Savlar
"We have in the service the scum of the Earth as common soldiers."
- – The Duke of Wellington
"Also, there will be a ton of loot!"
- – Captain Cayde Sixtus of the 91st Savlar Chem-Dogs "Golden Guns" rallying his troops.
Savlar is an Imperial Penal World located in the Segmentum Solar, approximately a hundred light-years from Armageddon. It is the homeworld of the infamous Savlar Chem-Dogs penal regiments of the Imperial Guard, and by extension the homeworld of Guardswoman Greta Knox, aka Chem-chan.
Overview and History[edit]
Savlar was formerly a simple Mining World, devoted to carving the rich chemical resources from the soil of its moons and processing them for export. Unfortunately for the planet, it failed to meet its quotas and was converted into a penal colony sometime in the 39th Millennium. The first new inhabitants to arrive were insurrectionists from the recently suppressed Bokur Rebellion, along with some Adeptus Arbites personnel to keep an eye on them. Savlar soon became a dumping ground for criminals from across the Armageddon Sector. The planet is now a toxic hellhole inhabited only by hardened criminals, traitors, and the Arbites garrison who maintains what little order there is to be had. Outside its manufactory cities, crime is rampant, gang wars are frequent, and rape is so common that three out of every four Savlar natives don't know who their father is.
The Chem-Dogs were first created by the ruling Arbites magistrate, Judge Callistar, in response to an uprising on Savlar itself. When this somehow didn't go wrong, Callistar managed to form his new goon squads into something approximating Imperial Guard regiments with a carrot-and-stick approach; if they agreed to enlist, they got to leave Savlar and could keep whatever loot they found on the enemy, but if they broke the law it was right back to the toxic shithole for them. This has proven surprisingly effective in keeping them in line, though they'll still happily steal everything that isn't nailed down from other Guard regiments and each other whenever they get the chance. Since they're a penal legion motivated by the promises of loot and not living on Savlar anymore, the Chem-Dogs are regarded as unreliable to the point where all their officers are assigned to them from the schola progeniums and they have extra commissars assigned to keep them from legging it at the first sign of trouble. They're also considered expendable, so they get stuck with the worst missions in the nastiest environments with the lowest survival rates, such as tunnel fighting in the underhives of Armageddon. Despite all that, they manage to win more often than not, even if they sustain heavy casualties. The few Chem-Dogs who live long enough to reach veteran status are occasionally cycled back to Savlar, where they pass their knowledge of killing, looting, and tactical paint-huffing on to future generations.