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Gabriel Seth

2020-04-12T05:26:17Z

2601:443:47F:3CA0:953C:A2D3:9AD5:716C: /* The aftermath of the Battle of Baal */

[[File:Gabriel_Seth.jpg|400px|thumb|right|Gabriel Seth of the Flesh Tearers. Testicle-kicking extraordinaire.]]
{{Topquote|1=[[James Swallow|Swallow's]] take on Seth is a guy who understands exactly what he is and will play his given role to the hilt, and damn the pitfalls. He consistently strikes a balance between acting like a complete dick and yet somehow hitting the precise level of dick that he gets you steamed while also garnering exactly the attention he needs to get his point across. It's like he's attained a zen level of dick [[Eldrad|other dicks]] could only hope to emulate.|2=[http://castellankurze.tumblr.com/post/79885067338/ivorytowerblr-misterruse-we-are-disorder Someone exactly getting what Gabriel Seth is all about].}}

'''Gabriel Seth''' is the [[Chapter Master]] of the [[Flesh Tearers]] Chapter of the [[Space Marines]] and a ruthless though pragmatic man.

==Father of the Flesh Tearers==
When Seth became the Chapter Master of the Flesh Tearers in 815.M41 he immediately was told bad news by his Chapter's Sanguinary High Priest. The regular attrition on the forces of the Flesh Tearers combined with the degree the Chapter lost its members to the [[Black Rage]] the Chapter could no longer recruit enough new Marines to keep replacing losses: the Flesh Tearers were going extinct. Seth [[Rage|did not take well to this]], but he vowed that if the Flesh Tearers were to burn up they were not going to smolder out, oh no. If the galaxy was to lose the Flesh Tearers it would do so in a massive conflagration fueled by the bodies of heretics and aliens, mutants and daemons with the massive roll of honor of the Flesh Tearers as the capstone to the grave. And so started the epoch of Gabriel Seth and the Flesh Tearers (which is an excellent band name by the way).

Seth knew that his men were all but frothing [[berserkers]] who slaughter anything and everything they run into on the battlefield, be they friend or foe. As such many [[Imperial Guard]] and [[Adepta Sororitas]] commanders dislike fighting alongside the Flesh Tearers: they were rather likely to turn on their allies and civilians alike (perhaps as some kind of proto-[[Khornate Knights]]?) and [[RIP AND TEAR]] through them. The Chapter Master decided to aim the [[Rage|zeal]] towards enemies with less non-targets around: diving head-first into dangerous situations in enemy territories and passing distress calls along to other Chapters who do not butcher entire planets. Thus far Seth's plan is working: those who were out for the Flesh Tearers' blood at first are now praising them, though (of course) some skeptics remain. It is human nature to like and respect people who recognize their flaws and tackle those flaws head-on. Sure, people may still be sore about the team-killing, but they also respect that the Flesh Tearers are trying to prevent it from being a problem even though it puts them in positions where they often take heavy casualties. That they (appear to outsiders) are choosing to risk death than endanger fellow Imperials garners true respect. To be fair, if their issue had persisted for ten thousand years, they’d have been purged. It’s either a largely recent thing (the extremes) or an on-and-off occurrence that periodically comes along.

==Son of [[Sanguinius]]==
[[File:Oh my Emperor....jpeg|300px|thumb|left|The master of the Flesh Tearers looks like Jason Statham]]
The Flesh Tearers are a [[Second Founding]] of the [[Blood Angels]] and as such hold the Chapter as first amongst peers. When the Blood Angels called for a conclave of the successor chapters. Seth was at first reluctant to answer, but he quickly figured out he could gain from the situation. When he met with the others as the conclave (and a nearly lethal duel between two [[Brother-Sergeant]]s of the Blood Angels and Flesh Tearers) [[Dante]] revealed that after a big internal conflict (not as big as the [[Blood Ravens]] civil war, but damn close) the Blood Angels had lost many of their men. So Dante had decided on two things: to accelerate the Blood Angel recruitment process and that all of the successors were to pay a tithe of Space Marines to their progenitor. Seth told Dante where he could stick it, then went even beyond that by suggesting Dante did the reverse: disband the Blood Angels and distribute their Marines and wargear between the Second Founding Chapters.

Before Dante could relieve Seth [[Angry Marines|of most of his primary and redundant organs]] a subordinate of the Blood Angels High Sanguinary Priest, Caecus, claimed to have found a solution: he had managed to artificially age a recruit into a fully-able Marine in a matter of weeks. Dante was not amused, but Seth was eager to see if the Priest's claim was true, with the future of his own Chapter in mind. Unfortunately the recruit (called a Bloodchild) was as flawed as the last time the aging techniques were used by [[Corax]], and the Bloodchild succumbed to the [[Black Rage]] in the middle of a combat trial and had to be put down. This infuriated Dante and ordered the research on the Bloodchild destroyed. Seth took the chance to approach Dante and made a bold offer: to disband the Blood Angels entirely and make them all Flesh Tearers (an offer that's [[troll|retroactively hilarious]] when it's revealed in a novel that decades ago Dante passed down a verdict for the Flesh Tearers to be disbanded and absorbed into the various Blood Angels chapters). Dante told Seth to go fuck himself, but then the alarms went off. Caecus had in a bout of desperation and an offer by one Magos Serpens made a terrible mistake: added blood from the Red Grail to the mix of the Bloodchild's prototypes, which spawned a horde of monstrosities called the Bloodfiends. With a nice [[troll]]face Serpens then revealed himself as [[Fabius Bile]] and the Bloodfiends broke loose. They tried to defile the tomb of Sanguinius, but with the help of Gabriel Seth and the other Second Founding Chapters the Bloodfiends were destroyed. Seth himself held the Priest Gate with Dante (postmortem analysis by Sanguinary High Priest Corbulo revealed that one in five of the Bloodfiends killed at the Priest Gate died of injuries resulting from a shattered pelvic bone), and Dante finally let out his frustrations, saying that Seth thrived on disorder. Seth put on a huge trollface and admitted as much, saying that he was essentially Dante's watchman: while the Flesh Tearers were the Great Angel's battle savagery, the Blood Angels represented all of Sanguinius and had to be held to a higher standard. Dante also proved that there was no bad blood (no pun intended) between two Chapter Masters when he rescued Seth from a Bloodfiend, calling him "brother" instead of the normal "cousin". Bile escaped with some of the blood of Sanguinius and became a target of the Blood Angels from that day on.

With the Blood Angels more, well, bloodied than ever, Dante repeated his request but added that it was nothing more than that: a request. Seth was the first to step up and repeated the final line of the Flesh Tearers Invocation Initiate to prove his point: if you messed with any of the Sons of Sanguinius, you messed with all of them, and pledged some of his men to the Blood Angels.

As of the current state of the Imperium, someone high up somewhere apparently wants Seth dead. The Chapter Master was lured to an old battlefield to make a vigil for his fallen brothers, but was trapped in an armourglass cell with an Eversor Assassin courtesy of a traitor ''(not [[Chaos|that kind]])'' Captain from his own chapter, who presented an Inquisitorial rosette and the alleged fact that Seth was leading the chapter to ruin as his justification. In other words, someone doesn’t like that Gabriel has basically solved the Flesh Tearer’s problem by simply making sure friendlies aren’t nearby. After being stabbed through the heart and in the forehead; Seth only barely managed to defeat the Assassin, pointedly [[Rip and Tear|NOT killing it]] (and a good thing too, as the resulting explosion likely would've killed him too) by smashing the Eversor to a bloody pulp and dragging its still living heap of a body back to his ship, where he locked it in a room with his former captain as a just punishment for the betrayal.

==The Devastation of Baal==

Gabriel was one of those who heeded Dante's call to all Chapters of the Blood to defend the Blood Angels home world from the incoming tendril of [[Hive Fleet Leviathan]]. In a move that surprised Seth himself, Dante called him friend, and privately loaned the Flesh Tearers a priceless treasure -- the Reliquary of Amit, the only work of craftsmanship done by the Chapter's first Chapter Master. In it was held the last remaining feather of the Primarch, preserved for all time.

The Flesh Tearers were assigned the defense of Baal Primus. When Seth found out that the renegade [[Knights of Blood]] had ''also'' decided to defend the area, he had to try long and hard not to pick a fight with his erstwhile "cousins", specifically the Knights of Blood Chapter Master Sentor Jool. After a slight detour and a history lesson, Seth decided to leave the Knights of Blood alone, but left an implied threat that it would ''not'' be a good idea for the two Chapters to meet on the field of battle.

The arrival of the [[Tyranids]] made any confrontation between chapters moot, and Seth threw himself into the defense with gusto, tempering the strong urge to [[Rip and Tear]] with actual tactical thought. The defense wore on, and the Chapter casualties mounted, and Seth would not expend his forces needlessly. This surprisingly strategic turn of thought enraged the Chapter's last remaining Reclusiarch, Appollus, who thought it would be better to lead the remaining Flesh Tearers into the horde and die in a blaze of glory, rather lose marine after marine in an unglorious defense far from Baal.

Faced between a quick if glorious end for his Chapter, and a slow one, Seth proverbially said to himself, "Screw this!" -- if the Flesh Tearers were to die out anyway, it would be doing something important. He decided to withdraw his forces to Baal, but not before dragging the Knights of Blood with him. He fought his way to where the renegades were holding out, deep in the Tyranid horde, and "convinced" Sentor Jool and his men to follow him back.

Then the Fall of Cadia happened.

The Great Rift grew, and with this (and the failure of a ritual on Baal by [[Mephiston]] and his coven of librarians from many Chapters of the Blood) the skein of reality grew thin. Seeing its chance, [[Ka'bandha]], the Angel's Bane, manifested in orbit around Baal Primus, and fell like a Warp-spawned meteor upon the moon.

==The aftermath of the Battle of Baal==
With the arrival of the khornate forces, Sentor Jool and the remaining Knights of Blood stayed to keep the daemons on the soon to be dead moon while Gabriel tried to find refuge outside of the satellite, both to preserve whatever was left of his chapter and to preserve Sanguinius' relic. While he was doing this, the influence of Khorne's on his red thirst was almost unbearable, and only due to the influence of Sanguinius' feather did he manage to stay lucid and sober. He was one of the first astartes to receive the news of the forces of the [[Indomitus Crusade]] coming to [[Baal]] to help at the last possible minute (which it wasn't, time had been deformed around Baal due to the [[Great Rift]]'s birth, and while it had been only a couple of days on Baal, decades had passed outside of it).

Seth appears as one of the few Chapter Master survivors. While Dante and him, discuss the future of the sons of Sanguinius, Seth confesses that he thinks Guilliman's Primaris Marines are going to be the end of the original astartes, saying that [[Roboute Guilliman|Guilliman]] is acting against the Emperor's design:

:''"‘You'' [[Dante]] ''are too noble to understand. [[Grimdark|That is not salvation, that is replacement]]. [[Primaris Marines|These new warriors]] will bear the colours of [[Flesh Tearers]], but without Sanguinius’ fury they will be Flesh Tearers in name only. All my time as Chapter Master I have waged war on our rage, to wrestle it into submission and use its strength to slay our foes. We are fury! From the time of [[Nassir Amit|Amit]], the savage lord, to this day, we have carried the white heat of Sanguinius’ anger in us. That was our gift and our burden. [[Red Thirst|The flaw]] is what makes us what we are.'We are nothing without the struggle against it. He would make us all [[Ultramarines]] in red armour.''’"''

With that, he leaves, lamenting the future of his chapter. Suffice to say, he is one of the more public characters that despise the idea of the Primaris Marines, and if something ever goes wrong with them, he may be one of the first to start a public campaign against them, despite the Primarch's wishes. [[Nassir Amit|Sounds weirdly familiar...]]. In the above quote, he forgets the Chapters are expected to teach the Primaris to be one of them and regardless they receive the means to make their own Primaris so those at least will be raised completely within the Chapter. He also places far too much emphasis on the flaws’ influence and forgets that any Son of Sanguinius is defined by far more than his flaws.

However, recent lore has confirmed that Sanguinius-born Primaris marines are also susceptible to the Red Thirst and Black Rage but the Todd news they can actually overcome it on there own which makes Seth happy. So Seth either has to come to terms that the Primaris marines are just as flawed as the original Sons of Sanguinius and consider them true battle brothers, or he's going to keep railing on them like that old coot down the street who hates these young whipper-snappers and their confangled techi-nology.

==Brawler on the Battlefield==
[[File:99800101050 GabrielSethNEW 01.jpg|300px|right|thumb|LET ME SEE YOUR WAR FACE!]]
{{Topquote|...indeed he himself is prone to rage-soaked savagery as any of his brethren.|Blood Angels Codex}}

Gabriel Seth foregoes the traditional [[Power weapon|Power Weapon]] of his fellow Chapter Masters in favor of the Blood Reaver: a massive sod-off [[Chainsword]] that in [[crunch]] terms doubles his strength to a total of 8 and gives a somewhat lacking AP-2, which funnily enough means that in 8th Edition he deals more damage than ever. It always deals 3 damage, and all rolls to hit of 6+ automatically inflict another hit. And while Seth has WS 2+ (with rerolls) and 4 attacks, well-armored foes might prove a problem. But if he manages to wound them all but the toughest targets die immediately. This also means that he's surprisingly effective against light vehicles, especially when backed by a properly-geared squad. Do not forget that he also has a Bolt Pistol and Frag/Krag grenades, which can really help out in a bind. He also has the Lord of Slaughter ability; if a squad finishes its consolidation within 6" of him it can immediately fight a second (but not a third) time, meaning that if Seth's unit does not immediately wipe out its opponent it has a second shot at doing so. And at 135 points (7 Power) he is a rather good purchase as long as you also have a dedicated assault unit for him to join ([[Veteran Squad|Company Veterans and Vanguard Veterans without Jump Packs]] come to mind) and a matching transport.

{{Marines-Characters}}

[[Category:Space Marines Chapter Masters]]
[[Category:Blood Angels]]

Black Templars

2020-04-12T05:22:41Z

2601:443:47F:3CA0:953C:A2D3:9AD5:716C:

{{Infobox Spess Mahreen Chapter
|Name = Black Templars
|Heraldry = [[File:Blacktemplarslogo.png|250px]]
|Battle Cry = "No pity! No remorse! No fear!"
|Number =
|Founding = [[Second Founding]]
|Successors of = [[Imperial Fists]]
|Successor Chapters =
|Chapter Master = [[Helbrecht]]
|Primarch = [[Rogal Dorn]]
|Homeworld = ''Eternal Crusader'' (fleet-based)
|Specialty = Assault, close combat, being massive try-hards
|Strength = Somewhere between 25 thousand at minimum (Reports about their crusades are unsure)
|Allegiance = [[Imperium of Man]]
|Colours = Black and white [[Pauldrons|shoulder pads]]
}}
{{awesome}}

{{topquote|They are rage, brutal, without mercy. But you? You will be '''worse'''. [[Rip and Tear]], until it is '''DONE'''.|The only order that matters.}}

{{Topquote|I have dug my grave in this place and I will either triumph or I will die!|Relcusiarch Grimaldus, Hero of Helsreach}}

{{Topquote|WHERE IS YOUR GOD? OH YEAH, HE'S WITH ME NOW!!|Rare Black Templar war cry/motto}}

The '''Black Templars''' are a [[Second Founding]] [[Space Marine Chapter]] of the [[Imperial Fists]]. These [[Space Marines|Space Marines]] are as manly as the [[Manly Marines]] and as angry as the [[Angry Marines]]. They make a hobby of dressing up as the Knights Hospitaller and trolling the Inquisition with their larger-than-Codex-approved numbers. They're righteously angry for the [[God-Emperor of Mankind|Emperor]], they're usually close combat focused and their idea of a charge is a giant zerg rush of a hundred angry Crusaders who won't hesitate to skullfuck the nearest alien/mutant/heretic with their powersword just because they look funny. [[Rip and Tear|Although they don't need swords that much...]]

The Black Templars and their iconography are of a mixture of the Knights Templar, Teutonic Knights and the Knights Hospitaller. Basically if you need someone's shit pushed in hard by a power armored fist, these are the guys you call.

==About the Black Templars==
[[Image:Blacktempbeinbadass.jpg|thumb|left|"I came here to Purge Heretics and pray in chapels of the Emperor. And I don't see any Chapels."]]

The Black Templars have their origins in the first company of the [[Great Crusade]]-Era Imperial Fists, a group originally known as the Templar Brethren. They wore all-black armor and had black crosses on their right pauldron and shields, and were sworn to protect the Temple of Oaths (OK, the reality is that [[Forge World]] wanted to justify including Black Templars into [[Horus Heresy]]. They're really more Templar than Imperial Fist at this point already). Their Commander and First Captain of the Imperial Fists, [[Sigismund]], started the tradition of the Emperor's Champion, in which a Templar would challenge the enemy's champions to single combat. After the Heresy had ended and [[Roboute Guilliman]] called for the [[Second Founding]], Sigismund took his Templar Brethren to found the Black Templars.

They express their [[Rage|fury]] through burning [[Codex Astartes|heretical texts]] (as kindling for the actual heretics), pwning [[furry|mutants]], [[Angry Marines|and skull fucking aliens]]. But you might say, "Isn't that what every other Spess Mehreen chapter does?" Well you'd be right, but they are the most pro-active about it, celebrations on finishing one Crusade involve declaring a new Crusade, recruits are taken from all the planets they've been on then sent to join the fighting so that they never have to slow down, and they usually fight by zerg rushing their enemies with hundreds (and sometimes thousands) of heavily power armoured super humans holding power weapons while screaming a litany of curses at the top of their superhuman lungs. Also unlike other Chapters, they don't have scout teams, as they think they're not righteously angry enough. Instead all new Neophytes (read: meatshields) are given some crap and schooled in the field by a fully appointed Marine (called an "Initiate").

Basically, the Black Templars focus on ''winning'' and ''killing everything'' as opposed to the normal Space Marine actions which prioritize glory and challenges. Most Space Marines would see a concentration of powerful enemies and charge in guns blazing. A Black Templar would call in a Whirlwind strike and walk on their corpses. To them, glory comes from simply murderizing the absolute '''''fuck''''' out of the enemies of man. They come in like a hurricane of death instead of the normal Astartes "Knights in SPAAAAACEEE!!!" shtick. They are not space monks, though they are pious. They are not knights, though they look the part. They are single-minded slaughter machines that retain just enough humanity to relate to...and just little enough to evoke deep dread in all who cross their path. This might also be part of the reason for their high numbers. Since they're so focused on just plain winning, they don't stupidly endanger themselves when a more effective and efficient method is available. They also fight to win rather than to show how powerful they are or to strike fear into the heart of the enemy or boost friendly morale or anything. They don't bother with that stuff, that's what the Emperor's Champion is for. No, the Black Templars just fucking '''kill'''.

The Black Templars are '''THE''' largest loyalist ([[Derp|"codex following"]]) chapter, estimated to have at least over two thousand marines in their ranks. This is primarily because the Black Templars sometimes split their crusade fleets to achive different campaing goals and they're scattered throughout the galaxy so the correct number of Templars in active service is only known by [[Helbrecht]], himself High Marshal of the Black Templars. This means that their chapter alone could wipe out the [[Tau|weeaboo communists]] or almost [[Rape|every faction]] if they were drawn together in one place. Of course this would twist the nipples of the Inquisition and move the setting of 40k along, so don't expect it to happen anytime soon (read:ever). Unfortunately they're unwilling to fight beside psykers except for Grey Knights, they got all buddy-buddy with them fairly quickly, enough so that they willingly shared the STCs for the [[Land Raider|Land Raider Crusader]] with them, mind-wipes not withstanding of course. They are descended from the [[Imperial Fists]], but obviously got more of Dorn's angry [[Gene Seed|splooge]] than his [[Imperial Fists|patient splooge]]. They sometimes get to wear cool Crusader helms, which are at least ten times as [[Awesome|awesome]] as the [[beakie]]s' Corvus helms.

The new Space Marines codex has changed several things about the chapter. It now states they worship the Emperor as a God like the larger Imperium and they have close ties with the Ecclesiarchy. This also makes them good friends with the [[Sisters of Battle]], whom they regularly team up with and have several alliances with. Emperor pity the heretics who have to face both of these groups of zealous nutters at once.

Alternatively, you could choose to ignore the fluff in the new codex that says that they worship the Emperor, as it is wrong and demonstrates a clear Ward-like level of disregard for previous, and better, fluff as it also says that out of all Astartes chapters, only the Black Templars worship the Emperor. This contradicts several novels that say the chapters they revolve around worship him. The first that come to mind are James Swallows series on the Blood Angels. THEN there's the fact that Grimaldus, the Black Templars' High Chaplain (you know, guy who knows better than anyone else what they believe), said that they DO NOT worship him in ADB's sequel to Helsreach, Blood and Fire.

<s>Shame the newer fluff decanonizes the old, but advancement is advancement.</s> Games Workshop says ''everything is canon'' so the debate is pointless. Besides, GW itself consistently holds that Space Marines do not worship the Emperor. GW lore even goes into details explaining that the Imperium accepts it as a quirk due to them being so physically and spiritually close to him that he only ''seems'' less divine to the Space Marines. The Inquisition and Ecclesiarchy don't like it, though. So, we have GW say "everything is canon" (In a multiple layers of reality due to Warp fuckery sort of way) and we have GW ''also'' saying that Space Marines do not worship the Emperor. Since they ''own'' Warhammer 40,000 we can safely say that Space Marines not worshiping the Emperor is the norm but there might be exceptions. Of which the Black Templars are not among them. They're utterly fanatical in enforcing the Emperor's will. Not what the Ecclesiarchy or Imperial Senate claims is his will, but his actual will. They refuse to work with (and often butcher) psykers because the Emperor said psykers and sorcery were no-nos. Logically, this means they would also respect his decree not to worship him and that he is not a god. The Black Templars were a Second Founding Chapter, so they would be fully aware of that.

As a curious aside, the Chapter's "fuck the man" policy has lead them to collect some odd friends. They are the only known allies for a few chapters, including the [[Celestial Lions]], [[Libators]], and [[Star Phantoms]].

==Accomplishments==
*Vowing to go on an Eternal Crusade as part of their deal during the Second Founding and [[awesome|keeping it going non-stop for 10,000 years without getting killed or so diminished they had to settle down to rebuild!]] (Which is a really impressive feat even for superhuman Astartes.) Although the [[Horus Heresy]] novels have revealed that Sigismund didn't start this voluntarily, he was ''exiled'' by [[Rogal Dorn]], and a lot of their more notable traits - like their absolute hatred of psykers - stems from Sigismund's [[butthurt]] over how he got exiled in the first place.
*Not forgetting about the Chaos Space Marines who fled into the Eye of Terror. When Abaddon and company first busted back out of the Eye of Terror, Sigismund was up in their business within the hour. And he nearly killed Abaddon.
*Taking back a hundred planets that were stolen by the [[Tau|blue space socialists]] after the Ultramarines realized the Tyranids were heading their way and left.
*Killing an alien psyker and accidentally blowing out ten billion astropaths in the process, <del>[[Derp|oops]]</del> [[Just As Planned|just as planned]]. To be fair, said psyker was too powerful to let live and the Black Templars didn’t know its power would explode (which implies this was not normal for psykers).
*Wiping out countless alien species and actually sparing one alien species that was worshiping "The Voice of the Emperor" when they got there. They only destroyed their temples just in case this voice wasn't [[Emperor|talking about who they thought it was.]]
*Successfully capturing [[Cypher]]! Then they were [[Fallen_Angels#Ophidium_Gulf_Crusade_incident|forced at gunpoint to hand him off]] to the Dark Angels chapter [[Just As Planned|where he almost immediately escapes.]]
*The Second Siege of Terra! When some crazy ass High Lord of Terra named Goge Vandire [[Age of Apostasy|usurped all power in Imperium]], thinking that he can do everything he wants, he wiped out some Templar fortresses with orbital strikes and when they found out they got all righteous angry! Assisting '''[[Sebastian Thor]]''', the Templars gather around a thousand Crusaders and along with some other Chapters as well as the Martian techno-guard; the Black Templars, with all fury, wage a frakkin second siege of Terra! (The insignificant detail they did get fought to a stalemate by the [[Sisters of Battle|bolter bitches]] until [[Adeptus Custodes|Big E.'s guardians]] told the lasses Vandire was a heretic tends to get glossed over. IMPERATORIS VULT!)

==Organization==
Since the Imperial Fists told [[Roboute_Guilliman|Papa Smurf]] to go fuck himself and his [[Codex Astartes|Codex]], the Black Templars have an organization different from Codex Chapters. They organize themselves into Fighting Companies, with much of it on the fly. Their ranks and positions include:

*'''High Marshal''': The Chapter Master of the Black Templars, who decides which Crusades the Black Templars will participate in, without bothering for an okay from the [[High Lords of Terra]]. [[Helbrecht]] serves as the current High Marshal. Interestingly enough, in their original Codex the High Marshal and regular Marshals typically do not go face to face with the enemy (to the point where Helbrecht never actually touched down in the Third War for Armageddon, he stayed in space dictating the orbital battle), [[Reasonable Marines|Marshals and High Marshals prefer to stay back assessing the battlefield]] and advising the various squads through their communicators about where they should strike and shoot to make the most out of their troops.
*'''Marshal''': The commander of a Crusade, a Marshal is equivalent to a Captain, they're the ones that lead the individual Crusades. When a Crusade is called and there is no Marshal to lead it a candidate is chosen from among the sword brethren and if the High Marshal thinks he is fit for the task appointed Marshal. There has only ever been one case of a candidate being rejected by the High Marshall. It is from the ranks of the Marshals that the new High Marshal is picked should he fall in battle.
*'''Emperor's Champion''': Before an undertaking usually during battle preparations, one of the Black Templars may have a vision granted by the Emperor. This knight will be declared by the [[Chaplain]]s to be the Emperor's Champion, as their founder Sigismund was ten millennia ago. He will be given the Black Sword and the Armour of Faith, and serve as an inspiration to the rest of the Crusading host. As with the first Emperor's Champion, Sigismund, it is the sole duty of those who bear the title to seek out and challenge any enemy champion the crusading force meets in battle. Things usually go badly if a Crusade doesn't have an Emperor's Champion. If he is killed before his mission is complete it is considered an ill omen indeed. It is unknown what happens to the knight who is chosen after the completion of a Crusade as none have been shown to survive long enough for it to matter. Other chapters, most usually Imperial Fist's successors, occasionally have an Emperor's Champion who serves a similar purpose but without the artifacts.
*'''Castellan''': The lieutenants of the Marshal, a temporary position chosen by the Marshals (one guy cannot be everywhere) and who is a Castellan can vary depending on the current Crusade or even the current battle ([[Reasonable Marines|pick who's best to lead the current fight]]). The Castellans lead the Fighting Companies of a Crusade, and they're also chosen from the Sword Brethren.
*'''Sergeant''': The only Codex rank the Black Templars employ. Also from the Sword Brethren (notice a pattern, yet?).
*'''Sword Brethren''': Roughly analogous to Veterans in Codex Chapters, Sword Brethren are the senior battle brothers of the Marshal. They also get to use [[Terminator]] armour.
*'''Initiates''': Rank and file battle-brothers. Marines (typically Neophytes) dying around them has a beneficial effect on Initiates, making them run harder into enemy gunfire for reasons unknown and oft-speculated upon.
*'''Neophytes''': While most Chapters have their neophytes serve in some sort of recon force, the Black Templars have their new Space Marines join the Crusade at the front lines and hit the ground running. Given that this has worked for ten thousand years, they may be onto something. Every Neophyte is assigned to an Initiate who is to train and tutor them. The Neophyte serves as the apprentice to the Initiate, sort of like Jedi in [[Star Wars]] but the Neophyte gets smacked if they even dare bitch about sand. They are also quite useful to Initiates to use as shields (literally) in battle.

===Chapter Strength===
[[Image:Praykillburn.jpg|400px|thumb|right|It's a lot like this, really.]]
Despite being a Codex Chapter (well, they're a Codex Chapter as of the newest Codex), they basically just cherry pick whatever they want from it. In particular, they're exploiting a loophole in the Codex Astartes that says a Crusading Chapter can go above the limit of 1,000 Marines, because they don't have a Fortress Monastery, a disastrous campaign or Warp mishap could destroy the entire Chapter if not for this stipulation. The Black Templars, however, take this to mean "have as many Marines as you want!" Seeing as they have multiple Crusades at once, they must be the best Marines around. Seeing as every other Crusading Chapter has roughly a thousand Marines (usually less). Guess that's what happens when you genuinely embrace righteous fury and unleash it upon the alien, the mutant, and the heretic.

However, it's not actually clear how many Marines they actually ''have.'' Some [[neckbeards]] (both fanboys and bitter opponents) exaggerate the actual numbers, referring to them as [[First Founding#Legions in 40k|legion strength]] and/or believing that their numbers are figuratively ''without limit'' and end up with ridiculously high guesses. Given the vagaries of in-universe time due to warp phenomena and the inevitable depletion of assets due to the nature of their work, as well as the fact that they have shit record keeping due to a complete lack of [[Librarian]]s, the actual number of active Templars would be in constant flux.

In ''Blood and Fire,'' Grimaldus mentions that they typically have dozens of Crusades going on at any point in time; [[Deathwatch (RPG)|other sources]] tell us that the Black Templars as an entire Chapter actually consist of a total of three '''"primary"''' Crusade fleets from which all other fighting companies are split from and deployed on their own '''"secondary"''' Crusades when necessary. This coincides with the original codex, which said that there were usually no more than three Crusades at any given time but that they can stretch themselves according to necessity, and states that in one exceptional case there were up to fourteen Crusades operating in the Segmentum Solar during the Treachery of Dalmark.

If we were to base the numbers off the estimate in the back of the 4th edition Codex: Black Templars, the deployment map totals greater than 6000 marines, with several of those Crusades routinely exceeding 500 marines. But when you factor in normal redeployment over the years that number isn't very helpful as many of those Crusades were finished by the time others arose. When you consider it like that, [[Blood Angels|many]] [[Minotaurs|other]] [[Dark Angels|chapters]] have deployed en masse over the years and would also generate a similar deployment map. Furthermore, only a handful of Crusades numbered relatively close to one thousand, with only Armageddon passing it, with 1,232 Marines total and even that number was questioned (?) by the author; for this campaign, High Marshal [[Helbrecht]] was said to have mustered three crusades.

So we can either take it as written in the Order of Battle that the three crusades represent the "normal" three crusades and hence the entire chapter, giving us an absolute ''minimum'' of over 1000 marines, or we can assume that the three crusades are not the primary crusades at all, which still doesn't give us much of an indication of the chapter size, leaving us at square one.

To make things even more confusing, each Crusade will be accompanied by a '''Black Sword''' and a set of the Armour of Faith, to be used by the Emperor's Champion. The 4E codex said that every Crusade and fighting company would have its own Champion, but the 6E Codex and the newer novels changed this older fluff and said that there could only be a ''single'' Champion in the entire Chapter at any given time, and that only a handful arise every century. Plus, there are only ten Black Swords in the Chapter and they are held by the Chaplains, just in case they find the Champion within their Crusade. This implies that there can only be ten Crusades active at any one time; hence, if the three Crusades at Armageddon, taken to be around 1,232, are three-tenths of the Chapter's overall size, the Black Templars have around 4,000 marines.

However, the novel ''Eternal Crusader'' flat-out says that the whole Chapter could gather together on the [[Battle-barge|Eternal Crusader]] itself and barely tax the capabilities of the vessel, and that ''"the mere'"'' 200 marines of Helbrecht's Crusade, which constituted one fifth of the Black Templars' total forces, meant that the vessel was mostly empty, making them far more Chapter sized. The book also shows High Marshal Helbrecht purposefully exaggerating the size of his contingent at Armageddon from 400 marines to 900 in order to gain overall command of the Astartes forces that had arrived ''(many Chapters had brought a lot more men than the Templars, and would have had more right to overall command)''. Helbrecht would later leave Armageddon briefly to muster [[A Game of Pretend|"more"]] Black Templars ''(but only bringing the number up to what he promised)'', so it is easy to see how the size of his contingent would be misleading to an outside observer.

The old Codex also suggested somewhere between 5000-6000 ''"if certain accounts are to be believed"'' which places a level of uncertainty on the number, and if you consider the above statement would sound reasonable if you took Helbrecht at his word about the availability to Black Templar soldiers and could easily show how the Administratum has been misled into thinking the Templars are much larger than they actually are. [[Aaron Dembski-Bowden|A-D-B]] also suggested about 6000 in an offhand comment; therefore, it is currently our highest reasonable upper limit without resorting to guesses.

----
[https://guyhaley.wordpress.com/2014/07/11/im-baaaacccckkk/#comment-5779 The author of ''Eternal Crusader'' later acknowledged on his blog that the Black Templars could have maintained extreme numbers in the past, but that the overall strength of the Chapter was reduced to a thousand (more or less) as result of a corporate decision by GW, not just of the codex authors.] Heresy!

It is perhaps best to repeat the Black Library's own take on the fluff: 40k is in the fucking dark ages and everything written down could be a legend, propaganda, an event that happened, or a rumor based on a real event. Any guess as to the number of Marines in the Black Templars is just that, a guess, and a book offers only the author's point of view, or what he wants you to think, or he himself is a fabrications.

8th Edition still maintains the information confusion over the Black Templar's actual numbers, just like before. While the Imperial Index states that ''"each Black Templars battle-fleet contains thousands of warriors."'' The actual Space Marine Codex states that "''the size of each can vary from several battle-brothers to several hundred"'' and though it says there is no fixed number of Crusades, they are still each accompanied by a Black Sword in case the Emperor's Champion arises, and there are still only nine swords (Guilliman destroyed one to defeat Skarbrand during the events of Rise of the Primarch). So all told, not much seems to have changed, fanboys and opponents can believe what they want.

==On Psykers==
For most of their history the Black Templars didn't have any Librarians. This was generally thought as a pretty simple fact, they hate all forms of witches. They even have a special rule call "Abhor the Witch". That was until 6th edition when it was more explicitly stated that they had no real compunction against Astropaths and Navigators, since they were the only people who knew how to drive the massive Crusading fleets (pure undadulterated HOLY RAGE!! can't steer a ship through the Warp after all). Of course, this was always true since the BT always accepted those psykers that the Emperor himself had sanctioned (although they watched them closely), which includes Astropaths, Navigators and (surprise, surprise) the Grey Knights. Which invalidates the logic of the following paragraph.

According to the GW apologists, the major difference between their codex and 6E is their opinion on other psykers: In previous works, it was made pretty clear that they wouldn't suffer the witch no matter who they were (except for the aforementioned groups the Emperor sanctioned personally), and as such literally couldn't ally with any other psyker-using force except for the Grey Knights (and even then, it was AoC (Note: "AoC" is a 6th Ed construct)). Come the 6E Codex however, suddenly all their hatred for every psyker was scaled back to merely just being a hatred to all enemy psykers. Some may call this fluff-rape and all that in their neckbearded [[RAGE]], but others realize that setting up tons of restrictions would ultimately serve to cripple the Templars and ultimately just kept things easier by just generalizing it, to say nothing of the fact that the Emperor himself was a psyker. Not to mention the whole organization of sanctioned psykers used by the Imperium. Those guys were permitted to operate by...uh...someone, right? If it was the Imperial Senate, then they speak with the Emperor's voice, so the Black Templars can suck it. If it was literally anyone else with that kind of authority then it would be someone even closer to the Emperor in authority than merely his voice. So, the general hatred of psykers just isn't feasible anyway.

So it was changed. The Black Templars hatred is only towards alien and rogue psykers and that they have great respect for the ones in the fleet. So why no Librarians? There are three <s>theories</s> hypothesis in the codex:

*They still enforce the Edict of Nikaea. Considered most likely, given their [[Crunch|special rule]] "Abhor the Witch!"
*A gene-seed defect.
*They lost them during The Howling.

A small part of it likely has to do with their recruiting process. Since they recruit from the worlds they Crusade on, and they spend a decent amount of time purging renegade psykers, there probably aren't any psykers left for them to recruit and they're not likely to recruit Psykers found by somebody else. It still doesn't explain why they've never had a recorded incident of latent Psykers awakening once they've been recruited.

Rather hilariously, the Black Templars are not even certain why they don't have Librarians; because the Librarius usually maintains the records of the chapter, the Templars have allowed their understanding of history to fall into decay. For the time being, they have come to the conclusion that the loss of the Librarius is simply part of the Emperor's grand design, and should he see fit to bless them with Librarians again they would gladly use them.

Given how the Warp (and 40K in general) works as a genuine Clap Your Hands If You Believe setting, it could be that the Black Templar's own hatred of psykers causes any psykers or latent psykers they didn't realize were such to either become non-psykers or simply inactive/latent and remain that way.

==Notable members==
*''[[Sigismund]]'': First Chapter Master/Soul brother who made the chapter when Dorn broke the Legion up.
*''High Marshal [[Helbrecht]]'': Their current Chapter Master. Gets fucked up by Imotekh the Stormlord who proceeds to take his arm as a trophy. Helbrecht then manages to destroy his entire fucking flagship as retaliation. Currently on <s>a manhunt for [[Ghazghkull Mag Uruk Thraka]] alongside [[Commissar Yarrick]]</s> Crusade to drive Chaos away from some Shrine Worlds.
*''Chaplain [[Grimaldus]]'': THE most badass [[Chaplain]] in the entire Godsdamn Imperium, with the possible exception of [[Lemartes]]. He fought the biggest Ork WAAAGH in history on a very old temple that had relics and artifacts that were sacred to the Imperium. The battle only ended after the temple collapsed and buried every Ork and Marine under the rubble. But since Grimaldus was too badass to die, he crawled out of the temple with a few relics he managed to save. And besides the guy has the word [[Grimdark|grim]] in his fucking name! How can he not be badass? The main caveat about his description is in his depiction in the book Helsreach, featuring Grimaldus' service in Armageddon leading up to his title as "Hero of Helsreach", where we learn he is equally skilled at tantrum-throwing/sulking, as he is kicking lots of ork ass. But to be fair, this isn't the Grimaldus we know and love as first. Helsreach is about him manning up under constant pressure, him finding he has to stop feeling like he has to be his old boss's bitch all the time and learning to be the butch. He does manage to man up and becomes the badass we all know and love (by the end of things, like, the very last second before a cathedral falls on him and knocks him out and not a second sooner). Plus, he had the stones to do it all WITHOUT A [[ROSARIUS]].
*''[[Tankred]]'': He who endures. Also is partial to bitches.
*''High Marshal Ludoldus'': A previous High Marshal notable for having led the Templars during two Crusades that were separated by over 2000 years, specifically the Vinculus Crusade (833.M41) and the Jerulas Crusade (645.M39). Considering that he was already High Marshall by the time of Vinculus, one can only conclude that Ludoldus was FUCKING OLD... and totally blows [[Dante]] out of the water as the guy even has ''old'' in his fucking name.
*''Castellan Draco'': notable role in the Vinculus crusade, notably in killing Inquisitor Lord Vinculus after he got possessed, but not after his own losses; that is, he got buried in rubble after lacing the cult's massive fortress with explosives. For his valiant efforts, he got his lost parts replaced with bionics, a relic suit of armour and Lord Vinculus' sword. Declared Excommunicate Traitoris in IF supplement, becoming the first SM special character with a model who turned traitor in 40k.
* ''High Marshal Bohemond'': Led the Chapter during the War of the Beast.
* ''Marshal Magneric'' See Tankred above imagine if he was in command of his own Crusade. Unlike most dreadnoughts he still kept his name and rank and rarely slept which made him into a crazy fanatic (and implied to be the source of the religious zeal) spends most of his days hunting his old BFF Warsmith Kalkator until Orks of The Beast showed up.

==Daily Rituals of a Black Templar==
Think [[Angry Marines]] but with less copious cursing.
* 03:50: Morning Call to Prayer: Initiates awaken their respective Neophytes from their comfortable slumber on bare stone floors. This often involves buckets of ice water, vox-casters playing hymns with the volume control knob broken off, or a power armor shod foot up the ass depending on the Initiate in question. Complaints that this awakening occurred ten minutes prior to scheduled reveille are met with readmistration of the waking aid.
* 04:00: Morning Prayer: Neophytes are berated for their perceived failings by their responsible Initiates, who are in turn berated by the Sword Brethren, the Sword Brethren by the Castellans, up to the Marshal who berates the entire Fleet then swears a solemn vow to an icon of the Emperor that they will do better and prove themselves worthy by stabbing heretics in the throat with their swords. Tactics may also be discussed and orders of battle issued, assuming they involve rushing headlong at the enemy.
* 05:00: Morning Firing Rites: The Initiates school their apprentices on the art of shooting xenos in the face while simultaneously swinging a chainsword. This shooting preferably occurs while rushing across the active firing range in order to close with the target and hit it with the bolt pistol if possible.
* 07:00: Morning Battle Practice: Initiates inform their neophytes that if they are done being cowardly whelps they may now avail themselves of a sword with which to stab shit.
* 11:55: Milk and cookies break. Any neophytes stupid enough to drink milk or eat cookies in front of their Initiate gets their meal pushed in their noses and eyeballs respectively. Things get interesting if they dipped their cookies in their milk.
* 12:00: Midday Prayer: Neophytes are told how poorly they did during the morning exercises, any sense of pride or joy is rooted out. The Marshal leads the Fleet in prayer and promises the Emperor they will kill more things even more righteously this afternoon.
* 13:00: Midday Meal: The chapter serfs provide cold cuts for the Brothers' enjoyment. Lunchmeat is usually collected by the serfs following each battle and stored in the ships' freezers. Naturally, Neophytes do not get something to eat yet as the Initiates insult them for even assuming they get to eat. The Neophytes soon learn that the Emperor has a sense of humor when the Initiates are informed that only Sword Brethren on up are allowed to eat.
* 13:15: Tactical Indoctrination: Locations of the vital organs and blood vessels of xenos species that may be encountered on the current Crusade and the weak spots of Daemons are reviewed, occasionally an Initiate will cuff his Neophyte on the back of the head and reiterate "Yes that, you stab that retard." Other tactics may also be discussed as long as they involve inserting blades into things.
* 14:00: Afternoon Battle Practice: Initiates attempt to kill their Neophyte with a power sword. If the Neophyte is not dead in four hours he passes muster.
* 18:00: Evening Firing Rites: Neophytes are instructed in how to operate heavy and specialty weaponry dropped by their responsible Initiate when he abandons it so that he may swing his sword with both hands to better kill shit or is eaten by a monstrous creature which he bravely <s>(read:stupidly)</s> (read:RIGHTEOUSLY) tried to skullfuck in CQC.
* 20:00: Evening Prayer: After short session of critique and berating, the Emperors' Champion leads a sermon about how awesome the [[God-Emperor of Mankind|Emprah]] is and how much He wants them to bifurcate/decapitate the current heretics/mutants/xenos they are fighting with power weapons.
* 21:00: Evening Meal: A feast is served by the chapter serfs. Alcohol and anything that has a pleasant taste will not be consumed as the Emperor looks down on those that enjoy life. No hamburger, no cheeseburgers, no french fries, no milkshakes, no potato chips; you will drink water distilled from the Fleet's waste/reactor AND LIKE IT!
* 21:30: Night-fighting/zero-gravity exercises: Initiates instruct their charges on stabbing things by the glow of a power sword and how to fight in a zero-gravity environment without jump packs (stab foe, use corpse as a springboard to assault another foe, repeat).
* 23:15: Wargear Maintenance: Initiates encourage Neophytes to keep weapons in proper working order with phrases like, "Sharpen your shit you incompetent bastard" as the Emperor reserves great disdain for those that kill heretics with dull blades.
* 23:45: Free time: The Initiate is free to challenge his Neophyte to a short duel. Wounds heal better during sleep anyway.
* 00:00 Rest period: The Initiate sees his Neophyte off to bed, with one last punch to the face to help him fall asleep. The Sword Brethren then punch the Initiates in the face before they retire for rest period.

Note that this constitutes a day off for a Black Templar. A working day will involve 23 hours of rushing monstrous creatures with melee weapons. Neophytes are expected to pull bullet sponge duty so the Initiate is not distracted by little things like enemy gunfire (and that their spilled blood will allow the Initiates to glide on the ground to their enemy faster) as seen here:

===Black Templar Combat Training===
Brother-Initiate Teuton McTemplar: "Neophyte, get your ass over here and hold my Lascannon while I charge that [[Carnifex]] with my Power Fist!"

Neophyte Hans Wolfgang: "But sir I have not yet earned my power armour and a Lascannon weighs 100 kilos..."

Brother-Initiate Teuton McTemplar: "You are going to pick up that spotlight and burn some fucking xenos, and you are going to like it!"

Note: It would be nice if this could happen, but in reality, you can only arm Neophytes with shotguns or bolt pistols with CCWs, though you were able to arm an initiate with both a Lascannon and a Power Fist in their original codex. Hilariously too you could go completely overboard and have one marine armed with a Power fist, three bolt pistols (or two bolt pistols and a bolter), a Chainsword, a Power Weapon, a Heavy Bolter, a Missile Launcher (or a Multi-Melta), a Lascannon, and a Plasma Cannon [[Obliterators|ALL AT THE SAME TIME]] (though while funny is still a terrible thing to put on the battlefield as he can still only fire one per turn, pistols notwithstanding). Talk about a jack of all trades...

==See Also==
*[[Warhammer 40,000/Tactics/Black Templar|Tactics/Black Templar]]
*Their [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_lrs9nIITQk| theme] by [[HMKids]].
*Also their [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P0TzUNti3rY| theme] by Andrew W.K.
*Their [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WyAEBux88hw| '''ONE TRUE ULTIMATE THEME] by [https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCqGKtkZ8-MlAeTVL0fFAMnw| StringStorm].
*An accurate representation of their daily lives https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GaUi8Dv73hA
*[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SUplioG2DC4| The unofficial animated version of Helsreach.]
*Their thoughts on [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xrJVZZLv2GE| furfags. ]
*Their continued campaign against the [https://youtu.be/j02V_34PXZg| furfags. ]

==Gallery==
<gallery>
Image:Templar Terminator.jpg|Actually pretty nice guys, once you get to know them.
Image:1206768954856.jpg|They also like to sing.
Image:howdoipurge.png
Image:bffs.jpg
Image:Imheretopurgehereticsandchewbubblegumandimalloutofbubblegum.jpg|Look at them hips.
Image:Black templar terminator by deadxcross.jpg|When you want to purge as much Heretics and Xenos as possible.
Image:A not so Little Sister by DeadXCross.jpg|They can even inspire zealots of their own.
Image:PURGINGWITHMYKIN.gif|The Black Templars' name does not corelate to the other Second Founding Imperial Fists because [https://youtu.be/0Vh_N8CpcL0?t=1208 they are absolute lunatics]
</gallery>

{{Template:Marines-Official}}

Helbrecht

2020-04-12T05:22:07Z

2601:443:47F:3CA0:953C:A2D3:9AD5:716C:

[[File:Helbrecht.jpg|250px|right|thumb|As sanctioned by the Imperium, he shall now remove your behind with his boot]]
{{topquote|1=[https://youtu.be/TYgItphyeXQ?t=15m52s '''"WAAAAAAAHHHH!!!"''']|2=What Hellbrecht sounds like in the BT audiobooks. Seriously.}}

'''Helbrecht''': more like... <i>puts on sunglasses</i>... HELL YEAH!

In all seriousness, though, Helbrecht is the High Marshal of the [[Black Templars]], which is sorta like a [[Chapter Master]], except he also gets to command a massive fleet. He's basically the single most independent commander in the Imperium, and he alone decides where the Black Templars will go. He also rolls with some 10 to 25,000 marines At minimum (as of Faith & Fury) as opposed to the Codex-mandated 1,000.

Helbrecht plowed through the ranks of the Crusade fleets jumping from [[Neophyte]] where he helped some Sororitas push a warrior cult deep into a continent spanning volcano mountain stronghold, to Sword Brethren for slaying a [[Warp]]spawned Vampire that was controlling the [[Hive World]] of Cephian IV. From there he fought for decades alongside Marshall Daidin, and took command of his crusade when he died. He eventually became High Marshall and fucked over [[xenos]] populations as he declared a new crusade against the Cythor Fiends in an area of space where no one had ever returned from. Many more crusades of extreme [[rape]] followed. He also trashed [[Imotekh the Stormlord]]'s flagship in revenge for being defeated and having his hand cut off. He helped out on [[Armageddon]] where he SWORE REVENGE on [[Ghazghkull Mag Uruk Thraka | Ghazghkull]] and decided to chase him all around the galaxy. Good ol' [[Yarrick]] was planning to do the same thing and asked to hang out with the Black Templars. Helbrecht said yes, and thus began the greatest buddy cop movie of all time.

But seriously, he's the incredibly badass commander of the incredibly badass Black Templars, and his sword is made of the sword [[Rogal Dorn]] used on Horus's battle barge. People like him for a reason. To be fair, he got his ass beaten several times in duels with other warlords, but it's OK, as he is more of an admiral and general than close combat monster, and therefore is automatically better than [[Matt Ward|Ward]]ian Mary Sues, who slay Avatars instead of doing their jobs as commanders. Besides, he has Emperor's Champions for kicking the shit out of enemy close combat monsters.

Never mind he stabbed a Daemon Prince to death with only a knife back when he was an initiate.

Helbrecht is actually an interesting character because he doesn't [[Kaldor Draigo|punch avatars to death or skullfuck bloodthirsters on a daily basis]]. He gets beat down by Imotekh because Imotekh kept regenerating his wounds, wearing Helbrecht down before taking Helbrecht's hand as a reminder. Helbrecht, being a Black Templar, took this loss as an affront to his honour, his bionic hand a constant reminder of his failure. He eventually gets payback erasing the stain of dishonour, mind you he was only a marshal at this time. This happens again with the cythor fiends no spoilers but things don't go as planned and helbrecht sees this as a failure. He forges on leading the Black Templars in Armaggedon however he doesn't singlehandedly rape the largest ork boss he can find and rout a thousand greenskins, he takes an axe to the stomach but ensures a bloody victory. Helbrecht is a master swordsman. He is a solid tactician and superb admiral but he's not invincible or flawless. He actually loses battles and makes mistakes which is why people like him. His spirit is unquenchable and his character isn't corrupted with IM A TACTICAL GENIUS. Helbrecht is awesome. Deus-Imperator Vult!

Although his voice makes him sound like a nerd.
==On the Tabletop==
{| class=wikitable
! 7th Edition || Pts || WS || BS || S || T || W || I || A || Ld || Sv
|-
| '''High Marshal Helbrecht:''' || 180 || 6 || 5 || 4 || 4 || 4 || 5 || 4 || 10 || 2+/4++
|}

{| class=wikitable
! 8th Edition || Pts || WS || BS || S || T || W || A || Ld || Sv
|-
| '''High Marshal Helbrecht:''' || 150 || 2+ || 2+ || 4 || 4 || 6 || 5 || 9 || 2+/4++
|}

Helbrecht is a Space Marine [[Warboss]], no kidding. He has ATSKNF, and Chapter Tactics: Black Templars (Adamantium Will and Crusader, plus he gets Rage and Counterattack if anybody dies to shooting), and his unique rule gives him the rather awesome ability to <strike>call a WAAAAGH</strike> give all black templars on the field Fleet and Hatred for one assault phase of your choosing. His warlord trait gives him and his squad Furious Charge, which is great. Gear wise he has artificer armor, an iron halo, frag and krak grenades, a combi-melta, and a relic power sword that gives him an extra D3 attacks on the charge.

Honestly, Helbrecht is used a lot like [[Ghazghkull Mag Uruk Thraka|Ghazghkull]]. Send him up the field charging at your enemy's lines with a bunch of Marines/Boyz, call the WAAAGH! when you're getting close, and everything in your opponent's army will die from that charge. He's pretty good on his own with a potential 7 attacks on the charge plus whatever bonuses he can pick up from USR's, plus he gives his whole unit Furious Charge. He's a relatively straightforward character; just run him up to the enemy and kill whatever's in front of him.

For some reason GeeDubs decided that the chapter master of a FLEET based chapter shouldn't have orbital bombardment.

==Gallery==
<gallery>
File:Helbrecht-Boss.jpg|Sitting like the boss that he is.
File:Black-Templars-Helbrecht.jpg|Dat big-ass sword...
File:High Marshal Helbrecht.jpg|For his level of badass, the servitors fight among themselves to earn the right to clean his giant sword for him
</gallery>

{{Marines-Characters}}
[[Category:Space Marines Chapter Masters]]