Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

And the Inquisitor wants to induct the entire regiment into his House Army (Or is it his House Guard?) and train them into Inquisitorial Storm Troopers, but the Grey Knights want to do there standard 'exterminate the Guard' schtick. Who gets them? The Inquisitor who finds the Regiment worth salvaging, or the Grey Knights who simply want to kill them because, low and behold, thier a secret.

And what happens if Inquisitorial Storm Troopers see Grey Knights? Wouldn't they, technically, go before the sword as well?

An Inquisitor doesn't have a 'house army' AFAIK...
Inq. Storm Troopers aren't recruited like that.
IIRC GK are Inquisition militant so they'd have to follow his orders regarding survivors...
So if he wanted the GK to kill them all then place to bodies to create a gigantic smiley face then they'd have to...

I think the Inquisitor has the technical final word on the subject, but if the Grey Knights were in a particularly bloodthirsty mood there wouldn't be a whole lot he could do to stop them. And as a side note, do the Grey Knights kill survivors in order to preserve their secrecy, or only when said survivors witnessed the physical manifestations of Chaos? I thought it was the second. Most of the time it wouldn't matter, but let's say they got called in for a Chaos cult and it turned out to be a Genestealer cult, then I was under the impression that the survivors in the second scenario would be off the hook. I've never read their Codex, though, so I can't say for sure.

The inquisitor wouldn't make them ISTs, but he might permantly requisition their services.

In this situation the GKs would probably let him keep them, unless they had had too much contact with Daemons. In which case the Gks mandate to curb corruption would override the Inquisitor's desire that they be attached to him.


I am sure they would talk about it, but if the GKs felt it was required to destroy them then the Inquisitor couldn't do anything otherwise. If anything, the Inquisitor would probably be more likely to kill them then the Gks would be.


The Gks only purge regimants that might be tainted. Seeing a GK is nothing. Seeing daemons means they might be corrupted, and its better to be safe then sorry. Life is cheap in the IG, better to suffer the minor cost of replacing the regiment then have them be corrupted and result in a whole new problem.

The kicker is that if you see a GK you probably see daemons too so you really are screwed.

I think it should be the Inquisitor who has the final word. Then again the GK codex is quite clear about that the GK likes to be cheated by Eldar and Tau, while they kill off any human ever laying eyes on them. Then again it's the crap Matt Ward has written, so I wouldn't bat an eye if you disregard it and barges ahead with your own fluff.

Inquisitors and Grey Knights have a blurry kind of joint jurisdiction, and I think it would depend on the ranks involved and the reasons involved. In the codex there are examples of the GK going to great lengths to eradicate IG regiments, and there are examples of them not bothering to kill a single one.

Beaviz81 wrote:Then again it's the crap Matt Ward has written, so I wouldn't bat an eye if you disregard it and barges ahead with your own fluff.

Oh for the love of....

Give it a rest will you?

It is crap though

Is it standard practice to wipe out the IG regiments after a battle, or is this only in cases where the spread of taint is suspected?

Technically, the Inquisition have no hold on the Grey Knights - they can only ever request their services.

I think if the Grey Knights suspected the regiment was tainted the inquisitor would probably have them all executed himself.

Iranna.

Think you'd end up with a bit of a pissing match. However as an Inquisitor can't imagine you'd want the GK pissed at you, all depends on how much knight want them dead and how much the inquisitor wants them alive.

Fair compromise would be mind wipe the whole regiment, keeping martial skill intact but all memory of knights being removed.

The GKs basically ARE the Ordo Malleus. If a GK and Inquisitor have a disagreement, the GK wins hands down.

The Ordo supports the GKs, not the other way around.

Grey Templar wrote:The GKs basically ARE the Ordo Malleus. If a GK and Inquisitor have a disagreement, the GK wins hands down.

The Ordo supports the GKs, not the other way around.

You sure? What if the Inquisitor was Ordo Xenos and the Guard he requisitioned fought Xenos who consorted with Daemons. This particular Inquisitor might value these Guardsmen for being able to fight in particular conditions (For example, The Gundrite Rifles and the Death Watch fighting on a Xenos planet teeming with Chaos, which the former embarassed the latter since they guardsmen had fought there before. *From Eisenhorn, First Book I think...*).

But even if a Ordo Hereticus Inquisitor doesn't suspect taint and finds these veterans more suitable under his House Banner, would the Grey Knights still be able to execute them even though the Inquisitors outside their Ordo desire their services?

I don't think so...

Yes, the GKs would be able to execute the Guardsmen. Only an Ordo Malleus inquisitor would have a hope of vouching for the Guardsmen and even then the GKs would have the final verdict.

The Ordo Malleus is the most important facet of the inqusition, followed by the Ordo Hereticus, and the younger Ordo Xenos.

Ordo Xenos is the joint oldest with Ordo Malleus...
Ordo Hereticus is the newer organisation...
That's how i remember it...

You are right purplefood, though both Malleus and Hereticus undoubtedly crosses paths. And that reminds me. Several million guardsmen on Vrak saw both Grey Knights and daemons, what happened to them?

Now does a regular space marine chapter master have to take orders from an inquisitor? What if he refused ?

usmcmidn wrote:Now does a regular space marine chapter master have to take orders from an inquisitor? What if he refused ?

Yes. Everyone takes orders from Inquisitors...
Unless the CM is stupid he won't outright refuse...
He'll say 'Our forces are currently occupied' or 'we are currently rebuilding our strength' or something...
The Inquisitor may take punitive actions otherwise...

Ordo Xenos isn't important if you don't consider the Tyranid or the Ork a threat, sure.

There are plenty of Ordo Malleus Inquisitors who make no use of the GKs, because they do their job well, and the Chaos Cults and Sorcerers they persecute never get to the daemon-summoning stage. However, since this doesn't make for exciting books, rather more of a police procedural where nothing really goes catastrophically wrong, they focus on the guys who are called in when it does catastrophically wrong.

Now, when it comes to the Guardsmen in question.... the Inquisitor isn't going to want a bunch of guys who might be tainted by Chaos in his retinue, unless he's particularly Radical and would not be calling in the GK in the first place. Inquisitors aren't stupid, they know the risks of Chaos taint, they know that a Chaos-tainted individual is, unless by some miraculous event, extremely fething dangerous to have around.

They're not really going to have this conversation with the GK. If the Inquisitor him/herself believes the Guardsmen might be tainted, they're not going to overlook that because they want to be nice and reward these guys with service in their Retinue. No, they're just going to give the order, and reward these guys with a quick, merciful death before they start mutating.

The GK are a powerful, individual Chapter of Space Marines... but they're the Chamber Militant of the Ordo Malleus. The Inquisition says "jump", they say "Do we get to kill daemons up there?".

All Space Marine Chapters are technically under the authority of the Inquisition (as is every other man, woman and child in the Imperium save the God-Emperor and the Custodes), but in the reality of the situation, it's not that easy or straight-forward.

purplefood most Inquisitors have learned to ask not just order Space Marine Chapters around as they don't want to meet with "unfortunate accidents" on the field of battle. Hehe then again I'm personally unsure how to take on the GK. On one side you have canon, but it's written by Matt Ward.

The only canon case of Space Marines outright refusing Inquisitorial demands would be the Space Wolves, and it's understandable that the Inquisition doesn't want to start a (rather pointless and resource-consuming) war over that. The Ecclessiarchy already tried after the Vandire Heresy and that was an obscene failure.

Psienesis wrote:
The Inquisition says "jump", they say "Do we get to kill daemons up there?".

Pretty much this

The GKs are the Ordos Militant of the Ordo Malleus (Unless this has been superceded in the new fluff?) Essentially meaning that the Inquisition gives them the orders. Being Marines they are less dependant than others, but they should still hold to the Inquisitorial authority.

That said, as has been said above; most Inquisitors, if they noted a particular guard regiment to be "tainted" would not hesitate to give the execution order themselves.

Hazardous Harry wrote:The only canon case of Space Marines outright refusing Inquisitorial demands would be the Space Wolves, and it's understandable that the Inquisition doesn't want to start a (rather pointless and resource-consuming) war over that. The Ecclessiarchy already tried after the Vandire Heresy and that was an obscene failure.

There are cases of Space Marines ignoring/denying commands from Inquisitors; though most of those are because of requests from elsewhere in the Inquisition. One example is the Red Scorpions abandoning Inquisitor Lok on Beta Anphelion IV because someone higher up in Ordo Xenos wanted rid of him.

My mistake, I meant to say the Inquisition as a whole, rather than individuals, and only outright refusing them rather than making excuses or not responding.

KplKeegan wrote:
But even if a Ordo Hereticus Inquisitor doesn't suspect taint and finds these veterans more suitable under his House Banner, would the Grey Knights still be able to execute them even though the Inquisitors outside their Ordo desire their services?

I don't think so...

Sounds like the makings of some fluff to justify a tabletop battle between a GK force and an IG force. The IG might not be so willing to be executed and may resist. If the inquisitor is totally convinced they're not tainted and thinks the Grey Knights are being unnecessarily and wastefully bloodthirsty, he may assist the IG. There are lot of different personalities in the inquisition so some might really take umbrage to the new GK "kill everyone and bathe in their blood" mentality.

Nah, the fluff is very clear on that point.

The Ordo Malleus has NO direct control over the GK's beyond the all reaching authority of the Inquisition as a whole. An Inquisitor requests the help of the GK's and vica versa. In all matters military the GK report back through their own command structure. The Inq has the higher political control.

Annihilating the Regiment is done for secrecy not a taint so to preserve that sanctity they would do so, that is fundamental to the Ordo Malleus and the fight against the Daemons so wouldn't be questioned.

If the Inq wants a regiment, division, corps or army of IG they simply requisition one with their Inq seal. No need to pick one up from a battle field.

Magpie wrote:If the Inq wants a regiment, division, corps or army of IG they simply requisition one with their Inq seal. No need to pick one up from a battle field.

Not if the Regiment has valuable experience with certain criteria (Again I point at the Gundrite Rifles in Eisenhorn) that makes them desirable. Besides, they're there already, proven in battle, veterans by Guard standards, free of taint, and some Shiney Jockey wants to purge them just because they were seen (I mean, its counter productive when you're this huge, shiney/silver creature-guy in armor and expect no-one to see you).

I believe that most Inquisitors have the personality to pick regiments who've proven themselves capable, and slowly wittle them down until they can snuggly fit into his/her retinue. I doubt an Inquisitor would pick a fresh regiment because the Guard are simply green.

Well I've not read Eisenhorn as yet so fair enough, working my way through Grey Knights and laying waste to things at the moment.

As of now you have the Grey Knights stupidly allying with any xenos while they butcher any human they meet. That sound like a pretty stupid combat-doctrine.

I guess the ending answer is it varies depending on the Inquisitor there, the Grey Knight in charge of them and the author writing the story.

The GKs are tasked with stopping daemon invasions.

The Eldar have some experience in this field.


Nothing is out of the question when daemons are involved. All other quarrels are set aside.

Naturally the GKs see the Eldar as nothing more then tools and the feeling is probably mutual. An alliance of convienience.

Grey Templar wrote:The GKs are tasked with stopping daemon invasions.

The Eldar have some experience in this field.


Nothing is out of the question when daemons are involved. All other quarrels are set aside.

Naturally the GKs see the Eldar as nothing more then tools and the feeling is probably mutual. An alliance of convienience.

Wouldn't it be the Eldar seeing the GK as their catspaws?