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Do they actually gain any physical benefit from drinking blood in the lore? Dante seems to suggest that he reverses his aging when he drinks his servant in the library, but since that's his first "drink" in over several centuries-1000 years, it may not be "required". Is there any documented fluff on how the red thirst gives them benefits other than what eating the flesh of an enemy gives a normal space marine (Memories, experience, knowledge of the eaten flesh)? Also, it seems to hint that Blood gruel is chopped up failed aspirants. Did I get that wrong or right?

Nothing special. It's just an innate desire.
Like you might get a craving for chocolate but not for any special benefit. Except 1000x as strong. And blood.
Whilst fully in the grips of the Red Thirst the Blood Angels can't really perceive anything other than the blood of those around them and an intense desire to feed on it.

It's simply a flaw in their geneseed.

Yeah, no innate benefits other than sating their - appetite? Addiction? Craving? Something along those lines.

I imagine any benefits would be entirely psychological.

Dante specifically mentions it reverses aging in his book, and the Blood gruel they eat - post implantation is designed to allow them to actually bond with the implants. I mean the fluff and the table rules seem to support it.

Yeah, with the Dante novel it went from a metaphorical flaw to straight up vampirism that physically rejuvenates him when he drinks his attendant dry. It's a thing.

It's also completely uninteresting and there isn't anything to do with it, since the rest of the BA drink blood on the regular (Dante had been abstaining, for... reasons? And he's super old even for a marine). They just made the metaphor literal and it means feth all, beyond 'this is even more dumb.'

Sending the BA blood so the chapter can get its Dracula on is super trivial for the imperium. Billions of people, 1000 marines. Maybe 20-30000 with successors. Seriously, whatever.

<Sorry didn't read whole of OP>

Didn't read the Dante novel. The Horus Heresy book VIII: Malevolence says the Blood Angels transfer memory, experiences, skills and abilities by eating and drinking blood. Captain Ishidur Ossuros fought in 317 battles- and was verified to die in at least four of them. The Imperium just assumed it was one of his Lieutenants taking up his name and mantle. The truth was much more gory. Every time he fell, one of his Lieutenants would eat and drink his blood, thus transferring his "Life Force" into the Lieutenant and emerging anew. Of course, on more than one occasion, they have been censored for it, most notably by Dorn before Sanguinious returned. Dorn and his Imperial Fists arrived to relieve the compliance siege of Kiy-Buran by the Blood Angels. What they found was a hole bunch of Blood Angels eating people in a victory feast. Dorn couldn't believe it- by all accounts, the Blood Angels were in way over their head and should have lost, but instead somehow won, but this thing they were doing- Dorn basically chastised the Legion, then burned all evidence of what the Blood Angels did on Kiy-Buran before the post Compliance Imperium units to take over the planet arrived.

Sanguinious took a very dim view of the "Eating of the Dead", but didn't quite forbid it. Instead, he encouraged drinking the blood. So while the Life Force, essence, soul, whatever you want to call it was 100% transferred, Blood Angels still get something out of drinking blood due to their Gene Seed.

I'm still amazed how/why the Blood Angels never joined Horus during the Heresy. The Blood Angels were a bad, bad Legion during the Great Crusade. They were given the all the suicide missions, all the Death World campaigns, all the fights against Daemons/Chaos before they were even recognized by the Imperium. They were cut off from resupply, none of the other Legions trusted them... and yet, not only did they survive, they flourished where other Legions would have floundered. The coming of Sanguinious really, really changed the Legion.

I'm still on board with Space Angel Vampires.

Not going to lie, the BA are the weirdest Genetic flaw out of all of them. Either 1 of 2 things occur, they either get thirsty because they get angry, or they get REALLY angry because they are thirsty. Then they just flat out eat things. Humans, Xenos, anything. They are supposed to be the NobleDark chapter, but really it's just Dante leading a bunch of heavily armored and armed Jeffry Dahmer clones into war. Like, I don't get how they were allowed to survive the inquisition. But then again you have literal Werewolves running around so a literal vampire isn't too far off. It's just silly writing. I mean, I love Dante as a character, but hate the chapter idea.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
Not going to lie, the BA are the weirdest Genetic flaw out of all of them. Either 1 of 2 things occur, they either get thirsty because they get angry, or they get REALLY angry because they are thirsty. Then they just flat out eat things. Humans, Xenos, anything. They are supposed to be the NobleDark chapter, but really it's just Dante leading a bunch of heavily armored and armed Jeffry Dahmer clones into war. Like, I don't get how they were allowed to survive the inquisition. But then again you have literal Werewolves running around so a literal vampire isn't too far off. It's just silly writing. I mean, I love Dante as a character, but hate the chapter idea.

Sanguinious had way more control over his Legion then I think any other Primarch. He single-handedly brought the entire Legion back from the brink of destruction, told them to stop eating everything, be noble warriors, etc. etc. It's not surprising his death sent a "Psychic Shockwave" through the entire Legion. Or I should say not his death. Merely his severing of his soul from his mortal body. He's only mostly dead, ya know? So Dante is more about reminding the Blood Angels they are better then a bunch of Jeffry Dahmer types, and Mepheston proves they can overcome the Black Rage.

 Tamwulf wrote:
Didn't read the Dante novel. The Horus Heresy book VIII: Malevolence says the Blood Angels transfer memory, experiences, skills and abilities by eating and drinking blood. Captain Ishidur Ossuros fought in 317 battles- and was verified to die in at least four of them. The Imperium just assumed it was one of his Lieutenants taking up his name and mantle. The truth was much more gory. Every time he fell, one of his Lieutenants would eat and drink his blood, thus transferring his "Life Force" into the Lieutenant and emerging anew. Of course, on more than one occasion, they have been censored for it, most notably by Dorn before Sanguinious returned. Dorn and his Imperial Fists arrived to relieve the compliance siege of Kiy-Buran by the Blood Angels. What they found was a hole bunch of Blood Angels eating people in a victory feast. Dorn couldn't believe it- by all accounts, the Blood Angels were in way over their head and should have lost, but instead somehow won, but this thing they were doing- Dorn basically chastised the Legion, then burned all evidence of what the Blood Angels did on Kiy-Buran before the post Compliance Imperium units to take over the planet arrived.

Sanguinious took a very dim view of the "Eating of the Dead", but didn't quite forbid it. Instead, he encouraged drinking the blood. So while the Life Force, essence, soul, whatever you want to call it was 100% transferred, Blood Angels still get something out of drinking blood due to their Gene Seed.

This would be due to the Marine's Omophagea, obviously due to the BAs culture (and other chapters descended from them) they make use of this organ via ingesting another being's blood.

Honestly not sure why Dorn would be disgusted at it, as literally every SM does it in some capacity. Many victories had been salvaged from the jaws of defeat via Marines eating a vital enemy's brain (or other organ) and gaining valuable information they could otherwise not get.

So GW is leaning HARD into the space Vampires aspect, as Mephiston is clearly a attempt at a space Vampire. He's not edward Cullen, but he could easily be Lestat in Power armor with a giant sword. Which is an odd direction for GW in my thinking. Like does this affect the Blood Ravens at all? I know it's not clear where their chapter gets its lineage, but they are heavily hinted at being BA descendants.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
So GW is leaning HARD into the space Vampires aspect, as Mephiston is clearly a attempt at a space Vampire.

Mephiston has ALWAYS been a "Honest guv, he's not a vampire", from the his original artwork loaded with Vampire symbolism like the bats flying above him to the fact he quite literally had the same statline in 2nd ed (and in the 5th ed White Dwarf list) as a Vampire Lord from WHFB. Seriously, look it up. That is a nice easter egg right there.

BAs being Vampires is nothing new.

 Grimtuff wrote:

 Tamwulf wrote:
Didn't read the Dante novel. The Horus Heresy book VIII: Malevolence says the Blood Angels transfer memory, experiences, skills and abilities by eating and drinking blood. Captain Ishidur Ossuros fought in 317 battles- and was verified to die in at least four of them. The Imperium just assumed it was one of his Lieutenants taking up his name and mantle. The truth was much more gory. Every time he fell, one of his Lieutenants would eat and drink his blood, thus transferring his "Life Force" into the Lieutenant and emerging anew. Of course, on more than one occasion, they have been censored for it, most notably by Dorn before Sanguinious returned. Dorn and his Imperial Fists arrived to relieve the compliance siege of Kiy-Buran by the Blood Angels. What they found was a hole bunch of Blood Angels eating people in a victory feast. Dorn couldn't believe it- by all accounts, the Blood Angels were in way over their head and should have lost, but instead somehow won, but this thing they were doing- Dorn basically chastised the Legion, then burned all evidence of what the Blood Angels did on Kiy-Buran before the post Compliance Imperium units to take over the planet arrived.

Sanguinious took a very dim view of the "Eating of the Dead", but didn't quite forbid it. Instead, he encouraged drinking the blood. So while the Life Force, essence, soul, whatever you want to call it was 100% transferred, Blood Angels still get something out of drinking blood due to their Gene Seed.

This would be due to the Marine's Omophagea, obviously due to the BAs culture (and other chapters descended from them) they make use of this organ via ingesting another being's blood.

Honestly not sure why Dorn would be disgusted at it, as literally every SM does it in some capacity. Many victories had been salvaged from the jaws of defeat via Marines eating a vital enemy's brain (or other organ) and gaining valuable information they could otherwise not get.

Malevolence points out that this gland works particularly well in the Blood Angels legion, and the Blood Angels took it to extremes even for space marines. Like, "our sergeant fell in battle, we're going to consume his body so that his memory and skills can live on" extremes. That's where the whole Eaters of the Dead thing came from, the entire legion participating in these rituals on the regular.

The 2nd edition Codex Imperialis (the fluff book that came in the boxed game) just flat-out stated that Blood Angels are vampires. It's not a new thing at all.

In the soul drinkers books they gain memories from someone’s soul.... if they drink it (their blood). I am not sure if they were a BA successor.

I think, originally, it was only a specific group of marines the fell to the desire to drink blood, is this the black rage? And it killed them, so they were put into units to go on blood frenzy in a war zone before they died.

Mephiston was the only one to have ever survived this. And I seem to remember in the 2nd Ed codex mephiston was the only BA to look vampiric

Ok, well for those of us who weren't around during the 2nd edition, I'm sorry I had no idea the red Astartes were literal vampires. Honestly, I had no idea. It was more like I just thought they were really into blood.

FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
Ok, well for those of us who weren't around during the 2nd edition, I'm sorry I had no idea the red Astartes were literal vampires. Honestly, I had no idea. It was more like I just thought they were really into blood.

Well, these days they don't seem to have much "vampireness" beyond the craving for blood. Unless I really missed something, they don't fear sunlight, they're not actually undead and sleep the day away in their coffins, they can't turn into bats, they don't care about garlic, running water or crucifixes and they can still eat normal food... It's just that their weird gene-seed defect kinda forces them to drink blood.

mrFickle wrote:
In the soul drinkers books they gain memories from someone’s soul.... if they drink it (their blood). I am not sure if they were a BA successor.

I think, originally, it was only a specific group of marines the fell to the desire to drink blood, is this the black rage? And it killed them, so they were put into units to go on blood frenzy in a war zone before they died.

Mephiston was the only one to have ever survived this. And I seem to remember in the 2nd Ed codex mephiston was the only BA to look vampiric

As someone who plays BA and detests the whole "Vampires.... In Space!" aspect of their lore, this sounds like to most agreeable interpretation. Surviving Black Rage turns a BA into a vampiric person, and therefore the only Space Vampire™ in the whole chapter is Mephiston.

Astorath has a very vampiric vibe as well though.

 Grimtuff wrote:
Honestly not sure why Dorn would be disgusted at it, as literally every SM does it in some capacity. Many victories had been salvaged from the jaws of defeat via Marines eating a vital enemy's brain (or other organ) and gaining valuable information they could otherwise not get.

I imagine that Dorn felt there was a substantial difference between making use of the ability every so often to acquire intel, and "eating people in a victory feast" - one speaks to necessity, the other to savage indulgence.

Touching on a couple of other Chapters that were mentioned up-thread:
- Blood Ravens - No-one knows who their genestock originates with, though there is a strong theory that they come from the Thousand Sons, given their chapter badge lines up with one of the branches of HH Thousand Sons (the Corvidae?).
- Soul Drinkers - The Soul Drinkers are, as far as is known, Imperial Fist successors, not Blood Angels successors. Second Founding, too, so had quite the history before everything went wrong. Have apparently been refounded during the Ultima Founding, which I'd missed.

Blood Angels have two afflictions from their geneseed - the Red Thirst, and the Black Rage. These aren't the same, and have different effects on the Marines. The Red Thirst is the desire to drink the blood of their enemies (or just blood in general), while the Black Rage is a psychic echo of the last battle of Sanguinius, including his death, which leaves a Marine suffering delusions of fighting this battle.

Of the two, the Black Rage is more debilitating, and is generally seen as irrevocable once triggered. Chaplains inspect BA Marines before battle for signs of the Black Rage, and any who appear to be falling are shuffled into the Death Company, in the hope of gaining a somewhat honourable death in battle, as opposed to being locked away in the Tower of the Lost until they die.

Mephiston originally fell to the Black Rage during the Second War for Armageddon, before being trapped in a collapsed building during the fighting. After seven days of being trapped, he was somehow able to control these desires, and was reborn as the Lord of Death - before promptly slaughtering a mob or Orks despite being weaponless and having heavily damaged armour...

Blood Angels are the 'vampire space marines' chapter. How literally GW takes that seems to have fluctuated up and down over time. Afaik back when WHFB was a world within 40k Mephiston was implied to literally be a vampire and that is where his boosted stats came from--they were the same stat increases vampires had over normal humans in WHFB but applied to a Space Marine.

This is however second-hand information so don't quote me.

Mephiston also had the ability/flaw that after defeat some enemy in melee combat you had to check if it retained control or he lost it feeding on the enemy.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
Blood Angels are the 'vampire space marines' chapter. How literally GW takes that seems to have fluctuated up and down over time. Afaik back when WHFB was a world within 40k Mephiston was implied to literally be a vampire and that is where his boosted stats came from--they were the same stat increases vampires had over normal humans in WHFB but applied to a Space Marine.

This is however second-hand information so don't quote me.

It was probably true but never committed to paper, just talked about. I don’t think it was ever written down the WFB was in 40K universe but was widely agreed at one point. But I think most of that dates back to rogue trader

Dont they also have giant fangs? Like Comically large? Dante talks about how they "retract" and "extend" when he gets thirsty and they are so long they puncture his gums.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
Blood Angels are the 'vampire space marines' chapter. How literally GW takes that seems to have fluctuated up and down over time. Afaik back when WHFB was a world within 40k Mephiston was implied to literally be a vampire and that is where his boosted stats came from--they were the same stat increases vampires had over normal humans in WHFB but applied to a Space Marine.

This is however second-hand information so don't quote me.

Back when WHFB was a world within 40K, Mephiston didn't exist yet.

That would throw a small wrinkle in the fluff I described.


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FezzikDaBullgryn wrote:
Dont they also have giant fangs? Like Comically large?

'Comically' is a matter of interpretation, but they do have big fangs yes.

Clearly any mechanism involving the ingestion of blood would have to be based off their Space Marine implants like the Omophagea rather than just straight normal digestion of the blood in the stomach. Maybe this stimulates things like tissue repair and DNA repair to account for the anti-aging effect.

The low pH acidic interior of the stomach would quickly denature the DNA, RNA, and blood proteins, turning the blood pitch black like tar. The clinical term for this is melena. It suggests then that Blood Angels that partake in blood drinking have black stools. It doesn't take much blood to get melena, as little as 50 mL according to a RL clinical experiment in which volunteers drank their own blood to see how much was needed until they got melena.

So TIL that all BA have black stool..

But do marines even defecate?

And I'm not saying BA aren't vampiric in GW's bluff, just that I've alvays hated the idea and actively reinterpret/misinterpret it for not to being true but just a myth

 tauist wrote:
So TIL that all BA have black stool..

But do marines even defecate?

Yes they do, and in BL fiction, from as far back as Ian Watson's Space Marine.