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well, as i have a ton of armies and the "modelling A.D.D / humming bird syndrome" is kicking in again, im thinking of doing a pre heresey space marine army. the idea is a chapter that existed at moderate strength before the heresey, then lost majority of its chapter during the battle. a strike cruiser crashed on an ice world during the battle, and its survivors were frozen untill recently. the now recently "rescued/uncovered etc" marines are resuming the fight.

modelling wise ill be making use of forgeworld upgrade packs and its older pattern of armor. im thinking of using a combo of the mark IV corvus armor and red scorpion upgrades / characters. what im wondering on is this:

to keep things "simple" i want to keep to current SM units and rules. however what types of these units would be considered rare, or not used, or used frequently for a marine army exisiting prior to and during the heresay? the army is not really meant to be hype tournament level competetive, but more of a fluffy build with a chance to go to town and make a really cool looking army model wise.

so any help from the marine experts is much apreciated.

If it is to be fluffy, there were no "chapters" pre-heresy, which was itself a post-heresy invention.

To run with your story, you would either have "frozen" guys from the loyalists, which would largely be Ultamarines, Imperial Fist, what-have-you as they are now, though they might not use the markings, company-colours etc.. set out in the (post-heresy)-Codex Astartes.

If you're "frozen" guys are from a traitor legion, it enters a whole different level of controversy on how to run a "pre-heresy" World Eater, Thousand Sons, Death Guard, etc.., which is quickly turning into a science of its own it seems.

I'd say don't make them part of a legion if you want to do your own stuff. Make them a successor from one of the other chapter that happened to become lost shortly after the initial split just after the heresy. Get the same look and feel while maintaining your own look to them.

Yea I'm figuring out that per heresy the marines were more of massive legions led by the primarchs, and didn't split into chapters untill after the heresy. So the exact nature and background is editable, but I'm wondering on the actual units etc. if there are things that were more common, or stuff that's new that would not be easily acsessable.

You should really read some of the Horus Heresy books before doing this if you want to do it right. You have over 14,000 points of 40k armies and you are JUST learning about the difference between Legions and Chapters?

DarthSpader wrote:Yea I'm figuring out that per heresy the marines were more of massive legions led by the primarchs, and didn't split into chapters untill after the heresy. So the exact nature and background is editable, but I'm wondering on the actual units etc. if there are things that were more common, or stuff that's new that would not be easily acsessable.

Short answer: No. Use what you like.

Long answer: "fluffy" pre-heresy armies, just like "fluffy" "current-day" armies likely wouldn't be the loopsided armies you often see on the table with a bare 5 tac marines standing in the back while buckets of "rare" and "special" stuff making up 90% of the army. If you read HH-novels (just like more contemporary Space Marine novels), the majority you read about will be basic Tac-Marines with bolters and the odd chainsword doing what Marines do. I haven't yet come across, say, a 20 Sternguard w/ 20 combi-melta strike-force let by Vulcan, a MoTF and 5 Dreads or something like that.. Heresy-area or no Heresy-area.

Aesthetic answer: As you want to have that "retro-look" with FW units, maximise units that give you that "FW-look" (old Mark Tac Marines, old-style pred, perhaps Contemptor Dreads, old LR) and stay away from things that don't really have an aesthetic equivalent currently (Scouts, Speeders, Terminators, etc..).

Zweischneid wrote:

DarthSpader wrote:Yea I'm figuring out that per heresy the marines were more of massive legions led by the primarchs, and didn't split into chapters untill after the heresy. So the exact nature and background is editable, but I'm wondering on the actual units etc. if there are things that were more common, or stuff that's new that would not be easily acsessable.

Short answer: No. Use what you like.

Long answer: "fluffy" pre-heresy armies, just like "fluffy" "current-day" armies likely wouldn't be the loopsided armies you often see on the table with a bare 5 tac marines standing in the back while buckets of "rare" and "special" stuff making up 90% of the army. If you read HH-novels (just like more contemporary Space Marine novels), the majority you read about will be basic Tac-Marines with bolters and the odd chainsword doing what Marines do. I haven't yet come across, say, a 20 Sternguard w/ 20 combi-melta strike-force let by Vulcan, a MoTF and 5 Dreads or something like that.. Heresy-area or no Heresy-area.

Aesthetic answer: As you want to have that "retro-look" with FW units, maximise units that give you that "FW-look" (old Mark Tac Marines, old-style pred, perhaps Contemptor Dreads, old LR) and stay away from things that don't really have an aesthetic equivalent currently (Scouts, Speeders, Terminators, etc..).

Seconded.

The original legions were truly that... Legions. Their were thousands of space marines in each legion, but the bulk of that would have been what would be today's equivalent of a tactical squad. So if you want a fluffy pre-heresy army, look into maxing out your troop slots with tactical squads. Then add the toys. Assault squads existed back then. Terminators were even more rare than they are now. Dreadnoughts were virtually non-existent(very few legions had anything like Dreadnoughts, it was not until close the the Horus Heresy that they came about from mortally wounded Great Crusade vets). Landraiders were around in the original pattern and in the rarer Achilles pattern (though it was only given to a few legions by Dorn). The Crusader and Redeemer pattern landraiders only existed post-heresy. Landspeeders replaced jetbikes post-heresy(so you could have some cool jetbike conversions to count as landspeeders). Predators and Rhinos were, of course, around. Maybe Vindicators and Whirlwinds, but I haven't seen any reference to them in the HH books.

All in all, you can do whatever you would like, but fluff nazis out there might scold you if you do not do your research. I would be interested to see how this comes along, because I am contemplating a Luna Wolves army, but I might wait until the 6th ed rules hit first.

@ killian - yea I have a ton of points in 40k. It's all dark eldar, orcs, and only recently some GK. I have never really played as space marines, or purchased any. So marine history and fluff is kind of a "basic level" of info. Even my friend who has played marines for 17 years only has a slightly more average Knowlege base. It has been mentioned I'm looking at a legion, possibly a reserve force or something else to explain why their strike cruiser was away from the main fighting. I definitely plan on maxing out on tac squads, and maybe devestaors as hev support with preds and maybe a land raider. However - for deployment: would legion armies deploy via thunderhawk, drop pods, or use rhinos and so on? I figure terminator armor is rare and character only if that, and dreads the same. I may grab a contempor dread or 2.