is cool and their dark blue with red fist looks a lot cooler than the smurf blue of the Ultramarines and their successors.

Depends on the army. For SoB, I finally settled on the "blank slate" option of a Minor Order Militant. For IG and SM, however, I'd go with one of the minor, yet established sub-factions - Valhallans and Celestial Lions, respectively. I feel this approach allows you to draw on some established fluff and possibly even receive nods of recognition, whilst at the same time avoiding any cases of "oh, yet another army of X". Uniqueness can feel nice.

I choose them based on colors, appearance, and fluff.

So with my CSM, I was stuck between Word Bearers and Iron Warriors. I'm better at painting metal (and like it better, too! ), found both looking just as cool, and slightly preferred the Iron Warrior fluff - so I went with those.

Necrons - I got into Necrons before they really had much in the way of separate factions, and now that they have I just don't care enough about the new fluff to pick one.

Tyranids - soon to be sold, but I picked Leviathan partially because of the paint scheme and partially because (if I'm remembering correctly) it's the only one of the 3 main ones in the 4th ed book that's still alive.

Imperial Guard - Just got these recently, and am in the process of converting them to a Hydra army (led by Company Commander Red Skull).

 Lynata wrote:
Depends on the army. For SoB, I finally settled on the "blank slate" option of a Minor Order Militant. For IG and SM, however, I'd go with one of the minor, yet established sub-factions - Valhallans and Celestial Lions, respectively. I feel this approach allows you to draw on some established fluff and possibly even receive nods of recognition, whilst at the same time avoiding any cases of "oh, yet another army of X". Uniqueness can feel nice.

This is how I've been going about things, to answer my own question. I look for a tiny bit of intriguing fluff to excite my imagination, and then take the ball and run with it in my own direction.

I took a core army that I liked, found out what options for customization were there, and took it from there.

Thus, my "Order of the Argent Blade", a minor Order Militant of the Sororitas, descended from the Order of the Ebon Chalice, was born.

I choose because I either like the fluff or because I like the painting scheme.

For me, Thousand sons pretty much cover both. They look bad-ass and their fluff is just the bomb.

Now for my new Tyranids I chose hive fleet Eumenides because the color scheme is beautiful and something else from the standard bone color or red tyranids.

For the most part I choose to represent the main factions for my armies. Since I have the IInfantryman s handbook. I have my IG represent the 91st Cadian Regiment. My Chaos Space Marines are Black Legion. My sons Tyranids are Hive Fleet Hydra. Half of this games appeal to me is the lore.

I gave my Tau white sept markings, then realised that white sept markings meant they were from T'au so yeah...

I personally made my marines from a new home brew chapter so I could then choose chapter tactics to suit the battle.

I lean towards Fists however just because I like the fluff.

 throwoff wrote:
I personally made my marines from a new home brew chapter so I could then choose chapter tactics to suit the battle.

I lean towards Fists however just because I like the fluff.

Very smart

I look at history for mine.

Which limits me to Guard Armies only really (which is fine).

My armies are made from real world themes and as a result I loose a lot of men during 99% of my battles.

For my Nids;

Battle for Macragge was my Starter set, and although 4th Ed was on its way out the door, and I didn't start until the summer 5th dropped, Behemoth was the Nids featured in the box and the paint manual said how to paint Behemoth.

For my Blood Ravens;
The tactical squad that comes in BfM was originally painted ultramarines and badly with yellow instead of gold. Looked horrendous. I read the novelisation of DoW2 by Chris Roberson and fell in love and used the image on the cover and the descriptions inside to paint the squad. Never looked back.

For my GK;
I like Draigo's fluff. I don't care what your opinion is on him, I like it. He was of the 3rd Brotherhood so so are mine. All 10 Knights. The others (Paladins and Purifiers) are from their own groups :p

For my Crimson Slaughter;
I wanted the exact opposite of my other armies; little psykers, while maintaining a hard hitting CC force. I made my own fluff about how these guys were ex-World Eaters made their own warband in M34 and just happens the official GW CS took the same name.
Then I hated it and made them generic World Eaters but with more control and military dicipline.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I also have some models as Black Legion. As most of my armies are red and this was as the paints were swapping to the current line, I had (and still have) 1 pot of Mechrite Red left which is need for all 4 armies in some capacity. I decided I couldn't cover a Heldrake. So decided all vehicles would be Black Legion and a Black Legion Terminator Lord would lead my army under their own Lord (from DV). The BL Lord is a lieutenant of Abaddon sent to oversee the Warband who have allied to his 13th Cursade in return for vehicle support.
Note this was long before either supplement dropped and I have neither. I use the standard Codex and have only played 1 game (and lost a Cultist so can't field 2 troops).

Ended up going with creating my own Minor Order for my SoB. I realised that I really wanted to think up a whole backstory and colour scheme for my dudettes, and a custom Order was the way to do that.

Though I will go with a pre-made Chapter when I get around to picking up some Marine allies for my Sisters. Either Red Hunters or Black Templars, since, thematically, they fit with the Sisters very well.

Don't have any subf-actions.

Majority paint scheme is BL, but codex says is pointless since its lead me down a garden path since 4th Have all other chaos legions gathering dust(ish)

Aside a Hel brute attachment. No point mono-scheming as yet.

Want to, but...

Technically, its a faction of its, mentionned as a subfaction in another codex.

I choose the DKoK because of the models, and the rules, too, half-fearless guardsmen who were stubborn back then are awesome.

I use Kraken in the sense of the models because I have 3rd edition Tyranid models, but the paint scheme is from the 3rd edition codex cover, which I amazingly haven't seen anywhere else... And since I had spare Space Marines as all people do, I started getting Ultramarines 3rd Company because of the Tyrannic War Veterans that have fluff closely related to 3rd Company. Natural progression there.

My Eldar are just about a decent paint scheme and what I prefer to play tactically. I have a very powerful gun theme with Rangers so Alaitoc made sense.

It's not difficult to find the sub faction that works best. Sometimes it's just the link in the fluff that matches two of your models together.