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Each First Founding Chapter/Legion generally has a method to go about fighting, whether its the Alpha Legion springing up with a bunch of cultists when the time is right, or White Scars who prefer the need for speed. I was wondering though, what is the specialty that the Black Legion have?

First, are you referring to luna wolves, sons of Horus, or black legion? luna wolves are tactically best at everything(seals/ spec ops of modern day), sons of horus is led by Horus, the best of big E's sons; black legion is led by Abaddon, the best son of Horus. If you want something more specific, then consider them shock troops.

Beating up Cadia?

Losing.

Painting with a broad brush, their "thing" is overwhelming shock assault. Think terminators teleporting in the middle of your critical locations at the exact moment the flyers start blasting apart defenses and unloading troops. They're also kind of the "swiss army knife of chaos" thanks to the sheer diversity of assets at their disposal.

"There's an app for that," basically. Sometimes that app is so many random cultsits and nameless warbands that the sky goes black in the shadow of your landing craft. Sometimes that app is Thousand Sons sorcerers performing a foul ritual while berzerkers, plague marines, and noise marines cover them.

Yeah in HH games they have the only terminators that can deep strike IIRC, you can even do it without deviation with Horus. They used to use decapitating strikes (like in one of the first 3 books when they assault the false emperor's palace).

 Big Mac wrote:
First, are you referring to luna wolves, sons of Horus, or black legion? luna wolves are tactically best at everything(seals/ spec ops of modern day), sons of horus is led by Horus, the best of big E's sons; black legion is led by Abaddon, the best son of Horus. If you want something more specific, then consider them shock troops.

Black Legion. And what would be considered shock troops in terms of models/units?

The Luna Wolves/Sons of Horus were designed for every aspect of battle, they are a very balanced force. That being said, their speciality was overwhelming force/decapitation strikes at key weak points in the enemy's defence. Kill the commanders, cause disarray, mop up the leftovers. They were also a very large legion which often brought huge numbers to bare and overwhelmed enemy defences.

Black Legion does still try to do this, but given the nature of being a renegade legion, they often lack materials, weapons, machines to make this type of warfare possible. Living in the warp is a logistical nightmare. They need to be as flexible as possible and adjust their strategies quickly to adapt to changing dynamics in their own army structure.

Thats why they don't dedicate themselves to one god, and have multiple warbands that specialize in different aspects of war. They take what is ever available at any given time to take advantage of a situation, including daemonic possession and cease fire/ally pacts with enemy warbands to win over a more dangerous foe.

The Black Legion at this point is the largest legion in the galaxy and realistically the only true threat to the Imperium. They also have the advantage of having one of the most tenacious warriors in history leading them, Abaddon. They command so much power in the warp that they can actually call upon the Daemon Primarchs to fight along side them from time to time.

 Psionara wrote:

 Big Mac wrote:
First, are you referring to luna wolves, sons of Horus, or black legion? luna wolves are tactically best at everything(seals/ spec ops of modern day), sons of horus is led by Horus, the best of big E's sons; black legion is led by Abaddon, the best son of Horus. If you want something more specific, then consider them shock troops.

Black Legion. And what would be considered shock troops in terms of models/units?

CC terminators, Raptors, Warp Talons, Bikers, Possessed / Greater Possessed, chainsword marines, anything that can deep strike, sorcerers to deep strike units who otherwise can't, and as little footslogging as possible, I suppose.

nataliereed1984 wrote:

 Psionara wrote:

 Big Mac wrote:
First, are you referring to luna wolves, sons of Horus, or black legion? luna wolves are tactically best at everything(seals/ spec ops of modern day), sons of horus is led by Horus, the best of big E's sons; black legion is led by Abaddon, the best son of Horus. If you want something more specific, then consider them shock troops.

Black Legion. And what would be considered shock troops in terms of models/units?

CC terminators, Raptors, Warp Talons, Bikers, Possessed / Greater Possessed, chainsword marines, anything that can deep strike, sorcerers to deep strike units who otherwise can't, and as little footslogging as possible, I suppose.

Thank you! I really appreciate it!

 Psionara wrote:

nataliereed1984 wrote:

 Psionara wrote:

 Big Mac wrote:
First, are you referring to luna wolves, sons of Horus, or black legion? luna wolves are tactically best at everything(seals/ spec ops of modern day), sons of horus is led by Horus, the best of big E's sons; black legion is led by Abaddon, the best son of Horus. If you want something more specific, then consider them shock troops.

Black Legion. And what would be considered shock troops in terms of models/units?

CC terminators, Raptors, Warp Talons, Bikers, Possessed / Greater Possessed, chainsword marines, anything that can deep strike, sorcerers to deep strike units who otherwise can't, and as little footslogging as possible, I suppose.

Thank you! I really appreciate it!

Oh, drop pods, and those spikey claw drop pods from Forge World, are definitely a chaos shock troop kinda thing.

Just bear in mind, as others have said, Black Legion is kinda like the chaos version of the Ultramarines. Their main "schtick" is well-roundedness and using absolutely all the tools available to heretic astartes armies. A given unit might be more associated with a different legion, like daemon engines and arch-lord discordant and warsmith for Iron Warriors, raptors and warp talons for Nightlords, possessed and master of possession and dark apostles for Word Bearers, noise marines and bikers for Emperor's Children, etc, but nothing will ever feel overtly out of place in a Black Legion army.

The best way to give your army a distinctly Black Legion vibe is adding Abaddon and/or Haarken Worldclaimer. *shrug*

Isn't Haarken kind of lackluster?

Brotherhood and purpose.

They will take back control of the Imperium they built from the False Emperor who stole it's glory and presided over it's ruination.

nareik wrote:
Brotherhood and purpose.

They will take back control of the Imperium they built from the False Emperor who stole it's glory and presided over it's ruination.

But they're the ones who wrecked it....

pm713 wrote:

nareik wrote:
Brotherhood and purpose.

They will take back control of the Imperium they built from the False Emperor who stole it's glory and presided over it's ruination.

But they're the ones who wrecked it....

Depends on your point of view. Horus’ followers during the HH were lead to believe the Emperor abandoned them during the Crusade to pursue becoming a god and would eventually liquidate them. In their minds the dark gods they serve are actually humanity’s future.

 Fajita Fan wrote:

pm713 wrote:

nareik wrote:
Brotherhood and purpose.

They will take back control of the Imperium they built from the False Emperor who stole it's glory and presided over it's ruination.

But they're the ones who wrecked it....

Depends on your point of view. Horus’ followers during the HH were lead to believe the Emperor abandoned them during the Crusade to pursue becoming a god and would eventually liquidate them. In their minds the dark gods they serve are actually humanity’s future.

exactly! Horus wrecked it, The Emperor stole it!

It's everyone's fault but theirs!

pm713 wrote:

nareik wrote:
Brotherhood and purpose.

They will take back control of the Imperium they built from the False Emperor who stole it's glory and presided over it's ruination.

But they're the ones who wrecked it....

I'm pretty sure it was already pretty effed. I don't get this weird insistence on thinking the violent genocidal totalitarians were somehow fine before Horus rebelled?

Bending over for Abbadon is their specialty.

nataliereed1984 wrote:

pm713 wrote:

nareik wrote:
Brotherhood and purpose.

They will take back control of the Imperium they built from the False Emperor who stole it's glory and presided over it's ruination.

But they're the ones who wrecked it....

I'm pretty sure it was already pretty effed. I don't get this weird insistence on thinking the violent genocidal totalitarians were somehow fine before Horus rebelled?

The Imperium was a far nicer place before the Heresy and was on the path to actually being a nice place to live.

pm713 wrote:

nataliereed1984 wrote:

pm713 wrote:

nareik wrote:
Brotherhood and purpose.

They will take back control of the Imperium they built from the False Emperor who stole it's glory and presided over it's ruination.

But they're the ones who wrecked it....

I'm pretty sure it was already pretty effed. I don't get this weird insistence on thinking the violent genocidal totalitarians were somehow fine before Horus rebelled?

The Imperium was a far nicer place before the Heresy and was on the path to actually being a nice place to live.

I strongly, strongly disagree. Before the heresy it was already in a state of Endless War. That's what the Great Crusade WAS. And it was always on the path to being a horrific dystopia. You can't build peace and equity on a foundation of war and genocide, you can't build freedom and democracy on a foundation of totalitarianism, fascism and shock-and-awe, you can't build science and enlightenment on a foundation of hypocrisy and forcefully imposed lies, and you can't build unity, trust and cooperation on a foundation of forced compliance at the barrel of a gun.

nataliereed1984 wrote:

pm713 wrote:

nataliereed1984 wrote:

pm713 wrote:

nareik wrote:
Brotherhood and purpose.

They will take back control of the Imperium they built from the False Emperor who stole it's glory and presided over it's ruination.

But they're the ones who wrecked it....

I'm pretty sure it was already pretty effed. I don't get this weird insistence on thinking the violent genocidal totalitarians were somehow fine before Horus rebelled?

The Imperium was a far nicer place before the Heresy and was on the path to actually being a nice place to live.

I strongly, strongly disagree. Before the heresy it was already in a state of Endless War. That's what the Great Crusade WAS. And it was always on the path to being a horrific dystopia. You can't build peace and equity on a foundation of war and genocide, you can't build freedom and democracy on a foundation of totalitarianism, fascism and shock-and-awe, you can't build science and enlightenment on a foundation of hypocrisy and forcefully imposed lies, and you can't build unity, trust and cooperation on a foundation of forced compliance at the barrel of a gun.

Nice is kinda relative.

It's unlikely the Imperium was ever going to be a nice place to live. We've no knowledge about the Big E planning to dismantle the mechanicus and re implement some kind of A.I. / automated labor, which would've been required to free the untold trillions of (essentially) slave laborers the Imperium needs to function at a base level.

However, the Imperium was sure as gak on the track to be a nicer place than it was now. With the intention being to removed the Xenos and starve Chaos to death, humanity would've had fewer threats. That would mean no inquisition torturing you because you were within 50 light years of a demonic invasion or happened to see what might have been an alien. No religious fanatics burning you alive to let you feel the emperor's warmth. Having a human webway would've meant no literal voyages through hell (complete with the reasonable risk of having your soul raped out of you) to get places.

Broadly, they are the mirror to Ultramarines; the generic guys that are generic so the specialists have something to stand out from. It may sound lame but it is a rather critical role to have present in the fluff. Not that they don't have some specialisms within that larger picture, but the main idea is being 'the normal ones'.

Imperium at that time would had been immensely rich if you know, it could stop fighting a total war for centuries on a galactic scale. But who I'm to tell that centuries old warfare does horrible things on society, economy and basically everything else. Ironically enough, it was the Emperor who had created Chaos as it is today. He had fed Chaos and shaped it to the way it became during Horus Heresy. Before it, Chaos was tame and largely uninterested in material universe. But no, Big E just had to go out of its way, make a deal with literal Gods and then pretend that they can be just as easily blocked as all of his other friends on facebook! Then surprised Pikashu face when it was revealed he wasn't as smart as he thought he was.

As NinthMusketeer mentions, Black Legion are the Ultramarines of Chaos; generic bois that can do everything, but with no real specialty.

-

 morganfreeman wrote:

nataliereed1984 wrote:

pm713 wrote:

nataliereed1984 wrote:

pm713 wrote:

nareik wrote:
Brotherhood and purpose.

They will take back control of the Imperium they built from the False Emperor who stole it's glory and presided over it's ruination.

But they're the ones who wrecked it....

I'm pretty sure it was already pretty effed. I don't get this weird insistence on thinking the violent genocidal totalitarians were somehow fine before Horus rebelled?

The Imperium was a far nicer place before the Heresy and was on the path to actually being a nice place to live.

I strongly, strongly disagree. Before the heresy it was already in a state of Endless War. That's what the Great Crusade WAS. And it was always on the path to being a horrific dystopia. You can't build peace and equity on a foundation of war and genocide, you can't build freedom and democracy on a foundation of totalitarianism, fascism and shock-and-awe, you can't build science and enlightenment on a foundation of hypocrisy and forcefully imposed lies, and you can't build unity, trust and cooperation on a foundation of forced compliance at the barrel of a gun.

Nice is kinda relative.

It's unlikely the Imperium was ever going to be a nice place to live. We've no knowledge about the Big E planning to dismantle the mechanicus and re implement some kind of A.I. / automated labor, which would've been required to free the untold trillions of (essentially) slave laborers the Imperium needs to function at a base level.

However, the Imperium was sure as gak on the track to be a nicer place than it was now. With the intention being to removed the Xenos and starve Chaos to death, humanity would've had fewer threats. That would mean no inquisition torturing you because you were within 50 light years of a demonic invasion or happened to see what might have been an alien. No religious fanatics burning you alive to let you feel the emperor's warmth. Having a human webway would've meant no literal voyages through hell (complete with the reasonable risk of having your soul raped out of you) to get places.

The lack of Xenos and chaos here in the real world has never stopped excessive religious zealotry, genocides, inquisitions, torture, slavery and such from occurring over and over throughout our history.

Once Emps enshrined messed up tactics like genocide and biochemical warfare and torture and such as appropriate and sanctioned within the Imperium, people were going to keep finding reasons to apply them, with or without chaos and orks to worry about. And sooner or later the Necrons were going to wake up and the Tyranids were going to arrive and so on. Also, do you think the Primarchs and Astartes were just going to quietly shuffle off and die once they were no longer required? No, they'd have eventually rebelled regardless, even if Erebus had been strangled in the cradle and Chaos never managed to corrupt anyone.

As said: it was all always inevitable.

Do you know that Emperor had ordered slaughter of civilian population centres just for a mere act of rebelling against him at final stages of unification of Terra? His Crusade was doomed before it even started, this is why he could not convince other humans to join him in spirit and mind.

nataliereed1984 wrote:

 morganfreeman wrote:

nataliereed1984 wrote:

pm713 wrote:

nataliereed1984 wrote:

pm713 wrote:

nareik wrote:
Brotherhood and purpose.

They will take back control of the Imperium they built from the False Emperor who stole it's glory and presided over it's ruination.

But they're the ones who wrecked it....

I'm pretty sure it was already pretty effed. I don't get this weird insistence on thinking the violent genocidal totalitarians were somehow fine before Horus rebelled?

The Imperium was a far nicer place before the Heresy and was on the path to actually being a nice place to live.

I strongly, strongly disagree. Before the heresy it was already in a state of Endless War. That's what the Great Crusade WAS. And it was always on the path to being a horrific dystopia. You can't build peace and equity on a foundation of war and genocide, you can't build freedom and democracy on a foundation of totalitarianism, fascism and shock-and-awe, you can't build science and enlightenment on a foundation of hypocrisy and forcefully imposed lies, and you can't build unity, trust and cooperation on a foundation of forced compliance at the barrel of a gun.

Nice is kinda relative.

It's unlikely the Imperium was ever going to be a nice place to live. We've no knowledge about the Big E planning to dismantle the mechanicus and re implement some kind of A.I. / automated labor, which would've been required to free the untold trillions of (essentially) slave laborers the Imperium needs to function at a base level.

However, the Imperium was sure as gak on the track to be a nicer place than it was now. With the intention being to removed the Xenos and starve Chaos to death, humanity would've had fewer threats. That would mean no inquisition torturing you because you were within 50 light years of a demonic invasion or happened to see what might have been an alien. No religious fanatics burning you alive to let you feel the emperor's warmth. Having a human webway would've meant no literal voyages through hell (complete with the reasonable risk of having your soul raped out of you) to get places.

The lack of Xenos and chaos here in the real world has never stopped excessive religious zealotry, genocides, inquisitions, torture, slavery and such from occurring over and over throughout our history.

Once Emps enshrined messed up tactics like genocide and biochemical warfare and torture and such as appropriate and sanctioned within the Imperium, people were going to keep finding reasons to apply them, with or without chaos and orks to worry about. And sooner or later the Necrons were going to wake up and the Tyranids were going to arrive and so on. Also, do you think the Primarchs and Astartes were just going to quietly shuffle off and die once they were no longer required? No, they'd have eventually rebelled regardless, even if Erebus had been strangled in the cradle and Chaos never managed to corrupt anyone.

As said: it was all always inevitable.

Just to hammer home your point, Nataliereed. The Horus Heresy happened because it was inevitable due to the methods the Emperor employed. Had it not been Lorgar being driven to rebellion by the Emperor's extremist methods, it would have been Magnus, or someone else down the line. He and his choices is as much to blame for the state of the universe as the Chaos Gods, and they are all tragic figures in a soup of misery because they have to be. That is the setting, Like the fatalism of a greek tragedy.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Ernestas wrote:
Do you know that Emperor had ordered slaughter of civilian population centres just for a mere act of rebelling against him at final stages of unification of Terra? His Crusade was doomed before it even started, this is why he could not convince other humans to join him in spirit and mind.

Precisely.

The Black Legion follow an essentially Prussian model of warfare. Ruthlessly focused aggression. When in doubt, attack with maximum force at a single vulnerable point, even if you're outnumbered or outgunned. Especially then, because the enemy won't expect it. Avoid wars of attrition at all costs. A war of movement is always preferable to a war of position. Always be moving. Always be attacking. Give your subordinates considerable leeway to use their own initiative and respond to changing circumstances in battle. Do whatever works. Victory requires no excuses, while defeat allows none.

pm713 wrote:

nataliereed1984 wrote:

pm713 wrote:

nareik wrote:
Brotherhood and purpose.

They will take back control of the Imperium they built from the False Emperor who stole it's glory and presided over it's ruination.

But they're the ones who wrecked it....

I'm pretty sure it was already pretty effed. I don't get this weird insistence on thinking the violent genocidal totalitarians were somehow fine before Horus rebelled?

The Imperium was a far nicer place before the Heresy and was on the path to actually being a nice place to live.

No, the Imperium was on a path to internal stability through the use of overwhelming force. Many dictatorships have/had internal stability (e.g. domestic peace) while being horrifyingly rotten places to live, this is why you pay your propaganda people.

 Ernestas wrote:
Imperium at that time would had been immensely rich if you know, it could stop fighting a total war for centuries on a galactic scale. But who I'm to tell that centuries old warfare does horrible things on society, economy and basically everything else. Ironically enough, it was the Emperor who had created Chaos as it is today. He had fed Chaos and shaped it to the way it became during Horus Heresy. Before it, Chaos was tame and largely uninterested in material universe. But no, Big E just had to go out of its way, make a deal with literal Gods and then pretend that they can be just as easily blocked as all of his other friends on facebook! Then surprised Pikashu face when it was revealed he wasn't as smart as he thought he was.

Chaos was not tame..........
.........
......

Also, the Enperor was smart Horus ruined everything. Not the Emperor