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Which are the more ruthless and cold-blooded killers, the Dark Angels or the Iron Hands?

I'd say The Iron Hands are cold and calculating, but when you factor in ruthless and cold-blooded, Dark Angels swing forward. They have no problems firing on their brother marines to achieve their goals and hide their secret.

There's even fluff in the 6th ed codex that suggests they may have intercepted an Inquisitorial ship who and destroyed it and everyone aboard, and covered it up - on the basis that the said inquisitor "discovered a heresy long standing and far reaching the likes of which have not been seen since the HH" - paraphrasing there a bit, but it's pretty close to what the passage says. That takes a gigantic set of balls, as it's basically immediate grounds for Excommunicate Traitoris if it were ever discovered.

There's also the whole "Though legions are not supposed to exist anymore, all the "successor chapters" of the Dark Angels still report back to the Dark Angels Supreme Grand Master" thing, which means they are still secretly a Legion. Which also happens to be one of my favorite fluff pieces on them.

The Dark Angels fluff is just full of absolutely ruthless, cold blooded moments and anecdotes, so i gotta go with DA on this one.

Iron Hands.

The Dark Angels are determined to hunt down and torture to death all their Fallen brethren.

I don't think the Iron Hands even come close to their cold blooded zeal.

More cold and calculating than the Iron Hands is virtually impossible. They deliberately purge themselves from all 'weak' emotions and embrace the pure, cold logic of the machine.
They are perfectly willing to sacrifice their allies if it helps them achieve their goals. They view the IG as a meatshield, a diversion.
And above all, they despise weakness. They would love to purge the entire Imperium of all those they deem 'weak'.
The Iron Hands almost never aid planets or other Imperial forces in need. If those IG can't defeat the enemy on their own, than they are too weak and do not deserve to live anyways.
The Dark Angels are extremely ruthless as well when it is about protecting their secret and hunting the fallen, but the Iron Hands are ruthless about everything.
The Iron Hands are more machine than man. This makes them absolutely the most cold, calculating loyalist chapter in the Imperium.

Altough it has to be said that in the most recent fluff, Kardan Stronos got the Iron Hands back to a more humane, emotional path, the Iron Hands still get the prize.

The Iron Hands, in their supplement, watched an entire company of Raven Guard get slaughtered to a man so that they could wait for every last gun barrel to swing into position and for every last targeting protocol to load up and find an optimal solution.

The Iron Hands, in their supplement, wiped out an entire Imperial Guard regiment (the Yormethi 26th) because it was being deployed to a system they had cordoned off - and they killed the survivors by boarding their ships and hunting them down. The system was cordoned off - none shall pass, no matter their creed, credit, or credentials.

THAT is cold, calculating, and ruthless.

 Haight wrote:

That takes a gigantic set of balls, as it's basically immediate grounds for Excommunicate Traitoris if it were ever discovered

Not so. SW have killed GK Masters, inquisitors, and been pretty open about it. They're fine.

Tyranids or the Ctan.

However, if forced to pick of the short lived human amateurs, I would say the Iron Hands.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
The Iron Hands, in their supplement, watched an entire company of Raven Guard get slaughtered to a man so that they could wait for every last gun barrel to swing into position and for every last targeting protocol to load up and find an optimal solution.

The Iron Hands, in their supplement, wiped out an entire Imperial Guard regiment (the Yormethi 26th) because it was being deployed to a system they had cordoned off - and they killed the survivors by boarding their ships and hunting them down. The system was cordoned off - none shall pass, no matter their creed, credit, or credentials.

THAT is cold, calculating, and ruthless.

With respect to the first example they gave, the whole Raven Guard thing sounds more like it was to do with the IH hatred of them than the fact they care about being super-efficient. TBH it seems the IH try to be cold and efficient, but they still get angry and vengeful. They do it so they can overcome the weakness that caused their primarch to die, but they still slip. As for the IG example, that's just the IH being dicks to those who can't stand up to them. I'm sure if another bigger SM force turned up, or a high ranking Inquisitor, or an AdMech Explorator fleet, they'd have sung a completely different tune. It's easy enough to say "none shall pass, no matter their creed, credit or credentials" when you're slaughtering a much weaker force who no one really cares about.

When the Fallen are concerned, the DA go full crusader on anything that gets in the way, and will sacrifice anything to get to the Fallen.

The rest of the time, though, the IH are by far the most ruthless. No matter what or who you are and what you are fighting for, if you come between the Iron Hands and their duty they will destroy you. IH are utterly uncompromising, brutal and ruthless. To an Iron Hand, there are 3 types of people in the world. Iron Hands, The Enemy and collateral damage.

I'd go gor the Iron Hands.

DA are ruthless when it comes to finding traitors but they are far from cold-blooded when it comes to that. Whenever they think that 3 systems onward some traitor may or may not have been sighted, they just pack up and go leadfoot to be the first on site, never mind that they actually are required here and now for a proper military operation.

Iron Hands are level-headed and methodical in their work. Dark Angels are just too paranoid for that sort of thing.

 Lobukia wrote:

 Haight wrote:

That takes a gigantic set of balls, as it's basically immediate grounds for Excommunicate Traitoris if it were ever discovered

Not so. SW have killed GK Masters, inquisitors, and been pretty open about it. They're fine.

Interesting ! Not that i disbelieve you, but curious to the source (i am not a total line fluff guru by any means - i like SW, but not up on their fluff).

The reason I mention my tidbit in the original post of mine is that in the 6th ed DA codex, on the successor chapters blurb, there's one successor that the entry says "runs the risk of being declared excommunicate" based on the fact that they re-deployed on a hive-planet during an orc invasion leaving 7 brigades of hive guardsman to fend off 3 million orcs.

The entry goes on to state something bizarre like "whether they are called to account for their actions by the Inquisition, even excommunicated, will be determined by their future actions" ... .paraphrasing a bit there, but the entry left me thinking that actions like this (which, lets face it, sacrificing a few brigades of hives guard vs. annihilating all trace of an inquisitorial convoy and inquisitor with evidence of "heresy" committed by the dark angels .... i think the latter is the bigger deal) could spell big trouble for the Dark Angels and their successors.

So i'm genuinely interested in reading the things you reference above.

Iron Hands.

The Dark Angels aren't ruthless and calculating so much as cowardly. Iron Hands will walk up to you, threatening to rip your head off all the while, and then rip your head off.

Dark Angels will brofist you, wink and give you the all-clear sign, they get distracted by a butterfly that says Fallen on its wings and wander off while you fight 50 orks by yourself.

I read the thread title and immediately thought, "that's easy, of course its women!"

Then I saw only two options in the poll, with neither being the deadliest of the species. : (

SJ

Let me put it this way. You can survive fighting side-by-side with a Dark Angel as a Gaurdsmen. So long as you don't see the Fallen or don't identify them as being Dark Angels, all's good.

Meanwhile, the Iron Hands will simply get you killed and you're very unlikely to survive the battle.

 Lobukia wrote:

 Haight wrote:

That takes a gigantic set of balls, as it's basically immediate grounds for Excommunicate Traitoris if it were ever discovered

Not so. SW have killed GK Masters, inquisitors, and been pretty open about it. They're fine.

The inquisition is scared of the SW.

 sing your life wrote:

 Lobukia wrote:

 Haight wrote:

That takes a gigantic set of balls, as it's basically immediate grounds for Excommunicate Traitoris if it were ever discovered

Not so. SW have killed GK Masters, inquisitors, and been pretty open about it. They're fine.

The inquisition is scared of the SW.

Doubtful.

 Haight wrote:

 Lobukia wrote:

 Haight wrote:

That takes a gigantic set of balls, as it's basically immediate grounds for Excommunicate Traitoris if it were ever discovered

Not so. SW have killed GK Masters, inquisitors, and been pretty open about it. They're fine.

Interesting ! Not that i disbelieve you, but curious to the source (i am not a total line fluff guru by any means - i like SW, but not up on their fluff).

So i'm genuinely interested in reading the things you reference above.

After the first war for Armageddon, where SW and GK fought against the World Eaters (including demon Primarch Angron) the GK began their policy of 'cleansing' (read: killing) the IG that had fought with them. Logan and the SW didn't agree with this, and in the last published version (The Emperor's Gift from BL), flew onto the GK ship and decapitated a Grand Master before waltzing out.

The SW and the Sister of Battle have also come to blows before. The eccelsiarchy sent a fleet to blockade Fenris and I can't recall what happened, but they certainly didn't get on.

The fact of the matter is, the IOM need the Wolves more than the Wolves need the IOM, so they get away with a lot.

If the inquisition is scared of the SW, wait until they try to purge out the BA blood rituals!

 sing your life wrote:

 Lobukia wrote:

 Haight wrote:

That takes a gigantic set of balls, as it's basically immediate grounds for Excommunicate Traitoris if it were ever discovered

Not so. SW have killed GK Masters, inquisitors, and been pretty open about it. They're fine.

The inquisition is scared of the SW.

The Inquisition finds the SW to be boring, bland, and unworthy of spending their time on.

I say Black Templar. They don't even care about any of the wars that the imperials have. They just kill aliens, if your not killing aliens or not an a close Allie then they just fly by. Not a care in the world. In the poll it would have the be DA because in the Black Templar codex they almost wiped out a crusade, due to them refusing to give up a SUSPECTED fallen. They are cold for almost doing that since it wasn't even confirmed.

 Redcruisair wrote:

 sing your life wrote:

 Lobukia wrote:

 Haight wrote:

That takes a gigantic set of balls, as it's basically immediate grounds for Excommunicate Traitoris if it were ever discovered

Not so. SW have killed GK Masters, inquisitors, and been pretty open about it. They're fine.

The inquisition is scared of the SW.

Doubtful.

After the chapter master killed his equivalent in GK? I'm be intimated if a valuable force did that.

Thanks to all for the replies bringing me up to speed... i did know about the armageddon stuff, but must have missed the part about beheading a GK grand master.

So from what i'm hearing, it's almost more like the Inquisition persecuting the Wolves would not be worth the effort, and the Imperium needs the wolves. So their actions are met with a fist shaking roll of the eyes, rather than any real consequence.

... so by that logic, The DA could still be in serious gak if their anti-inquisition activities were discovered (backed up by the two commentaries i note in 6th ed codex).


... What's interesting to think is that if the DA or a successor did get declared Excommunicate Traitoris for whatever reason, how would the rest of the quasi-legion respond.

 Haight wrote:
Thanks to all for the replies bringing me up to speed... i did know about the armageddon stuff, but must have missed the part about beheading a GK grand master.

So from what i'm hearing, it's almost more like the Inquisition persecuting the Wolves would not be worth the effort, and the Imperium needs the wolves. So their actions are met with a fist shaking roll of the eyes, rather than any real consequence.

... so by that logic, The DA could still be in serious gak if their anti-inquisition activities were discovered (backed up by the two commentaries i note in 6th ed codex).


... What's interesting to think is that if the DA or a successor did get declared Excommunicate Traitoris for whatever reason, how would the rest of the quasi-legion respond.

I suspect that there might be a massive increase of new chapters made with DA gene-seed by order of the High Lords, then...

 Haight wrote:
Thanks to all for the replies bringing me up to speed... i did know about the armageddon stuff, but must have missed the part about beheading a GK grand master.

So from what i'm hearing, it's almost more like the Inquisition persecuting the Wolves would not be worth the effort, and the Imperium needs the wolves. So their actions are met with a fist shaking roll of the eyes, rather than any real consequence.

... so by that logic, The DA could still be in serious gak if their anti-inquisition activities were discovered (backed up by the two commentaries i note in 6th ed codex).


... What's interesting to think is that if the DA or a successor did get declared Excommunicate Traitoris for whatever reason, how would the rest of the quasi-legion respond.

They all head to The Rock and hang out there, and laugh when no one can do anything about it.