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I am fairly new to the 40k story/background and I was wondering how the Chaos forces (especially chaos marines) get their equipment, do they have an economy system?

They obviously did have their gear when they turned and the traitor chapters probably had some stores as well.
They would however run out of ammunition, gas and equipment and people as well.
Or do the traitors work similar to the imperium, having recruiting worlds, forgeworlds etc?

Also how are they keeping up technology wise? I know (pre)heresy stuff is regarded as better/more sophisticated equipment than the modern stuff, however being chaos I doubt they are bothered as much with rules and restrictions as the mechanicus is, which would mean if they have tech priests they would have an easier time making real technological progress.

I also read that some champions get benefits from their patron god (Khorn, Slaanesh, etc) in the forms of possessed equipment, that however could not contribute enough to offset a missing economy methinks.

Thanks for reading and if you have a good suggestion on a novel discussing this, please let me know.

Well, they either -

a) Still have equipment from the HH
b) Have it made by the Dark Mecanicus
c) Raid it from the IoM
d) all of the above

No, they aren't restricted, but tech wise they are relatively primitive compared to the IoM. However, they compensate for this by having demonic enhancements on their weapons.

And no, there is no economy. An economy requires order.
order =/= chaos

Most of the time, if something breaks down or is damaged it's looted from Imperials. Although mind you I imagine the weapons stocks of the Legions were -massive- It could be very well possible that they never really ran out of equipment.

But yeah it's been explained that cultists use scavenged or makeshift gear. And that Chaos Renegade Marines loot what they need.

1.) Captured from Imperial forces
2.) Leftover from the Heresy
3.) Produced on a limited scale on their own worlds/bases by captured or raised slaves
4.) Purchased from Dark Mechanicus/renegade arms dealers, such as the Daemon Forge World of Xana II in the Eye of Terror. Xana II in particular is known for its advanced weapons.

Harriticus wrote:1.) Captured from Imperial forces
2.) Leftover from the Heresy
3.) Produced on a limited scale on their own worlds/bases by captured or raised slaves
4.) Purchased from Dark Mechanicus/renegade arms dealers, such as the Daemon Forge World of Xana II in the Eye of Terror. Xana II in particular is known for its advanced weapons.

Really, what sort of advanced weapons?
Kai Gun? (does that even exist anymore?)

Geneseed is stolen from the bodies of slain Space Marines and occasionally captured if they destroy a chapter.

Weapons are captured from the Imperium or made by worlds in the Eye in exchange for small benefits (eg, not being murdered). This doesn't always work out well. (see: Kai, Kai Gun)

Thanks for the fast replies!

So economy wise the traitor legions basically are limited by what they already have, they can loot or whatever they can trade for.

This brings me to another point. The loyalists "simply" extract the gene seed from fallen brothers and recruit a new chap from their recruiting worlds who gets all the astartes augments and pretty much replaces the lost battle brother.

It sounds like a lost chaos marine is actually lost forever, so that their numbers are pretty much finite, while the loyalists numbers are pretty much infinite.

Or am I (again) missing something?

Not really...with chaos its really weird.
Apparently, if a chaos marine dies his god (if he has one) can just resurrect him.
They also have access to cloning technology I believe, courtesy of a delightful chap named Fabius Bile.

They have crazy Chaos powered factories on worlds that defy physics, so they can build stuff. Also, they steal from the Imperium because that's sometimes easier.

Also, Chaos Space Marines steal geneseeds from loyalists they kill and recover geneseeds from their dead.

CthuluIsSpy wrote:

Harriticus wrote:1.) Captured from Imperial forces
2.) Leftover from the Heresy
3.) Produced on a limited scale on their own worlds/bases by captured or raised slaves
4.) Purchased from Dark Mechanicus/renegade arms dealers, such as the Daemon Forge World of Xana II in the Eye of Terror. Xana II in particular is known for its advanced weapons.

Really, what sort of advanced weapons?
Kai Gun? (does that even exist anymore?)

Harbinger Bomber is specifically cited as a Xana II product, along with most Chaos aircraft.

The Dark Mechanicus also built Planet Killer, tho if it was a Xana II brand or not is unknown.

fiddler6291 wrote:Thanks for the fast replies!

So economy wise the traitor legions basically are limited by what they already have, they can loot or whatever they can trade for.

This brings me to another point. The loyalists "simply" extract the gene seed from fallen brothers and recruit a new chap from their recruiting worlds who gets all the astartes augments and pretty much replaces the lost battle brother.

It sounds like a lost chaos marine is actually lost forever, so that their numbers are pretty much finite, while the loyalists numbers are pretty much infinite.

Or am I (again) missing something?

They're not exactly very limited. Ships lost or destroyed in the warp often drift near the Eye, allowing them to be looted and used by the Chaos Marines. This often happens with Nurgle's Plague Fleets as well. Chaos Marine gene seed works in pretty much the same way as loyalist ones as far as I know.

As said above Fabius Bile can clone marines, implant normal humans to be comparable to marines (and insane...) and he's also trying to discover the secrets of the gene seed so he can make his own.

Space Ebay

Chamazon.

Yes the Kai-gun still exists, but the Chaos Codex no longer lists it as an option.

It was a pretty weird weapon though.

Yeah, the rules were quite awesome as well;

Kai Gun
When warp storm Gae-sann enveloped the Kai system in M34 it absorbed into the Eye of Terror a powerful industrial culture. The Machine Smiths of Kai bartered their skills for a measure of protection, learning to fashion weapons of the warp that they could not have conceived of before. Their ploy eventually failed and the Daemon hordes descended to fight for possession of these new domains. All that remained after the destruction of Kai was the weapons they had built to appease their slayers
The Kai Gun is a huge Bolter of archaic design, so large that a normal man would be unable to lift it. It is a two handed weapon (you do not gain an extra attack for having two weapons). The gun is a psychic catalyst, turning the hate and malice of its firer into tangible bolts of energy. The Kai Gun is a normal ranged weapon with the following profile:
Range: 24" Str 6 AP 3 Assault 2 The Kai Gun costs 25 points

Ok tell me if I am wrong, but shouldn't chaos tanks run off off blood?

nomotog wrote:Ok tell me if I am wrong, but shouldn't chaos tanks run off off blood?

Only Khorne Tanks.
Also, I'd imagine Daemon Possessed Tanks can repair/modify itself in such ways as to still be useful, after being damaged.

They have Chaos Forge Worlds. The Eye of terror is kinda like the Imperium but shows it's evil and has blood runes everywhere, though they are not united.

blood reaper wrote:Yeah, the rules were quite awesome as well;

Kai Gun
When warp storm Gae-sann enveloped the Kai system in M34 it absorbed into the Eye of Terror a powerful industrial culture. The Machine Smiths of Kai bartered their skills for a measure of protection, learning to fashion weapons of the warp that they could not have conceived of before. Their ploy eventually failed and the Daemon hordes descended to fight for possession of these new domains. All that remained after the destruction of Kai was the weapons they had built to appease their slayers
The Kai Gun is a huge Bolter of archaic design, so large that a normal man would be unable to lift it. It is a two handed weapon (you do not gain an extra attack for having two weapons). The gun is a psychic catalyst, turning the hate and malice of its firer into tangible bolts of energy. The Kai Gun is a normal ranged weapon with the following profile:
Range: 24" Str 6 AP 3 Assault 2 The Kai Gun costs 25 points

Fancy pants!
Seems like it would go quite nicely in a Slaanesh-themed list. It is not sound weaponry, but it is fairly exotic.

CthuluIsSpy wrote:Not really...with chaos its really weird.
Apparently, if a chaos marine dies his god (if he has one) can just resurrect him.
They also have access to cloning technology I believe, courtesy of a delightful chap named Fabius Bile.

Not really as simple as that.

Chaos worshipers can be resurrected by their gods. Basically, when a CSM is killed, his soul enters the warp. This soul can then be placed into a new body by the Chaos Gods. However, it is a very honour to be granted a new body after your death, and only the mightiest champions and daemons will have this chance. Khorne will not bother himself with the dozens of lowly bezerkers he looses across the galaxy everyday.

Fabius is apparently becoming some kind of expert on gene-seed. He is more or less able to create his own marines. He sells his (expensive) services to the highest bidder. He also a very talented cloner (if it's a word?). He managed to clone Horus once, and even cloned himself several times (probably the dream of any slaaneshi worshiper actually ). But the process must be difficult and delicate, for he apparently never really tried to clone anything else.

On a side note, CSM legions are known for capturing loyalist gen-seed whenever they can (and sometimes even harvesting it directly on dead loyalists), so they must have a way of spawning their own space marines like the loyalists.

Laodamia wrote:
CSM legions are known for capturing loyalist gen-seed whenever they can (and sometimes even harvesting it directly on dead loyalists), so they must have a way of spawning their own space marines like the loyalists.

They create space marines form this geneseed and uncorrupted humans, thus a basic space marine. But the indoctrination is different...
Sooner or later they are mostly evil-ultra-smurfs, as geneseed defines the marine in some way.

Wouldn't hunt for 'loyalist' geneseed if they could use their own like pre-heresy.

Also, I believe they can force/quick corrupt humans/space marines to their side. E.g. Take a normal human captive and inject them with chaotic geneseed to turn them into a chaos marine.

CSM numbers are just as limitless as the imperium's because they don't go through the long training process that normal marines do. You see, normal space marine's win battle through tactical strikes, order, clear headedness, effective use of life. Whereas CSM are fuelled by rage, hate and go into frenzies which make them harder to kill and faster than normal and whatnot. Luckily, their leader's and veterans often have thousands or ten of thousands of years of experience so the new recruit's inexperience is often inconsequential.

CthuluIsSpy wrote:

Harriticus wrote:1.) Captured from Imperial forces
2.) Leftover from the Heresy
3.) Produced on a limited scale on their own worlds/bases by captured or raised slaves
4.) Purchased from Dark Mechanicus/renegade arms dealers, such as the Daemon Forge World of Xana II in the Eye of Terror. Xana II in particular is known for its advanced weapons.

Really, what sort of advanced weapons?
Kai Gun? (does that even exist anymore?)

Some known designs from Xana II are the Harbinger bomber, the Hellblade/Helltalon and the very advanced Idolator class raider.
While the Dark Mechanicus is aparently quite a bit smaller than their loyalist cousins one could argue that their freedom from dogma allows
them to create pieces of technology which cannot be replicated by the adepts of mars.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

lunarman wrote:Also, I believe they can force/quick corrupt humans/space marines to their side. E.g. Take a normal human captive and inject them with chaotic geneseed to turn them into a chaos marine.

CSM numbers are just as limitless as the imperium's because they don't go through the long training process that normal marines do. You see, normal space marine's win battle through tactical strikes, order, clear headedness, effective use of life. Whereas CSM are fuelled by rage, hate and go into frenzies which make them harder to kill and faster than normal and whatnot. Luckily, their leader's and veterans often have thousands or ten of thousands of years of experience so the new recruit's inexperience is often inconsequential.

Some chaosmarines are frenzied killers, others are just as methodical as their loyalist brethren.

CthuluIsSpy wrote:Well, they either -

a) Still have equipment from the HH
b) Have it made by the Dark Mecanicus
c) Raid it from the IoM
d) all of the above

No, they aren't restricted, but tech wise they are relatively primitive compared to the IoM. However, they compensate for this by having demonic enhancements on their weapons.

And no, there is no economy. An economy requires order.
order =/= chaos

dont be so naiive. economy can take many forms. dealing in slaves/tech/favors is very chaotic to say the least. besides, chaos is not chaotic in every respect. if it was they would not be able to coordinate anything. war needs planning and some degree of disipline. thats order too...

another point: where did defilers come from if not from some form of economy and structured production? wishfull thinking? come on.

tarnish wrote:

CthuluIsSpy wrote:Well, they either -

a) Still have equipment from the HH
b) Have it made by the Dark Mecanicus
c) Raid it from the IoM
d) all of the above

No, they aren't restricted, but tech wise they are relatively primitive compared to the IoM. However, they compensate for this by having demonic enhancements on their weapons.

And no, there is no economy. An economy requires order.
order =/= chaos

dont be so naiive. economy can take many forms. dealing in slaves/tech/favors is very chaotic to say the least. besides, chaos is not chaotic in every respect. if it was they would not be able to coordinate anything. war needs planning and some degree of disipline. thats order too...

another point: where did defilers come from if not from some form of economy and structured production? wishfull thinking? come on.

+1

Contrary to popular belief, Chaos is not as chaotic as you might think. The followers of Chaos can actually be compared to some kind of loose feudal society with the Four Chaos Gods at the top. There is no real, definite hierarchy between Chaos followers, only a complicated network of alliances, oaths of fealty and sponsorship. In the end, you get a multitude of independent warbands, empires, realms, etc, each with a powerful daemon/CSM/primarch at its head.
And most of the time, all those different factions would probably be trading with each other to get their supplies. Some factions are in high demand for military equipment and hardware (like the Chaos warbands) since they are in a state of near constant conflict with the IoM. However, these warbands also gain access to large amounts of wealth (raw resources, loot, slaves, souls, or whatever you can think of) gained from their raids.
On the other side, other factions would have access to great amounts of military gear (chaotic forge worlds) but would depend on the warbands for their raw materials.

See? Chaos is actually based on some kind of market economy where currency is replaced by barter. It is true that this form of capitalism is extremely competitive and violent but it's still capitalism. It's even got a name: Crony Capitalism.

Laodamia wrote:

tarnish wrote:

CthuluIsSpy wrote:Well, they either -

a) Still have equipment from the HH
b) Have it made by the Dark Mecanicus
c) Raid it from the IoM
d) all of the above

No, they aren't restricted, but tech wise they are relatively primitive compared to the IoM. However, they compensate for this by having demonic enhancements on their weapons.

And no, there is no economy. An economy requires order.
order =/= chaos

dont be so naiive. economy can take many forms. dealing in slaves/tech/favors is very chaotic to say the least. besides, chaos is not chaotic in every respect. if it was they would not be able to coordinate anything. war needs planning and some degree of disipline. thats order too...

another point: where did defilers come from if not from some form of economy and structured production? wishfull thinking? come on.

+1

Contrary to popular belief, Chaos is not as chaotic as you might think. The followers of Chaos can actually be compared to some kind of loose feudal society with the Four Chaos Gods at the top. There is no real, definite hierarchy between Chaos followers, only a complicated network of alliances, oaths of fealty and sponsorship. In the end, you get a multitude of independent warbands, empires, realms, etc, each with a powerful daemon/CSM/primarch at its head.
And most of the time, all those different factions would probably be trading with each other to get their supplies. Some factions are in high demand for military equipment and hardware (like the Chaos warbands) since they are in a state of near constant conflict with the IoM. However, these warbands also gain access to large amounts of wealth (raw resources, loot, slaves, souls, or whatever you can think of) gained from their raids.
On the other side, other factions would have access to great amounts of military gear (chaotic forge worlds) but would depend on the warbands for their raw materials.

See? Chaos is actually based on some kind of market economy where currency is replaced by barter. It is true that this form of capitalism is extremely competitive and violent but it's still capitalism. It's even got a name: Crony Capitalism.

+1. See "Traitor General" by Dan Abnett.

Many of the Chaos-held worlds that still exist in Realspace trade with other renegades, pirates, immoral Rogue Traders, and even Xenos. This barter usually centers around things like slaves, raw materials, and artifacts that the Chaos-held world cannot otherwise produce on their own.