Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

having never been to any tournament play what is the norm for chapter's/paint schemes. Is it not always best to paint your space marines in a custom paint job that way being able to play as any chapter so long as you don't mix and match special characters from different chapters I.e I want to play Ultramarines but paint the whole army purple, I can still use say Calgar as long as he is painted purple to?

As far as i know there are no GW rules for painting what so ever. And i have not seen any tournament make rules for painting (except for the painting cometition.) So you can paint you army in any color sheme that you like you could paint any model a different way if you wanted.

It varies by tournament but generally noone cares if your ultramarines are red.

The only no is having different chapters in the same list represented by the same colours

I think this is more for player clarity than anything else. If you say, have 3 different chapters in your army and you have 7 different paint schemes, or one consistent paint scheme the opponent my get frustrated having to check if this marine squad has these special rules or those special rules for instance.

It'd be similar to having dice you made yourself out of wood or clay. Yes there are no rules against it specifically, but it could lead to a few sneakies being pulled in the rush to remember everything going on.

As for having a chapter as another or successor chapter paint scheme, well in real life most military organizations will have several camouflage schemes they use in different situations? Maybe your marines are cluey enough not to wear bright colours during the planned night raid for instance?

That's good then as I want a custom paint scheme and as long as I paint the special characters in the same colour I can run any chapter then. If I want green Ultramarines one day as long as the special Ultramarines characters are green to then I can run them as Ultramarines but if I wanted say green blood angels the next day as long as say Dante is green to then I can run them as blood angels as long as I didn't have special characters from another's chapter running along side it?

IIRC GW's own tournament rules have recently said that if your marines are painted to obviously be a certain chapter they have to be that chapter - so no saying your obviously-painted-as-ultramarines are actually white scars. However if your marines are painted as something that isn't obviously a certain chapter you can say they're anything.

The non-codex chapters (blood angels, dark angels, space wolves, grey knights, deathwatch to a very limited degree) have different models from the codex chapters for some stuff. Most tournaments aren't going to care, but again IIRC warhammer world's most recent iteration had something about no proxies that would mean you couldn't, say, use a normal space marine captain to proxy for a dark angels master.

I think GW has "Sort of" tried to push this and had a LOT of push back against it. Mostly its only a Space Marine issue because Space Marine are the only army which actually has models for their "sub" armies. All other armies don't even get alternative model upgrade packs (eg shoulder pads); they are purely the same models*.

As said most of the time its about clarity of your army when you're taking units from different sub-armies on the same table. I think there's also abit of a push with marines when it comes to if you've got a collection of Blood Angels in red and with all the BA insignias and icons and try to run it as an Ultramarine army.

Otherwise so long as your units can clearly be told which is from which then you should be fine.


You can even have two different sub armies and have them with the same paint scheme, just make sure to highlight each "unit" so they can be told apart. You might paint numbers on the shoulderpads for each squad; or paint the base ring a different colour for each squad. Terrain features on the base have also been used. So long as its overt and clear it should be fine - this can even help when you've all models from a single army because it can help you tell one squad from another without them getting jumbled up (great for armies like Tyranids when you've two or three units of gaunts close together)


*Plus even fans of most armies can't tell most official paint schemes outside of marines.

Adding free power in the form of paint has led to an odd situation where painting and playing a collection as an established faction is a gamble that might end up kneecapping you.

Would happily return to subfaction being an aesthetic and personal background preference.

 Eldarain wrote:
Adding free power in the form of paint has led to an odd situation where painting and playing a collection as an established faction is a gamble that might end up kneecapping you.

Would happily return to subfaction being an aesthetic and personal background preference.

It's not even free power. It's that GW has given every army sub-factions and in every army barring marines, those subfactions are basically very tiny adjustments. Most are focused on a specific role so they might get close combat bonuses or ranged bonuses. When you then let armies be comprised of more than one subfaction at a time it means that gamers are encouraged heavily to put all their close combat units in the closecombat subfaction and then have a separate group of another subfaction with all ranged. Or if you weight your army build entirely to one end you, again, want to use the best subfaction. Just like when selecting upgrades and artifcats you pick those that best compliment the unit.

In AoS its not as bad because your army can only be made from one core army block and you can only ally in other armies, not subfactions from your own army. However you still have subfactions weighted to certain properties and shifting between them is only changing a few lines of rules (barring one or two armies where it also changes what units you can take). Heck Daughters of Khaine the "official schemes" are so close to each other some are just various different shades of red.


40K is more messy (and I kind of hope that for 9th they take some leads from AoS) because its built of detachments not armies. So you've a lot more pressure to take two or three detachments even from the same army so that you can take the best sub-groups for the focus they offer. Painting is a VERY bad way to work this because no one expects you to build three, four, five or however many armies entirely so that you can field each one in its correct (or at least different) colours.



Also, amusingly, the way GW worded their painting justification for events, it meant that if you used an official scheme you were locked in; but if you used your own you were free to do whatever you wanted. Thus creating an insane disparity that is really unfair (especially because not only is marketing a powerful tool in influencing what people want to choose as a scheme - but many new painters and new gamers will follow official schemes because they've got guides and guidance on how to do it)

Sounds to me like it's a no brainer to paint your own scheme so you can always run them as any chapter as long as the special characters for that chapter are the same colour


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I wanted a raven guard army but think I'll just paint them all black still but with just yellow shoulder pads and helmets so if I don't enjoy raven guard anymore one day I can change to a different chapters and just paint their special characters in the same black/yellow scheme. Also will probably paint shrike with some darker tone skin and lighter hair to not look so goth lol

This is why so many leave them in grey plastic or primer.

GW have a various points in time tried to enforce painting must match chapter's/legions. But for the most part outside of marines no-one even GW could say which was which paint scheme, Guard had some odd situations of having model's for regiments but magically cadian's became the defacto standard.

If you're at a big GW event or a narative event it might be more of an issue but GW events can also have issues with 3rd party bits alternative models etc, but mostly it will not be a big thing.

Well, the painting standard is often three colors for the models and the bases need to be painted.
If so, you are at the safe side.

munnster wrote:
having never been to any tournament play what is the norm for chapter's/paint schemes. Is it not always best to paint your space marines in a custom paint job that way being able to play as any chapter so long as you don't mix and match special characters from different chapters I.e I want to play Ultramarines but paint the whole army purple, I can still use say Calgar as long as he is painted purple to?

It's usually OK to use your own colours and just say "These are the Ultramarines, in the purple battle regalia they wore in M37.63" or whatever.

Where there are more likely to be objections is going the other way - having an entire army painted up as White Scars in their normal scheme with Chapter symbols on every model and then saying "These guys are actually Iron Hands".

The safest bet is to do your own thing - at least in part. Rather than using the Ultramarines "U" on your blue marines with gold trim, just use a different Chapter symbol transfer and you can do whatever you want with them.

thanks for the help guys. My own colour scheme it is then and I'll just use any chapter transfer I want. I got loads of Imperial fists transfers so will probably use them

You don't even need to use Transfer tho, B.c you may find you don't want to play IF after a few months or you might want to mix it up time to time.

I just like the look of a shoulder pad more with a transfer on rather than plain paint so will put transfers on

In tournament play, there are often specific rules and guidelines regarding chapter/paint schemes. It is generally expected that players adhere to the official color schemes and iconography associated with a particular Space Marine chapter. This helps maintain visual consistency and allows opponents to easily identify the faction being played. While some tournaments may allow custom paint jobs, it's important to check the specific rules of the event. As for special characters, they are typically tied to specific chapters and should be painted accordingly to match their chapter's color scheme.

Please do not commit acts of thread necromancy, locking now.