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You know what doesn't make sense; why are there no HQ dreadnoughts. I mean it makes sense fluff wise as dreadnoughts are the oldest most badass veterans who having had their bodies all but destroyed refuse to die through sheer force of will and entombed in a metal sarcophagus monster of guns and armour. These are the guys even grand masters go to for advice so why can't they be a HQ choice.

Further more it could be argued that the closest thing to having the emperor on the battlefield is a grey knight dreadnought. Think about it; a powerful psycer and incredible warrior if immense age kept alive by will and arcane technology staving of the perils spewed forth by the warp? And being grey knights they're made from the geneseed of the emperor himself.

So why do you think GW hast released a dreadnought HQ option? (Note I said GW not forgeworld)

Hmmm well maybe it is the factt hey are more revered and they do not want to overtax them (fluff-wise) as day to day commanders. I know there is fluff where they give council.

Space Wolves has a HQ Dreadnaught.

From what I understand Dreadnoughts are often kept in some sort of stasis or "rest" when they aren't in the Dreadnought Armour itself (ie. the sarcophogus is removed) they are reawakened when they are needed.

It may be that even though the Marine is kept alive by the Dreadnoughts systems it is very taxing on them and they need long periods to recuperate.

It is often said in fluff that Bjorn (oldest I think) sees the world as it was not as it is. Could be over time the mind of the occupant deteriorates?

I thought I saw a dreadnought Chaplain on FW. Space wolves has a HQ called Bjorn the Fell handed. Fluff wise, I do not see why a dreadnought can't be a HQ since the greatest heroes of a chapter is interred within a Dreadnought.

Sure as a special character but I'm talking standard

In one of the HH books it goes over in great detail how a space marine deteriorates in a dreadnought sarcophagus. They no longer are immune to fear most importantly. They also go insane from being constantly encased. For these reasons I don't think a dreadnought would be able to survive being alive day to day without going completely crazy.

 Archer wrote:
From what I understand Dreadnoughts are often kept in some sort of stasis or "rest" when they aren't in the Dreadnought Armour itself (ie. the sarcophogus is removed) they are reawakened when they are needed.

It may be that even though the Marine is kept alive by the Dreadnoughts systems it is very taxing on them and they need long periods to recuperate.

It is often said in fluff that Bjorn (oldest I think) sees the world as it was not as it is. Could be over time the mind of the occupant deteriorates?

That does make a fair bit of sense however in long campaigns surely they'd have to be active for ages so although the day to day jobs couldn't be coordinated by a dreadnought couldn't they just take control for the campaign and then hand over to his subordinates after its won?

I think the reason is an army design thing really: HQ Dreads is a Space Wolf thing, just like Terminators are a Dark Angel thing and marine Assault armies are a Blood Angel thing - fluffwise everyone should be able to do the above.

Back in 3rd edition Iron Hands used to have both HQ Venerable Dreadnoughts and Terminator Sgts in non-Terminator squads, but lost them for this reason - stepping on Space Wolves toes.

 Archer wrote:
From what I understand Dreadnoughts are often kept in some sort of stasis or "rest" when they aren't in the Dreadnought Armour itself (ie. the sarcophogus is removed) they are reawakened when they are needed.

It may be that even though the Marine is kept alive by the Dreadnoughts systems it is very taxing on them and they need long periods to recuperate.

It is often said in fluff that Bjorn (oldest I think) sees the world as it was not as it is. Could be over time the mind of the occupant deteriorates?

This is the fluff snippet that gets bounced around at times, but it doesn't really make much sense to me: Bjorn is a special case, his reason for existing is as the living memory of the chapters oral traditions (which the Space Wolves refuse to write down), they wake him up every few centuries to make sure their sagas haven't become corrupted. Regular Dreadnoughts have no reason to be put in stasis for long periods of time.

I am not sure a lot of the game makes any sense. Just gives out enough for us to populate these threads with speculation and conjecture.

It would be pretty hard to not step on another Chapters toes as there are meant to be about a thousand of them and there are only so many variations you can make with Assault, Devastator and Tactical squads....

I only ask because I'd love to play an army consisting entirely of dreads; bigass HQ dreads, stock standard dreads in units if three for troops, smaller 'intersepter' dreads with deul heavy flamers for fast stack and massive lascannon wielding, whirlwind missile launching tank destroying dreads for heavy support.

That would be cool (my Iron Hands army has 4) but unfortunately what looks and sounds cool just doesn't live up to it on the tabletop.

But if you used forgeworld you could almost achieve an all dread army, almost.

Gashrog wrote:


This is the fluff snippet that gets bounced around at times, but it doesn't really make much sense to me: Bjorn is a special case, his reason for existing is as the living memory of the chapters oral traditions (which the Space Wolves refuse to write down), they wake him up every few centuries to make sure their sagas haven't become corrupted. Regular Dreadnoughts have no reason to be put in stasis for long periods of time.

Well, at least according to the wiki, Bjorn was placed in stasis to be awakened only every 100 years because the long years were taking their toll on him. So assuming the wiki got that from an official source (an assumption that may or may not be correct, but whatever), it's consistent with that other BL piece that stated that space marine mental facilities deteriorate in a dreadnought.

It should be noted that chaos dreadnaughts, who do NOT get placed into stasis, tend to get quite batty. Being in a dreadnaught sucks ass.

In savage scars they do provide council. In the book Sarik hears council of a dreadnaught(And ultramarine one too) and says how, while they are not part of the command structure, heeding their advice from such a revered warrior is prudent

 hotsauceman1 wrote:
In savage scars they do provide council. In the book Sarik hears council of a dreadnaught(And ultramarine one too) and says how, while they are not part of the command structure, heeding their advice from such a revered warrior is prudent

I knew it was something like that, thanks. So that confirms That they can still be tactical and intelligent even if not all of them can due to deterioration. So to have an all dreadnought chapter would be possible.
I'm thinking something along the lines of the grey knights rock with strange secretive creatures looking after thousands of resting dreadnoughts only awakened by direct command from the emperor or a chapter master in dire need. Like tomb world almost.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Of course the inquisition would have a number of operatives in place.

No, it is not possible. Not in the slightest

Im pretty sure you could make a mostly dreadnought army with the BA. Furioso dreads for elites, DC dreads for troops and normal dreads for heavy support. The only thing you cant get as a dread is a HQ and fast attack, although for HQ you could just take a captain with dreadnought armour and for fast attack just have a librarian dread with wings of Sanguines and have him fly up the board.

Hmm didn't I read somewhere that the tech to produce the dreadnought sarcophagi was lost? Whatever remains with chapters are treated with reverence as it is scarce? A chapter of dreadnoughts don't seem possible.

They can remain lucid, but the longer they remain awake and active the harder it becomes for them to do so. This is why they are allowed to sleep except when needed. This is also why they are not good commanders, as they can't be kept active to deal with all the little situations that a commander deals with day to day.

Bjorn is a special case because he was a Wolf Lord (Chapter Master) before he was put I to a Dreadnaught. He is no longer a Wolf Lord, he just gets to be an HQ choice out of respect accorded him, rather than a place in the command structure.

Actually in one of James Swallows Blood Angels books, one of the chapters decended from the BA was lead by a dreadnought chapter master, though he did die iirc

http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Lord_Daggan#.Ut0WiBBFA-U

TiamatRoar wrote:

Gashrog wrote:


This is the fluff snippet that gets bounced around at times, but it doesn't really make much sense to me: Bjorn is a special case, his reason for existing is as the living memory of the chapters oral traditions (which the Space Wolves refuse to write down), they wake him up every few centuries to make sure their sagas haven't become corrupted. Regular Dreadnoughts have no reason to be put in stasis for long periods of time.

Well, at least according to the wiki, Bjorn was placed in stasis to be awakened only every 100 years because the long years were taking their toll on him. So assuming the wiki got that from an official source (an assumption that may or may not be correct, but whatever), it's consistent with that other BL piece that stated that space marine mental facilities deteriorate in a dreadnought.

It should be noted that chaos dreadnaughts, who do NOT get placed into stasis, tend to get quite batty. Being in a dreadnaught sucks ass.

Should be noted though, that Bjorn is really old, even for a Dreadnought, he was Russ' pal and remembers the Emp. Any yet still he is capable of wrecking major face, as what happens in Battle of the Fang.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also, theres the Forgeworld Salamander dread BRAY'ARTH ASHMANTLE, not sure if hes a hq or just a special character though.

For Orks you can take a Dread Mob list from Imperial Armour 8, which can have up to 2 Meka-Dreads as HQs, up to 18 Deff Dreads (6 blocks of 3) as Troops, up to 15 Kill Kans as Fast Attack (3 blocks of 5) and up to 3 Mega-Dreads as Heavy Support. That's a total of 38 Ork Walkers and nothing else.

I know it's not Marines, but it's doable.

So to have an all dreadnought chapter would be possible.

Not really, and here's why:

One, Space Marines do not move between Chapters, with only 1 exception: The Deathwatch. This is an "elite" organization that other Space Marine Chapters send some members to for a limited period of time, and who then return to their home Chapter when their tour is done. You require there to be non-Dread Marines in your Chapter before they can be interred into a Dreadnought.

Two, Space Marines do not begin post-implantation life as Dreadnoughts. Dreadnought sarcophagi are very rare, relics of a bygone era, and very hard to replace. Most Chapters can only support a few Dreadnoughts at any one time, as they simply do not have any extra sarcophagi to put another nearly-dead Space Marine into.

Three, in order to qualify for being interred into a Dreadnought, you have to be wounded in such a way that regular augmetic reconstruction is not a viable way to save your life, but also survive the injury long enough to be interred into the life-support systems of a Dreadnought. If you get torn in half, you're going to die before this can be done. If you get both arms and legs blown off, they can replace those with augmetics. There's a very narrow list of injuries that can get you into a Dreadnought, assuming that there's an empty one available.

Four, Dreads are rather tactically limited. A very broad range of SM operations are not possible for Dreadnoughts. They also have problems walking through a regular door, which means that any kind of stealth mission is pretty much right out.

Five, as the opening movie of DoW indicates, they have some pretty big blind-spots, and are susceptible to anti-armor weaponry. They don't dodge. At all.

Six, and most importantly, you can't get geneseed from a guy in a Dread sarcophagi. If your entire Chapter is Dreads, this is a Chapter that will become extinct through battle-losses.

I do not see why this would not be possible. If the sarcophagus is as rare as people say, and I have not read that anywhere in the fluff, then the BA codex would not have DC Dread. If they are as rare as posted then when one of the Dreads went highside they would eject him out of the sarcophagus and put someone in that was not suffering from Bat-Guano Psychosis, instead of sending him out to die and possibly losing a sacred, very rare sarcophagus.

I was thing the opposite; they would never remove a marine from a Dreadnought and so they would end up with a whole bunch if Dreads occupied by marines who shouldn't be sent into battle so what do you do with such marines? You send then to the Dreadnought grave ship and get a new shell (like a gass bottle exchange system). So the tiered, worn out dread can now sleep for eternity on this ship until they die of one thing or another or someone needs a ton of heavy support and they send a Dread battalion.
This ship would be crewed by creatures who would clean and maintain the Dreads and would probably have some style of psychic network to keep the marines mentally active and prolong their sanity.

 OIIIIIIO wrote:
If the sarcophagus is as rare as people say, and I have not read that anywhere in the fluff, then the BA codex would not have DC Dread. If they are as rare as posted then when one of the Dreads went highside they would eject him out of the sarcophagus and put someone in that was not suffering from Bat-Guano Psychosis, instead of sending him out to die and possibly losing a sacred, very rare sarcophagus.

But that's just the thing with Imperial factions - their thinking doesn't always make sense to normal people that surf the web and pass even the basic armchair general test.

The Blood Angels is maybe the richest Chapter of all the first foundings, stocked with rare relics - and they use them according to their own particular needs and habits. Death Company marines can be sent out with only basic weapons but they can also be fitted with the most insane number of specialist close combat weapons anyone's seen. The commanders apparently decide how to outfit them before battle. A dreadnought is valuable, true. I guess they don't actually store DC dreads as much as paint them black if and when a dreadnought finally goes crazy on campaign. Actually moving some near-dead hero to a dreadnought is probably not done in the field but back in base, so they keep the crazy one around until they can get back. If the situation is dire enough they'll wake it and point it at the enemy.

As has already been said...the SW can have dreadnought a as HQ

Gashrog wrote:
I think the reason is an army design thing really: HQ Dreads is a Space Wolf thing, just like Terminators are a Dark Angel thing and marine Assault armies are a Blood Angel thing - fluffwise everyone should be able to do the above.

Back in 3rd edition Iron Hands used to have both HQ Venerable Dreadnoughts and Terminator Sgts in non-Terminator squads, but lost them for this reason - stepping on Space Wolves toes.

 Archer wrote:
From what I understand Dreadnoughts are often kept in some sort of stasis or "rest" when they aren't in the Dreadnought Armour itself (ie. the sarcophogus is removed) they are reawakened when they are needed.

It may be that even though the Marine is kept alive by the Dreadnoughts systems it is very taxing on them and they need long periods to recuperate.

It is often said in fluff that Bjorn (oldest I think) sees the world as it was not as it is. Could be over time the mind of the occupant deteriorates?

This is the fluff snippet that gets bounced around at times, but it doesn't really make much sense to me: Bjorn is a special case, his reason for existing is as the living memory of the chapters oral traditions (which the Space Wolves refuse to write down), they wake him up every few centuries to make sure their sagas haven't become corrupted. Regular Dreadnoughts have no reason to be put in stasis for long periods of time.

I don't think it's about stepping on toes. Iron Hands fluff has slowly been rewritten to where they are now just codex compliant guys with boners for augmentation. They probably didn't sell as well, cause that stuff is basically the lite beer version of space wolves.

herpguy wrote:
In one of the HH books it goes over in great detail how a space marine deteriorates in a dreadnought sarcophagus. They no longer are immune to fear most importantly. They also go insane from being constantly encased. For these reasons I don't think a dreadnought would be able to survive being alive day to day without going completely crazy.

Two of the HH books deal with this - it's touched upon in Mark of Calth, when a newly occupied dreadnought sarcophagus crashes, and it talks about the numbness, disconnect from the outside world, and constant pain. The occupant finds it hard to accept that a mechanicum priest keeps on just turning him 'off' but the pain would drive him crazy otherwise.

Also, in Betrayer, all the old War Hounds dreadnoughts are awoken to defend the World Eaters flagship, led by Lhorke, the old legion master. He says that he was always awake in the early days of being dreadnoughted, and commanded the legion like this, but as the years passed he needed to spend more and more time asleep. When he is awoken, he is still completely sane - more so than the World Eaters anyway! - and remains awake for the events of the book (a few days) but at the end comments on how exhausted he is.

 ArbitorIan wrote:
When he is awoken, he is still completely sane - more so than the World Eaters anyway! - and remains awake for the events of the book (a few days) but at the end comments on how exhausted he is.

Well, that also seems to be an effect of long life in general.

Commander Dante of the Blood Angels is said to feel tired of life itself at times, and why shouldn't he? His recruitment and eventual rise to Chapter Master are now myths and legends even among his own Battle Brothers. A few Dreadnoughts might remember, but they're kept asleep unless needed. No one Dante knew in youth remains, and the faces around him have been replaced many times over. He's alone in his own future.