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Hey all.

New to 40k and I'm painting up some space marines. Horrible with placing on decals and not skilled enough to paint on a symbol. Thought I'd just make them blackshields, but upon further research it seems they really only existed in 30k. So I'm trying to come up with some fluff to explain why they don't use heraldry. Here's the best I've come up with as an idea.

They're a cursed founding chapter. Not considered a legitimate chapter due to their founding they went with a bastard motif. Calling themselves the Emperors Bastards, they use no heraldry as I believe in medieval times bastards weren't allowed to use heraldry. Not sure on that but seems right?

Just wondering what folks think. Laughable? Looking for any ideas and criticisms.

Thanks

There are 1000 chapters, and they all take very different views on the Codex Astartes.

You can also make the ultimate Grey Marines: a company of pseud-renegades that have stripped themselves of heraldry out of shame for some past misdeeds.

Not a bad idea. I've already painted them leadbelcher heavily shaded with nuln oil.

Grey Marines is a bit of an old joke, for a Space Marine army that was very ambiguously painted to allow it to use various codices as the owner wanted.

But if you went with gunmetal armor, you can make the "chapter badge" a jet black shoulderpad, and then some sort of very simple split design for company/squad markings.

Well that went way over my head then!

 Mrs. Esterhouse wrote:
They're a cursed founding chapter. Not considered a legitimate chapter due to their founding they went with a bastard motif. Calling themselves the Emperors Bastards, they use no heraldry as I believe in medieval times bastards weren't allowed to use heraldry. Not sure on that but seems right?

Just wondering what folks think. Laughable? Looking for any ideas and criticisms.

I think it'd be kind of weird for a Space Marine chapter to so actively disparage itself in this way. Calling themselves bastards in a context where they consider it a pejorative just seems out of character for what a marine chapter is supposed to be. Even not having their chapter badge on the armour might be considered shameful to them, where even extremely secretive or shady chapters like the Mentors or the Minotaurs have prominent chapter badges.

If you're sold on the idea of not having iconography on their shoulders, I can think of a couple of scenarios that might make sense...

-The chapter grouped up for a major mobilization then disappeared into the warp. They were declared lost or destroyed and their heraldry was reused for a new chapter in memorial. The chapter reemerges, discovers the situation and goes on a crusade to achieve some great deed to be retroactively worthy of that memorial.

-The chapter fell in with the Ecclesiarchy during the Reign of Blood, receiving some degree of favour from Vandire's supporters and we're renamed some sufficiently holy sounding or haughty name. When Vandire is overthrown the chapter strikes off its own name and goes on a penitent crusade.

-The chapter is a Fists successor that believes whole-heartedly in extensive full-body camouflage on their power armour. Emphasizing scouts and guerrilla tactics.

That said, I think you're worrying too much about the iconography, you could easily make it something as simple as a diagonal line intersecting a vertical line, or explain away inconsistencies olfrom model to model by describing how they draw it on their own shoulders just before each battle...

Good ideas. Probably do something simple then. Maybe the Greek delta numeral and call them Delta marines or something.

There is an old bit of fluff (RT-era) that the banners of the Salamanders did not have any visible heraldic divisions. They were there, but only visible in infrared wavelengths that the Salis could see.

I don’t paint chapter marking on my scouts. A few reasons for this. From a practical POV, I first painted them when I had two active armies, Ultras and BAs. So by leaving them unmarked, I could use them in both armies (they are in camo, not chapter colors). My fluff justification for this is that their job is to gather intelligence, not distribute it. If they are spotted in the field, their opponent might know there are marines in the area, but not which chapter they are facing. If you wanted to have your chapter being more practical, this idea could be used on the whole chapter level.

One idea I had was a band of blackshields lost in the warp emerging in the 40k era. Not sure if I could use the marine codex for them though.

 Mrs. Esterhouse wrote:
One idea I had was a band of blackshields lost in the warp emerging in the 40k era. Not sure if I could use the marine codex for them though.

Given the way Blackshield Legion Tactics work and the way the marauder squads are organized I'd recommend starting from either Black Templars or the Deathwatch if you want to use 40k rules.

You could just use the 30k rules if your opponents are okay with it.

Cool. Thanks for the ideas. Don't really like the 30k rules as I can't take tactical squads with them but I'll look into the other options you mentioned.

They're your models. Paint them however you wish. They don't need icons on their shoulders to be playable.

Possibly they just deliberately don't use heraldy?

There's no real reason to do so, after all - a space marine's awareness of who he's talking to and where his battle-brothers are is provided by his armour's systems in much greater detail than armour heraldry, after all; an apothecary, for example, sees the vital signs of all marines he's responsible for.

Wearing marks of rank and allegiance is ultimately just a matter of ego. The Alpha Legion, in the Heresy Era, often went with essentially unmarked armour to make it hard for opponents to know who they were fighting, and certainly modern day armies tend to have removable rank markings and a tradition of not saluting under battlefield conditions; painting one guy's armour with gold trim is, in practical terms, a 'sniper check'.

 Mrs. Esterhouse wrote:
Cool. Thanks for the ideas. Don't really like the 30k rules as I can't take tactical squads with them but I'll look into the other options you mentioned.

You can't take Legion tactical squads with 40k rules either. A Blackshield Marauder Squad (their core Troops) is a very flexible unit that can imitate a 40k Tactical squad very easily but is nigh-impossible to imitate in 40k (though Deathwatch come close).

The chapter could have been attacked at the moment they were created, and maybe before names and heraldry were assigned, so they were forced to fight their first battle/war before they even knew who they were. A tradition that stuck, perhaps?

Yea I'm definitely making it a bigger issue than it needs to be. The group I'm playing with isn't that concerned about fluff so I needn't really worry about it. And we're playing Killteam so I could just say they're a roving band of rogue marines or the last of some blackshields.
I guess my "fanboyism" is making me want something "chapter approved". Haha

Could always go with a Penitent Crusade type situation, a shame of their Chapter, so they blacked out their symbols until they feel vindicated.

With my CSM it was easy to give them all a bland black shoulder guard to represent their participation in a Black Crusade.

So maybe something similar.

But also, my loyalist army is painted up red with blank chapter symbols so they can be used in any Chapter Tactic (altho I haven't really deviated from WS yet) and it isn't even that noticeable on the table top.

The Fists Exemplar are an IF successor chapter that leave there armour unpainted.

locarno24 wrote:
Possibly they just deliberately don't use heraldy?

There's no real reason to do so, after all - a space marine's awareness of who he's talking to and where his battle-brothers are is provided by his armour's systems in much greater detail than armour heraldry, after all; an apothecary, for example, sees the vital signs of all marines he's responsible for.

Wearing marks of rank and allegiance is ultimately just a matter of ego. The Alpha Legion, in the Heresy Era, often went with essentially unmarked armour to make it hard for opponents to know who they were fighting, and certainly modern day armies tend to have removable rank markings and a tradition of not saluting under battlefield conditions; painting one guy's armour with gold trim is, in practical terms, a 'sniper check'.

It makes sense. The enemy not know where a captain is.
Which points are the senior, who is a key link in chain.

Disguised. They give a enemy less information.

GoatboyBeta wrote:
The Fists Exemplar are an IF successor chapter that leave there armour unpainted.

I had not heard of them. Thanks!

Steel confessors...... created by the Ad Mech in secret.

 Mrs. Esterhouse wrote:
Hey all.

New to 40k and I'm painting up some space marines. Horrible with placing on decals and not skilled enough to paint on a symbol. Thought I'd just make them blackshields, but upon further research it seems they really only existed in 30k. So I'm trying to come up with some fluff to explain why they don't use heraldry. Here's the best I've come up with as an idea.

They're a cursed founding chapter. Not considered a legitimate chapter due to their founding they went with a bastard motif. Calling themselves the Emperors Bastards, they use no heraldry as I believe in medieval times bastards weren't allowed to use heraldry. Not sure on that but seems right?

Just wondering what folks think. Laughable? Looking for any ideas and criticisms.

Thanks

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baton_sinister