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According to fluff and the Lexicanum, Huron Blackheart is the strongest Chaos Lord next to Abaddon, and that the Red Corsairs are a huge raiding force that continually receives new recruits from defectors. If Abaddon's legions number in the tens of thousands of Chaos Marines and gods know how many cultists and regular infantry, what sort of numbers would effectively describe the Red Corsairs? The Lexicanum states that their numbers are in the several thousand, but it also says that not all Red Corsairs are Marines. Many are just normal humans, and even some xenos mercenaries. So what sort of gauge could be used to determine the true number of Marines, and then a separate graph for their non Astartes allies?

The Red Corsairs are stated to be "near legion size". The smallest legion was the Thousand Sons, with 10,000, so "near legion" would be in the ballpark of around 8-9000 troopers.

As far as the ratio of human to astartes, it's impossible to say. No indication has ever been given what the ratio is, though logical deduction would infer that there would be far more humans than astartes, as always.

I don't think there's any particular size given, but I believe it's implied that they are the second largest renegade Space Marine force in the galaxy, only seconded by the Black Legion. Plus, you factor in the fact that they get renegade Astartes joining them from loyal and Chaos factions all the time. Not to mention the various human and xenos auxiliaries.

It's also worth noting that many Legions have difficulty replacing their losses, and so have to get creative (see Dead Sky, Black Sun by Mr. Abnett). The Corsairs aren't genetic purists and can quickly recoup losses through defectors.

 Arcsquad12 wrote:
According to fluff and the Lexicanum, Huron Blackheart is the strongest Chaos Lord next to Abaddon,

I was intrigued by this so I actually had a look around. Lexicanum says nothing of the sort: This is the closest quote Lexicanum has in terms of describing Huron's forces.

Huron now leads the largest pirate fleet in the eastern Imperium.

Chaos Codex 6e only mentions that his forces grow in strength daily, nothing about Abaddon here.

So I went back to that old trusty bible, Codex Chaos 2e, again, nothing noting that his forces are particularly large or any comparison to any other Chaos Lords.

He's a pirate, he leads renegade marines and other traitor forces, there's really nothing to suggest he's some kind of successor to Abaddon, he's not even marked.

But he does have arms.

MarsNZ wrote:

 Arcsquad12 wrote:
According to fluff and the Lexicanum, Huron Blackheart is the strongest Chaos Lord next to Abaddon,

I was intrigued by this so I actually had a look around. Lexicanum says nothing of the sort: This is the closest quote Lexicanum has in terms of describing Huron's forces.

Huron now leads the largest pirate fleet in the eastern Imperium.

Chaos Codex 6e only mentions that his forces grow in strength daily, nothing about Abaddon here.

So I went back to that old trusty bible, Codex Chaos 2e, again, nothing noting that his forces are particularly large or any comparison to any other Chaos Lords.

He's a pirate, he leads renegade marines and other traitor forces, there's really nothing to suggest he's some kind of successor to Abaddon, he's not even marked.

Its 1d4chan's doing they reference that Huron "gets gak done" and mention him along with Cypher and Honsou as guys who can take over for "failabaddon the armless wonder". I really can't seem him having that massive of an army, I'd reckon that some Iron Warriors Warbands are bigger but that's just speculation on my part

welshhoppo wrote:
But he does have arms.

I'm pretty sure Huron has so many bionics that even the Mechanicus think he's too much machine. I wouldn't bank on him having arms.

 Sir Samuel Buca wrote:

welshhoppo wrote:
But he does have arms.

I'm pretty sure Huron has so many bionics that even the Mechanicus think he's too much machine. I wouldn't bank on him having arms.

I don't think that's true. The Mechanicus is all about becoming one with the machine spirit. There's documented fluff of them being entirely mechanical save for their physical brains. Huron's got at least one arm. And the other arm is a giant claw you don't want to get into an argument with.

 gpfunk wrote:

 Sir Samuel Buca wrote:

welshhoppo wrote:
But he does have arms.

I'm pretty sure Huron has so many bionics that even the Mechanicus think he's too much machine. I wouldn't bank on him having arms.

I don't think that's true. The Mechanicus is all about becoming one with the machine spirit. There's documented fluff of them being entirely mechanical save for their physical brains. Huron's got at least one arm. And the other arm is a giant claw you don't want to get into an argument with.

It was a jocular comment highlighting, and exaggerating, the amount of bionics Huron has.

S4, T4 for the most part.

JWhex wrote:
S4, T4 for the most part.

Zing! he is here all month - try the veal!

I've never seen anything highlighting them as particularly strong .I'm sure they are but barring various renegades, defectors and other varieties of CSM I don't think they have a huge number of Marines. As for various human forces, they probably have a lot.
Fleet elements, they are probably quite strong.

Though all together if the Maelstrom suddenly dissipated the Imperium could wipe them out. So they are strong but like everything else in 40k, they are not invincible. No one is.

The problem with this is it devalues the Legions that stayed together, are they saying that Huron commands a force more powerful than the Iron Warriors or Word Bearers. I read a novel were Erebus shrugged off the loss of 8,000 Astartes like it was nothing.

ZSO, SAHAAL wrote:
The problem with this is it devalues the Legions that stayed together, are they saying that Huron commands a force more powerful than the Iron Warriors or Word Bearers. I read a novel were Erebus shrugged off the loss of 8,000 Astartes like it was nothing.

Not really, Hurons armies are composed of large amounts of Renegades. It just shows how charismatic he is that his entire force is built from those who betrayed and yet still considered a power comparable to the original legions.

I mean the man converted a huge section of Space Wolves, one of the harder groups to fall into his legion.

The Red Corsairs are notable for being "near legion" sized in number.

That's all the indication of its strength you need.

It's notable because nonr of the pre-heresy legions remained solely intact. Take any of the biggest pre-heresy legions and minus roughly a third of their number due to the Istvaan incidents. Take what's left of that and whittle it away over the course of years as it fights its way across the galaxy to Terra. Take that number, and take another third out of it for fighting at Terra, the bloodiest conflict in the heresy. Then, take that number and break it up into smaller chunks as the legion fractures into warbands. Then take those warbands and have them fight other warbands and everything else in the galaxy for 10,000 years.

It isn't at all a stretch to assume that the biggest legion could be reduced to warbands of only a few thousand or less after 10,000 years of that.

What's the one legion who's known for staying mostly intact post-heresy?

Why, the black legion of course. It suddenly all makes sense.

BlaxicanX wrote:
What's the one legion who's known for staying mostly intact post-heresy?

Word Bearers?

Don't forget the Iron Warriors. I can't imagine that Huron is more powerful than Pertuburo

 FinalAnswer wrote:

BlaxicanX wrote:
What's the one legion who's known for staying mostly intact post-heresy?

Word Bearers?

Nope

Word Bearers weren't even completely unified before the Battle for Terra.

I haven't read the wiki or the lex on this one but i have read the battle book 'The Gildar Rift' and i have read the second book of the Night lords trilogy, both of these books have Huron as near main characters and he doesn't command a near legion size i dont care what other sources say i own the books. He commands no more then 300 marines on a good day, but thousands of cultists, he also HAD an impressive fleet but Daery's Arrun fleet master of the Silver skulls basically out maneuver's him in void warfare and Huron has to escape. Like i said Ive read both books and other then those two i dont think hes involved in any other 40k books, you get insight to almost every aspect of him and his "Legion size force" which is laughable, i would say plainly that Hurons forces after his fleet was destroyed by the silver skulls that he has maybe 100 marines maybe 150 but even thats a realistic stretch. He HAD the strength of a small chapter around the time of the second Night lords novel however he only escapes with his main flagship and a handful of vessels after his battle with the silver skulls. All the other named battle barges he had were destroyed or stolen back by the Night lords lol.

Huron could assemble a strikeforce of 50 terminators for a single assault. His sorcerers control stars to make them flare up or wink out. Other warbands stop by his turf to recruit, re-arm and trade. He rules a huge stretch of space virtually unopposed. He hosts chaos tournaments where tens of thousands of traitor marines shift allegiance.

Those are not things he would be able to do with a merely chapter-sized force. So yeah, I'm leaning toward Legion-sized organization. It's a bit dodgy because 40K keeps most numbers vague. How many Necron Tomb Worlds exist? How many Craftworlds are still there? What is the combined size of all Dark Eldar armed forces? How big is a Black Crusade?

The answer for all of those is the same: enough to be a colossal threat averted at the last moment by immense sacrifice, returning to the status quo until the next crisis.

 Frecklesonfire wrote:
I haven't read the wiki or the lex on this one but i have read the battle book 'The Gildar Rift' and i have read the second book of the Night lords trilogy, both of these books have Huron as near main characters and he doesn't command a near legion size i dont care what other sources say i own the books. He commands no more then 300 marines on a good day

It's never stated nor implied anywhere within Blood Reaver that the number of astartes under Huron's command is at or around 300. No concrete number of troops is given at all in fact. I too own the book.

Where are you getting near-Legion size from then?

And can you explain your dismissal of the Word Bearers Legion?

6th Edition Rulebook, page 176:

The Maelstrom Threat - The Red Corsairs launch a major raid from out of the Maelstrom, bringing Chogoris, Kaelas and Sessec systems under siege. Rumors report that Huron Blackheart has grown his group of renegades as large as the Space Marine Legions of old. It is an awesome power to wield.

As for the Word Bearers, Betrayer makes it clear that Kor Phaeron, Lorgar and Erebus all openly despise one another and believe that they're the true agent of Chaos whilst the others are just puppets. While Lorgar is generally above lowering himself to shadowplay and politiking, the other two are frequently Game of Throne'ing it up. In the Word Bearers omnibus they apparently spend quite some time warring with each other over command of the Legion.

As for the Word Bearers, Betrayer makes it clear that Kor Phaeron, Lorgar and Erebus all openly despise one another and believe that they're the true agent of Chaos whilst the others are just puppets. While Lorgar is generally above lowering himself to shadowplay and politiking, the other two are frequently Game of Throne'ing it up. In the Word Bearers omnibus they apparently spend quite some time warring with each other over command of the Legion

I see no evidence of this hatred, Erebus killed Argel because he didn't want him to be more favored by Lorgar. He regards Erebus and Kor as his adopted sons/adoptive fathers, this does'nt mean who hes afraid to mince words when they do something stupid or fail. The fact that he doesn't kill them outright despite their insubordination speaks volumes. Erebus even states that his struggles with Kor really mean nothing, its like a giant game of chess to them over who controls the Legion.

Seems we read different books.

Lorgar is aware of Kor Phaeron and Erebus' scheming behind his back, and makes it known to them both.

So then you agree that they fight among themselves for control of the legion. Cool, I guess.

I haven't read the wiki or the lex on this one but i have read the battle book 'The Gildar Rift' and i have read the second book of the Night lords trilogy, both of these books have Huron as near main characters and he doesn't command a near legion size i dont care what other sources say i own the books. He commands no more then 300 marines on a good day, but thousands of cultists, he also HAD an impressive fleet but Daery's Arrun fleet master of the Silver skulls basically out maneuver's him in void warfare and Huron has to escape. Like i said Ive read both books and other then those two i dont think hes involved in any other 40k books, you get insight to almost every aspect of him and his "Legion size force" which is laughable, i would say plainly that Hurons forces after his fleet was destroyed by the silver skulls that he has maybe 100 marines maybe 150 but even thats a realistic stretch. He HAD the strength of a small chapter around the time of the second Night lords novel however he only escapes with his main flagship and a handful of vessels after his battle with the silver skulls. All the other named battle barges he had were destroyed or stolen back by the Night lords lol.

In Gildar Rift, Huron smacks the Silver Skulls fleet around like a rented mule for the entire book (and it's not even Huron's ENTIRE fleet. Just a portion dedicated to this operation that Huron had been planning for like 50 years). The ONLY thing that saves the Skulls is the ascendant. Once they pulled that off Huron's Fleet (which was actually largely scout vessels and smaller attack craft) was forced to retreat. That's hardly Huron's ENTIRE fleet getting out maneuvered and destroyed. Not even close. Let's also not forget that the Skulls had to dedicate almost an ENTIRE COMPANY to stop Huron' s freaking raiding force planet side and STILL BARELY succeeded.

As for the Night Lords books - As has already been mentioned, it never really says how many Astartes he has, but the implication is that he has a HUGE operation. A massive fleet AND sorcerers powerful enough to pull a ship through the freaking warp without the use of a Navigator. It clearly states that (at least before the Flayer defected to the NL) that Huron has an operation set up to recover gene seed and recover his losses and let's not forget the Space Wolf strike Cruiser he owns. At the end of that book, the Night Lords take back ONE ship. One. And this is after Huron's forces wreck a Space Marine Fortress monastery like they were taking candy from a Tau baby, doom an entire Space Marine chapter to a slow extinction and escape with ALL of the monastery's gene seed.

Yeah, not sure you and I read the same books there ...

And can you explain your dismissal of the Word Bearers Legion?

IDK much about the Word Bearers pre-heresy, but at the end of the Word Bearer's trilogy, There's a scene where Erebus basically says they are divided and that he and Kor Phaeron take turns trying to wipe each other out.