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So like my username indicates, I play Talons of Anathrax (who are one of the chapters that fell to chaos in M37 after warp storm Dyonis).



So we wondered how many ships they could have, and if they'd rename them or keep their orignal names?
We guessed that they'd have a corrupted Battle Barge, but we had no idea what normal chaos forces use (how many escorters could they have? Would they take control of a Space Hulk?)

Thanks!

PS: We're planning a campaign where they get greedy and attack a big, valuable system to sacrifice it's population to Nurgle without knowing that the IG, Deathwing and Inquisition are mustering an army to reconquer the worlds the Talons have stolen

Chaos always renames captured ships to be more Chaosy.

That said, a decent-sized, yet nimble fleet, commanded mainly by CSM, would have a single battle-barge as its flagship, with 3 to 5 frigate-weight vessels as escorts, one of which might be built to be a carrier-ship, if the Barge doesn't have that capability. It would also need another 3 to 5 "support" vessels. These will be a range of ship-classes, and it is these ships that transport your troops, war materials, supplies and all that kind of stuff.

Each ship would also have its own complement of lighters and "shuttlecraft" for moving people and material between the ships in the fleet.

So, at the largest (unless you are wanting to play huge, huge RT games) fleet-size that makes sense for a CSM warband with limited resources and fairly-local interests is 11 ships, 5 of which are mostly transports/cargo haulers.

I think a Chaos warband would only have a Battle Barge if they took it from a loyalist chapter. Battle Barges are rather lumbering beasties designed primarily for planetary bombardment. If you're a raider a Barge is too slow and not optimized for ship-to-ship combat. A Battle Barge would have excess carrying capacity for most warbands anyway; they're around a Battleship in size.

In my mind a typical Warband would most likely go for cruiser class ships at the largest. One Cruiser is large enough to house most warbands by itself; they can hold thousands of troops. Several escorts/destroyers/frigates as even faster support ships would round them out nicely.

Ask yourself how big your warband is and what kind of enemies they've fought. If they spend their time smashing major Imperial worlds and engaging Imperial Navy squadrons a Battle Barge supported by a squadron of cruisers and a swarm of escorts might make a lot of sense.

If they're raiders as I outlined above a smaller, more nimble squadron that's quick and hard to detect makes a lot more sense.

My two teef.

Warboss Gorhack wrote:
I think a Chaos warband would only have a Battle Barge if they took it from a loyalist chapter. Battle Barges are rather lumbering beasties designed primarily for planetary bombardment. If you're a raider a Barge is too slow and not optimized for ship-to-ship combat. A Battle Barge would have excess carrying capacity for most warbands anyway; they're around a Battleship in size.

In my mind a typical Warband would most likely go for cruiser class ships at the largest. One Cruiser is large enough to house most warbands by itself; they can hold thousands of troops. Several escorts/destroyers/frigates as even faster support ships would round them out nicely.

Ask yourself how big your warband is and what kind of enemies they've fought. If they spend their time smashing major Imperial worlds and engaging Imperial Navy squadrons a Battle Barge supported by a squadron of cruisers and a swarm of escorts might make a lot of sense.

If they're raiders as I outlined above a smaller, more nimble squadron that's quick and hard to detect makes a lot more sense.

My two teef.

This. Give 'em a bunch of Strike Cruisers and some smaller ships and your good.

A strike cruiser would be the ideal. a Warband isn't going to want to get into slugging matches, remember every time you win you'll need to go in for repairs. which in the case of a war band operating within the screaming vortex means you'll proably have to deal with the sorcerers of Q'sal or another faction within the Vortex. something powerful eneugh to destroy most light patrol ships but fast eneugh to run from anything serious is the best choice.

I've been playing the game Chapter Master for a little bit. If you're into 40k then I totally recommend it. When you start out you have the choice of being given a homeworld ,or being fleet-born. If you choose the fleet option then you are given a Battle Barge, and other various ships. If you choose to have a homeworld then you do not get a Battle Barge.

While this game is completely fan made I could see how a Chaper like the Black Templars would have a larger fleet than the Iron Hands (Poor examples but examples nonetheless) .

I'd say 100 Astartes to each Strike Cruiser. In regards to the capture of a Space Hulk. Those things are filled with beasties, and while Space Marines are fearless and tough they would lose a considerable amount of manpower when taking it over.

Manpower might not be an issue for Loyalist Chapters or established Legion Warbands (Traitor Legions), but a renegade chapter might have a hard time.


If you're set on the Battle Barge then I'd say Battle Barge as the flagship, a couple Strike Cruisers and a menagerie of captured Imperial ships.

Ave Dominus Nox wrote:
I've been playing the game Chapter Master for a little bit. If you're into 40k then I totally recommend it. When you start out you have the choice of being given a homeworld ,or being fleet-born. If you choose the fleet option then you are given a Battle Barge, and other various ships. If you choose to have a homeworld then you do not get a Battle Barge.

While this game is completely fan made I could see how a Chaper like the Black Templars would have a larger fleet than the Iron Hands (Poor examples but examples nonetheless) .

I'd say 100 Astartes to each Strike Cruiser. In regards to the capture of a Space Hulk. Those things are filled with beasties, and while Space Marines are fearless and tough they would lose a considerable amount of manpower when taking it over.

Manpower might not be an issue for Loyalist Chapters or established Legion Warbands (Traitor Legions), but a renegade chapter might have a hard time.


If you're set on the Battle Barge then I'd say Battle Barge as the flagship, a couple Strike Cruisers and a menagerie of captured Imperial ships.

I've always seen them as fleet-born, and by raiders I mean "raiding planets", not small colonies or weak troop transports. Furthermore, they've been fighting successfully enough in the Vortex for 3000 years, so they might have a menagerie of VERY different ships (as several factions build and sell voidships in the Vortex).
So I'll probably stick for your kind of estimate, or Psienesis' one. Thanks guys!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

BrianDavion wrote:
A strike cruiser would be the ideal. a Warband isn't going to want to get into slugging matches, remember every time you win you'll need to go in for repairs. which in the case of a war band operating within the screaming vortex means you'll proably have to deal with the sorcerers of Q'sal or another faction within the Vortex. something powerful enough to destroy most light patrol ships but fast enough to run from anything serious is the best choice.

I seem them less at about chapter strenght, but only 1/2 of that is marines: the rest of that is cultists, serfs and allied Nurgle Daemons. Plus, I could totally see renegades having a few of those factory ships from RT on hand, and salvaging components from destroyed ennemies. In case of a major defeat they'd have to go and treat with more powerful factions, but otherwise their warpsmiths and plentiful workforce should let them manage, especially in areas like the Ragged Helix where they could be the big guy. Remember that although Q'sal is very powerful, it tends to leave you alone if you leave it alone, as it's internal politics are the main focus of it's population. anyway, if they were a chapter in the first place they-d have had a battle barge right? And I doubt that they'd abandon it.

Anyway, why would a battle barge be slow? I thought that space marines would be fast
Because in space, size has no infuence on speed: it's instead decided by the quotient between their mass and their acceleration. As big ships can have bigger engines, they are often faster than small ones actually. I can understand that IG ships might be slow, but I believe that mant RT or Marine vessels would get the best engines the AdMech could provide.

One issue with a full fpsize battlebarge is crew, there huge ships and even with automation will require bigger crews and larger "marine cultist" troops to guard and secure.

More complex to maintain and a capital ship will draw far more impirial attention than fast strike cruiser.

Not impossible by any means but to run effectively bigger ships would require as more established and supported warband.

A cruiser or such sized ship would make a Ideal raider though.

I imagine that the upper echelon of command was ok with going renegade, if they voiced dissent then they were probably purged. This included a lot of the human staff, possibly ship captains. The crew on the other hand didn't know about the change in management. As new generations came about the idea of the "Imperium" is more of a legend, all the crew/peasants/serfs/slaves know is the demigods are in charge.

They're also in the screaming vortex, where slaves are plentiful, as well as mercenaries. You won't be gathering a great deal of Imperial attention in the Screaming Vortex, but when you leave it to go on a Black Crusade it'll be a different story.

I believe the red corsairs have sizable fleet.

It's important to remember too that it is very, very, hard for a chapter and all its assets like a fleet to go renegade. Too many layers of control and checks internally and externally on even the most feisty chapter exist. It is more likely that chaos captures individual ships, over time, which outside of the legions in the eye would inherently lead to smaller fleets.

If I recall my battlefleet gothic fluff chaos operates in the game as the story as raiders and fast strike units. They don't have the resources to sit in battle of attrition like the IoM does. They strike hard and fast then leave. All that is to say that chaos favors ships that share those qualities and wouldn't rely heavily on large, lumbering battleship types.

 buddha wrote:
I believe the red corsairs have sizable fleet.

It's important to remember too that it is very, very, hard for a chapter and all its assets like a fleet to go renegade. Too many layers of control and checks internally and externally on even the most feisty chapter exist. It is more likely that chaos captures individual ships, over time, which outside of the legions in the eye would inherently lead to smaller fleets.

If I recall my battlefleet gothic fluff chaos operates in the game as the story as raiders and fast strike units. They don't have the resources to sit in battle of attrition like the IoM does. They strike hard and fast then leave. All that is to say that chaos favors ships that share those qualities and wouldn't rely heavily on large, lumbering battleship types.

Yeah, you're right. I've given a look to warzone Pandorax (which lists the ships both sides have), and they usually have 1 or 2 "lumbering battleships" (as in, big, fast and powerful capital ships), but no real lumbering stuff: it's all fast, and their fleets are composed mostly of escort vessels. We've decided that in our campaign, the Talons would have enough big ships to attack 2 very defended worlds (probably 1 per world, with 1 or 2 escorters), and a few weak ones for border/less defended Imperial possessions. So we'd have 5 warzones (4 planets, and 1 extra for special battles such as Kill Team, RT ship battles, Zone Mortalis...)

However, seeing the chapter fell during a crusade into the eye of terror, their serfs would probably have slowly been corrupted too (no contact with the outside world, generations trapped inside a dark, currupted tomb). So, I could imagine that all of their surviving fleet serves Chaos now.

Warboss Gorhack wrote:
I think a Chaos warband would only have a Battle Barge if they took it from a loyalist chapter. Battle Barges are rather lumbering beasties designed primarily for planetary bombardment. If you're a raider a Barge is too slow and not optimized for ship-to-ship combat. A Battle Barge would have excess carrying capacity for most warbands anyway; they're around a Battleship in size.

Battle Barges are actually very fast. They are armed with devastating close range weaponry, they can take on any vessel they can bring their guns to bear on. Turns out that guns capable of leveling planet fortifications also make short work out of space ships too. They're designed to quickly close with a planet, smash through all defenses, and quickly deploy their cargo. Thats not the job of a slow ship that can't fight ship to ship combat.

If they are a renegade chapter, they most likely still have their battle barge and a couple of original strike cruisers. Any losses will have been replaced when possible with captured ships.

So a renegade fleet might look something like

Battle Barge, 1-3 Strike Cruisers, 1-3 captured IN cruisers, and a dozen or so escort frigates of varying types(IN or Space Marine classes)

Keeping in mind that Battle Barges and Strike Cruisers aren't a particular type of ship, they could be any battleship or cruiser class vessel that has been converted. A Dauntless class light cruiser could easily be converted into a Strike Cruiser for Marine use.