Marines Malevolent

This article is about something that is considered by the overpowering majority of /tg/ to be fail. Expect huge amounts of derp and rage, punctuated by /tg/ extracting humor from it.

Marines Malevolent
Battle Cry	This ancient Terran chant
Founding	A mistake. Has to be the part of the 4th (last founding on M32). Taints that founding by association.
Successors of	Unknown, as no Chapter in their right mind (loyalist or traitor) would admit it. (Probably traitor stock)
Successor Chapters	None. Or at least, No Chapter would admit it under fear of being declared traitoris perdita
Chapter Master	Scumbag Steve
Primarch	Secundus That Guy Likely a traitor, definitely hates them too.
Homeworld	Worse off for having them
Strength	Hopefully declining
Specialty	Being absolute assholes, fuckwads, and douchebags, pissing off the Salamanders, and getting completely burned by said Salamanders
Allegiance	Imperium (much to their chagrin)
Colours	Piss Yellow and "Hangover poop" Black trim

Witness the very pinnacle of douchebaggery, the yellow that reeks of scum PISS. They are every Salamanders' nightmare and major cause of ragequits. They are... the Marines Malevolent. Notice they are also the colour of wasps, undisputed douchebags of the insect world.

"Fact #105: The Marines Malevolent are the worst."

– Games Workshop itself

The Marines Malevolent are a Space Marine Chapter in Warhammer 40,000 whose aesthetic is basically stereotypical Russian Spetsnaz i.e. "ten hostages, five terrorists, fifteen body-bags: mission accomplished" type stuff. They have only two real defining characteristics beyond their piss-hued Ceramite: they are complete assholes (even by WH40k standards), and they hate the Salamanders, and are hated by every loyalist, and a few traitor chapters, which is probably related to the first point. It may also be related to their unique approach to hostage situations (hint: it involves Whirlwinds, poison gas, and probably Warlord titans) They're such super massive assholes that, if their douchebaggery manifested in reality, it would be as a Warp Rift which would collapse in on itself and sucks in the entire universe. Imagine Angry Marines but with all the anger, rage, and lolrandom cursing replaced with passive-aggressiveness, zero empathy, and complete dickishness. They're pretty much the poster boys of everything bad about the Imperium rolled into one collection of chucklefucks who's closest thing to a virtue is not falling to the ruinous powers. Between that and the name, they're collectively the Goge Vandire of Space Marine Chapters: almost comically evil, comically dickish, and overtly malignant... except that the Imperium eventually "solved" their Goge problem, at least.

Relationship with the wider Imperium of Man

They have a shortage of power armour (pissing off the Adeptus Mechanicus tends to have that effect), so they use whatever parts of it they can find. In the novel Salamander by Nick Kyme, they even steal some from an abandoned forge ship. Not only do they justify such acts by necessity born of their own infamy, but also by their sheer contempt for anyone who is inferior not them. This, coupled with their aforementioned lack of empathy, means they show outright scorn towards the common people of the Imperium, and won't bat an eye at slaughtering confirmed faithful humans to accomplish their goals, such as wading through the unclean masses in their spikiest boots on their way to convert the Ministorum orphanage into a new firing range.

A few Chapters, such as the Salamanders and the Lamenters (The counterpart to the Marines Malevolent in many ways, being poorly equipped and distrusted by the Imperium at large, but also being genuinely compassionate to regular humans as opposed to these dickwads), go out of their way to minimize casualties. Battle-brothers, we few are all that stand between the heretics and the refugee camp behind us. The PDF and the Guard have not the men to spare to protect this place as they withdraw themselves. But curses upon ourselves and our Chapter if we allow that degenerate rabble to harm the Emperor's faithful!

Most Chapters, such as the Imperial Fists or Ultramarines, regard casualties, particularly those of the collateral nature, to be unfortunate but largely unavoidable. Yes, many civilians and Guardsmen died during the orks' assault on the hive, but had we not fought the xenos there, many more would be dead. Civilian casualties should be avoided but the mission always comes first.

Some Chapters, like the Minotaurs and the Alpha Legion will actively kill fellow imperials when necessary (say, you cannot have someone spouting important information if they're captured, so that person needs to be silenced) or let them be killed (like bait - the Minotaurs are known to do that) in order to ensure a very important goal is achieved and in fact more lives are saved in the long run – “lives are the emperor’s currency” after all, so fucking use it well and certainly don’t fucking waste it. Those chapters will do so because it is necessary and there are no better options, however, they will be under no illusions what they did and certainly won’t be dicks about it (this is the attitude of the Inquisition too, contrary to popular perception). Yes, we allowed those civilians and Guardsmen to be slaughtered, for if we did not the xenos could not have been wholly eradicated. I pray their souls will find peace at the Emperor's side, but their deaths were necessary to prevent far more.

But then we have the Marines Malevolent; their attitude is that the dead are worthy of contempt, for they were too weak to live, and if the wounded suffer, then it is likewise because they are wretchedly weak. This might be why the other Space Marine assholes known for sacrificing civvies, the Star Phantoms, nearly destroyed the chapter during the Macharian Heresy. Help, Guardsman? No, you will only have my scorn. The Star Phantoms may be dicks, but they at least get shit done.

Their callous and insufferably smug attitude towards authorities and civilians has even caused the ire of the Inquisition to press charges to censure the chapter declare the entire chapter traitoris perdita. Yes, even the trigger-happy Dickbags that pop Exterminatus like Christmas presents, find the Marines Malevolent to be fucking unpleasant and cruel towards civilians. In fact, when the Star Phantoms nearly blew up the Marines Malevolent by total accident on some planet called Thoth, the Inquisition found the irony so hilarious they didn't press any charges against the Phantoms.

Relationship with other Space Marine Chapters

When even the Red Scorpions, don't seem to want to do anything with you then you're another level of dickery.

At this point, with the amount of hatred the Chapter has garnered, it's pretty amazing in and of itself that several other, cooler Chapters don't just petition the High Lords to disband them and give the armour and weapons to other Chapters who don't shit themselves laughing after launching artillery at a refugee camp. Hell, since the Imperium is so bumfuck stupid HERESY *BLAM*, Stuck up its own ass, they could probably get away with being stamped as 'Traitors' for killing civilians for no reason...in fact some of the inquisition have done that already, but the order has yet to reach the high lords. (ooh, some Kommandos are nearby. It'd be nice if we had some sort of low-key, un-Power Armoured marine who has been trained in stealth and reconnaissance to go and take them out).

And should that happen, we can't think of too many Chapters who would turn down the chance to kick the Marines Malevolent in their collective dicks. Especially if the Minotaurs and SPESS SHARKSH!!! happen to be in the area. One of the Malevolents challenged a Black Templar to an honor duel, just so he could take the Templar's armor when he won, so the Templars would probably be first in line as well.

They even blackmailed a First Founding Chapter Master to the point that he had to physically restrain himself from smacking the fuck out of the Malevolent representative. When the two met again at the end of the Third Armageddon campaign, said Chapter Master openly insulted the Malevolent Captain (after he beat the ever-living fuck out of him in private) in front of the entire army, causing much sniggering amongst the nearer Guardsmen and earning the Chapter Master (Tu'Shan) the title Hero of Armageddon.

Well OK, he got it for kicking Thraka's ass, but who cares.

One could make the argument that this dickishness is just extreme pragmatism, combined with scorn towards everyone (including their own) who show weakness. You'd be wrong. Being pragmatic isn't bad in itself as such Chapters like the Raven Guard, or their successors like the Raptors, show multiple times, but the Marines Malevolent are just callous. They see others as an interference in doing their job as Marines, while those who prevent them in doing so actually do so because even they draw a line. An Inquisitor must be pragmatic due to the things he has to deal with constantly, but even then he wouldn't go that far as to put an entire sector to the torch unless he has enough evidence to justify this act, and even then he'll go to great lengths to hit places where heresy and corruption are at its worst and then cauterize the rest before it grows and strengthens itself. The Raptors Space Marines are known for their pragmatic take on warfare, yet even then they will never go so far as to waste allies or bombard a place with civilians in it. This is the reason why Marines Malevolent are not liked that much by the Imperium.

They also have piss-coloured armour, the ungrateful fucks.

Other forces in the Warhammer 40k universe may be EEEEEEVIL!!! on some sort of grand cosmic scale of grimdark, but very few are just nasty, petty, and cruel in an all-too human way. They treat their Chapter Serfs like slaves, and for those not in the know, this is otherwise unheard of. That's not grimdark, M&Ms, that's just... unpleasant.

In short, in a galaxy of horror and tragedy, most suffer jadedly, a few grieve but only the Marines Malevolent jeer.... well, and the Iron Hands, but that's basically retconned now. Alternately: a Marine Malevolent is, on average, ten pounds of jerkwad in an eight pound bag.

42nd Millenium

They're still active in the 42nd Millennium (unfortunately). A Marines Malevolent relief force arrived to rescue some Custodians defending Primaris Marine Gene-tech on Loque II, just in time to rescue the last surviving Custodian and the gene-tech. Knowing the Marines Malevolent, they probably not only tried to take the gene-tech but they probably took the credit too.

The Malevolent were last seen on the world of Etariis, leading the desperate retreat of several Space Marine Chapters but having managed to succesfully blow a certain Khârn's ship to pieces, only for The Betrayer to board one of theirs and steal it in return.

During the early years of the Indomitus crusade, the chapter found new use as enforcers for the establishment of new resupply fortresses for the crusade ; actions that were often extremely unpopular with the existing population on said worlds. They were notably employed as guerilla warfare terror troops on the knight world of Kamidar when it's queen rebelled against the Imperium. Whilst they were highly effective at this (up to and including killing civillian refugees that were in their way, esp. children), they continued to indulge in their teamkilling assholery when they attempted to set fire to a prison block containing the captured Imperial diplomatic delegation. The captain leading said action was promptly gutted by an attending and disgusted Storm Reaper Primaris, while the rest of their force was summarily executed by equally disgusted Sisters of Battle. The book makes it clear that their loss was missed by absolutely nobody.

Characters (or lack thereof)

They have only a few named characters, and only a few of these characters are alive at the time of the 'present day' in 40k. They had no fewer than thirty three of their 2nd Company (including a Veteran Sergeant, two Techmarines, a pilot, and a fucking APOTHECARY) get infected by the Obliterator Virus while they were boarding the ship Demetrion, so Vinyar basically told them to go hit themselves with Tu'Shan's Thunder Hammer until they were purified. We are not kidding.

Captain "Dickbag" Vinyar

The only Malevolent known to be alive at the time of Medusa was Vinyar,. The chapter's Captain of the 2nd Company, who has a raging grudge against Tu'Shan, and the actual cause of most of the Chapter's reputation. No really. read the books. While the chapter has a reputation for being dicks, its because they are compared to the snugglebunnies called the Salamanders, but overall are only dicks out of pragmatism. FUCKING VINYAR though is your 'garden variety' petty goddamn JACKASS. While a normal Marine Malevolent will use one of his brothers as bait for the enemy so the rest can attack more safely, Vinyar will straight have one of the other Marine Malevolent's killed just to clap back at that guy's friend. Or have a bunch of his troops, who got chaos corrupted, attack an allied Astartes homeworld, just to clap back at that guy for calling him out on his dickatry! And unlike most unreasonably petty fucking jerkoffs depicted in 40k, Vinyar doesn't even have the excuse of being Chaos corrupted. HE IS JUST A COMPLETE PRICK.

Veteran Ballsack Ballack

Ballsack was a member of the chapter's elite 1st Company veteran 'Vilifiers'. A surprisingly Cool Guy for being a douchebag Marine. Like letting the guardsmen they were working with get some extra sleep, because they are normal humans who kinda need that kinda thing. Granted he later used a new member of his company as bait for the Orkz, just in case you started to forget which Chapter he is from. He was also pretty badass and managed to beat a Black Templar Sword Brethren in a 1v1 duel (by deliberately goading him and getting him to agree that the winner takes the other's gear). Ballsack was killed when Dickbag Vinyar told the aforementioned Templar's bros where to find him, with one of the Templars just literally stabbing Ballsack in the back. As he died Ballsack actual approved and complimented the Templar for being more of an underhanded dick than him.

Chapter Tactics

Friend no one Likes: When determining the level of allegiance between a faction with this chapter tactic and another without it decrease the standard level of allegiance as shown on the allies matrix by one to a minimum of Come the Apocalypse.

Victory at any Cost: Units with this chapter tactic may make shooting attacks at enemy units that are locked in close combat with any allied unit that does not have this chapter tactic. To represent the nature of firing into a swirling melee use the following rules when firing: If using a blast or template weapon place them as usual but allied models may be under its starting position and roll for scatter as necessary. If firing another kind of weapon target the enemy unit as normal and roll to hit with a -1 to ballistic skill. For each successful to hit, roll to wound against the enemy unit, but for each miss roll to wound against the allied unit. All wounds are randomly allocated and saves may be taken as normal.

Disdain for the Weak: Units with this chapter tactic automatically pass morale checks the unit must take due to Casualties or to Losing an Assault.

Because I Feel Like It: Sergeants and characters in a unit with this chapter tactic gain the Summary Execution rule.

Progenitor chapter

While no chapter would admit it, there are a number of sound theories regarding the progenitor of this group of douchebags. All of them posit that their stock of gene seed came from a traitor. And most of them posit that they were not progenated from the first 20 legions, but one of their successor chapters. While little is written of them, their attitudes (pragmatic, bitter, spiteful, consider one another disposable, consider others even more so, and massive entitlement) REEKS of Iron Warriors. Their colors of yellow & black seem reminiscent of the Iron Warriors' signature hazard stripes (and they still use the Iron Warriors hazard stripes too). Their Chapter emblem is just the Iron Warriors' marking for Fast Attack with a wing on it. However a member of the iron warriors (who wishes to remain anonymous) Expressly denied any involvement with the chapter. Insisting “we are called ruthless and cruel but we still respect humanity to an extent, they don’t... and we would be glad to deal with them for you.” (This offer was refused.)

There is also the option, oddly enough, of them being descendants of the Salamanders themselves. After all, several of them did join with the Dragon Warriors, who are not only comprised of traitor salamanders and successors, but also bear the Salamanders' old name from the Unification Wars/early Great Crusade.

Also, while not being a Second Founding chapter (supposedly) much of their wargear dates back to the Great Crusade. This includes Cataphratii terminator armour and Combi-Bolters (instead of stormbolters). Then again, much of it was probably stolen from other Space Marine chapters.

The Civilian Bombing

A lot is made of the Marines Malevolent's bombing of civilians during the Third War for Armageddon, what with it being their agreed upon douche establishing moment. The thing is, it really is one of their least heinous crime and shows the writers have no idea what they're doing or are unaware of the realities of war. Even in Modern times, intentional civilian casualties are common. Terrorists are known for taking civilian targets as human shields. The USMC bombed a stadium hijacked by Al-Queda operators along with their civilian hostages; the premise being that the terrorists would cause more innocent deaths if left alive then what was caused by the bombing. It is even arguable that killing the civilians in a Ork infested camp is a mercy. In The War of the Beast, humans were used as cattle and in the videogame Space Marine, the orks gleefully and systemically killed everyone, many of which just died tired. It can also be argued that the fight with the Salamanders was equally their fault (face it, the Salamanders don't have a single pragmatic bone in their bodies).

Strangely, the problem everyone has with the Marines Malevolent is that they just don't care. The fact that they feel no remorse or shame whatsoever for their actions ticks people off. Even tho there are hosts of other chapters who are similarly callous and noone bats an eye. And to be fair, not all the MMs are so heartless. After the shelling of the Ork camp, the last surviving prisoner shot a MM with a bolt pistol for the collateral damage. The shot only scuffed his armor, and the MM went to kill her. But another MM punched him in the face to protect her, claiming that enough human blood had been shed that day.

Daily Rituals

04:00: Morning. Marines Malevolent awaken and turn off the obnoxious heavy metal music and strobe lights playing outside of their soundproofed bedrooms. The chapter slaves serfs are beaten and whipped to awaken them from their 4 hours of sleep. Any who protest are shoved into hunter missiles.

05:00: Enforcement of Morale. Said hunter missiles are launched to awaken the local populace. They always try to aim for adult care centers or hospitals.

06:00: Morning Prayer. The chapter serfs are sent to collect cotton in the fields whilst the Marines Malevolent pray to the Emperor. These prayers are usually outright ignored.

07:00: Morning Firing Rites. The chapter serfs return in time to be used as target practice for neophytes. They also practice yelling passive aggressive insults at the serfs for when any Salamanders show up.

08:00: Morning Meal. The Marines Malevolent eat a light meal of waffles and milk. Any slightly overcooked waffle demands the immediate conversion of ten serfs into servitors.

09:00: Morning Battle Practice. Said servitors are destroyed with extreme prejudice with their families being sent messages about how worthless they were in life and death with pictures of their corpses attached to the letters.

10:00: Midday Battle Practice. The chapter gathers to talk shit on the majority of the Imperium. This takes a large portion of the day, as the Mechanicus, Militarum, Ecclesiarchy, Inquisition, Iron Hands, Ultrasmurfs, Black Templars, Salamanders, half the population of their planet, and Angry Marines are all talked copious amounts of shit. This time is also set aside to defend the chapter when someone hears that they were talking shit.

15:00: Afternoon Battle Practice. Realize they wasted all that time pointlessly, and so take it out on the chapter serfs by either killing them or burning the cotton they collected. May also fight any Salamanders that happen to be nearby (and usually get beat up by said Salamanders).

16:00: Tactical Indoctrination. The Marines Malevolent study the works of history's greatest shitcunts, assholes, piss stains, arse weasels, ovary thieves, and cock munchers for inspiration. The first company read the collected works of the most revered of the Chapter's icons; the xenos abomination Assholetep, and the horrid Eldrad, kept secret from the rest of the Imperium.

17:00: Recruitment. Kidnap innocent civilians to replenish their dwindling number of serfs. May also kidnap orphans to become future Marines Malevolent.

18:00: Evening Meal. The Marines Malevolent titter and giggle to themselves about how mad they made everyone else during their feast. Sometimes they try to eat cake stolen from Children's birthday parties, but usually cannot because the Inquisition orders the Blood Ravens to steal it back. The Blood Ravens are all too happy to oblige.

19:00: Night Fighting Training. The Marines Malevolent initiate evening battle practice. May or may not involve deepstriking directly into a funeral and making death jokes, depending on how they feel at the time.

20:00: Free Time. The Marines Malevolent do all sorts of recreational activities. Typical activities include: Fine-tuning their lack of empathy for any other living being, blowing cigarette smoke into asthmatic children's faces, running up as big of an Astropath charge as possible with long-distance, meandering and awkward calls that you aren't quite sure if you should hang up on, trying to start fights between loyalist chapters, "urban driving practice" (Smashing civilian homes over with land raiders), verbally harassing any nearby orders of the Sisters Of Battle, and acquiring sweets by stealing them from small children after popping their balloons, robbing the poorest citizens and then give all the stolen scrap to puppy mills so they'll have more puppies for recreational kicking.

23:00: Bed time. The Marines Malevolent decide to go to bed. They turn the heavy metal back on turn on obnoxiously bright strobing middle finger pattern spotlights to make sure none of the plebs get any sleep, whether they be the Techpriests at the nearby manufactorum or the lowliest peasant.

00:00: Actual Bed Time. The Chapter Serfs are finally permitted to "sleep", though this is made harder with the Marines' noise weapon tier snoring.

Gallery

• 

  A squad of Marines Malevolent, resplendent in their piss colored armor.

• 

  YELLOW BOXES! Carron would be pissed.

• 

  Brother-Captain Assneus Dickeos.

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  Salamanders (or most Imperials for that matter) groan and cringe when the Marines Malevolent arrive.

• 

  A rarely seen Marines Malevolent-pattern smug grox shit-eating grin.

See Also

• Unofficial theme song for the Marines Malevolent