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Perhaps the point is that it's rarer for an entire chapter to just go "Ah, Feth it" and go renegade, than say, just a squad or company going renegade. I think it's considered an exceptional event for the full thousand marines to all decide at once that Chaos is groovy.

Plus, it's probably only in there to make GW's new thing to sell even more of a special snowflake. "Hey guys, you've bought the Chaos marines codex, but these guys are totally different! We promise!"

That makes more sense if they are restricting the news to *entire* Chapters falling. Yes, that's a rare event. For anything less than that, though, it's a fairly common occurrence, all things considered.

You'd think the Inquisition would take more precautions if that had been the case.

As it is they seem to prefer trying to clean up any mess that does appear.

The Astartes Chapters are granted lots of autonomy, for the most part, and the Inquisition doesn't get to throw agents around when and wherever they like... it's a big galaxy, can't watch all of it all of the time.

TiamatRoar wrote:
The Badab War isn't a common occurrence. It was stated to have been the biggest astartes vs astartes battle since the Heresy (which means it's a nearly one-of-a-kind occurrence)

Where does it say that? The original IA article stated it was the largest Astartes rebellion since the Fourth Quadrant Rebellion which had only ended 120 years earlier. (Though a lot of other articles erroneously referred to the Badab War as the Fourth Quadrant Rebellion)

I'd go so far as to say that even just a full "squad" of marines going rogue is incredibly rare, relatively speaking. It's hard enough for one person whose basically been brainwashed and mind-fethed for most of his existence into unconditionally loving the Imperium to become corrupted into turning loyalties. The idea that ten individuals could simultaneously do it is pretty out there (though it does happen).

As well, what are the general reasons for a Marine to go rogue? Chaos usually snares them with pride, doubting the Imperium and themselves, and bloodlust. The latter point is something that is hard to stamp out, and could indeed infect an entire squad (because they'd seen some gak, or whatever), but the first two? It's hard for an entire squad to be corrupted by pride simultaneously, or by doubt. Especially with Chaplains around, who regularly wander the chapter addressing those two things.

With only a thousand marines to look after, it seems unlikely that a Chaplain would fail to notice an entire squad simultaneously falling to their pride, or having doubts, or even becoming obsessed with bloodshed.

This article is relevant. It's an article all about renegade Marines. There's some interesting stuff in there.

Anyway, reading through said article, I do get the impression that whole Chapters going renegade isn't quite "nearly unheard of", which, to me, is putting it a bit strongly. There's references to a four different forces being considered as favoured responses against a rogue Chapter, depending on why said Chapter has gone rogue. To me, this implies that it's happened enough times for these forces to have been used against said Chapters multiple times. There's also this highly relevant quote:

It is not recorded exactly how many chapters have been purged in this way, as all record of their existence will be expunged upon their defeat. It can be estimated however, that as many as a dozen chapters may have been completely destroyed and subsequently deleted from the records, while a small number of others have been declared Excommunicatus, but are still at large somewhere in the galaxy.

Seems to imply that whilst rare, whole Chapters going rogue has certainly happened a fair few times. Also note that records being expunged is noted here as a reason for us not getting a clear picture.

 BlaxicanX wrote:
Chaos usually snares them with pride, doubting the Imperium and themselves, and bloodlust. The latter point is something that is hard to stamp out, and could indeed infect an entire squad (because they'd seen some gak, or whatever), but the first two? It's hard for an entire squad to be corrupted by pride simultaneously, or by doubt. Especially with Chaplains around, who regularly wander the chapter addressing those two things.

With only a thousand marines to look after, it seems unlikely that a Chaplain would fail to notice an entire squad simultaneously falling to their pride, or having doubts, or even becoming obsessed with bloodshed.

However, Chaos can also corrupt people quite quickly. Marines could potentially be corrupted before they were able to make it back to the Chaplain's loving arms.

 BrotherHaraldus wrote:

Games Workshop wrote:It’s a rare, almost unheard-of occurrence, but there have been times in Imperial history when a Space Marine Chapter has turned renegade.

Yeah, the usual way is like when those Space Wolves decided to join the Red Corsairs, because… well, they had better beer and funny pirate hats or something. I know, pretty petty reason, but remember, we are talking Space Wolves. That event was not really described as rare or almost unheard of.

Interestingly, a small trapped crew of Space Wolves deciding to rather join the Corsairs than die was literally a one of a kind occasion.

Nowhere else has any other Space Wolves doing the same been mentioned.

You're speculating rather wildly there by implying it would be common.

The Wolf of Fernis was one of Hurons greatest victories because he was able to corrupt the crew. And some chapters are deemed rouge for political reasons such as the Blood Knights who still consider themselves loyal to the Imperium and continue to defend it

I'm just going over the Lexicanum list right now, and to those who are using the number 135 from those lists needs to be very careful.

I would say it's just a bad idea to try and skim the broader list and use that in this discussion.

Because I do have the time to go through each article right now, I've started doing just that, and I've only just hit the 6th warband on the list, the so-called Apocalypse Company, I've already run into problems. Namely:

The Apocalypse Company has the same armour colours and symbol as the Bleak Brotherhood.

Followed by this in the Bleak Brotherhood section:

...noted as a possible faction of the Warp Ghosts.

Followed by this from the Warp Ghosts:

The Warp Ghosts have the same colour scheme as the Death Mongers...

Followed by this from the Death Mongers:

Originally known as the Brothers of the Anvil, they were among the thirty Chapters sentenced to the Abyssal Crusade.

So you have to be very careful with this "135" number. In fact I bet it's totally useless, and the actual number is a GREAT DEAL less than that. The Lex lists splinter warbands from the original legions separately, and lists duplicates, such as listing each of the Black Legion, Luna Wolves, and Sons of Horus. Remember, the Lex's-- and other wiki's-- job is not to really compile and organize and adjudicate on all the different things GW has published over the years, but simply to act as a collection service of all that info, from which we must then draw our own conclusions, organizing it all in whatever way we might to fit our version of the storyline. There are undoubtedly quite a lot of these conflicting paint jobs and blurbs and other things from various publications by GW which have been presented on the Lex separately and then simply linked together so we know what the issues are and can "solve" them ourselves.

I'm still going through this thing.

EDIT: Also, look at the Lex list of Renegade Chapters.... Only nine. In the context of 10,000 years that is quite a good number if it is reliable-- you can't simply go "9/1,009=n%" either. This total comes over the entire history of Space Marine Chapters, a vast swathe of history in which many more chapters have come and gone for entirely different reasons (destroyed homeworlds, lost in the warp, et cetera). So that would be a greatly inflated percentage itself. And the nine includes the Knights of Blood, as well as a splinter of the Astral Claws, and puts the Relictors in twice, and doesn't include the Iron Drakes or many of the other Chapters which went on Penitent Crusades into the EoT, only to turn once there.

These lists are just not very good resources taken on their own. You have to dig a lot deeper if you want to bring any good info to the discussion.

Most of the "entire chapter" turning traitor was from the Abyssal Crusade when most of those turned, other than that it's been the Astral Claws, and now the Crimson Sabres. So yes it's rare for an entire Chapter to turn, groups here and there are more common.

Given the general level of autonomy that marines enjoy, its probably quite commonplace that they perform acts that would elicit a censure of some kind. the severity of the censure might vary, but its not difficult to imagine marines respond to a threat, wipe out the threat, and then find out that they just killed the sector governors best friend. marines have also been known to go overboard, massacring millions when there were just a few traitors.

Outside sources would view them as being excessive, and when marines being an independent bunch tell the inquisitor or local governor to stick it where the sun don't shine, an otherwise loyal chapter is declared renegade, and then they do indeed turn traitor. How else would they view it, the marines have just done their duty, ended a threat with extreme prejudice, are censured for it, which is nothing but an indication that the conspiracy is far more wide ranging than they originally thought.....

Many many cases of marines being declared traitors could probably be avoided if there was some oversight, but since the chapters are girlymans ideas, thats not going to happen...

You people seem to forget that chapters don't always fall as one. (no offense meant) Individual marines fall often, and even companies falling whilst the rest of the chapter stays 'pure' is nowhere near unheard of. And yes, the Badab war was a once in several eons occurrence.

 BrotherHaraldus wrote:
Interestingly, a small trapped crew of Space Wolves deciding to rather join the Corsairs than die was literally a one of a kind occasion.

Nowhere else has any other Space Wolves doing the same been mentioned.

Svane Vulfbad wants to have a word with you.

Orkdom basically beat me to my point. Even if you were to use the Lex in this way, many "renegade warbands" left the Traitor Legions, not the modern Imperial Astartes.

The 4e Chaos Space Marine Codex says that the Ordo Malleus believe that as many as fifty Space Marine Chapters have fully fallen to Chaos since the Horus Heresy.
So that really isn't a lot, only about one every two hundred years.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Jape wrote:
Orkdom basically beat me to my point. Even if you were to use the Lex in this way, many "renegade warbands" left the Traitor Legions, not the modern Imperial Astartes.

And those Warbands don't necessarily represent a whole Chapter turned.
The 4e Codex mentions how two Fallen Chapters split into dozens of Warbands.

 Psienesis wrote:
The Lexicanum article lists 134 entries for Chaos Space Marines, including the original Traitor Legions, and that's not even getting into those Chapters, like the Souldrinkers, who are just renegades...

... seems it's a lot more common than GW thinks. 135 entries is more than 10% of all Chapters currently in existence.

Those are warbands. Each entry is not a chapter turned traitor. The vast, vast majority of those are original traitor legion SMs that have split up and recoalested into roving pillagers. For example the Festizio warband would be like 50 Black Legionaires, 40 World Eaters, 40 Iron Warriors etc. With other bands of Alpha Legionaries and Night Lords coming going depending on how they feel about what's going on and if there's good power grabbing/backstabbing opportunites. After The Scouring The traitor Legions kept breaking down into smaller and more mixed groups. They're basically tribals now.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Animus wrote:
The 4e Chaos Space Marine Codex says that the Ordo Malleus believe that as many as fifty Space Marine Chapters have fully fallen to Chaos since the Horus Heresy.
So that really isn't a lot, only about one every two hundred years.

I don't have it in front of me but I believe it actually says there have been 50 incidents, which includes incidents of 1 marine turning. Typically, it's going to be in the 1 squad area.

 Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote:

 BrotherHaraldus wrote:
Interestingly, a small trapped crew of Space Wolves deciding to rather join the Corsairs than die was literally a one of a kind occasion.

Nowhere else has any other Space Wolves doing the same been mentioned.

Svane Vulfbad wants to have a word with you.

Okay, a crew + one guy.

Still not the masses that you enjoy throwing around.

That's from a single Chapter, out of one thousand, of Space Marines... a First Founding Chapter, too. Kind of a big deal.

Aye, the loss of both Vulfbad and the Wolf of Fenris were -very- big deals.

 BrotherHaraldus wrote:
Okay, a crew + one guy.

None of which being portrayed as something out of the ordinary. Hence, those are merely a few examples, not ultra-rare exceptions .
I mean, it is not like the Red Corsairs even had to use any kind of stratagem, or daemonic influence, or warp-based mind-control, or manipulation, or anything really. Board the ship, kill the captain, and BANG!, every space wolf that is a Chaos wannabe just comes out of the closet. If there was no manipulation involved, no conspiracy, why would that particular ship be full of Chaos wannabe just dying to turn their cloak around, and every other ship having only paragon of loyalty that would rather die than betray, like any good Imperial Guard ?

 KamikazeCanuck wrote:
I don't have it in front of me but I believe it actually says there have been 50 incidents.

Nah, it says Chapters.

"the lords of the Ordo Malleus believe that as many as fifty Space Marine Chapters have fully fallen to the wiles of Chaos since the end of the Horus Heresy."

 Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote:
Two known cases in all of imperial, Space Wolf, and objective history of SW turning, for a total number of twenty or so marines at most = SW turn all the time at the slightest provocatio

Yeah, I am not convinced.

By that logic, I can say that dropping a normal pencil is enough to make a Battle Sister squad panic and run in mindless, pant-wetting terror, since they have been known to retreat once or twice in lore. (And if you want to go down the game mechanics route, they are even subject to Fear and can flee all the way from the enemy right off the table.)

Your arguments have more holes than substance.

Are you trolling, or is it just some butthurt vendetta over Marines getting more love from GW?

 BrotherHaraldus wrote:

 Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote:
None of which being portrayed as something out of the ordinary. Hence, those are merely a few examples, not ultra-rare exceptions .
I mean, it is not like the Red Corsairs even had to use any kind of stratagem, or daemonic influence, or warp-based mind-control, or manipulation, or anything really. Board the ship, kill the captain, and BANG!, every space wolf that is a Chaos wannabe just comes out of the closet. If there was no manipulation involved, no conspiracy, why would that particular ship be full of Chaos wannabe just dying to turn their cloak around, and every other ship having only paragon of loyalty that would rather die than betray, like any good Imperial Guard ?

Yeah, you are right, I see it now! You are a genius and I love you.

Ah, finally, you have come to your sense. Also, modifying the text you quote is uncool.

 BrotherHaraldus wrote:
By that logic, I can say that dropping a normal pencil is enough to make a Battle Sister squad panic and run in mindless, pant-wetting terror, since they have been known to retreat once or twice in lore.

They have been known to retreat one or twice, yes, but not exactly in “mindless, pant-wetting terror”. Every force of the Imperium has been known to retreat, and the Sisters not any more than others. While Marines has been described as falling to chaos way, way more often than Imperial Guards or Sisters. And we just mention an occasion where they do so without any good reason at all.

Animus wrote:
The 4e Chaos Space Marine Codex says that the Ordo Malleus believe that as many as fifty Space Marine Chapters have fully fallen to Chaos since the Horus Heresy.
So that really isn't a lot, only about one every two hundred years.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Jape wrote:
Orkdom basically beat me to my point. Even if you were to use the Lex in this way, many "renegade warbands" left the Traitor Legions, not the modern Imperial Astartes.

And those Warbands don't necessarily represent a whole Chapter turned.
The 4e Codex mentions how two Fallen Chapters split into dozens of Warbands.

That was my point in backing what Orkdom said. 135 warbands do not equal 135 chapters. Hell a 'CSM' warband could be one marine leading a cult of nutters.

Animus wrote:
The 4e Chaos Space Marine Codex says that the Ordo Malleus believe that as many as fifty Space Marine Chapters have fully fallen to Chaos since the Horus Heresy.
So that really isn't a lot, only about one every two hundred years.

How often are SM chapters created ? Is that about… maybe once every two hundred years ?

Depends. There's been a total of 26 Foundings, including the one that pre-dates the Heresy in all of the 40K setting.

Sometimes, they happen millennia apart... other times just a few centuries, but the actual dates of some Foundings are not known, and in some cases, they assume a Founding happened (because a later Founding has a date and an assigned number), but they have no record of what Chapters were created in that Founding.

Only when the "Plot" calls for it.....

Or when someone dreams it up.

 Psienesis wrote:
There's been a total of 26 Foundings, including the one that pre-dates the Heresy in all of the 40K setting.

So, that means about 2 chapters from each founding went traitor. How many chapters per founding, though, that is the big question ! To get 1000 chapters, it would mean at least about 40 chapters per founding, but we never get a founding with more than 10 new chapters described.