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I have been reading through the space marine codex and loving the concept of custom space marine chapters. Mechanically getting to pick out some tactics is fun, but I am especially talking about the fluff, getting to pick a world they have, what they are a successor to, all that. Its fun how much is set up for customization.

Are there any other armies Which armies have the most built in lore customization? Which have the least? (my guess would be custodes)

Rfkannen wrote:
I have been reading through the space marine codex and loving the concept of custom space marine chapters. Mechanically getting to pick out some tactics is fun, but I am especially talking about the fluff, getting to pick a world they have, what they are a successor to, all that. Its fun how much is set up for customization.

Are there any other armies Which armies have the most built in lore customization? Which have the least? (my guess would be custodes)

That's pretty much up to you. Imperial Guard in particular can vary quite a lot in terms of themes in the same way Astartes do, because they're from a specific world in the same way. You could make a Craftworld with a very idiosyncratic culture, and so on.

I would put forwards that Chaos Daemons have the least amount of customisation available. So much so, that even GW is stuck on what to do. They have demonstrated that the only way they can expand the faction is by throwing more and more characters at it. At this point, Chaos Daemons have more HQ options than all of the other options combined!

In terms of armies with high levels of customisation in both lore and table top, that would largely be most armies with a 9th edition codex. There are some exceptions in Death Guard and Thousand Sons, but that's because those books are looking at subfactions of CSM (but you do still have quite a lot of room for "your guys")

Some come close but none beat out Marines for customisation. *By Marines, I mean all flavours, Chaos and Imperial.

Marines have the luxury of being the one model line where everything has the same basis as a blank canvass and the modularity of the range is second to none.
This can range from a simple head swap, to fully converting the model with sculpting and kitbashing. Marine background is very similar, where you have "Your Dudes" and can do a lot more with their story than say a Regiment or Craftworld with much of the existing background in support of this.

You need look no further than the many Successors of the Ultramarines. You have the more similar Chapters such as the Genesis Chapter or Praetors of Orpheus who operate almost identically to their founder, with the Genesis sometimes even filling in gaps in Ultramarines Companies or offices when they appear. Then you have Chapters like the Mortifactors, who recruit from savage barbarians and adopted their grim practices, or the Libators, who offer the blood of their defeated foes as a gift to the Emperor. There are even the Emperor's Spears who actively shun their heritage and refuse to operate alongside the Ultramarines.
Space Marines ignore a lot of the restrictions placed on other factions, especially Imperial ones, and character traits are entirely optional from the ground up. You can very easily have a Chapter of Marines that doesn't believe the Emperor is a god, in fact, most already fall into this category. You couldn't have a Guard Regiment or Sororitas Order fall under the same category due to the nature of their integration into Imperial society. Your Space Marine hero could wield a Necron or Aeldari weapon but you wouldn't see a Necron or Aeldari wielding a Human weapon.

The individual customisation of Marines is also an important factor to consider. You can make a unit leader stand out in every army in 40k but with Marines, you can do more and evolve their story in a natural way.
Say you have a game where your Captain ends up racking up a considerable kill count. You could then give that model a transfer or gubbin that denotes they have earned some form of Honourific. If that Captain continues to perform, you could make him the new Chapter Master, having been promoted for his deeds. This can continue even until you decide that Marine has fallen in glorious combat and gets interred in a Dreadnought, in fact, there are Crusade rules in 40k that specifically allow this sort of thing to happen. Now you could do this for most armies but IMO with Marines, the nature of their longer lifespans and ability to shrug off all but the most devastating of blows means that an in-universe story can last hundreds of years rather than tens of years.

The only reason why customization is easy for Marines is because so much attention is lavished on them. They have a crazy amount of books and models compared to other factions.

But really, in-universe if you want breadth of culture and visual distinctions, Guard is the Faction.

This is Marine Variation, for the most part:


This is Guard:


If you look at the historical gamut of Guard releases, they've had the greatest variation in infantry kit releases too, from a visual standpoint.

Cadians (original and current)
Mordians
Vostroyans
Praetorans
Valhallans
Catachan
Death Korps
Elesian Drop Troops
Tallarn
The OG plastics with an even different uniform
Probably more that I'm not remembering atm.

Plus a whole host of variety in Regimental Doctrines back in the glory days of 3rd/4th edition. Examples include allowing Infantry to be CC focussed by exchanging Lasguns for Pistols and CC weapons. Upgrading everyone with better armor (Carapace). Giving everybody chemical masks to make them psychos. There was a whole bunch of cool options available to define your armys culture/doctrine.

Marines just sell like crazy, so they get more attention lavished on them. And no-model-no-rules means GW doesn't provide as many options as they used to. But in-universe, Guard are wildly divergent.

Are chaos marines equal to space marines in customization? I hadn't looked at them much tbh, I had assumed your choices were black legion, world eaters, noise marines, death guard, or thousand sons. Do they have rules for custom chapters?

The guard do look like they have tons of space for it in the lore! But am I right that the models don't really support it? (aka, you could paint craft world eldar as any craftworld, but guard only really supports cadians and tempestus?)

On paper marines a ton of options, most of them are dead options which are never run. Sure foot chaplains or captins of different kinds exist. But who would ever take those instead of a chaplain, primaris or not, on a bike? Same with all other options be it for specific HQ models or units themselfs. Eldar HQs have more flexibility, because something like winged autarch or a spider teleporter autarch could actually be used.

Same with troops or elites or heavy options. Bucket of tanks, non gets used ever. Bunch of dreadnoughts, only FW or the primaris one, but only with plasma see use. Bladeguard and Venguard Veterans are probably the two options for melee units where both make sense. And venguard actually are run with different gear load outs on the models. And that is marines with their gigantic collection of units. Other armies have much less. GK are 2 unit codex NDK and Interceptors. Custodes armies with the new codex come pre build, DE came pre build when they came out, the builds changed post nerfs, but that is more or less it.

Rfkannen wrote:
Are chaos marines equal to space marines in customization? I hadn't looked at them much tbh, I had assumed your choices were black legion, world eaters, noise marines, death guard, or thousand sons. Do they have rules for custom chapters?

The guard do look like they have tons of space for it in the lore! But am I right that the models don't really support it? (aka, you could paint craft world eldar as any craftworld, but guard only really supports cadians and tempestus?)

Lore-wise, Chaos Space Marines would be waaaay more customizeable than loyalists. Older rulesets support it quite heavily. Model-wise they have fewer kits, although if you're creative about it the sky is the limit, really, since they can all have tentacles/fur or whatever growing out of them.

For Guard, sadly Cadians are the only easy option from GW. But theres also the Death Korps for $$$. However there's a bunch of 3rd party options available, as well as the option to get creative with other GW kits and mish-mash them together. You can also patiently collect older regiments from Ebay. Tons of options, just requires a bit more thought.

 Insectum7 wrote:

Rfkannen wrote:
Are chaos marines equal to space marines in customization? I hadn't looked at them much tbh, I had assumed your choices were black legion, world eaters, noise marines, death guard, or thousand sons. Do they have rules for custom chapters?

The guard do look like they have tons of space for it in the lore! But am I right that the models don't really support it? (aka, you could paint craft world eldar as any craftworld, but guard only really supports cadians and tempestus?)

Lore-wise, Chaos Space Marines would be waaaay more customizeable than loyalists. Older rulesets support it quite heavily. Model-wise they have fewer kits, although if you're creative about it the sky is the limit, really, since they can all have tentacles/fur or whatever growing out of them.

For Guard, sadly Cadians are the only easy option from GW. But theres also the Death Korps for $$$. However there's a bunch of 3rd party options available, as well as the option to get creative with other GW kits and mish-mash them together. You can also patiently collect older regiments from Ebay. Tons of options, just requires a bit more thought.

yeah, the whole successor chapter framework wouldve worked best with CSM IMO.

Rfkannen wrote:
Are chaos marines equal to space marines in customization? I hadn't looked at them much tbh, I had assumed your choices were black legion, world eaters, noise marines, death guard, or thousand sons. Do they have rules for custom chapters?

CSM don't have their custom traits just yet but every Codex so far has got them so they'll be along soon in the upcoming CSM Codex. That being said CSM variety comes more from what aspects of Chaos you want to delve into rather than any cultural signifiers.

The guard do look like they have tons of space for it in the lore! But am I right that the models don't really support it? (aka, you could paint craft world eldar as any craftworld, but guard only really supports cadians and tempestus?)

Right now it's Cadians, Catachans, Tempestus Scions, and sort of Death Korps of Krieg as the plastic kits for Guard. However, a lot of the Human scale models from the various GW ranges are easily used as Guard models as well either as kitbashes or just as they come. Necromunda gangs, Genestealer Cults, or even the AoS Freeguild and Darkoath models are all very good sources for Human scale bits to make Guardsmen from. GW did convert some for the 8th Ed Guard Codex here:

Despite what some say, the Cadian kit is actually a very good base to work off making custom Regiments since by design it's the basic SciFi trooper look and it's really simple to swap a head or the arms to get a substantial difference. Simple sculpting can also be used to make longer coats, hoods, or robes as well.

Another army that would work really well for customization is Orks. Their different Klans are already distinctive, but if you wanted to get really wild with conversions they could also be really crazy and remain in line with the lore. Their vehicles are also famed for coming in all sorts of different shapes and sizes. Lots and lots of unique looks are available with Orks. Lots of good examples of crazy vehicles online too.

They're not that distinctive outside of mostly paint schemes and I would argue they take quite a bit of change to make each one properly stand out. Some are easier than others, Snakebites just need to use the Bonesplitterz with some Sluggas for example, but what about the Goffs? Compared to some of the other "basic" factions (Ultramarines, Black Legion) it's hard to make the Goffs stand out when their defining trait is they're bigger than other Orks, sort of, sometimes. With the Ultras you can lean into the Roman aesthetic and use fancy plumes and pteruges, or with the BL you can add in bits from the Traitor Legions or different 40k Chapters to show the mongrel amalgamation of a brotherhood born from choice rather than heritage.
In fact, I would argue it's a problem found in most of the Ork factions. The Deathskullz like to loot stuff but looting isn't their "thing" because all Orks loot stuff. The Evil Sunz like to go fast but again, lots of Orks like being fast that aren't Sunz.
Ork Klanz are better represented in the army building stage rather than the kit building stage, which isn't a bad thing it's just not on the same level as Marine types or Guard.

Isn't it just that the specific clans do, aside for the blood ax, things better then all other clans. Bad moons may have more teeth to buy expensive vehicles, and like to go fast, but evil suns vehicles will go faster. All orks loot, but death skulls loot other orks, they loot durning combat , looting is in their gene code, same way the whole orkish race is programed to do specific things.

Karol wrote:
Isn't it just that the specific clans do, aside for the blood ax, things better then all other clans. Bad moons may have more teeth to buy expensive vehicles, and like to go fast, but evil suns vehicles will go faster. All orks loot, but death skulls loot other orks, they loot durning combat , looting is in their gene code, same way the whole orkish race is programed to do specific things.

You're missing the point.

Visually, Orks are a difficult army to make distinct (with specific exceptions). How do you make Goff Boyz visually different from another Klanz Boyz? Maybe armour them up a bit more, but wait the Deathskullz like to loot so they could easily strap looted armour on and the Bad Moonz are rich so they can afford to kit themselves out with more armour. Well, the Goffs also love a good melee, but wait again the Snakebites are low tech with means they're more likely to use melee weapons than say Rokkit Launchers or Shootas. The only other things that make a Goff a Goff is that they tend to be slightly bigger, so you need to be able to sculpt, and they wear black.

Compare that to an Intercessor where I can show the model is an Imperial Fist by swapping the shoulder pads and helmet for MkIII gear to show their reliance on heavier armour for sieges, or I can show the model is an Iron Hand by using bionics, or show the model is a Space Wolf by giving it a bearded head and some pelts.

It's the same thing with armies like T'au or Tyranids where the major differences in the subfactions come from how those subfactions play rather than how they look, the T'au especially due to their use of camo with the true identifier of the Sept being the Sept markings and iconography. My friend for example paints their army with a desert camo similar to the standard T'au Sept but has Farsight Enclave markings and icons so they use the Farsight rules.
Painting is the biggest way to customise models but the point is some factions can do it before you even open the paint pot.

 Gert wrote:
They're not that distinctive outside of mostly paint schemes and I would argue they take quite a bit of change to make each one properly stand out.

Hehe. You could say the same thing about Space Marines.

If you wanted romanesque Orks, you could totally do it and it'd work just fine within canon.

 Insectum7 wrote:
Hehe. You could say the same thing about Space Marines.

If you wanted romanesque Orks, you could totally do it and it'd work just fine within canon.

I'm not saying you can't do Roman-style Orks, I'm saying it takes more effort compared to Marines when using models to define subfaction.

What makes the Evil Sunz stand out? They wear red and like speedy units like bikes, buggies, and planes.
What makes the Goffs stand out? They wear black and like tough units like Nobz, Mega-Nobz, and Warbosses.

What makes the Iron Hands stand out? They make heavy use of bionics and units like Dreadnoughts and Terminators.
What makes the Space Wolves stand out? They often don't wear helmets, have lots of beards and long hair, wear a lot of animal pelts, and have a preference for CQC units like Assault Marines.

The Ork examples are defined by their colour scheme and unit preference more than the Space Marine examples which are easier to define by modeling differences alone.
Take this lovely image of the Legions:

There are very few in there that don't have some sort of visual distinction to make them stand out. You can tell the Space Wolf is in the top right because it has a big wolf pelt and you can tell the Word Bearer is in the bottom right because it has lots of parchment. This is not a difficult concept to grasp yet you seem wholly incapable of doing so.

The converting imperial gaurds thing sounds like a ton of fun!

With my armies I try to stick to the idea I could use them anywhere (like at adeptacon or a gw store or whatever) How much kitbashing are you allowed to do there? Like Could you run a whole army of gaurd that all have heads from cities of sigmar? Or what using the genestealer cult upgrade kit to make a whole genestealer gaurd?

There's no specific answer, but as a general rule, if they're all GW/FW plastic/resin and it's reasonably easy to tell what a given unit is, you should be fine. Greenstuff/plasticard on GW/FW should be fine as well, though I'm sure there's some benighted hellhole where anything not tied to a GW SKU is forbidden. Beyond that, it's really hard to say. Some places are absolutely fine with 100% 3rd party/homesculpts, some places totally forbid them, other places will look the other way but want your army to at least partially be things purchasable in-store. This is one of those situations where the best policy is to ask the store/tourney organizers when in doubt.

 Gert wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Hehe. You could say the same thing about Space Marines.

If you wanted romanesque Orks, you could totally do it and it'd work just fine within canon.

I'm not saying you can't do Roman-style Orks, I'm saying it takes more effort compared to Marines when using models to define subfaction.

What makes the Evil Sunz stand out? They wear red and like speedy units like bikes, buggies, and planes.
What makes the Goffs stand out? They wear black and like tough units like Nobz, Mega-Nobz, and Warbosses.

What makes the Iron Hands stand out? They make heavy use of bionics and units like Dreadnoughts and Terminators.
What makes the Space Wolves stand out? They often don't wear helmets, have lots of beards and long hair, wear a lot of animal pelts, and have a preference for CQC units like Assault Marines.

The Ork examples are defined by their colour scheme and unit preference more than the Space Marine examples which are easier to define by modeling differences alone.
Take this lovely image of the Legions:

Spoiler:

There are very few in there that don't have some sort of visual distinction to make them stand out. You can tell the Space Wolf is in the top right because it has a big wolf pelt and you can tell the Word Bearer is in the bottom right because it has lots of parchment. This is not a difficult concept to grasp yet you seem wholly incapable of doing so.

Point the first: One could say those differences in your picture stand out more because otherwise the marines are incredibly uniform. The defining characteristic is the color. Which Legion is this?


Point the second: None of those "modeled details" in the picture would look out of place on an Ork model.

Point the third: I'm no Ork expert, but Ork Clans actually do have defining tendencies that could be modeled. They just often aren't because generic models are more functional, product wise (just like gray Intercessors can be Space Wolves.) Bad Moons like to flaunt their wealth, wearing their teeth and fancy clothes. Snakebites tend towards wearing animal skins, preferring a nativist philosophy. Goffs prefer the horned helmet. Blood Axes have a more militaristic forbearing. Death Skulls prefer looted equipment as well as grisly trophies. Some of these details show up in the kits, such as Kommandos. (Which used to be sold as "Bood Axe Kommandos", btw.) It's easy to make this a story about Space Marine favoritism by GW. The Clan-specific model support for Orks has been cut. Space Marine kits of course getting more and more attention.

Here is a pic from RT era Ork line: You got yer animal skins, horned helms, moon shaped hats, and whatever that military style cap is called for the Blood Axes.


Goff models from the 2nd ed Ork book:


Point the 4th: Ork Clans are only part of the Ork army aesthetic. An Ork Warband can have it's own thematic preferences on top of whatever Klans are involved. This is different than Space Marine Chapters, since Chapters ARE the "warband", all the same organizational entity. Ork Clans are not "warbands" operating under the same organizational structure. There are millions of warbands across the galaxy, even though there are only six major Clans. A chapter has a thousand(ish) troops. A Clan likely has trillions of members scattered across the galaxy with their own local proclivities. (A thousand worlds each with a billion Orks is a trillion Orks. It is said that there are roughly a million Imperial worlds. Some of those worlds are in the hundreds of billions in population. How many Orks do we think there are?)

Point the 5th: Ease of conversion. Well it'd be pretty easy to slap some animal fur pieces on some Orks, or any number of other creative options (some of them from other dakkadakka members ) :

1 - You've taken the most generic base Marine and made something unique, proving my point that Marines are highly customisable. Nice job.

2 - I never implied they wouldn't. In fact, I very specifically said they wouldn't.

3 - You must have missed the bit where I said Snakebites are easy to make. But again, the problem with Orks is that the modeling traits are very generic or become more like another unit type. Horned helmets are common in Ork kits so seeing a horned helmeted unit isn't something that's going to make me think "Goffs". Deathskulls like to loot (I chose them when I played Orks because of this) but when does a Deathskull become a Loota? If a unit of 10 Ork models is equipped with all looted guns are they Boyz with Shootas or Lootas? What about the Bad Moonz? They are rich yes but a lot of the Boyz models have piercings or trinkets anyway, so to show off that they are Bad Moonz you have to start putting on looted fancy bitz (which could then mean they look like Deathskulls) or you paint them shiny colours (which is paint). If someone sculpted a load of berets onto their Blood Axe Boyz I would ask if they were Boyz or Kommandos because the units have very similar options even with the new kit released.
I am not denying Space Marines aren't the poster faction nor that they sell well, it doesn't mean any points made about Marines being highly customisable and the premier "Your Dudes" faction are automatically void just because you have an axe to grind.

4 - Ok? What's the point here? That there are loads of Orks so you can do what you want? You realise that the models are yours right? You don't need anyone's permission.

5 - And yet none of those models scream "Ork Klan X", which was the point I was making also.

I think we're done discussing because you clearly have no intention of actually adressing the points I make.

^Then I'll just reiterate what I said above

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Gert wrote:
They're not that distinctive outside of mostly paint schemes and I would argue they take quite a bit of change to make each one properly stand out.

Hehe. You could say the same thing about Space Marines.

If you wanted romanesque Orks, you could totally do it and it'd work just fine within canon.

 Gert wrote:
1 - You've taken the most generic base Marine and made something unique, proving my point that Marines are highly customisable. Nice job.

I've also proven that the "defining characteristics" for the legions you've tried to point out are easily redistributable within those legions.

 Gert wrote:

3 - You must have missed the bit where I said Snakebites are easy to make. But again, the problem with Orks is that the modeling traits are very generic or become more like another unit type. Horned helmets are common in Ork kits so seeing a horned helmeted unit isn't something that's going to make me think "Goffs". Deathskulls like to loot (I chose them when I played Orks because of this) but when does a Deathskull become a Loota? If a unit of 10 Ork models is equipped with all looted guns are they Boyz with Shootas or Lootas? What about the Bad Moonz? They are rich yes but a lot of the Boyz models have piercings or trinkets anyway, so to show off that they are Bad Moonz you have to start putting on looted fancy bitz (which could then mean they look like Deathskulls) or you paint them shiny colours (which is paint). If someone sculpted a load of berets onto their Blood Axe Boyz I would ask if they were Boyz or Kommandos because the units have very similar options even with the new kit released.
I am not denying Space Marines aren't the poster faction nor that they sell well, it doesn't mean any points made about Marines being highly customisable and the premier "Your Dudes" faction are automatically void just because you have an axe to grind.

Wicked double standard at work here. You say bionics partially define Iron Warriors (even though other chapters make use of bionics), but also say that horned helmets are not a model-able trait of Goffs because other Orks may make use of horned helmets. Ergo, if you wanted to make specifically Goff Kommandos, you can put horned helmets on them.

 Gert wrote:

I think we're done discussing because you clearly have no intention of actually adressing the points I make.

They're hypocritical points.

You know this is ridiculous, but I think the main reason ork legions feel less distinct to me than space marine chapters is because less of their model is covered in armor. So most orks are primarily green, while every space marine chapter is an entirely different look.

Rfkannen wrote:
You know this is ridiculous, but I think the main reason ork legions feel less distinct to me than space marine chapters is because less of their model is covered in armor. So most orks are primarily green, while every space marine chapter is an entirely different color.

Fixed that for you

The fact of the matter is that Space Marines are really simple, smooth, models when compared to Orks. So anything you put on them to make them look different stands out more. Orks on the other hand are very busy models, especially some of the specialists, so defining characteristics have to be large or gaudy in order to stand out more. But it's not like more unified clan or warband aesthetics couldn't be done. Like above, if you really wanted to make a clan "Goffy", then putting in the extra effort to spread more horned helmets around gets you there modeling-wise, and then unifying it with your paint scheme polishes it off.

Orks just don't have the same range of bits that Space Marines have, because Space Marines just take up a lot of shelf space. But also as shown above, Orks can just use Space Marine bits, lol.

The flipside of Orks is that their aesthetic makes conversions really easy. You get away with all sorts of craziness. Here's a Stompa made out of a Mr. Potato Head http://www.irondogstudios.com/images/tater/mek_tater.html