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Just had an odd idea and wanted to throw it out there. Here goes.

So the idea is to have an army based on the imperial guard or Eldar ruleset. The lore behind them would be something like.... They're a group of mercenaries from multiple species. They all used to be a part of their own empires' armies but in a battle involving several different species, they were all left behind accidentally (or on purpose) on a death world. Forced to band together for their own survival this group of Eldar, Imperial Guard, Gue'Vasa, Tau, Kroots, hell even Squats maybe find a way off the planet and become an elite mercenary group. In the story, there might be about 1,000 or so of them. They would also get recruits from others who were outcast, abandoned, or disillusioned with their governments. Each unit would be a hodge-podge of species all converted to appear to be part of a squad. Each unit would have some sort of distinguishing factor so you could tell what unit they were a part of. They wouldn't be wide-eyed idealists (No offense Tau) but instead a group of veteran soldiers who are good at only one thing...War. They realize that they can make a lot of money utilizing their species' different skillsets and become a deadly force of mercenaries sought after by all sides in the 41st Millenium.

Just a thought I had. Would really like to know what people think of it.

P.S. yes I know that everyone but the Tau is so outrageously xenophobic that this could probably never work but let's just say that they're a bit more openminded.

So, iirc early lore had Orks as occasional mercenaries. Eldar too. (Although probably not working together)

The Imperial Guard also used to feature beastmen in a type of militia.

Overall I think a mercenary group is a good idea. The only issue is getting a nice mix of statlines. I think a combination of Genestealer Cults and Nids would get you a nice array of statlines and weapons to choose from, as well as access to Imperial Guard vehicles to kit them out.

Tau + the unaligned models

I've been kicking around similar ideas for my tau army. The alien auxiliaries angle is a big part of what drew me to tau, but the rules largely neglect them at the moment.

My plan was to simply go "imperial" so that I have plenty of statlines to work with for whatever cool third party mini I want to paint up and include. My rough thoughts on what I'd use as what are...

kroot = catachan guardsmen (s4, booby trap strat)
krootox rider = heavy weapons team (2 wounds, bit of dakka)
kroot hounds = ???
fire warriors = skitarii
crisis suits = ??? (probably some brand of marine, though that would limit their gun options a bit; maybe treat them as land speeders?)

fireblade = company commander
ethereal = priest or commissar

And then you've got assassins and inquisitors and tons of other statlines to use for what have you.

By virtue of having the most data slates, going "imperium" is going to give you the most flexibility in creating your army. Other armies might pidgeon hole you in a way you don't want. For instance, going craftworlder means you're comitting to your whole army being relatively fast, expensive, and having WS/BS on par with marines. Which might be fine if that's the tone you're going for. If you want your guys to feel more "average joe," however, you might find BS3+ a bit of a mismatch.

(Sidenote: I'm also working on an Alpha Legion army that uses imperial rules when I field actual marines and GSC rules when I just want to focus on the sneaky humans/mutants.)

Fluff-wise, I don't think what you're pitching is unreasonable. It's a big galaxy with plenty of space for some minor "empires" (though anything big enough to mark on a galactic map would probably get exterminated well before it reached that size). In the Salamanders Omnibus, it mentions a collection of mercenaries working for some csm. Their numbers include drukhari (who could themselves include a bunch of sslyth, etc.), I believe dog soldiers, and a handful of other alien factions. Various Rogue Trader stories like to have the odd eldar hanging out with the Rogue Trader and his crew. The demiurge are out there somewhere doing their own thing. The Farseer novel has a spaceport that is "wild" enough to let a couple of barely-disguised eldar show up and buy some transportation. So yeah, I don't think it's unreasonable for there to be a multi-species mercenary fleet somewhere in the galaxy.

Now, some of them might not do well with the same environmentals on a given ship. The species that we already know of should probably remain true to form with all the nastiness that entails.

And a species with a significant enough combat advantage will probably be compelled to leverage that advantage. The big, muscle-bound guy who can bench press a land raider is probably going to be used as the squad's heavy weapon guy or melee specialist; not as their vox guy or a sniper. So with that in mind, if you want mixed-species squads, I'd probably treat your especially alieny members as wargear options. So if you're using eldar rules, maybe the big guy they force to be a heavy weapons specialist is represented as the guardian squad's heavy weapon platform. Maybe your "flamer" is actually the corrosive gas cloud your reptillian snake type can emit. Maybe your squad's jokaero represents the plasma gun guy. That sort of thing.

Kroot literally had a "mercenary codex" back in the day. It was in an Imperial Armor entry of White Dwarf, I believe. It was when the Kroot wanted to do things that the Tau frowned upon, or were from planets that the Tau had not incorporated in to their empire.

Kroot do have an advantage in that they actually can travel through the Warp rather than just surfing its edges.

You could probably do this just fine in crusade. Its narrative anyway so no issues there. Have the army be similar to deathwatch in that it can splash in other models to the units and get extra rules.



Example would be for troop choice:

Merc squad- a merc squad consists of 4 guardsmen and one veteran seargent. The guardsmen are armed with lasguns and frag grenades. One may take a flamer or melta gun. The seargent is armed with a hot-shot lazgun. You may take up to 5 more models in the unit from the following list:
Eldar ranger, tau breacher, ork nob, astartes veteran, drukari trueborn.

Each model grants the unit an ability as long as they are still part of the unit.

So you want non-castle tau.

Because that's what Tau were originally supposed to be. A combined arms combined race army which had a "predominant" faction, but was made up of various different elements and races all fighting on the same side and utilizing their advantages to dominate the battlefield.

Instead we got Fish of Fury and Trip-Tide lists.

Yeah, the Tau angle was kind of what I was going for but I wanted an army that could actually survive a close combat situation. I don't really think an Astartes would really work. (At least in an infantry squad.) I was thinking of if I did use Astartes they would either be Crisis Suits, Wraithguard, or Striking Scorpions. The Space Marines would be Salamanders (lore-wise) as I think they would probably be the most Xenos friendly of the Astartes because their basically the good guys of the Imperium (at least until 'ol Roboute showed up)


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Wyldhunt wrote:

I'd probably treat your especially alieny members as wargear options. So if you're using eldar rules, maybe the big guy they force to be a heavy weapons specialist is represented as the guardian squad's heavy weapon platform. Maybe your "flamer" is actually the corrosive gas cloud your reptillian snake type can emit. Maybe your squad's jokaero represents the plasma gun guy. That sort of thing.

That sounds great. I had kind of wondered how to denote each special unit on the battlefield other than color-coding everyone and then giving the opposing player a list saying "lime green= Guardsmen with flamer, etc".

I have a small batch of nomad warriors currently (from Rogue Trader set and Blackstone Fortress), plus a few others. Would be great to expand into some form of mercenary patrol, maybe add an Ork Freebooterz unit...some kroot, etc. Could be fun.