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Do you mean they are included in the 1st company roll, or they are just considered veterans?

They wouldn't be included in the 1st Company Roll, because If that was so 1st company thunderhawks and Land Raiders would be detracting from the fighting strength of the company. I'll use my lovely Salamanders as an example.

(Quoted Directly from the Warhammer 40k Wiki, http://warhammer40k.wikia.com/wiki/Salamanders )

Chapter Fleet

The Salamanders Chapter fleet is known to comprise the following vessels:

◾2 Battle Barges
◾10 Strike Cruisers
◾5 Rapid Strike Cruisers
◾220 Thunderhawk gunships

Now, ignore the Battle Barges and Strike Cruisers. The Salamanders have an exceptional number of Thunderhawks, but if the pilots of the Thunderhawks were to be counted as battle brothers in the standard companies, they would have more than 880 brothers added to the roll. Obviously, you don't mean Thunderhawks, but that's just my example. Not the best, but the first I could think of.

HOWEVER, this would not be the case in other companies. If the entire reserve Assault Company was put formed into Land Speeder squadrons, they would still be considered members of the 8th.


The most basic form of organisation for a standard codex compliant chapter would be 10 Veteran Squads, with of course command squads and all that apparatus. These 10 squads can further be split into 20 Combat Squads, which would seem the logical organisation. If we were to work by basic logic, and also what is common, we would therefore have 10 squads of Sternguard Veterans and 10 squads of Vanguard veterans. We would technically have 5 FULL squads of Vanguard, and 5 FULL squads of Sternguard.

Depending on the situation and foes at hand, the squads could then be turned into TDA squads or kept as PA squads.

HOWEVER, if we are to use the GW 1st Company as an example...

(This is quoted from the Games Workshop website, under Warhammer 40,000/Warhammer 40,000 Armies/Space Marines/Apocalypse Formations/1st Company Veterans. http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/productDetail.jsp?catId=cat1120011a&prodId=prod2080046a )

1 Captain in Terminator Armour; 1 Chaplain in Terminator Armour; 1 Space Marine Command Squad; 3 Venerable Dreadnoughts; 5 Terminator Squads; 5 Terminator Close Combat Squads; 5 sets of Vanguard Veterans; 3 sets of Sternguard Veterans; and 2 sets of Veterans.

Of course, this is a template, and is not to be taken as exact canon. It provides a good base though.


This entire thread could have been solved by saying 10 Veteran squads, of varying designations and missing space marines (battle losses) which could be split into 20 Combat Squads.

Super Ready wrote:From a common sense point of view, a Chapter should be using the best kit it has available except if (and sometimes even when!) there's considerably high risk of said kit being lost.

That's one way of looking at it. I see it more as them keeping the good stuff in a secure locker until it's really, really necessary to get it out (like Andy Hoare once suggested about the SoB and their "Break Glass in case of Renegade Marines" special armoury), simply because there's always a risk of losing it due to some freak occurrence. Imagine how crappy a Captain would feel for having to explain the loss of a suit of vaunted Terminator Armour to a bunch of rebellious villagers rigging a bridge with explosives!

DeffDred wrote:This is just speculation but [...]

Sounds viable, this would fit well to the idea of Space Marines becoming jacks-of-all-trades ... although I would add that the numbers are probably more an ideal rather than common practice, not due to a shortage in men (as they'd simply promote some Marines from the other Companies) but rather as equipment gets lost that may not be easily replaceable.

Hinges a lot on personal interpretation regarding the Imperium's industrial capabilities, though, or how much the Space Marines rely on their own forges rather than ordering stuff from some Forge World.

DeffDred wrote:I would also like to ask a question. Are the pilots of 1st company vehicles also veterans themselves?

A "recent" WD article (#300) about the Ultramarines' organisation mentioned that the vehicles supporting a Battle Company are crewed by Marines (Tactical Marines, if the 2E 'dex is still an indication) from the Reserve Companies. This doesn't invalidate the possibility of Veterans manning the vehicles themselves if they think they don't necessarily need the entire Company to deploy on foot, though (I like to think they are as multi-purpose as you suggested yourself, picking the gun or the vehicle most suitable for the mission at hand).

And of course that is just one of many possible ways it could be done, anyways. No canon, conflicting source, blah blah ... you know the drill.

Legion of Flame wrote:This entire thread could have been solved by saying 10 Veteran squads, of varying designations and missing space marines (battle losses) which could be split into 20 Combat Squads.

Good point.

A "recent" WD article (#300) about the Ultramarines' organisation mentioned that the vehicles supporting a Battle Company are crewed by Marines (Tactical Marines, if the 2E 'dex is still an indication) from the Reserve Companies.

That's what always made the most sense to me. Even though people paint their armies at one unified company, if you are playing a codex legal chapter, if you already have more than 20 assault marines from a company on the field (between bikes, assault squads and landspeeders), any marines above that 20 would have shoulder markings from the 8th reserve company. Same for Devastators and Tactical marines, of course, in their own numbers.

It's not that hard to describe a 1st company. There are (nominally) 100 members, who are members of both Veteran Squads and Terminator squads. They take to the field as either, as the Chapter needs them to. That does not make 100 men automatically become 200, just because they have dual-roles.