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I am referring of course, to the specific chapters cited out of the latest marine codex (not SW, DA, and BA). As I am going about building a Salamanders army currently I have been reading through their fluff so I can best build a force around it. I have noticed some inconsistencies however, between their fluff and the options in the new SM 'dex. (Like GW doesn't do THAT all the time, I know.). Here are a few of my ideas for the Salamanders but I'd love to hear from anyone else about ideas for other chapters.

- Give all Salamander characters the ability to upgrade to artificer armor for say 5-10 points.
- Let any squad that has the ability to take heavy weapons have access to Heavy Flamers instead of limiting them to Sterngard, LoD, and Terminators. (For example, since a Tac squad could take 1 Heavy Weapon, they could take the heavy flamer)
- Give scouts the option to take multi-melta as well.
- Give their Librarians re-rolls on 1's for casting any Pyromancy powers.
- Limit the amount of Land Speeder squadrons to 1 per detachment.
- Give the Firestorm Cannon on the Land Raider Redeemer the Torrent rule (although I think they should make that a rule for every chapter's Redeemers)

Thoughts? Am I just being silly and starry eyed trying to bring more fluff into the rules?

 bomtek80 wrote:
- Give all Salamander characters the ability to upgrade to artificer armor for say 5-10 points.

Not got a problem with this one, fits well I think, and I'm sure it used to be an option way back when (the 4th ed traits codex maybe?).

 bomtek80 wrote:
- Let any squad that has the ability to take heavy weapons have access to Heavy Flamers instead of limiting them to Sterngard, LoD, and Terminators. (For example, since a Tac squad could take 1 Heavy Weapon, they could take the heavy flamer)

Again, fine. It's something BA get access to, so it can't be super-broken.

 bomtek80 wrote:
- Give scouts the option to take multi-melta as well.

Really not sure on this one though. Ordinary flamer or melta I think I'd be ok with, but multi-melt seems slightly jarring. See what other people think though.

 bomtek80 wrote:
- Give their Librarians re-rolls on 1's for casting any Pyromancy powers.

Sure, why not.

 bomtek80 wrote:
- Limit the amount of Land Speeder squadrons to 1 per detachment.

I'm not sure this needs to be a thing. In general, GW has been moving away from restrictions like this, and the only time I've seen multiple squadrons is just to split them up into single model units.

 bomtek80 wrote:
- Give the Firestorm Cannon on the Land Raider Redeemer the Torrent rule (although I think they should make that a rule for every chapter's Redeemers)

The Redeemer needs some sort of buff, but full-on Torrent would make it a bit good I think. You could always just have it as a reduced-range Torrent though, say 3" for non-Sallies and 6" for Sallies. That should help it get past struggling to hit units without being too powerful (looking at you, Heldrake).

Also, the upcoming Ravenguard / White Scars / Tau campaign book contains Warlord Trait tables and Tactical Objectives for those Chapters, so maybe have a think about something similar?

Limiting the land speeders was simply trying to limit their forces to the fluff. Traditionally the Salamanders don't use any grav speeders since their home world's gravity would play holy heck with it. The are supposed to field more tracked vehicles than anything.

The ability for Iron Hands to upgrade their tactical Marine sergeants to techmarines for 40pts.

 DoomShakaLaka wrote:
The ability for Iron Hands to upgrade their tactical Marine sergeants to techmarines for 40pts.

That seems a little cheap, but i kinda like it. I would make it 51 pts to match the cost of a techmarine.

I would personally like these changes:

Add this to The Flesh is weak: All Iron Hands Dreadnoughts may take the venerable upgrade, and dreadnoughts with the venerable upgrade may be taken as an HQ choice.

Add this to Machine Empathy: Vehicles part of an Iron Hands army may take Chapter tactics (IH) for 20pts.

Iron Hands HQs can take the Iron Father upgrade for 50pts granting the HQ Zealot (as per the Chaplain) and Blessings of the Omnissah (if they don't already have it), as well as these bonuses: Captains/Chapter Masters gain a servo arm, power axe, and artificer armor; Librarians gain a servo arm and artificer armor; Dreadnoughts with the venerable upgrade gain a servo arm; and Techmarines gain +1WS and +1 W.

Techmarines(and their Iron Father upgrade) may exchange their bolter, frag and krak grenades and Artificer armor for Terminator armor and a storm bolter for 10 points. (may still take other upgrades. any choice that would replace the bolter instead replaces the storm bolter and deducts cost of storm bolter)

Iron Hands do NOT have Chaplains but may substitute an Iron Father for a Chaplain in any Formation requiring a Chaplain.

Iron Hands do not have Terminator squads or Terminator Assault squads.

IH may take up to 1 Medusan Immortals squad in place of a command squad or Honour Guard.

Medusan Immortals Squad: 125 points for 5 veteran models, WS4 BS4 S4 T4 W1 I4 A2 Ld9 2+/3++ , Infantry; wargear: artificer armor, storm shield, bolt pistol, bolter, frag and krak grenades. One veteran may take a narthecium for 20pts. One veteran may be upgraded to a Company Champion (+1WS, Honour or Death) for 15pts. The entire squad may exchange their artificer armor, bolter, frag and krak grenades for a storm bolter and terminator armor for 15 points. The entire squad may take bikes for 25 points. Any veteran may replace a bolt pistol, bolter or storm bolter with items from the melee weapons, ranged weapons, and/or special weapons list (reduce cost of storm bolter if they have terminator armor). unit may select Land raiders (all types) or Stormraven gunship as dedicated transports. Company Champion and veteran with narthecium are infantry(character)

Tactical Squads and Devastator Squads may exchange their sergeant for a techmarine 51 pts, or Veteran Terminator Sergeant 21pts (power weapon, storm bolter, terminator armor WS4 BS4 S4 T4 W1 I4 A2 Ld9 Infantry(character); may exchange power weapon for power fist (10pts), chainfist (15pts), Thunder Hammer (15pts), Lightning claw (free) and/or they may exchange their storm bolter for a lightning claw (5 pts) or a storm shield (10pts).

Medusan Immortals squads,Command Squads, Honour Guard, Tactical squads and devastor squads with at least one character and/or Independent character in terminator armor with IH chapter tactics gains relentless and +1 FNP.

Tactical Squads and Devastator squads with 9 marines and a techamarine in terminator armor or veteran sergeant in terminator armor may take a stormraven gunship or land raider (any type) as a dedicated transport.

Do the Iron Hands traditionally not have terminators?

 bomtek80 wrote:
Do the Iron Hands traditionally not have terminators?

In the original fluff they were supposed to sparse after the HH so they spread them out to sergeants and the like. So instead of having a big unit of them they would reserve them to the guys leading so to speak. I must admit I took some liberty/inspiration on the medusan command squad from the hh second book. I could see the IH having maybe a small elite group of them to protect their Iron fathers who were their chaplains. Dread hqs makes great sense in IH because of their beliefs and doctrines. they are about as machine as the Space marines can get. Some points and rules might need tweeking here and there but I think the rules aren't overly crazy and op. A guy in terminator armor leading a tac squad is fluffy but not very effective so i felt something was needed to make that a viable option (transports other than razorbacks basically useless when they cant combat squad, no sweeping advances ect.)

The idea of Techmarine Dreadnoughts seems to have snagged my imagination although make it so he can't repair himself?

Leaving the Speeders in for the Salamanders gives people the opertunity to do tracked / wheeled conversions (dune-buggy style, I've seen a few on the internets) if they really want to stick to the fluff.

What e really need is some formations ala the new White Scars and Ravenguard ones for each of the different chapters.


Something I'd like to see for Iron Hands is an all Venerable Dreadnought formation that grants 5+ invul saves against glancing hits and +1 to IWND rolls.

 Quanar wrote:
The idea of Techmarine Dreadnoughts seems to have snagged my imagination although make it so he can't repair himself?

Leaving the Speeders in for the Salamanders gives people the opertunity to do tracked / wheeled conversions (dune-buggy style, I've seen a few on the internets) if they really want to stick to the fluff.

That was the intention. While being able to self repair isn't that op it does seem strange. Other thoughts I had was introducing the cyber familiar from HH. Iron Hands characters may take a cyber familiars for 15 points granting the character a 6+ invulnerable save or improving an existing invulnerable save by +1 to a max of 3+. Maybe some unique bionic upgrades that are only available to HQs, but an hq can only take one and they take up a relic slot on the HQ. what they would be idk, but they could prove fluffy additions.

Possible Idea for a Wargear Relic for Iron Hands

Omnissiah's Wrath-15 pts.

Range 30" S4 ap5 Rapid Fire, Haywire

Enhanced Augmentics- 20pts

Models with this have their attack and initiative value increased by one and may re-roll charge and run distances.

Deflector Shield-20pts
5+ invulnerable save. Any save that is successfully made by this model from a shooting attack automatically causes an equal number of hits to the original shooting unit with the same profile as the original shot.

 DoomShakaLaka wrote:
Possible Idea for a Wargear Relic for Iron Hands

Omnissiah's Wrath-15 pts.

Range 30" S4 ap5 Rapid Fire, Haywire

Enhanced Augmentics- 20pts

Models with this have their attack and initiative value increased by one and may re-roll charge and run distances.

Deflector Shield-20pts
5+ invulnerable save. Any save that is successfully made by this model from a shooting attack automatically causes an equal number of hits to the original shooting unit with the same profile as the original shot.

I don't agree with everything here but it does serve as inspiration http://www.bolterandchainsword.com/topic/152367-codex-iron-hands/page-51#entry3439709

Snipped from the link: Point costs and values adjusted as seen fit.

Artificer Bionics: Because of the extensive bionics employed by the Chapter, any character that has access to Chapter Relics may also make a selection from the Artificer Bionics wargear list. Like Chapter Relics, only one of each may be selected per army and you may not select more than one per model.
Hand of Manestus (15 points): Increases the character's Initiative by +1 for any close combat attack (this means that the character may strike at I2 with unwieldly weapons).
Eye of Manestus (20 points): Increases the character's Ballistic Skill by +1 and the bearer and his unit have the ignores cover special rule.
Heart of Iron (25 points): You may re-roll any failed FNP or IWND on this model.
Blantar's Frame (50 points): Increases the character's Toughness to 6 as well as gaining the fear and the Smash special rules. The model counts as Extremely Bulky and may not take a bike.

 DoomShakaLaka wrote:
Snipped from the link: Point costs and values adjusted as seen fit.

Artificer Bionics: Because of the extensive bionics employed by the Chapter, any character that has access to Chapter Relics may also make a selection from the Artificer Bionics wargear list. Like Chapter Relics, only one of each may be selected per army and you may not select more than one per model.
Hand of Manestus (15 points): Increases the character's Initiative by +1 for any close combat attack (this means that the character may strike at I2 with unwieldly weapons).
Eye of Manestus (20 points): Increases the character's Ballistic Skill by +1 and the bearer and his unit have the ignores cover special rule.
Heart of Iron (25 points): You may re-roll any failed FNP or IWND on this model.
Blantar's Frame (50 points): Increases the character's Toughness to 6 as well as gaining the fear and the Smash special rules. The model counts as Extremely Bulky and may not take a bike.

Yeah I like all of those. I just think there needs to be a few more maybe one that gives eternal warrior and/or one increasing strength by 1. Maybe a dread upgrade or 2. I think what they came up with is good as far as bionics I just think there needs to be a bit more. Maybe one or two that somehow give unit or army wide buffs that change the way an IH army plays a bit or maybe just makes them better at waht they are supposed to be good at. Maybe a bionic that does the army upgrade thing moves the unit to a LoW slot.

This could be a way to add in your LOW

special rule:
Iron Father- A single Chapter Master model in your army may be upgraded to an Iron Father for free so long as the model takes Artificer Armor, all items from the Artificer Bionics list, Gorgon's Chain, the Iron Stone, and the Tempered Helm. Other upgrades may still be purchased aside from Terminator armor and a Bike.

A model with the Iron Father rule grants a 6+ FNP to all friendly units and grants IWND to vehicles and walkers within 24” of it. If the vehicle already had this rule add +1 to the die result. In addition the model with the Iron Father special rule may select an additional unit with the Tempered Helm and has the fear and adamantium will special rules.
If a model is upgraded to an Iron Father it is counted as a LOW.

Total cost comes to 345pts.


I admit I'm just throwing out random ideas though, nothing solid.

 DoomShakaLaka wrote:
This could be a way to add in your LOW

special rule:
Iron Father- A single Chapter Master model in your army may be upgraded to an Iron Father for free so long as the model takes Artificer Armor, all items from the Artificer Bionics list, Gorgon's Chain, the Iron Stone, and the Tempered Helm. Other upgrades may still be purchased aside from Terminator armor and a Bike.

A model with the Iron Father rule grants a 6+ FNP to all friendly units and grants IWND to vehicles and walkers within 24” of it. If the vehicle already had this rule add +1 to the die result. In addition the model with the Iron Father special rule may select an additional unit with the Tempered Helm and has the fear and adamantium will special rules.
If a model is upgraded to an Iron Father it is counted as a LOW.

Total cost comes to 345pts.


I admit I'm just throwing out random ideas though, nothing solid.

I was kinda toying with the idea of something along this line: Neural Augmentation 100pts - May only be taken by a warlord with the Forgefather upgrade - The warlord becomes a LoW, gains eternal warrior, grants an additional use of the Devastator Doctrine plus an additional use of any other doctrine for each IH HQ choice beyond the warlord.

!00 points might be too much for something like this IDK or maybe this is just a bonkers ability. It is fluffy though.