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The World Engine

2019-12-04T06:25:27Z

2601:585:8301:76D0:69AC:2336:691C:A216: /* Tell me a story, Grandpa */

{{Awesome}}

[[File:Necron_deathstar.jpg|250px|thumb|right|Artist's Impression]]

A gloriously epic and totally [[awesome]] fight between the [[Space Marines]] and the [[Necrons]]. This story is reminiscent of the glorious days of yore, when Space Marines were real heroes(Sons of Dorn) and when the enemy brought something new and ungodly to the table, the Imperium went balls-to-the-wall and risked total failure on a crazy awesome plan.

An untainted gem hidden in the annals of the 5th Edition Space Marine Codex, no sight of [[Matt Ward|Wardian]] stupidity or Ultrahmahreen fanwank exist here. Only awesome. Only sons of Dorn. And now it's a Battles novel.

== Tell me a story, Grandpa ==

The ''World Engine'' was a planet-sized Necron space vessel that set out when the [[Necron Lord]] of the [[Tomb World]] '''Borsis''' was usurped by Necronian politics (this was written in the 5th Ed Marine Codex, mind you!) and the revolutionaries, presumably led by Tut Guevara, took the WHOLE TOMB WORLD for a little joyride. They appeared in the Vidar Subsector at the close of M41, beginning their reign by [[Exterminatus|Death-Starring the Agri Worlds of '''Gaios Prime''' and '''Gaios Tertio''' of all life]], using the largest [[Gauss]] weapons known to man.

The [[Imperium]] got its act together uncharacteristically promptly, and sent the whole sector's fleet, and detachments from fifteen Space Marine chapters, including the [[Ultramarines]], the [[Astral Knights]], the [[Invaders]], the [[Blood Angels]] and the [[Aurora Chapter]] to head off the ''World Engine'' at '''Safehold''' before the Necron punks could get any further.

Now, the main problem with the assault was that the ''Giant Ball of Haetraep'' had <s>the Necron equivalent of Void Shields</s> some kind of force field unique to it (it is unknown what this technology is but it is certainly '''not''' void shields.) it was apparently so powerful that not even ''that many'' ships could do anything to it. No torpedoes, no Drop Pods, not even Nova Cannons could touch the thing. It also blocked all teleportation attempts, killing the three full squads of Terminators the Invaders sent to infiltrate it. All the while, the Necrons happily blasted away at the Imperial fleet, destroying and crippling dozens of ships.

But then something wonderful happened. Chapter Master Artor Amhrad of the Astral Knights came to a discision.

== TODAY IS A GOOD DAY TO DIE ==

Chapter Master Artor Amhrad of the Astral Knights decided that if weapons can't break the shield, maybe something bigger would. He brought his battle barge, ''Tempestus'', around to bear, fired up the engines, and rammed it directly into the World Engine.

And it totally worked. He sent the entire Astral Knights chapter to war, now that his ship was through the shield and crashed on the World Engine's surface. The Astral Knights proceeded to kick the collective buttocks of [[awesome|a world's worth of Necrons over a 100-hour period]]. They blew up everything they found in their path, yet it seemed not even that would be enough, however the Space Marines persisted; because Chapter Master Artor Amhrad had a plan.

Chapter Master Artor Amhrad was going to overload the WHOLE PLANET.

There are two versions of this final battle. Both are epic as fuck, so we're printing them both. In the first, only Artor Amhrad and five other Marines were left standing, while the surrounding fleet continued to pound on the still-impenetrable shielding while being slaughtered by the still-mostly-operable Gauss batteries. The team finally hit the Central Command Tomb after one hundred hours of continuous fighting. After presumably strangling Tut Guevara to death with his bare hands (how do you strangle a robot!? By popping its head off of course) and beating the sorry scrapheap's head in, Chapter Master Artor Amhrad planted meltabombs all over the Command Tomb, blowing it, himself, and his five remaining, finest marines to kingdom come. Because the Knights had destroyed so many generators and command nodes, when the Central Node exploded the power couldn't regulate itself fast enough, backed up, and blew out the whole shielding array, most of the remaining weapons, and several other critical systems in a glorious chain reaction.

In the second, Amrad sent all the survivors of the Chapter on a suicide distraction attack, meanwhile a crack commando unit made of the entire Astral Knights' HQ and lead by the man himself went to plant meltabombs at the central generator of Borsis in order to release the imprisoned C'tan who was powering up the entire World Engine, after fighting against some crazy-scary overpowered Necron Judicator (we really need a mini of him) Amhrad blew himself and every Necron and marine up at the generator, releasing the C'tan who proceeded to mulch evil Overlord <s>Tut Guevara</s> Heqiroth out of existence along with most of the Engine's power systems.

When the Imperial Fleet saw that the ''World Engine's'' shields were down (in both versions), they let everything they had fly, and promptly [[exterminatus|BLAMMED]] [[awesome|THE FUCK OUTTA IT.]]

Point is, no matter which version you read, it's fuckawesome final act of FUCK YOU meltabomb sacrifice. With his last act, Chapter Master Artor Amhrad had both ended the Astral Knights Chapter, and saved the Imperium from this unstoppable foe. Oh, and in the second version, the last Astral Knight, a librarian whose mission was to record everything in his mind so when the Inquisition found his corpse they would know what happened, vowed to the C'tan the Imperium would hunt him down too, because [[Humanity Fuck Yeah|that's how imperials roll]].

The after-mission report was similarly filled with win. The fleet remained in orbit for several weeks after, not because they were searching for any remaining Necrons, mind you. No, they were letting the Adeptus Mechanicus ''actually sift through the wreckage for useful stuff.'' And, the Ultramarines salvaged the wreck of the ''Tempestus'' themselves, towing it down to make planetfall on the recently-harvested Dead World '''Safehold''', to raise an Imperial Shrine ''inside the wreck'' dedicated to ''each'' of the last 772 Marines of the Astral Knights Chapter who fought and died to cripple the World Engine. Every one of them got a personal statue inside the shrine. And despite the fact that the world is totally deserted save for only about nine scavengers that still live on the entire planet to this day, the shrine is personally guarded by ''volunteers'' from each of the 14 Space Marine chapters that fought alongside the Astral Knights. Fucking. Metal.

==Live Adaptation==
Either inspired from their example, or Gee Dubs wanting to give more justice to this: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uu94vrj7lPY this event re-occurs in the officially-licensed video game: Battlefleet Gothic Armada 2], against a Necron vessel of similar size called the "Dark Throne", although under different circumstances. Shadow Captain Ajaz Solari of the [[Raven Guard]] used his Battle Barge as an oversized drop pod, as it become impossible to land Thunderhawks or drop pods on it's surface, and sacrificed himself and his company in order to destroy a Necros planet-sized weapons platform by using a vortex bomb.

You, as High Admiral Spire of the Imperial Navy, must protect Solari from the incoming Necron fleet as he desperately attempts to plant the bomb inside the vessel and bring it to heel.

Alternatively if you play the Necron campaign, you will play as Phaeron Amarkun of the Nepheru dynasty and be tasked with preventing this from happening, as the Dark Throne is actually a massive anti-warp device similar to the Cadian pylons, although much more defensible as it's also a planet-sized fortress on par with the World Engine.

== Miscellaneous ==

Imperial Historians in-universe speculate that Port Maw, an artificial planet discovered during [[Horus Heresy|The Great Crusade]] and the largest Imperium star port in the [[Battlefleet Gothic|Gothic Sector]], was a botched or abandoned Necron world engine project. Currently they don't have any real evidence for the theory besides the fact that the area is filled with other old Necron artifacts such as the Cadian pylons and the [[Blackstone Fortress|blackstone fortresses]].

== External Links ==

* [http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/World_Engine The epic story, laid out in full at the 'factual" 40K wiki.]

[[Category:Warhammer 40,000]][[Category:Necrons]][[Category:Awesome]]

The World Engine

2019-12-04T06:24:56Z

2601:585:8301:76D0:69AC:2336:691C:A216: /* Tell me a story, Grandpa */

{{Awesome}}

[[File:Necron_deathstar.jpg|250px|thumb|right|Artist's Impression]]

A gloriously epic and totally [[awesome]] fight between the [[Space Marines]] and the [[Necrons]]. This story is reminiscent of the glorious days of yore, when Space Marines were real heroes(Sons of Dorn) and when the enemy brought something new and ungodly to the table, the Imperium went balls-to-the-wall and risked total failure on a crazy awesome plan.

An untainted gem hidden in the annals of the 5th Edition Space Marine Codex, no sight of [[Matt Ward|Wardian]] stupidity or Ultrahmahreen fanwank exist here. Only awesome. Only sons of Dorn. And now it's a Battles novel.

== Tell me a story, Grandpa ==

The ''World Engine'' was a planet-sized Necron space vessel that set out when the [[Necron Lord]] of the [[Tomb World]] '''Borsis''' was usurped by Necronian politics (this was written in the 5th Ed Marine Codex, mind you!) and the revolutionaries, presumably led by Tut Guevara, took the WHOLE TOMB WORLD for a little joyride. They appeared in the Vidar Subsector at the close of M41, beginning their reign by [[Exterminatus|Death-Starring the Agri Worlds of '''Gaios Prime''' and '''Gaios Tertio''' of all life]], using the largest [[Gauss]] weapons known to man.

The [[Imperium]] got its act together uncharacteristically promptly, and sent the whole sector's fleet, and detachments from fifteen Space Marine chapters, including the [[Ultramarines]], the [[Astral Knights]], the [[Invaders]], the [[Blood Angels]] and the [[Aurora Chapter]] to head off the ''World Engine'' at '''Safehold''' before the Necron punks could get any further.

Now, the main problem with the assault was that the ''Giant Ball of Haetraep'' had <s>the Necron equivalent of Void Shields</s> some kind of force field unique to it (it is unknown what this technology is but it is certainly '''not''' void shields. it was apparently so powerful that not even ''that many'' ships could do anything to it. No torpedoes, no Drop Pods, not even Nova Cannons could touch the thing. It also blocked all teleportation attempts, killing the three full squads of Terminators the Invaders sent to infiltrate it. All the while, the Necrons happily blasted away at the Imperial fleet, destroying and crippling dozens of ships.

But then something wonderful happened. Chapter Master Artor Amhrad of the Astral Knights came to a discision.

== TODAY IS A GOOD DAY TO DIE ==

Chapter Master Artor Amhrad of the Astral Knights decided that if weapons can't break the shield, maybe something bigger would. He brought his battle barge, ''Tempestus'', around to bear, fired up the engines, and rammed it directly into the World Engine.

And it totally worked. He sent the entire Astral Knights chapter to war, now that his ship was through the shield and crashed on the World Engine's surface. The Astral Knights proceeded to kick the collective buttocks of [[awesome|a world's worth of Necrons over a 100-hour period]]. They blew up everything they found in their path, yet it seemed not even that would be enough, however the Space Marines persisted; because Chapter Master Artor Amhrad had a plan.

Chapter Master Artor Amhrad was going to overload the WHOLE PLANET.

There are two versions of this final battle. Both are epic as fuck, so we're printing them both. In the first, only Artor Amhrad and five other Marines were left standing, while the surrounding fleet continued to pound on the still-impenetrable shielding while being slaughtered by the still-mostly-operable Gauss batteries. The team finally hit the Central Command Tomb after one hundred hours of continuous fighting. After presumably strangling Tut Guevara to death with his bare hands (how do you strangle a robot!? By popping its head off of course) and beating the sorry scrapheap's head in, Chapter Master Artor Amhrad planted meltabombs all over the Command Tomb, blowing it, himself, and his five remaining, finest marines to kingdom come. Because the Knights had destroyed so many generators and command nodes, when the Central Node exploded the power couldn't regulate itself fast enough, backed up, and blew out the whole shielding array, most of the remaining weapons, and several other critical systems in a glorious chain reaction.

In the second, Amrad sent all the survivors of the Chapter on a suicide distraction attack, meanwhile a crack commando unit made of the entire Astral Knights' HQ and lead by the man himself went to plant meltabombs at the central generator of Borsis in order to release the imprisoned C'tan who was powering up the entire World Engine, after fighting against some crazy-scary overpowered Necron Judicator (we really need a mini of him) Amhrad blew himself and every Necron and marine up at the generator, releasing the C'tan who proceeded to mulch evil Overlord <s>Tut Guevara</s> Heqiroth out of existence along with most of the Engine's power systems.

When the Imperial Fleet saw that the ''World Engine's'' shields were down (in both versions), they let everything they had fly, and promptly [[exterminatus|BLAMMED]] [[awesome|THE FUCK OUTTA IT.]]

Point is, no matter which version you read, it's fuckawesome final act of FUCK YOU meltabomb sacrifice. With his last act, Chapter Master Artor Amhrad had both ended the Astral Knights Chapter, and saved the Imperium from this unstoppable foe. Oh, and in the second version, the last Astral Knight, a librarian whose mission was to record everything in his mind so when the Inquisition found his corpse they would know what happened, vowed to the C'tan the Imperium would hunt him down too, because [[Humanity Fuck Yeah|that's how imperials roll]].

The after-mission report was similarly filled with win. The fleet remained in orbit for several weeks after, not because they were searching for any remaining Necrons, mind you. No, they were letting the Adeptus Mechanicus ''actually sift through the wreckage for useful stuff.'' And, the Ultramarines salvaged the wreck of the ''Tempestus'' themselves, towing it down to make planetfall on the recently-harvested Dead World '''Safehold''', to raise an Imperial Shrine ''inside the wreck'' dedicated to ''each'' of the last 772 Marines of the Astral Knights Chapter who fought and died to cripple the World Engine. Every one of them got a personal statue inside the shrine. And despite the fact that the world is totally deserted save for only about nine scavengers that still live on the entire planet to this day, the shrine is personally guarded by ''volunteers'' from each of the 14 Space Marine chapters that fought alongside the Astral Knights. Fucking. Metal.

==Live Adaptation==
Either inspired from their example, or Gee Dubs wanting to give more justice to this: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uu94vrj7lPY this event re-occurs in the officially-licensed video game: Battlefleet Gothic Armada 2], against a Necron vessel of similar size called the "Dark Throne", although under different circumstances. Shadow Captain Ajaz Solari of the [[Raven Guard]] used his Battle Barge as an oversized drop pod, as it become impossible to land Thunderhawks or drop pods on it's surface, and sacrificed himself and his company in order to destroy a Necros planet-sized weapons platform by using a vortex bomb.

You, as High Admiral Spire of the Imperial Navy, must protect Solari from the incoming Necron fleet as he desperately attempts to plant the bomb inside the vessel and bring it to heel.

Alternatively if you play the Necron campaign, you will play as Phaeron Amarkun of the Nepheru dynasty and be tasked with preventing this from happening, as the Dark Throne is actually a massive anti-warp device similar to the Cadian pylons, although much more defensible as it's also a planet-sized fortress on par with the World Engine.

== Miscellaneous ==

Imperial Historians in-universe speculate that Port Maw, an artificial planet discovered during [[Horus Heresy|The Great Crusade]] and the largest Imperium star port in the [[Battlefleet Gothic|Gothic Sector]], was a botched or abandoned Necron world engine project. Currently they don't have any real evidence for the theory besides the fact that the area is filled with other old Necron artifacts such as the Cadian pylons and the [[Blackstone Fortress|blackstone fortresses]].

== External Links ==

* [http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/World_Engine The epic story, laid out in full at the 'factual" 40K wiki.]

[[Category:Warhammer 40,000]][[Category:Necrons]][[Category:Awesome]]

The World Engine

2019-12-04T06:22:13Z

2601:585:8301:76D0:69AC:2336:691C:A216:

{{Awesome}}

[[File:Necron_deathstar.jpg|250px|thumb|right|Artist's Impression]]

A gloriously epic and totally [[awesome]] fight between the [[Space Marines]] and the [[Necrons]]. This story is reminiscent of the glorious days of yore, when Space Marines were real heroes(Sons of Dorn) and when the enemy brought something new and ungodly to the table, the Imperium went balls-to-the-wall and risked total failure on a crazy awesome plan.

An untainted gem hidden in the annals of the 5th Edition Space Marine Codex, no sight of [[Matt Ward|Wardian]] stupidity or Ultrahmahreen fanwank exist here. Only awesome. Only sons of Dorn. And now it's a Battles novel.

== Tell me a story, Grandpa ==

The ''World Engine'' was a planet-sized Necron space vessel that set out when the [[Necron Lord]] of the [[Tomb World]] '''Borsis''' was usurped by Necronian politics (this was written in the 5th Ed Marine Codex, mind you!) and the revolutionaries, presumably led by Tut Guevara, took the WHOLE TOMB WORLD for a little joyride. They appeared in the Vidar Subsector at the close of M41, beginning their reign by [[Exterminatus|Death-Starring the Agri Worlds of '''Gaios Prime''' and '''Gaios Tertio''' of all life]], using the largest [[Gauss]] weapons known to man.

The [[Imperium]] got its act together uncharacteristically promptly, and sent the whole sector's fleet, and detachments from fifteen Space Marine chapters, including the [[Ultramarines]], the [[Astral Knights]], the [[Invaders]], the [[Blood Angels]] and the [[Aurora Chapter]] to head off the ''World Engine'' at '''Safehold''' before the Necron punks could get any further.

Now, the main problem with the assault was that the ''Giant Ball of Haetraep'' had the Necron equivalent of Void Shields so powerful that not even ''that many'' ships could do anything to it. No torpedoes, no Drop Pods, not even Nova Cannons could touch the thing. It also blocked all teleportation attempts, killing the three full squads of Terminators the Invaders sent to infiltrate it. All the while, the Necrons happily blasted away at the Imperial fleet, destroying and crippling dozens of ships.

But then something wonderful happened. Chapter Master Artor Amhrad of the Astral Knights came to a discision.

== TODAY IS A GOOD DAY TO DIE ==

Chapter Master Artor Amhrad of the Astral Knights decided that if weapons can't break the shield, maybe something bigger would. He brought his battle barge, ''Tempestus'', around to bear, fired up the engines, and rammed it directly into the World Engine.

And it totally worked. He sent the entire Astral Knights chapter to war, now that his ship was through the shield and crashed on the World Engine's surface. The Astral Knights proceeded to kick the collective buttocks of [[awesome|a world's worth of Necrons over a 100-hour period]]. They blew up everything they found in their path, yet it seemed not even that would be enough, however the Space Marines persisted; because Chapter Master Artor Amhrad had a plan.

Chapter Master Artor Amhrad was going to overload the WHOLE PLANET.

There are two versions of this final battle. Both are epic as fuck, so we're printing them both. In the first, only Artor Amhrad and five other Marines were left standing, while the surrounding fleet continued to pound on the still-impenetrable shielding while being slaughtered by the still-mostly-operable Gauss batteries. The team finally hit the Central Command Tomb after one hundred hours of continuous fighting. After presumably strangling Tut Guevara to death with his bare hands (how do you strangle a robot!? By popping its head off of course) and beating the sorry scrapheap's head in, Chapter Master Artor Amhrad planted meltabombs all over the Command Tomb, blowing it, himself, and his five remaining, finest marines to kingdom come. Because the Knights had destroyed so many generators and command nodes, when the Central Node exploded the power couldn't regulate itself fast enough, backed up, and blew out the whole shielding array, most of the remaining weapons, and several other critical systems in a glorious chain reaction.

In the second, Amrad sent all the survivors of the Chapter on a suicide distraction attack, meanwhile a crack commando unit made of the entire Astral Knights' HQ and lead by the man himself went to plant meltabombs at the central generator of Borsis in order to release the imprisoned C'tan who was powering up the entire World Engine, after fighting against some crazy-scary overpowered Necron Judicator (we really need a mini of him) Amhrad blew himself and every Necron and marine up at the generator, releasing the C'tan who proceeded to mulch evil Overlord <s>Tut Guevara</s> Heqiroth out of existence along with most of the Engine's power systems.

When the Imperial Fleet saw that the ''World Engine's'' shields were down (in both versions), they let everything they had fly, and promptly [[exterminatus|BLAMMED]] [[awesome|THE FUCK OUTTA IT.]]

Point is, no matter which version you read, it's fuckawesome final act of FUCK YOU meltabomb sacrifice. With his last act, Chapter Master Artor Amhrad had both ended the Astral Knights Chapter, and saved the Imperium from this unstoppable foe. Oh, and in the second version, the last Astral Knight, a librarian whose mission was to record everything in his mind so when the Inquisition found his corpse they would know what happened, vowed to the C'tan the Imperium would hunt him down too, because [[Humanity Fuck Yeah|that's how imperials roll]].

The after-mission report was similarly filled with win. The fleet remained in orbit for several weeks after, not because they were searching for any remaining Necrons, mind you. No, they were letting the Adeptus Mechanicus ''actually sift through the wreckage for useful stuff.'' And, the Ultramarines salvaged the wreck of the ''Tempestus'' themselves, towing it down to make planetfall on the recently-harvested Dead World '''Safehold''', to raise an Imperial Shrine ''inside the wreck'' dedicated to ''each'' of the last 772 Marines of the Astral Knights Chapter who fought and died to cripple the World Engine. Every one of them got a personal statue inside the shrine. And despite the fact that the world is totally deserted save for only about nine scavengers that still live on the entire planet to this day, the shrine is personally guarded by ''volunteers'' from each of the 14 Space Marine chapters that fought alongside the Astral Knights. Fucking. Metal.

==Live Adaptation==
Either inspired from their example, or Gee Dubs wanting to give more justice to this: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uu94vrj7lPY this event re-occurs in the officially-licensed video game: Battlefleet Gothic Armada 2], against a Necron vessel of similar size called the "Dark Throne", although under different circumstances. Shadow Captain Ajaz Solari of the [[Raven Guard]] used his Battle Barge as an oversized drop pod, as it become impossible to land Thunderhawks or drop pods on it's surface, and sacrificed himself and his company in order to destroy a Necros planet-sized weapons platform by using a vortex bomb.

You, as High Admiral Spire of the Imperial Navy, must protect Solari from the incoming Necron fleet as he desperately attempts to plant the bomb inside the vessel and bring it to heel.

Alternatively if you play the Necron campaign, you will play as Phaeron Amarkun of the Nepheru dynasty and be tasked with preventing this from happening, as the Dark Throne is actually a massive anti-warp device similar to the Cadian pylons, although much more defensible as it's also a planet-sized fortress on par with the World Engine.

== Miscellaneous ==

Imperial Historians in-universe speculate that Port Maw, an artificial planet discovered during [[Horus Heresy|The Great Crusade]] and the largest Imperium star port in the [[Battlefleet Gothic|Gothic Sector]], was a botched or abandoned Necron world engine project. Currently they don't have any real evidence for the theory besides the fact that the area is filled with other old Necron artifacts such as the Cadian pylons and the [[Blackstone Fortress|blackstone fortresses]].

== External Links ==

* [http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/World_Engine The epic story, laid out in full at the 'factual" 40K wiki.]

[[Category:Warhammer 40,000]][[Category:Necrons]][[Category:Awesome]]

Chapter Master Smashfucker

2019-12-04T06:20:44Z

2601:585:8301:76D0:69AC:2336:691C:A216: /* 8TH EDITION: CAPTAIN SMASHFUCKER GOES BANANA */

'''Smashfucker''' ''was'' one of the most [[cheese]]y, deadly character builds in Warhammer 40,000. An [[Iron Hands]] Chapter Master with a monstrous set of wargear, he is practically immortal and will smash your shit with extreme prejudice.

==The O.G. Smash==
Smashbane, Smashfucker's original incarnation, is an Iron Hands Chapter Master kitted out to be rock-hard. He was conceived using the 6th Edition Codex: Space Marines. In his most basic form, he looks a little something like this:

===Smashbane (220 points)===
{| class="wikitable"
!WS
!BS
!S
!T
!W
!I
!A
!Ld
!Sv
|-
|6
|5
|4
|5
|4
|5
|4
|10
|2+
|}

''Wargear:''
*Chainsword
*Frag grenades
*Krak grenades
*Iron Halo
*Orbital strike
*Shield Eternal
*Space Marine Bike

''Special Rules:''
*Adamantium Will
*And They Shall Know No Fear
*Chapter Tactics (Iron Hands)
*Eternal Warrior
*Feel No Pain (6+)
*Independent Character
*Invulnerable (3+)
*It Will Not Die (5+)

It'd be a damned shame to leave him like that, though; he's damned near unkillable but won't do much killing. You'll want a real weapon, plus maybe some melta bombs for special occasions and digital weapons to help your hits land. If you take a Thunder Hammer - and there's really no reason not to, you're paying so much for him as it is that there's no point in trying to save points - you'll be hitting at strength 8, AP2 with Concussive, and you won't need to worry about initiative as you're not going to die anyway. While he won't win against everyone - notably, he'll (mathematically) lose against Be'lakor, Skarbrand, Abaddon, and a Waaagh-buffed [[Ghazghkull Mag Uruk Thraka|Ghazghkull]] - he's still dead 'ard and dead killy.

Also of note is the fact that he managed to go head-to-head with [[Darnath Lysander]] and the two punched each other out, despite Lysander's S10.

==Clan Raukaan Supplement version==
With the release of the Clan Raukaan supplement, Smashbane evolved into Smashfucker: a Clan Raukaan detachment loses access to C:SM relics (i.e. The Shield Eternal), but gains its own, including the amazing (and 5 points cheaper) Gorgon's Chain. This piece of gear doesn't take up a weapons slot, unlike the Shield, and not only do you get 3++ and Eternal Warrior, you ALSO get +1 to your Feel No Pain! You lose the Shield's Adamantium Will, but that's hardly a big deal. Unfortunately its effectiveness decreases as you take wounds, first losing the Feel No Pain boost, then the Eternal Warrior, and then having its 3++ decreased to a 4++. However, you're unlikely to get that far, and if you regain wounds with your IWND, you get the previous levels of the Chain back!

Clan Raukaan also includes a new table of warlord traits that you can use in addition to the rulebook ones. One of the possibilities is a further +1 to FNP, for a total of FNP (4+). Sure, it takes luck, but with a CAD's rerollable warlord trait you have a not-terrible 31% chance of getting it.

Because the Gorgon's Chain doesn't take up a weapons slot, you can grab a Lightning Claw / Thunder Hammer combo, receiving an extra attack and the option to strike (weaker, but shredding) blows at initiative. Alternatively, you could go with a ranged weapon, like a combi-plasma (Gets Hot! will not be a problem for you). If you're willing to make the argument that you're allowed to replace your bike's twin-linked boltguns (and let's be honest, if you're trying to field Smashfucker then you probably are), grab them all at once!

If you field it, they will die. Almost nothing short of a Daemon Prince of Nurgle wielding the Black Mace can even touch this guy, and even then the Daemon Prince might lose given one bad roll.

== Angels of Death supplement ==

The new Angels of Death supplement has even more toys for you to break the game with. First, it extends the benefits from the Clan Raukaan supplement to all Iron Hands detachments, without imposing restrictions on what C:SM stuff you can use. Second, it adds a Gladius-style detachment specifically for the Iron Hands called the Fist of Medusa Strike Force which provides yet another +1 FNP. Last but not least, it adds a new Terminator Captain who has the ability to take Cataphractii Terminator Armour, allowing him to rerolls 1s on invulnerable saves.

This is Smashfucker's Final Form. The Smashiest, '''fucking ''hardest'' fucker to ever live.''' No Smashfucker can ever be more smashfucky. The basic form starts with a Terminator Captain leading a Fist of Medusa, sacrificing Chapter Master status to take Cataphractii armour:

===SMASHFUCKER PRIME===
{| class="wikitable"
|+ SMASHFUCKER PRIME
! Points !! WS !! BS!! S !! T !! W !! I !! A !! Ld !! Sv
|-
| 165 || 6 || 5 || 4 || 4 || 3 || 5 || 3 || 10 || 2+/3++R1/4+++
|}
;Wargear
:'''Cataphractii Terminator Armour'''
:'''Combi-Bolter'''
:'''Bike'''
:'''Power Fist'''
:'''The Gorgon's Chain'''

;Special Rules
:'''And They Shall Know No Fear'''
:'''Bulky'''
:'''Chapter Tactics (''Iron Hands'')'''
::+1 FNP, IWND (5+)
:'''Deep Strike'''
:'''Eternal Warrior'''
::Lost at 2+ Wounds Suffered
:'''Independent Character'''
:'''It Will Not Die''' (5+)
:'''Feel No Pain''' (4+)
::+1 (Fist of Medusa Command Benefit)
::+1 (Gorgon's Chain)
::+1 (Iron Hands Chapter Tactics)
::Degrades to 5+++ at 1 Wound Suffered.
:'''Slow and Purposeful'''

Obviously already hard as diamonds, but wait, there's more! You could make the argument that Cataphractii Terminator Armour isn't Terminator Armour, even though it can only be worn by a Terminator Captain, in an attempt to get around the restriction that prevents regular Terminators from taking bikes. Obviously it's nice not having to footslog any more, but equally important is the toughness boost so you don't have to worry about Instant Death from anything less than S10. Smashfucker 9000 has Eternal Warrior, so ID attacks only wound him, but they prevent him from taking his epic FNP roll. The bike will bump him up to 185 points, which is a ''goddamned bargain''. However, do note that because Cataphractii Armour is explicitly stated to be Cataphractii ''Terminator Armour'', some people (namely your opponents, all of them, as well as every tourney organizer) would argue that is just enough RAW for the bike to be illegal (since Bikes say they cannot be bought by anyone wearing ''Terminator Armour''). If you're dead set on fielding this guy, be sure to put on your Phoenix Wright hair and go in prepared for a rules lawyering battle that will leave the wargame you're supposed to be playing in the dust.

Of course you'll still need to make him killy, but that topic is pretty well covered by now. There are only a couple of things to add. Because Smashgasm has two free hands, you can grab a Thunder Hammer / Lightning Claw combo. In addition, Terminator (and Cataphractii) armour can take a chainfist, which is a fine alternative to the Thunder Hammer. Ask yourself these two questions: "Is anyone actually going to survive long enough to be affected by the Thunder Hammer's Concussive?" and "Do I want to tear Land Raiders in half with my fists?".

All by his lonesome, Smashfuckomatic has a 2+ armour save, a 3+ invulnerable save that rerolls 1s, a 4+ Feel No Pain save, and 5+ It Will Not Die. With just a little help (see [[Chapter Master Smashfucker#Bring Your Friends!|below]]), though, Smashfucker Prime can be pushed to the absolutely monstrous saves line of:

2+/2++R1/2+++

Which means that you would need 1296 Conscripts to put ''a single wound on Smashfucker.'' And of course, ''even if you do somehow succeed in wounding him'', he still has a 5+ IWND, so there's no guarantee that wound will still be around next turn. And let's face it, you already need multiple turns of your entire army laying into this guy non-stop to even tickle him.

Pretty much the only reliable way to even threaten Smashfucker is with either a massive amount of S10 AP2 or a roll of 6 on the Strength D chart. Even in the case of the S10 AP2 route, Smashfucker still has the ungodly 2++/2+++ to burn it off, so you need 36 shots at S10 AP2 to shave off a single wound.

Note: A much much cheaper Bloodthirster of Insensate Rage takes Smashfucker in 2 turn mathematically, without sweating too much. So run like a Roid Forest Gump if you ever face one. Oh wait, you're Slow and Purposeful. Fuck.

==Bring Your Friends!==

Things only get smashier when you roll with your crew. Keep in mind that a Fist of Medusa Detachment and a good roll on the Iron Hands warlord traits table will improve FNP by an additional +1 ''each''.

===Apothecaries===

A Command Squad with an Apothecary grants Feel No Pain (5+); when Smashbane was conceived, this replaced his Chapter Tactics FNP (6+), and Smashfucker's Gorgon's Chain improved it to FNP (4+). However, with C:SM 7th edition, all of the FNP sources they get base (Chapter Tactics, the Gorgon's Chain, and Fist of Medusa command benefit) can simply add 1 to another FNP source if present. That brings Smash* to a monstrous FNP (2+), or FNP (3+) if not leading a Fist of Medusa. The Iron Hands Warlord Trait table has a result that can add another +1 to the Warlord's FNP, so that means Smashfucker could get an FNP (3+) without the Apothecary! While theoretically possible to get FNP (1+), you obviously still fail on a 1 (GW had to include that in the recent FAQs to check the rules-lawyers trying to max out the immortality of Smashfucker), so no point in that, although it DOES mean he will stay at FNP (2+) even after managing to lose his first wound, which also removes his +1 from the Gorgon's Chain.

You can kit out the Squad with Bikes, if you wish; since non-Challenge Wounds are resolved against majority Toughness, this means Smash* is T5 against most things, making it even harder to shut down his FNP and slightly improving his already absurd durability against any non-Poisoned weapon below S7. However, remember the unit will only move at Smash*'s speed and won't fit in a Transport any longer.

===Librarians===

Because magic. Take a librarian, or go all-out and grab a whole fucking conclave. If you want, grab bikes and attach them to Smash*'s squad. Finally, roll on Sanctic Daemonology and hope for Sanctuary. That will give Smashy and any shield-toting command squad vets a ''2+ invulnerable save''; if your fearless leader is rocking Cataphractii armour, that shit is ''rerollable.'' The libby and apothecary will have to settle for a 6+, so wrap them up tight and remember that even a command squad apothecary is a character who can make Look Out, Sir! rolls. If you successfully grab Sanctuary and still have powers left to roll, Endurance deserves a special look: it'll deliver FNP (4+) without taking Shen and his detachment.

You can even try to do the legendary "Psysmashfucker", an Iron Hands librarian in a big Librarius Conclave. Put him on a bike with a Force Maul and either the Gorgon's Chain or the Shield Eternal, and try to roll Iron Arm, Warp Speed, Endurance, and Life Leech. If you get the necessary buffs and still have librarians with powers to generate, try for Sanctuary so you can push that invulnerable save to 2+. Assuming you get them all up and running, get a load of this stat line:

{| class="wikitable"
!WS
!BS
!S
!T
!W
!I
!A
!Ld
!Sv
|-
|5
|4
|9
|8
|2
|7
|5
|10
|3+
|}

''Wargear:''
*Bolt pistol
*Force maul
*Frag grenades
*Krak grenades
*Psychic hood
*Space Marine Bike
*The Gorgon's Chain

''Special Rules:''
*And They Shall Know No Fear
*Chapter Tactics (Iron Hands)
*Eternal Warrior
*Feel No Pain (3+)
*Fleet
*Smash
*Independent Character
*Invulnerable (3+)
*It Will Not Die (5+)

With 5 S9/AP2 Instant Death attacks at I7, he's killier than Smashfucker, but much squishier too. He's 3+/3++ without Sanctuary (no artificer armour for you), and he has just two wounds. If you took Terminator armour instead of a bike, he'd have a 2+/3++, but he'd give up a point of toughness and lack the mobility to stay out of trouble (or at least choose the trouble he gets into). Use Life Leech to keep him healed up. If you went the Gorgon's Chain route, hold on to a pistol for yet another attack, or swap it out for more dakka (Betrayer's Bane again?).

===Banners===

Just in case you haven't already blown all your points on a single unit, the Command Squad can grab the Standard of the Emperor Ascendant, which provides +1A in a 12" radius around the standard bearer. The Angels of Death supplement now lets you mix-and-match the former Raukaan relics with the codex relics, so the old restrictions are now dead.

For one more bonus attack, you can switch Smashfucker over to an Honour Guard equipped with a Chapter Banner (+1A to that unit), and keep them in the command squad's 12" +1A zone. Unfortunately the Honour Guard can't take bikes or an apothecary. You can compensate for the latter by using a librarian with Endurance. You can even embrace the slowness by swapping your librarians' bikes for Terminator armour and giving them storm shields. You give up Sweeping Advances, but now they're part of your hard candy shell instead of your gooey center.

===Family Reunion===

Because Angels of Death lets you use C:SM's relics as well as its own, and the Shield Eternal and Gorgon's Chain can make almost identical 'fuckers, you can take two of the Super Smash Brothers ''in the same detachment''. Two Chapter Masters would probably be frowned upon (maybe take a "successor chapter" allied detachment if you want to use both Smashbane and the original Smashfucker), but Smashfucker Prime is a Captain! You could take him along with his boss, or go Psysmashfucker. You could also accept that nobody will ever play with you and just '''''take two fucking Primes.'''''

Of course, if you really don't give a fuck about points cost, or you're playing [[Apocalypse]], then feel free to make sure your opponents understand why PRIME is referred to as such. '''Go ahead and give PRIME a retinue consisting of 10 Honour Guard, 5 Librarians, and 10 Terminator Captains in Cataphractii Armour.'''

==The Bane of Smashfucker==
Okay, we've seen what Chapter Master Smashfucker is. How do we effectively counter him? Cheap units that have fearless, eternal warrior, and/or a fuckload of models, namely termagants from Tervigon or a unit of 50 conscripts with Ministorium Priest attached to them. Note that this tarpitting strategy is only a temporary solution as Smashfucker inflicts around 4 wounds per turn to the tarpit unit, and might also have a retinue to thin it out. The strategy also suffers heavily if Smashfucker just decides to use his mobility to go around the blob. Although it is quite hard to go around 50 model units as they have the ability to smear themselves over the table. Astra Militarum blobs specifically give CMS problems as he cannot reliably inflict enough wounds, and most likely the blob is going to have primaris psyker attachments that WILL ruin smashfucker's day with their instant death power axes and possible psychic powers etc. Large Units with mass rending attacks at high initiative, like Genestealers or Daemonette (or units with enough AP2 attack base would be better but those are very rare) might be able to inflict an ass ton of damage but no guarantee that would work thanks to feel no pain, though his retinue might take a major hit.

Strength 10 weapons are actually quite good in this regard: even though most rounds blink off 3++ or 2+, the master is still T5 so he gets no FNP, and AP2 or 1 weapons will force him to use his slightly worse 3++ instead of the 2+. This is the primary reason why Lysander and Ghazkhull do so well against him. Also remember that Gorgon's chain loses quite a lot of its power once the master gets wounded, and the third S10 hit will instagib him, having lost Eternal Warrior. Coordinate your weapons fire with this in mind.

Knights will actually give Smashfucker issues, as he only hits at S8 with no extra capabilities for armour penetration, and will have trouble going through AV13 with a 5++ for a Lancer, or 4++ from divination psykers. Meanwhile, D-strength weapons prevent FnP from coming into play, and a roll of 6 is likely to kill outright, as are good stomp results. While the biker command retinue can be a threat (if equipped with melta bombs), decent shooting can thin the scouts out. Also note that knight attacks first, so hope for those 6's!

For Chaos! Maulerfiends with magmacutters can cause pretty gory results if you manage to get one or two of these guys in combat with Smashfucker: S10 and extra attacks from magmacutters will chip off a few wounds, and that's all that is needed to deactivate gorgon's chain. A Daemon Prince with Nurgle, Wings, Armour, and Black Mace would ruin Captain Smashfucker pretty good, WS9, I8, 5+D6 Attacks, at S6 AP2, wounding on 2+. While Black Mace's Toughness tests are flimsy at best against T5 units, it might get a wound off, but don't bet on it.

Daemons have a good counter in the form of a Bloodthirster of Insensate Rage. Thanks to its wings, high WS and D Strength hits, the Bloodthirster has the means to catch up to Smashfucker and take him out. Even without rolling a '6' on the chart, D wounds ignore FnP and deny him a huge chunk of his lasting power.

On the subject of psychic powers, he also lacks innate psychic defense, although this can be countered somewhat since he is a space marine and so can have a librarian in the same detachment to give access to psychic hoods. Most notable he has no way to counter psychic deathstars that spam invisibility, he may pulp what he hits but if he's only hitting on 6's that will stop him and he will be slowed down by the strategic summoning of demons to block charge lanes. And of course, there's spamming Wraithguard and their Strength D shots as Eldar like a douche.

Smashfucker's biggest bane however is objective based missions in general and Maelstrom of War in particular. While he may destroy what ever he charges, he is not in any way cheap and his "zone of control" (part of the game board he threatens in one turn), is limited to his bike move+average charge, and he can only commit himself to one charge per turn. If a unit takes three turns to finish off, (very likely against big blobs) then he's spent half the game pulping some conscripts/hormagaunts/boyz/guardians/sisters/scouts, and not helping his army.
Most likely tho the rest of the CMS's army is tailored to counter what counters Smashfucker (in very "[[Just as Planned]]" way) so chances are that you need to get creative with the tarpits or they get squashed out beforehand.
However, if you manage to delay Smashfucker and obliterate his anti-tarpit forces then your victory is most assuredly guaranteed since CMS is HQ choice and thusly lacks Objective Secured special rule (because you have it like a good boy, right?).

See the Smashfucker despair as he has those Secure Objective 1 and Domination Maelstorm cards on his hands, only to see a 40-man conscript blob sitting on objective 1. But that's what Thunderfire cannons are for...

Win by objectives!

==SMASHFUCKER PRIME VERSUS THE PRIMARCHS==
All of these fights are assuming that Smashfucker Prime has his command squad with him making up the points difference, and a single librarian giving him Sanctuary. This normally violates the "Fighting in a Vacuum" principle, but it is done for the sake of fairness given the extreme difference in points cost between Smashfucker Prime, and all of the Primarchs. We are assuming that the Command Squad is also collectively cowering behind a pillar to provide morale/medical support for Smashfucker's fights with literal demigods.
<div class="toccolours mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="100%">
SMASHFUCKER PRIME Vs. Perturabo
<div class="mw-collapsible-content">
Perturabo strikes at the same time as Smashfucker, dealing 3.333 wounds at S10, which is brought down to 0.0925 wounds by Smashfuckers re-rollable invuln. Prime's 4+ IWND brings that down to 0 Wounds.

Smashfucker Prime swings as well, hitting 2.333 times, and scoring 1.944 wounds. Perturabo's invuln save brings that down to 0.648, which IWND brings it down to 0.315.

Smashfucker wins by a huge margin.
</div>
</div>
<div class="toccolours mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="100%">
SMASHFUCKER PRIME Vs. Angron
<div class="mw-collapsible-content">
Angron Strikes First, hitting 4.667 times, and wounding 3.889 times. Smashfucker's invuln save brings that down to 0.108, and his Feel No Pain brings it down to 0.018. IWND brings that further down to 0.

Smashfucker Prime swings next, hitting 2.333 times, and scoring 1.944 wounds. Angron's invuln save brings that down to 0.972, which IWND brings it down to 0.639.

Smashfucker Prime wins.
</div>
</div>
<div class="toccolours mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="100%">
SMASHFUCKER PRIME Vs. Horus Lupercal
<div class="mw-collapsible-content">
Horus Strikes First, hitting 4 times, and inflicting 3.333 wounds on Smashfucker. Smashfucker's re-rollable 2++ brings that down to 0.09, and his Feel No Pain brings that down further to 0.01. IWND brings that further down to 0.

Knowing this, it will be 100 turns before Horus can alter Smashfucker's Statline with the Talon of Horus. Keep this in mind, as Smashfucker needs to kill Horus before his statline gets changed.

Smashfucker then strikes next with 4 attacks, hitting 2.333 times, and wounding 1.944 times. Horus' Invuln save brings that down to 0.648, and IWND brings it down further to 0.315.

Smashfucker wins in 14 turns, long before Talon of Horus ever comes into effect, let's assume Horus is too stupid to use worldbreaker to ignore the feel no pain.
</div>
</div>

<div class="toccolours mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="100%">
SMASHFUCKER PRIME Vs. Rawbutt Girlyman
<div class="mw-collapsible-content">
Rawbutt uses his Hand of Dominion, because denying Smashfucker his 2+ Feel No Pain is more useful than re-rolling to wound. In this case, Rowboat hits 3.333 times, and wounds 2.778. Smashfucker's Invuln brings that down to 0.0771, and IWND down to 0.

Smashfucker strikes back, hitting 2.333 times, and wounding 1.944 times. Rowboat's invuln brings that down to 0.972, and IWND down to 0.639.

Smashfucker wins again.
</div>
</div>
<div class="toccolours mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="100%">
SMASHFUCKER PRIME Vs. Corvus Corax
<div class="mw-collapsible-content">
Corax hits 4 times, and inflicts 3.556 wounds. Smashfucker's Invuln save brings this down to 0.0987, and his FNP brings this down to 0.0164. IWND takes it further to 0.

Smashfucker swings back, hitting 2.33 times, and wounding 1.944 times. Corax's shitty invuln save brings this down to 1.28, and IWND down to 0.947.

Corax gets his shit kicked in so hard, he actually dies in 7 turns. Making him the only primarch that dies to Smashfucker in a standard length game.
</div>
</div>
<div class="toccolours mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="100%">
SMASHFUCKER PRIME Vs. [[Ferrus Manus|HIS OWN PRIMARCH]]
<div class="mw-collapsible-content">
Ferrus Manus strikes 4 times, hitting 2.667 times, and wounding 2.222 times. Smashfucker Prime's Invulnerable save brings this down to 0.061, and IWND down to 0.

Smashfucker swings back, hitting 2.333 times, and wounding 1.556 times. Ferrus's Invuln brings this down to 0.51, and IWND down to 0.178.

Smashfucker wins against his own primarch, proving that he (and his entire command squad and several librarians) is superior to his own father.
</div>
</div>
<div class="toccolours mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="100%">
SMASHFUCKER PRIME Vs. Magnus the Red, courtesy of [[Codex - Thousand Sons]]
<div class="mw-collapsible-content">
We're assuming that Magnus has 10 warp charges worth of powers to activate before the battle starts, and isn't using Paralyze(Because I hate you mezzy). This battle is unlike any of Magnus's brothers' duels, as the Lord of Sorcery bears powers that simply end the fight:

First, we will assume Magnus doesn't use any offensive powers. Many of these don't allow saves and wound/apply on stat rolls, obviating Prime's defenses. Killing Prime before the battle with a few salvos of Nether Surge or one Living Bomb is considered unsporting, after all.

Next, we'll assume Magnus doesn't open the battle by using Thief. This short-ish range power could deprive Smashfucker Prime of his weapons, leaving him literally unable to scratch the Crimson King once he casts Battle Form (which will raise his toughness to 8, or 9 with a sacrifice token). Facing down the primarch of the Thousand Sons with only your krak grenades (or nothing if Magnus swipes those too) simply will not do.

Finally, we'll require that Magnus doesn't use any warp dice as sacrifice tokens through his Lord of Sorcery rule. Doing so hands him a number of expanded powers including a rerollable 3++ from Flickering or a pool of 1d6+1 choosable dice from Bend Fate. We'll call it charity.

Magnus starts the battle by using Flickering, Battle Form, and Bend Fate. Due to his Power Overload rule Magnus is spending one extra warp charge for each of these powers, as they're all self-targeted blessings. His stat-line is now a fairly fearsome WS 10, S 8, T 8, W 6, I 10, A 8, 2+/4++/5+++/5++++, rerolling his 4++. Not having stolen anything fancy he'll be attacking with his force axe (S 10 AP 2 instant death at initiative, as he's a monstrous creature).

Magnus strikes first, hitting 5.333 times, and wounding 4.444 times. Prime's rerollable 2++ and 2+++ brings this down to .0206 wounds, and IWND will statistically regrow more than that every round. Magnus will be at a stalemate until Prime's friends suffer perils/get killed/fall asleep. All of this, however, gets tipped over by Bend Fate, which allows Magnus to choose the results for 1d3 of Smashfucker's rolls on each of Magnus's turns. A d3 roll of 3 would allow Magnus to push wounds past quite a few of these rerollable 2+ saves, making him the statistical victor within about eight rounds before factoring in the Gorgon's Chain weakening.

Assuming he brought a chainfist and some other specialist weapon (best case scenario), Smashfucker returns by hitting 3 times, and wounding 1.5 times. He could try a lightning claw or some other weapon, but none of his options actually outperform the trusty fists. Magnus's rerollable 4++ and regular FnP cuts this number down to a comfortable .25 wounds per turn, with IWND bringing that down to .0833. Smashfucker would statistically expect to slay the red giant in a meager seventy-two rounds. To make matters worse, unlike loyalist librarians Magnus never fails to cast his powers and with six wounds to burn through it will take quite a lot of lucky rolls for Prime to win out.

Ultimately, this is an incredibly hard fight with the psychic factory that will only take place if Magnus is feeling particularly sporting (he has several ways to erase Smashfucker's chances or wipe him off the board). What were you expecting from 666 points of crimson cyclops?

</div></div>
<div class="toccolours mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="100%">
SMASHFUCKER PRIME Vs. The God Emperor of Mankind
<div class="mw-collapsible-content">
For this fight, we are assuming that the God Emperor has the following Statline: WS10, BS10, S10, T10, W10, A10, I10, LD10, 2+/3++, and is also equipped with The Burning Blade, which does not Get Hot for him, as it's his sword after all! In addition, he has Smash, Eternal Warrior, Fearless, IWND, and Adamantium Will. This is also, of course, assuming The Emperor does not simply erase Smashfucker, his whole retinue and that entire side of the table (table included) with whatever op psychic bullshit Emps would likely be bringing with him.

The God-Emperor swings first, hitting 6.667 times, and wounding 5.556 times. Smashfucker's Invuln brings this down to 0.154, and IWND down to 0. SMASHFUCKER PRIME has a net 2.401% chance of going Blind from this, which will reduce his accuracy on further rounds from 50% to 33.33%.

Smashfucker swings back with his Thunder Hammer (his other hand has his unused Lightning Claw), hitting 2.0 times, and wounding 0.333 times. The Emperor's Invuln brings this down to 0.111, and IWND down to 0. The Emperor has a net 8.943% chance of being Concussed from this, which eliminates his Initiative advantage. Accounting for the net probability Smashfucker was Blind this turn from a previous turn of combat, he actually inflicts 0.0919 wounds, and the Emperor's chance of being Concussed is 8.874%.

The God Emperor has a slight wounding advantage but both will remain tied until Smashfucker's Psyker buddies end up getting perils of the warp.
</div>
</div>
All in all, the Primarchs cannot hurt Smashfucker, though the amount of time it'll take for him to kill them is more than enough for his Librarians to suffer Perils, in which case he loses his 2+ Invuln, and if you're using them for Endurance, you'll also suffer perils and lose the 2+ FnP before the fight ends. These also aren't exactly fair fights since Smashfucker's friends bring his points to well above them, and if they had friends, for example even one apothecary, the match would be an infinite stalemate.

==The Matchups==
http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/28464888/ (The birth of Smashfucker. He's made near the end.) This link does not work, we need a update.

http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/28734574/ (Keep in mind that this doesn't factor in the warlord traits, digital weapons, the Betrayer's Bane, or the Tempered Helm.)

http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/28818975/ (Some recalculations were made. Made some assumptions on Daemon Weapons and on Stalker and Disarming Strike abilities, as well as disregarding any rolled Powers)

==8TH EDITION: CAPTAIN SMASHFUCKER AND THE IRON BASTARDS==

Although he may not be the inviolable [[rape]] juggernaut we all knew and loved, Smashfucker <s>still exists in 8th and with the release of the Space Marines codex he and his biker gang are still scary as shit</s> is no more. <b>Unfortunately, following the April 2018 FAQ, units may only roll for a single FNP ability.</b> So SMASHFUCKER would only get one 6+++ save, not two or three of them. Only in nerf does duty end. Mind you "Only" one 6+++ is still pretty tanky if not the same unstoppable juggernaut of lore.

{| class="wikitable"
!Pts
!M
!WS
!BS
!S
!T
!W
!A
!Ld
!Sv
|-
|136
|14"
|2+
|2+
|4
|5
|7
|4
|9
|3+/3++/6+++
|}

This rendition of He Who Smashes and Fucks is an Iron Hands Space Marine Captain on Bike equipped with a Thunder Hammer, a Storm Shield upgraded to The Shield Eternal relic, and the Iron Resolve warlord trait. The bike gives him amazing maneuverability as well as an extra toughness and wound. The Iron Resolve trait increases his wounds again to 7. So for every wound he takes (or rather every point of damage) he gets to roll a 6+ to try and ignore it, even mortal wounds SO FUCK YOU PSYKER CUNTS. One 6+ isn't the amazing FNP [[bullshit|fuckery]] he used to have, but in 8th edition where everything dies alot fucking quicker this is will definitely buff his staying power. Giving him The Shield Eternal will half all damage he takes (rounding up) which reduces the number of 6+'s you'll have to roll, and combo's nicely in that regard. Set him up with his gang of biker veterans kitted however you like them (but you WILL give them storm shields, you aren't an idiot), a biker apothecary to heal him up or bring back those expensive vets, and possibly a biker librarian to give him Might of Heroes, and it'll all ALMOST feel like it did when Angels of Death dropped back in 2016. Remember: neither Smashfucker or his buddies have the tankiness they were known for, so don't run them up the centre of the board and expect them not to get shot, stabbed, and dropkicked right into the dumpster. Use their excellent speed to position them behind cover and erase your opponent's units one by one if you can. Aim for the important/dangerous stuff if you're certain it's not a suicide mission. The Iron Bastards are too expensive to be used as a [[distraction carnifex]].

How you equip the veterans is mostly up to your playstyle and opponent. At only 2pts each, they should always be equipped with storm shields. The twin bolters from their bikes makes their shooting against infantry pretty great already, especially because they can get inside that rapid fire range easier with bike movement. If you're fighting a lot of armor or TEQ's take some combi-meltas or combi-plasmas. If you want to use them primarily as a CC unit, give them lightning claws or thunderhammers (depending on how hard you need to hit).

In most cases it is NOT worth spending 3cp to make him a Chapter Master again. The "reroll all to-hit rolls" bubble is nice, but in most games that's half your total CP and god forbid you fuck up and get Smashfucker merc'd in the first 2 turns then that was a straight up waste son. Stick with the rerolling 1's and use those CP's to, among other things, reroll the apothecary's 4+ revive roll maybe?

*NOTE* There may have been opportunities to create him through the Primaris Captain in Gravis Armor, except that unit entry can't swap his weapons and wargear around (the stubborn Primaris fuck). Besides Primaris Captain in Gravis Armor costs 137pts to Smashfucklers 136, and is objectively worse.

*Theoryhammer* Perhaps a stronger, if slower variant of our favorite Iron Hands Commander; Venerable Chaplain Smashfucker. Hear me out here. For 38 points more than a fully kitted Captain on Bike, you can take a bare bones Chaplain Venerable Dreadnought (2CCW+Stormbolters). What do those 38 points buy you? +2S(+3 in Fight from Icon of Hate), +2T, +3W, & +1LD. You lose the -1 to hit from your CCW that the TH gives you. Because you're taking 2 CCW you retain the ability to reroll 1's to hit(logic dictates this only applies to the fight faze and the CCW's themselves, ''but it doesn't actually say that sooo..'') although it's only for you and not an aura. And you also gain an innate 6+++ thanks to Unyielding Ancient, while the Iron Resolve Trait brings his wounds to 10 (which will also make him targetable like a normal Dreadnought.
{| class="wikitable"
!Pts
!M
!WS
!BS
!S
!T
!W
!A
!Ld
!Sv
|-
|174
|6"
|2+
|2+
|7
|7
|10
|4
|10
|3+/5++/5+++ or 6+++
|}
Yes. Venerable Chaplain Smashfucker is significantly slower, has a notably worse base Invuln thanks to not being able to take The Shield Eternal, and loses the damage reduction for the same reason. However his ability to shrug off wounds, and amount of wounds he has ''to'' shrug off are notably higher. And he has slightly more reliable melee combat, and brings double the firepower (You can also replace one or both of the Storm bolters for Heavy Flamers at 15 more points a piece if you fancy even more close range death and destruction). And he can still get even tankier. Since Smashfucker is now a VEHICLE instead of INFANTRY, on taking his first Mortal Wound you can spend 1CP to use the Armour of Contempt Stratagem, which gives the friendly VEHICLE a better FNP, this one being a 5+++ instead of his others, against any further Mortal Wounds dealt to it. A bit situational, but significantly useful if you're going up against an army that can dish out Mortal Wounds on a consistent basis like AdMech, Grey Knights, or Psyker-heavy armies. And to top off his ability to shrug off damage, grab the Armor Indomitus for a 2+ Armor Save, and once per game when you feel you really need it, make his Invuln a 3++.

So Venerable Chaplain Smashfucker's only real problem left is that crippling blow to his movement. Yes it's 6" like any other standard infantry, but for a Vehicle it's murder. There are two solutions to this. The first is to buddy Smashfucker up with some tanky infantry who can also help shore up the lack of momentum with heavy firepower such as Devastator Centurions, more Dreadnoughts (Because why not?), or just surround him with Honor Guard (Yes they're not too shooty but they can Look Out Sir with 2W a piece). Or, you can load him up with some chums in drop pods and laugh as your opponent shits his pants at a sudden turn 1 assault of Terminators/Assault Centurions/Dreadnought''s''. I personally think it'd be hilarious to set up something big and scary like a Fellblade or a pair of Knight Wardens, run them up the table at my opponent to make them forget about whats on my side board before suddenly dropping Venerable Chaplain Smashfucker down flanked by 2 Relic Leviathan Siege Dreadnoughts and a handful of LC Terminators and watch them panic. In either case you'll want to accompany Smashfucker with the usual support of a Librarian or two (Stacking Psychic Fortress & Might of Heroes for hilarity), an Ancient for the banner buff (If accompanying Smashfucker with infantry models instead of vehicles), and a pair of Techmarines to keep him healed up. Techmarines are also a bit more survivable, and have slightly better offence.

If you're feeling '''really''' obnoxious, then why not go the whole way and [[Troll|make both your two HQs Captain Smashfucker and Venerable Chaplain Smashfucker.]]

==8TH EDITION: CAPTAIN SMASHFUCKER GOES BANANA==

Aka. "whatever a mere Space Marine can do, [[Adeptus Custodes|we]] can do better". With the release of the Custard codex, a true successor to Smashfucker can be made.

Take a Shield-Captain, put him on a Dawneagle Jetbike, make him your Warlord with the "Superior Creation" trait and the Auric Aquilas Relic and a Misericordia. Oh, and for maximum [[lulz]], Spend 2CP on him at the start of the game for a "Victor of the Blood Games". This gives you the following profile:

{| class="wikitable"
|+ Golden Smashfucker
!Pts
!M
!WS
!BS
!S
!T
!W
!A
!Ld
!Sv
|-
|164
|14"
|2+
|2+
|5
|6
|7
|5
|9
|2+/3++/5+++/6+++ (psy only)
|}

Not only is a jetbike mobile and pumping out decent dakka against hordes, the fly keyword allows your golden banana to disengage and fire in case he gets in combat with something he can't beat (like a knight). Thanks to the stratagem, that guy gets to reroll 1 hit, wound, or save roll per turn for the whole game. On the charge, BlingSmash has 5A at WS2+ rerolling 1's, S6 rerolling to wound, AP-3 D3 + an extra S5 AP-2 attack. And don't forget about the Hurricane Bolter/Missile Launcher. All that for a mere 180 points. [[rape|Prepare thy anus!]]

[[Category:Warhammer_40,000]][[Category:Space Marines]][[Category:Gamebreaking]]

White Consuls

2019-12-04T06:17:48Z

2601:585:8301:76D0:69AC:2336:691C:A216: /* Relics & Wargear */

{{Infobox Spess Mahreen Chapter
|Name = White Consuls
|Heraldry = [[File:White Consuls Shoulder Pad.png|150px]]
|Founding = [[Second Founding]]
|Successors of = [[Ultramarines]]
|Chapter Master = Cymar Xydias & Titus Valens
|Homeworld = Formerly Sabatine (now a Nurgle-corrupted daemon world)
|Specialty =
|Strength = Severely Undermanned
|Allegiance = [[Imperium of Man]]
|Colours = White & Blue
}}
The '''White Consuls''' are a [[Second Founding]] chapter and also one of the [[Astartes Praeses]], based on the world of Sabatine close to the [[Eye of Terror]]. Due to the extreme distance, it is a rare thing for the Chapter’s representative to
appear in the [[First Founding#Legions in 40k|Senate of Primogenitors]] [[Spiritual Liege|led]] by [[Marneus Calgar]], and when it does occur it is a cause for great celebration.
The White Consuls, alongside the other [[Astartes Praeses]], are bound to protect the [[Imperium]] from the depredations of the whatever spews forth from the Eye of Terror, therefore are routinely on the front lines during [[Black Crusade]]s.

==Organisation==
As part of their duties in fortifying the Eye of Terror, the White Consuls have instigated a unusual [[Heresy|deviation]] from the [[Codex Astartes]]. The Chapter is ruled not by a single [[Chapter Master]], but by two. One of these remains upon their homeworld to oversee the defences and commands a standing force made up of the chapter reserves and scouts to respond to Chaos incursions through the Cadian Gate, while the second chapter master oversees the operations of the Chapter’s forces in war zones elsewhere in the [[Imperium]].

It is completely obvious that this separation of command is not sanctioned by any entry in the Codex Astartes, therefore the White Consuls are [[Awesome]] for [[Captain Titus|taking the initiative]] to create a unique situation that works well for themselves rather than dogmatically following the [[Codex Astartes]]. ''(It is also a very fluffy excuse to field TWO Chapter Masters on the tabletop, except not really, because the whole point of having two is that they're not in the same place or even doing the same thing)''.
It is most likely due to the Chapter’s great distance from [[Ultramar]] and their [[Ultramarines|forefathers]] that they have not been challenged on the matter.

Like their progenitors however, the White Consuls do maintain sovereignty over nearby system and its officers must spend a portion of their duties administrating those worlds if they intend to increase in rank, while in this position they are referred to as '''Proconsuls'''. This position also requires those officers to oversee the local [[Planetary Defense Force|PDF forces]] [[Warhammer_40,000/Tactics/Tyrant%27s_Legion|as well as what squads of Space Marines]] are assigned to them. This means that the White Consuls have a unique perspective when fighting alongside [[Imperial Guard|mortal forces]].

==History==
They feature in [[Anthony Reynolds]] [[Word Bearers]] series. Like other Successor Chapters from the XIII Legion, the White Consuls have a strong hatred of the Word Bearers, further magnified by the death of their brother Chapter, the [[Black Consuls]]. However, before the launch of the 13th Black Crusade, the Word Bearers launched a campaign on one of the White Consuls protectorates.

Half the Chapter was deployed, with offers of assistance coming from the rest of the [[Astartes Praeses]] and the [[Grey Knights]], but the Word Bearers used a [[Necron]] relic to cut off warp travel, stranding the White Consuls with only their PDF. The meatgrinder that followed took a heavy toll on the White Consuls, but was nothing compared to the slaughter that occurred when the Necrons showed up wanting the relic back. The combined Word Bearer and Necron campaigns wiped out half the Chapter, including one Chapter Master Valens and most of the First Company, with only three White Consuls surviving. Additionally their protectorate was all but destroyed, with most of the PDF (and civilians, but who cares for them) slaughtered by the World Bearers and Necrons, and land tainted by Chaos. All in all, a bad day.

They were more or less crippled by a Death Guard warband shortly after the fall of Cadia--with the bulk of their forces off fighting Abaddon, one of their chapter masters was killed, their geneseed stocks wiped out, and their whole planet turned into one giant satanic petri dish after it got swallowed by the [[Great Rift]]. They were able to send out 5 companies by the time of [[War of Beasts]].

==Relics & Wargear==
It can be assumed that the White Consuls are very well equipped, as the Astartes Praeses must be to maintain constant battle status on the [[Grimdark|edge of the]] [[Eye of Terror]].

They do have one unique relic that is known, though it is actually not in their possession: The '''Gauntlet of Sabatine''' is a sanctified, master-crafted power-fist that is the bane of mutants and will [[Deathwatch (RPG)|do additional damage]] to them. However, the gauntlet was lost on the planet of Polyphemnos when its bearer was overrun by a horde of [[List of /tg/ Cuisine|cannibal]] [[Ogryn]]s. It has since '''''somehow''''' fallen into the hands of [[Blood Ravens|those bloody magpies.]]

==Gallery==
<gallery>
File:White Consuls Miniature.webp
File:White Consuls Primaris.jpg
File:White Consuls Space Marine.jpg
</gallery>

{{Template:Marines-Official}}
[[Category:Warhammer 40,000]]
[[Category:Imperial]]
[[Category:Space Marines]]

The World Engine

2019-12-04T06:11:31Z

2601:585:8301:76D0:69AC:2336:691C:A216: /* Tell me a story, Grandpa */

{{Awesome}}

[[File:Necron_deathstar.jpg|250px|thumb|right|Artist's Impression]]

A gloriously epic and totally [[awesome]] fight between the [[Space Marines]] and the [[Necrons]]. This story is reminiscent of the glorious days of yore, when Space Marines were real heroes(Sons of Dorn) and when the enemy brought something new and ungodly to the table, the Imperium went balls-to-the-wall and risked total failure on a crazy awesome plan.

An untainted gem hidden in the annals of the 5th Edition Space Marine Codex, no sight of [[Matt Ward|Wardian]] stupidity or Ultrahmahreen fanwank exist here. Only awesome. Only sons of Dorn. And now it's a Battles novel.

== Tell me a story, Grandpa ==

The ''World Engine'' was a planet-sized Necron space vessel that set out when the [[Necron Lord]] of the [[Tomb World]] '''Borsis''' was usurped by Necronian politics (this was written in the 5th Ed Marine Codex, mind you!) and the revolutionaries, presumably led by Tut Guevara, took the WHOLE TOMB WORLD for a little joyride. They appeared in the Vidar Subsector at the close of M41, beginning their reign by [[Exterminatus|Death-Starring the Agri Worlds of '''Gaios Prime''' and '''Gaios Tertio''' of all life]], using the largest [[Gauss]] weapons known to man.

The [[Imperium]] got its act together uncharacteristically promptly, and sent the whole sector's fleet, and detachments from fifteen Space Marine chapters, including the [[Ultramarines]], the [[Astral Knights]], the [[Invaders]], the [[Blood Angels]] and the [[Aurora Chapter]] to head off the ''World Engine'' at '''Safehold''' before the Necron punks could get any further.

Now, the main problem with the assault was that the ''Giant Ball of Haetraep'' had the Necron equivalent of Void Shields so powerful that not even ''that many'' ships could do anything to it. No torpedoes, no Drop Pods, not even Nova Cannons could touch the thing. It also blocked all teleportation attempts, killing the three full squads of Terminators the Invaders sent to infiltrate it. All the while, the Necrons happily blasted away at the Imperial fleet, destroying and crippling dozens of ships.

But then something wonderful happened. Chapter Master Artor Amhrad of the Astral Knights came to a discision.

== TODAY IS A GOOD DAY TO DIE ==

Chapter Master Artor Amhrad of the Astral Knights decided that if weapons can't break the shield, maybe something bigger would. He brought his battle barge, ''Tempestus'', around to bear, fired up the engines, and rammed it directly into the World Engine.

And it totally worked. He sent the entire Astral Knights chapter to war, now that his ship was through the shield and crashed on the World Engine's surface. The Astral Knights proceeded to kick the collective buttocks of [[awesome|a world's worth of Necrons over a 100-hour period]]. They blew up everything they found in their path, yet it seemed not even that would be enough, however the Space Marines persisted; because Chapter Master Artor Amhrad had a plan.

Chapter Master Artor Amhrad was going to overload the WHOLE PLANET.

There are two versions of this final battle. Both are epic as fuck, so we're printing them both. In the first, only Artor Amhrad and five other Marines were left standing, while the surrounding fleet continued to pound on the still-impenetrable shielding while being slaughtered by the still-mostly-operable Gauss batteries. The team finally hit the Central Command Tomb after one hundred hours of continuous fighting. After presumably strangling Tut Guevara to death with his bare hands (how do you strangle a robot!? By popping its head off of course) and beating the sorry scrapheap's head in, Chapter Master Artor Amhrad planted meltabombs all over the Command Tomb, blowing it, himself, and his five remaining, finest marines to kingdom come. Because the Knights had destroyed so many generators and command nodes, when the Central Node exploded the power couldn't regulate itself fast enough, backed up, and blew out the whole shielding array, most of the remaining weapons, and several other critical systems in a glorious chain reaction.

In the second, Amrad sent all the survivors of the Chapter on a suicide distraction attack, meanwhile a crack commando unit made of the entire Astral Knights' HQ and lead by the man himself went to plant meltabombs at the central generator of Borsis in order to release the imprisoned C'tan who was powering up the entire World Engine, after fighting against some crazy-scary overpowered Necron Judicator (we really need a mini of him) Amhrad blew himself and every Necron and marine up at the generator, releasing the C'tan who proceeded to mulch evil Overlord <s>Tut Guevara</s> Heqiroth out of existence along with most of the Engine's power systems.

When the Imperial Fleet saw that the ''World Engine's'' shields were down (in both versions), they let everything they had fly, and promptly [[exterminatus|BLAMMED]] [[awesome|THE FUCK OUTTA IT.]]

Point is, no matter which version you read, it's fuckawesome final act of FUCK YOU meltabomb sacrifice. With his last act, Chapter Master Artor Amhrad had both ended the Astral Knights Chapter, and saved the Imperium from this unstoppable foe. Oh, and in the second version, the last Astral Knight, a librarian whose mission was to record everything in his mind so when the Inquisition found his corpse they would know what happened, vowed to the C'tan the Imperium would hunt him down too, because [[Humanity Fuck Yeah|that's how imperials roll]].

The after-mission report was similarly filled with win. The fleet remained in orbit for several weeks after, not because they were searching for any remaining Necrons, mind you. No, they were letting the Adeptus Mechanicus ''actually sift through the wreckage for useful stuff.'' And, the Ultramarines salvaged the wreck of the ''Tempestus'' themselves, towing it down to make planetfall on the recently-harvested Dead World '''Safehold''', to raise an Imperial Shrine ''inside the wreck'' dedicated to ''each'' of the last 772 Marines of the Astral Knights Chapter who fought and died to cripple the World Engine. Every one of them got a personal statue inside the shrine. And despite the fact that the world is totally deserted save for only about nine scavengers that still live on the entire planet to this day, the shrine is personally guarded by ''volunteers'' from each of the 14 Space Marine chapters that fought alongside the Astral Knights. Fucking. Metal.

==Live Adaptation==
Either inspired from their example, or Gee Dubs wanting to give more justice to this: [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uu94vrj7lPY this event re-occurs in the officially-licensed video game: Battlefleet Gothic Armada 2], against a Necron vessel of similar size called the "Dark Throne", although under different circumstances. Shadow Captain Ajaz Solari of the [[Raven Guard]] used his Battle Barge as an oversized drop pod, as it become impossible to land Thunderhawks or drop pods on it's surface, and sacrificed himself and his company in order to destroy a Necros planet-sized weapons platform by using a vortex bomb.

You, as High Admiral Spire of the Imperial Navy, must protect Solari from the incoming Necron fleet as he desperately attempts to plant the bomb inside the vessel and bring it to heel.

Alternatively if you play the Necron campaign, you will play as Phaeron Amarkun of the Nepheru dynasty and be tasked with preventing this from happening, as the Dark Throne is actually a massive anti-warp device similar to the Cadian pylons, although much more defensible as it's also a planet-sized fortress on par with the World Engine.

== Miscellaneous ==

Imperial Historians in-universe speculate that Port Maw, an artificial planet discovered during [[Horus Heresy|The Great Crusade]] and the largest Imperium star port in the [[Battlefleet Gothic|Gothic Sector]], was a botched or abandoned Necron world engine project. Currently they don't have any real evidence for the theory besides the fact that the area is filled with other old Necron artifacts such as the Cadian pylons and the [[Blackstone Fortress|blackstone fortresses]].

== External Links ==

* [http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/World_Engine The epic story, laid out in full at the 'factual" 40K wiki.]

[[Category:Warhammer 40,000]][[Category:Necrons]][[Category:Awesome]]

Doom

2019-12-04T05:59:18Z

2601:585:8301:76D0:69AC:2336:691C:A216: /* Doom 4 (aka DOOM aka DOOD aka Brutal Doom HD) */

{{/vg/}}
{{Oldschool}}
{{awesome}}
{{Cleanup}}
[[File:Doom cover poster.jpeg|thumb|If you don't already have the first level's music in your head, you may be on the wrong site.]]
{{topquote|Over the centuries, mankind has tried many ways of combatting the forces of evil... prayer, fasting, good works and so on. Up until Doom, no one seemed to have thought about the double-barrel shotgun. Eat leaden death, demon...|[[Discworld|Terry Pratchett]]}}

The granddaddy of the first person shooter, the original ass-kicking demon-slaying 3D slaughterfest, '''''Doom''''' is a franchise that demands respect even in the hallowed halls of /tg/. It was actually inspired by a [[Dungeons & Dragons]] campaign played by the founders of id Software; John Romero had given a demon lord the key to overrunning the material plane in exchange for a magic [[Katanas are Underpowered in d20|katana]] because he's an edgy little bitch like that, and John Carmack (the DM) decided it made a good premise for their new 3D game. The katana in question would later be used in Romero's game ''Daikatana'', which was a total failure for reasons that aren't important enough to go over right now.

The plot? What do you think this is, [[Fags of 4chan#Board Fags|urchin?]] Here's your plot: you are a Space Marine (no, not the 40K guy, a jumped-up soldier who is sent to fight on other planets, so closer to the [[Imperial Guard]]) stationed on Mars. Somehow, demons break through into our reality and slaughter everyone else. Your job? Fight your way to where, you hope, there's a ride off of this rock, and make bloody mincemeat out of everything standing between you and salvation. Standing in your way are armies of zombified fellow marines and eggheads, fireball-tossing imps, hulking flesh-eating demons, cyborg-demon monstrosities, and various other hell-spawned nasties who want to kill you horribly. Good luck. You'll need it...

Although not the very ''first'' of the FPS genre (even its predecessor, [[Wolfenstein]] 3D, wasn't the first, as the history of the genre goes back all the way into 70's), Doom was definitive to the genre, so much so that "Doom Clone" was the standard nickname for many years afterwards. People are still playing it and making it even more awesome with [[Homebrew|their own custom modifications]] 24 years later, which isn't something you hear that often outside of /tg/; this is one of the main reasons why the franchise is so well-respected.

Fun fact: that iconic Doom monster, the Cacodemon, was actually inspired by the artwork for an Astral Dreadnought on the cover of the [[Dungeons & Dragons]] 1st edition [[Manual of the Planes]] splatbook. Also relevant to /tg/ is that Sandy Petersen, co-designer of [[Ghostbusters RPG]], creator of [[Call of Cthulhu]], and author of some [[RuneQuest]] stuff, worked on the game. He designed some levels (more in the sequel) and made some contributions to the monster design.

==Classic DOOM (aka The Good Shit)==
{{topquote|Welcome to DOOM, a lightning-fast virtual reality adventure where you're the toughest space trooper ever to suck vacuum. Your mission is to shoot your way through a monster-infested holocaust. Living to tell the tale if possible.|README.TXT, Doom 1.8 shareware}}
The original Doom was fast-paced and bloody compared to what came before, but wasn't afraid to vary the pace with more labyrinthine levels or make you shit your pants by dropping you into a crowd of demons when you least expected it. (Fun fact No. 2: The extra levels included in the full version of Doom were built by the same guy who wrote [[Call of Cthulhu]] in just 10 weeks.) Doom II on the other hand was a circle-strafing explosion-rich gorefest, and is what basically everyone thinks of when they think of both Doom and 90s FPS gameplay in general. Plot was bare-minimum: Demons took over Phobos and ate Deimos, kill them all. Or, in Doom 2's case, Demons are trying to infest Earth in revenge, kill them all AGAIN. But this time, ''it's personal''. (No, seriously, they killed your pet bunny Daisy.) The Doom engine is extremely mod-friendly for a 90s game (as both Carmack and Romero had been big into software tinkering in their day) and id Software actually paid a modding group for the right to sell two of their expansion packs commercially. Slightly more obscure but still relevant is Doom 64, which replaced the high-speed explode-o-rama with a stronger horror theme and more deliberate pace. id Software then for a time turned toward more multiplayer-oriented games with the ''Quake'' series and gave Doom a rest.

===The Doom Comic===
{{topquote|'''DYNAMITE! I'M COOKING WITH GAS! I'VE GOTTA HANDFUL OF VERTEBRAE AND A HEADFUL OF MAD! YEAH, THAT'S YOUR SPINAL CORD, BABY! DIG IT!'''|You, the moment you read that heading}}
The origin of [[Rip and Tear]]. Possibly the most ridiculously, amazingly, stupidly 90s thing that has ever been put to paper with the possible exception of [[Snowflame]]. It has to be read to be believed. [https://www.doomworld.com/10years/doomcomic/ So go read it.]

===Monsters===
[[File:Reaperminis.jpg|thumb|right|Limited-edition monster minis from [[Reaper Miniatures]]. Admit it, you want that Cyberdemon for your Daemons of Chaos army.]]
*'''Former human''': Wet toilet paper. Only dangerous until you get a shotgun.
*'''Former sergeant''': Still wet toilet paper, but full of broken glass; if one of these assholes gets behind you before you find armor you're probably dead. Likely to be your first source for shotguns.
*'''Imp''': The first true demon you encounter with a dodgeable projectile and more health than the formers. The first meaningful enemy you meet, and runner-up for most iconic non-boss monster.
*'''Demon''': Otherwise known as '''Pinkies'''. Giant hairless gorilla with a mouth that could give a [[squig]] lessons in eating. [[Derp|They can't walk and bite at the same time]] so you can just step out of their way, but they tend to come in large groups and dance around like spastic toddlers (which makes them harder to shoot) as they run up to you.
**'''Spectre''': Demon with Predator-style optic camo. An absolute bitch to deal with in dark environments, which is naturally where you find them.
*'''Cacodemon''': Mr. [[Astral Dreadnought]] Head. These fuckers can fly and you can't look up, so have fun fighting them in close quarters where they can float out of your field of view. Dangerous, but get a rapid-fire weapon and they become a joke as you stunlock them until they are all dead. ''The'' most iconic non-boss monster, partially because of its sheer WTFery but mostly because of how easy it is to chibi/make plushies out of.
*'''Lost Soul''': Floating flaming skulls that fly at you at approximately SANIC miles per hour. Fairly weak, but very fast and has a habit of nibbling at you while you focus on something more dangerous.
*'''Hell Knight''': Now we're talking. [[Space Marine]] sized and equipped with a punch and moderate projectile attacks (fireballs). Shooting him in the face with a shotgun will kill him pretty quickly.
**'''Baron of Hell''': Super hell knight with double the health. Big and equipped with nasty melee and projectile attacks. Shooting ''him'' in the face with a shotgun just '''pisses him off'''. Super shotguns will work though.
*'''Former commando''': Unlike the other formers this guy is no joke: he's durable enough to not die when breathed on and his hitscan chaingun is almost as powerful as yours. Using hordes of these guys in an open arena with no cover is the pinnacle of dick moves in Doom mapping.
*'''Revenant''': [[Meme|Agitating skeleton aka '''DOOT'''.]] One of the few monsters that moves anywhere near as fast as you do, plus he runs up and tries to punch your head off if you move inside the minimum range of the homing rockets he shoots. It is an established fact that any given Doom map is automatically casuals-only unless the mapper adds at least 100 revenants.
*'''Mancubus''': [[Festus the Leechlord|HELLO I'M FUCKING FAT.]] Slow, but very tank and he has dual heavy flamers for arms that hurt like hell. Fortunately, this also applies to any nearby demons, so you can make them kill each other for your amusement just by standing between a mancubus and another monster.
*'''Pain elemental''': [[Meme|Meatball demon.]] Like a cacodemon, but instead of shooting fireballs, it shoots Lost Souls. Has the opposite problem to the pinkies in that [[Derp|you can stand in front of its face]] and prevent the lost souls from spawning.
*'''Arch-vile''': One of the few monsters that that's faster than the player at a full run. Sets you on fire [[Psyker|with its mind]] and revives any monsters it comes across so you have to kill them all over again. Meeting one of these guys in a slaughtermap will make you [[Khorne|hate everything forever.]]
*'''Cyberdemon''': [[Rip and tear|Is huge, and therefore has huge guts.]] Basically a (Chaos possesed?) Carnifex with a rocket launcher for an arm, and significantly faster than he looks. Without a doubt the fuckingest monster in the classic game, and practically tailor made for soaking up BFG shots.
*'''Spider Mastermind''': Doom 1’s final boss, despite being inferior in almost every way to the Cyberdemon you fight earlier. Go figure. Even more XBOX HUEG than the Cyberdemon, but has a super-chaingun instead of a rocket launcher and refuses to let up until either you or it are dead. Has the critical weakness of BFG shots up the ass due to the way its hugeness interacts with the mechanics of the classic BFG.
**'''Arachnotron''': Babby Masterminds that go fast and shit plasma at you.

==Doom 3==
In the early 2000s, Doom 3 came along. It blows chunks compared to the classics, but since the classics are so damn good it ends up being passable anyway. Since Valve had made "story-driven" shooters and "realistic" scripted encounters the in thing id decided to rip off Half-Life, grafting on elements of the original Doom that had been scrapped at the concept stage. Unfortunately the gameplay was too slow and similar to the rest of the genre, the scripting and story interludes just made the gameplay even clunkier and the big technological gimmick (per-pixel lighting) meant you had to choose between seeing what you're supposed to shoot with a crappy little flashlight and actually being able to shoot it. Supposedly the lighting effects were resource intense during development and this was the "solution" (of course we know better that they wanted to make it a quasi survival horror). Naturally the first mod for the game was duct tape.

==Doom 4 (aka DOOM aka DOOD aka Brutal Doom HD)==
{{topquote|They are rage, brutal, without mercy. But you? You will be '''worse'''. [[Rip and Tear]], until it is '''DONE'''.|A direct order from what is either [[God-Emperor of Mankind|God's]] [[Living Saint|seraphs]], [[Khorne]] himself, or his champion (at the time) ,and your co-conspirator, the ''first'' betrayer (not [[Kharn|Khârn]]) Seriously, does any of that really matter. do you really need more of a mission briefing? if so why are you playing this game?}}
listen to it here[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OpllUQ38CKY]

Then the latest Doom came out in May 2016. This rendition can basically be described as "3d Brutal Doom II" only sexier, with features like [[Rip and tear|ripping enemies apart with your bare hands]] and having to stay on the move to avoid being torn to shreds. The plot is also about as bare minimum as the original (albeit with a surprising amount of lore hidden away in the Codex), kicking the player straight into the action with waking up on Mars, immediately [[Rip and tear|smashing a zombie’s skull]], and basically being told “demonic invasion, go kill everything.” Also, the player this time around is someone the demons call the “Doom Slayer", who has traveled through “Worlds and Time” (hinting that the Doom Slayer could very well be the original Doomguy from the first two games, having also survived Doom 64 and has been traveling Hell since but that's deliberately left ambiguous in-game, names will be used interchangeably), and millennia ago [[Awesome|kicked Hell’s ass so hard that the best the demons could do is seal him away so that he wouldn’t destroy Hell]]. Then the UAC decides to deal with an Energy Crisis by quite literally [[Humanity Fuck Yeah|slamming an Oil Derrick on a Hell Portal to siphon off Hell Energy for power]], and just for giggles starts tomb raiding Hell for artifacts and treasures as well, ultimately running off with the Doomguy's sarcophagus. The demons see that the Doomguy’s prison/tomb is empty, and the subsequent invasion is actually a panicked attempt to stop the Doomguy from being woken up. Obviously they fail and he butchers ever last one of them.

Samuel Hayden is the guy in charge of the UAC, a cyborg the size of a 40k [[Space Marine]]. He and Vega, the Mars UAC AI, are basically quest givers for the most part. His subordinate Olivia Pierce pretty much ran a cult while Hayden was pillaging artifacts from Hell, [[Grimdark|being the only one to make it back from the expeditions]]. When shit hits the fan he decides to wake the Doom Slayer up. Of course, once awake, he goes on a rampage and busts the UACs shit, as Hayden's disregard for human life is too far even for Doomguy to take, expressing his outrage without the need for a voice actor.

So now it's up to the Doom Slayer in awesome power armor to [[Rip and Tear|rip and tear]] and dakka every demon he comes across to stop Olivia while wrecking UACs energy production. After going to hell at least once due to Olivia breaking an Argent Accumulator and making it back to Mars, then after Hayden installs a "tether" to him, Hayden sends Doomguy on a quest to find the Helix Stone, picking up the most powerful version of the BFG 9000 yet on the way(more on that below). Once he reaches the Helix Stone it directs Doomguy to acquire the Crucible, a relic in the Titan's Realm. So Doomguy has to kill the Cyberdemon to get back to hell, make a long trek and fight three bosses, two of them at once, for the Crucible and returns to Mars again. Then to finally stop Olivia, Hayden, being the bastard that he is, even sacrifices his old friend, Vega, though unlike everyone else, at least our player character is nice enough to make a backup. The first major hint that Hayden is a corporate douchebag is that he doesn't tell Doomguy that the backup function even exists. The Doom Slayer uses the Crucible to shutdown Hell's energy wells and releases the spirits of his old friends, the Night Sentinels.

Once Olivia is found, she transforms into the Spider Mastermind. If you've been collecting all the stuff like you should have, she can easily be(and the other bosses) can be cheesed by the best weapons even on the highest difficulty, with the [[Cheese|Rich get Richer]] Rune fully upgraded. Once she's dead its the final cutscene, Where Hayden steals the "Crucible" which turns out to be an energy blade that makes a Lightsaber look like a toothpick, Then sends the Doom Slayer off to who knows where with the tether he installed into the Praetor suit earlier. So he can have a gopher who isn't dead or something. Then you experience one of the best credit sequences made for a video game in over a decade.

Mick Gordon's soundtrack gives the game the best metal music ever. BFG Divison being the standout in the soundtrack. Used for two whole levels and the final boss music is a Glitch remix of it. There is also some inspiration from RPG style FPS a la Metro 2033 and [[Samus|Metroid Prime]]. As collecting Argent Energy, weapon mods and Runes allow them to upgrade the Praetor Suit to suit their preferred play style. The engine allows the Doom Slayer a wide range of first-person animations. As his destruction of UAC property and actions portrays an "I'm too old for this shit" attitude. Having to fight demons for centuries doesn't make for a happy camper.

The damage of the BFG 9000 itself is notable. This thing instantly vaporizes every non-boss enemy on-screen!(and them too if you exploit a glitch. However what a player does that the devs didn't intend is dubious in canon.) You read that correctly you don't have to aim it directly at your targets to kill them. You just have to find the right opening to make it kill every demon you can. As the Plasma Bolt throws out lightening or much more likely, solar flares. That would mean the Plasma the BFG fires is likely firing a fucking miniature star with each shot! The F in BFG may stand for Fermentation, Grimdark! with science!. We can wait while you Google it.

Don't be impressed just yet. A Baron of Hell is 2000 pounds and because it turns everything into gibs it comes in contact with.
That means it has to have 7 Gigajoules of energy and would have to be heated up to over 100,000 degrees Celsius! [[Anal_Circumference|A temperature range which is only seen in small stars and nebula!]] That's not just [[GrimDark]], that's just fucking cold in the most brutal way possible and speaks to the insanity of the UAC for building this thing. Are we sure somebody didn't screw up the name? Though Brown Dwarf Gun 9000 doesn't sound as cool.(Though why is it green? Because it's blue-green! As blue in space equals very fucking hot!) In all possibility, if the Doom Slayer didn't wear his Praetor suit. Firing the weapon would instantly annihilate him too! (since Photons are their own particle and antiparticle the word is valid) No apologies for the science jokes. They are necessary evils in explaining how the BFG 9000 works.

It also says a lot of the bosses as a direct hit will merely stun them (without using the weapon wheel glitch) while shaving off large portions of their health. So you need either a very advanced suit of Powered Armor or a significant amount of mass to survive a direct hit from the plasma bolt and its flares. The only real con to using the BFG 9000 is it's limited ammo of four shots. Though a good player can get around that if they set up their Runes correctly.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ig_gQAITzIk| Science and math mostly explained in this Youtube video ]. So yeah, the BFG 9000 shoots miniature stars.

===DOOM Eternal===
Doom Eternal was announced at E3 and a gameplay reveal was shown at Quakecon 2018. From the look of it, it's glorious. It's set on a demonically infested Earth and the now post-Exterminatus Mars and Phobos Research Center, the latter of which featuring the BFG10000 (a stationary ship-sized version of the BFG9000). The Doom Slayer has a shitload of new abilities: gone is the Preator Suit and hello Predator Suit!
It includes a shoulder-mounted flamethrower/grenade launcher (which you can fire WHILE you fire your Chaingun!), a retractable arm blade to split demons in half, a dash move, the super shotgun has been upgraded with a grappling hook, A FUCKING DEMON SWORD (which has been confirmed by the devs to be another Crucible, which raises the question as to how many of those things are there?) and shitloads of other toys. Some demons from the old Doom games have returned (such as the Arch-Vile and Arachnotron). The designs have also been updated; for example, the Mancubus looks more like its Doom II design, and the Baron of Hell has dual flaming swords. There is also an awesome feature called "Destructible Demons", where demons will actually show more damage on their bodies the more they get hit. There will also be a player mode called Invasion, a [[Dark Souls]]-inspired feature where players can join another player's campaign and fight them as demons (it can be turned off if you want). Overall, a lot of amazing things are in this game.

Also, check out [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h0Bx4G3bOu4 this video where the Doom Slayer's presence scares the shit out of humans and demons alike]. Awesome.

Of course, we can assume Samuel Hayden fails to save Earth from its energy crisis. Also obvious is that whatever hell-cult took over the UAC on Mars wasn't an isolated case, as it seems to have dug itself deep enough to make Earth undergo its own apocalypse. Based on the above clip, a significant portion of upper management is part of the cult as they tell their terrified subordinates to let the demons through; another clip tells employees to outright welcome demons to Earth, going full-on Quisling even as they’re being turned into zombies left and right. One would think Hayden would replace his dead Elite Guard with cyborgs loyal to himself who ''wouldn't'' be influenced by a bunch of fanatics. But since this is a video game series that mocks corporate malfeasance every chance it gets, Hayden's doctorate seems to have been sparse on the ability for strategic planning. This is all speculation though, as we've only seen two members high ranking members of the UAC so far in the reboot series.

On top of all that, the Doom Slayer appears to have a demonic counterpart now, wearing armor that looks similar to his Praetor Suit and equipped with a super shotgun and demonic axe. Who is he? Where did he come from? Whatever the case it’s looking like Doomy may have found a worthy adversary. In a notable first for the series, there are also signs of an opposing (but not necessarily friendly to humanity) force opposing Hell, with screenshots and box art showing vaguely angelic (or at least non-demonic) vistas and enemies to be fought. Because of course, the Doom Slayer would be able to tear Heaven down too.

==Doom: The Board Game==
Yes, there is a Board Game - made by [[Fantasy Flight Games]] no less - giving the vague '/tg/ related' qualifications this site uses.
It was released around the time Doom 3 was released, though it wasn't that remarkable and is pretty hard to find nowadays.

One guy plays the baddies, the other 1-4 players play a band of unfortunate marines. The heroes start with 2-3 powerup cards, and the baddies get 5 cards from his own deck and during the game, he gets to draw more (the rate of which is equal to how many marines there are) and if his deck is empty, he gets to insta-kill one of the Marines. His guys are more varied in their movement but they can only shoot once.

The marines have three options: move 8 spaces without shooting, move 4 spaces and shoot once, or shoot twice without movement. They need to explore the board, find computers and other events as the board provides. The baddies, meanwhile, can either upgrade his monsters or bring more to the board.
Either way, his goal is to score 6 kills on the Marines.

A new board game got released shortly after May 2016 Doom, which, to my understanding, is basically just the same shit as before with a new coat of paint.
* It's different, but not too different. Similar in concept and design, with the main differences seeming to be in how the Marines play, and victory conditions for certain scenarios. Absolutely beautiful models however, and incredibly fun. Highly recommended.

==Movie==
Also (roughly) around the same time as Doom 3 was a movie starring Karl Urban and former WWE superstar Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson. It pretty much replaced the whole Hell plot with some genetic experimentation to give people superpowers that only succeeds in creating hyper-aggressive mutants, and a squad of Marines sent to investigate the mayhem. It wasn't that good, with the only really 'good' scene being this one scene where it's all FPS-style like the original games and has monster killing.

Another movie was released in 2019, named ''Doom : Annihilation.'' When asked what they thought about this, id Software simply replied: "We are not involved in the movie."

==External Links==
*[https://doomwiki.org/ Doom Wiki] for all your Doom-related autism needs
*[https://www.doomworld.com/idgames/ /idgames/], the home of pretty much every Doom mod worth playing (and pretty much every Doom mod that isn't worth playing) since 1994.

[[Category:Video Games]][[Category:Awesome]]

Doom

2019-12-04T05:58:19Z

2601:585:8301:76D0:69AC:2336:691C:A216: /* Doom 4 (aka DOOM aka DOOD aka Brutal Doom HD) */

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{{Oldschool}}
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[[File:Doom cover poster.jpeg|thumb|If you don't already have the first level's music in your head, you may be on the wrong site.]]
{{topquote|Over the centuries, mankind has tried many ways of combatting the forces of evil... prayer, fasting, good works and so on. Up until Doom, no one seemed to have thought about the double-barrel shotgun. Eat leaden death, demon...|[[Discworld|Terry Pratchett]]}}

The granddaddy of the first person shooter, the original ass-kicking demon-slaying 3D slaughterfest, '''''Doom''''' is a franchise that demands respect even in the hallowed halls of /tg/. It was actually inspired by a [[Dungeons & Dragons]] campaign played by the founders of id Software; John Romero had given a demon lord the key to overrunning the material plane in exchange for a magic [[Katanas are Underpowered in d20|katana]] because he's an edgy little bitch like that, and John Carmack (the DM) decided it made a good premise for their new 3D game. The katana in question would later be used in Romero's game ''Daikatana'', which was a total failure for reasons that aren't important enough to go over right now.

The plot? What do you think this is, [[Fags of 4chan#Board Fags|urchin?]] Here's your plot: you are a Space Marine (no, not the 40K guy, a jumped-up soldier who is sent to fight on other planets, so closer to the [[Imperial Guard]]) stationed on Mars. Somehow, demons break through into our reality and slaughter everyone else. Your job? Fight your way to where, you hope, there's a ride off of this rock, and make bloody mincemeat out of everything standing between you and salvation. Standing in your way are armies of zombified fellow marines and eggheads, fireball-tossing imps, hulking flesh-eating demons, cyborg-demon monstrosities, and various other hell-spawned nasties who want to kill you horribly. Good luck. You'll need it...

Although not the very ''first'' of the FPS genre (even its predecessor, [[Wolfenstein]] 3D, wasn't the first, as the history of the genre goes back all the way into 70's), Doom was definitive to the genre, so much so that "Doom Clone" was the standard nickname for many years afterwards. People are still playing it and making it even more awesome with [[Homebrew|their own custom modifications]] 24 years later, which isn't something you hear that often outside of /tg/; this is one of the main reasons why the franchise is so well-respected.

Fun fact: that iconic Doom monster, the Cacodemon, was actually inspired by the artwork for an Astral Dreadnought on the cover of the [[Dungeons & Dragons]] 1st edition [[Manual of the Planes]] splatbook. Also relevant to /tg/ is that Sandy Petersen, co-designer of [[Ghostbusters RPG]], creator of [[Call of Cthulhu]], and author of some [[RuneQuest]] stuff, worked on the game. He designed some levels (more in the sequel) and made some contributions to the monster design.

==Classic DOOM (aka The Good Shit)==
{{topquote|Welcome to DOOM, a lightning-fast virtual reality adventure where you're the toughest space trooper ever to suck vacuum. Your mission is to shoot your way through a monster-infested holocaust. Living to tell the tale if possible.|README.TXT, Doom 1.8 shareware}}
The original Doom was fast-paced and bloody compared to what came before, but wasn't afraid to vary the pace with more labyrinthine levels or make you shit your pants by dropping you into a crowd of demons when you least expected it. (Fun fact No. 2: The extra levels included in the full version of Doom were built by the same guy who wrote [[Call of Cthulhu]] in just 10 weeks.) Doom II on the other hand was a circle-strafing explosion-rich gorefest, and is what basically everyone thinks of when they think of both Doom and 90s FPS gameplay in general. Plot was bare-minimum: Demons took over Phobos and ate Deimos, kill them all. Or, in Doom 2's case, Demons are trying to infest Earth in revenge, kill them all AGAIN. But this time, ''it's personal''. (No, seriously, they killed your pet bunny Daisy.) The Doom engine is extremely mod-friendly for a 90s game (as both Carmack and Romero had been big into software tinkering in their day) and id Software actually paid a modding group for the right to sell two of their expansion packs commercially. Slightly more obscure but still relevant is Doom 64, which replaced the high-speed explode-o-rama with a stronger horror theme and more deliberate pace. id Software then for a time turned toward more multiplayer-oriented games with the ''Quake'' series and gave Doom a rest.

===The Doom Comic===
{{topquote|'''DYNAMITE! I'M COOKING WITH GAS! I'VE GOTTA HANDFUL OF VERTEBRAE AND A HEADFUL OF MAD! YEAH, THAT'S YOUR SPINAL CORD, BABY! DIG IT!'''|You, the moment you read that heading}}
The origin of [[Rip and Tear]]. Possibly the most ridiculously, amazingly, stupidly 90s thing that has ever been put to paper with the possible exception of [[Snowflame]]. It has to be read to be believed. [https://www.doomworld.com/10years/doomcomic/ So go read it.]

===Monsters===
[[File:Reaperminis.jpg|thumb|right|Limited-edition monster minis from [[Reaper Miniatures]]. Admit it, you want that Cyberdemon for your Daemons of Chaos army.]]
*'''Former human''': Wet toilet paper. Only dangerous until you get a shotgun.
*'''Former sergeant''': Still wet toilet paper, but full of broken glass; if one of these assholes gets behind you before you find armor you're probably dead. Likely to be your first source for shotguns.
*'''Imp''': The first true demon you encounter with a dodgeable projectile and more health than the formers. The first meaningful enemy you meet, and runner-up for most iconic non-boss monster.
*'''Demon''': Otherwise known as '''Pinkies'''. Giant hairless gorilla with a mouth that could give a [[squig]] lessons in eating. [[Derp|They can't walk and bite at the same time]] so you can just step out of their way, but they tend to come in large groups and dance around like spastic toddlers (which makes them harder to shoot) as they run up to you.
**'''Spectre''': Demon with Predator-style optic camo. An absolute bitch to deal with in dark environments, which is naturally where you find them.
*'''Cacodemon''': Mr. [[Astral Dreadnought]] Head. These fuckers can fly and you can't look up, so have fun fighting them in close quarters where they can float out of your field of view. Dangerous, but get a rapid-fire weapon and they become a joke as you stunlock them until they are all dead. ''The'' most iconic non-boss monster, partially because of its sheer WTFery but mostly because of how easy it is to chibi/make plushies out of.
*'''Lost Soul''': Floating flaming skulls that fly at you at approximately SANIC miles per hour. Fairly weak, but very fast and has a habit of nibbling at you while you focus on something more dangerous.
*'''Hell Knight''': Now we're talking. [[Space Marine]] sized and equipped with a punch and moderate projectile attacks (fireballs). Shooting him in the face with a shotgun will kill him pretty quickly.
**'''Baron of Hell''': Super hell knight with double the health. Big and equipped with nasty melee and projectile attacks. Shooting ''him'' in the face with a shotgun just '''pisses him off'''. Super shotguns will work though.
*'''Former commando''': Unlike the other formers this guy is no joke: he's durable enough to not die when breathed on and his hitscan chaingun is almost as powerful as yours. Using hordes of these guys in an open arena with no cover is the pinnacle of dick moves in Doom mapping.
*'''Revenant''': [[Meme|Agitating skeleton aka '''DOOT'''.]] One of the few monsters that moves anywhere near as fast as you do, plus he runs up and tries to punch your head off if you move inside the minimum range of the homing rockets he shoots. It is an established fact that any given Doom map is automatically casuals-only unless the mapper adds at least 100 revenants.
*'''Mancubus''': [[Festus the Leechlord|HELLO I'M FUCKING FAT.]] Slow, but very tank and he has dual heavy flamers for arms that hurt like hell. Fortunately, this also applies to any nearby demons, so you can make them kill each other for your amusement just by standing between a mancubus and another monster.
*'''Pain elemental''': [[Meme|Meatball demon.]] Like a cacodemon, but instead of shooting fireballs, it shoots Lost Souls. Has the opposite problem to the pinkies in that [[Derp|you can stand in front of its face]] and prevent the lost souls from spawning.
*'''Arch-vile''': One of the few monsters that that's faster than the player at a full run. Sets you on fire [[Psyker|with its mind]] and revives any monsters it comes across so you have to kill them all over again. Meeting one of these guys in a slaughtermap will make you [[Khorne|hate everything forever.]]
*'''Cyberdemon''': [[Rip and tear|Is huge, and therefore has huge guts.]] Basically a (Chaos possesed?) Carnifex with a rocket launcher for an arm, and significantly faster than he looks. Without a doubt the fuckingest monster in the classic game, and practically tailor made for soaking up BFG shots.
*'''Spider Mastermind''': Doom 1’s final boss, despite being inferior in almost every way to the Cyberdemon you fight earlier. Go figure. Even more XBOX HUEG than the Cyberdemon, but has a super-chaingun instead of a rocket launcher and refuses to let up until either you or it are dead. Has the critical weakness of BFG shots up the ass due to the way its hugeness interacts with the mechanics of the classic BFG.
**'''Arachnotron''': Babby Masterminds that go fast and shit plasma at you.

==Doom 3==
In the early 2000s, Doom 3 came along. It blows chunks compared to the classics, but since the classics are so damn good it ends up being passable anyway. Since Valve had made "story-driven" shooters and "realistic" scripted encounters the in thing id decided to rip off Half-Life, grafting on elements of the original Doom that had been scrapped at the concept stage. Unfortunately the gameplay was too slow and similar to the rest of the genre, the scripting and story interludes just made the gameplay even clunkier and the big technological gimmick (per-pixel lighting) meant you had to choose between seeing what you're supposed to shoot with a crappy little flashlight and actually being able to shoot it. Supposedly the lighting effects were resource intense during development and this was the "solution" (of course we know better that they wanted to make it a quasi survival horror). Naturally the first mod for the game was duct tape.

==Doom 4 (aka DOOM aka DOOD aka Brutal Doom HD)==
{{topquote|They are rage, brutal, without mercy. But you? You will be '''worse'''. [[Rip and Tear]], until it is '''DONE'''.|A direct order from what is either [[God-Emperor of Mankind|God's]] [[Living Saint|seraphs]], [[Khorne]] himself, or his champion (at the time) ,and your co-conspirator, the ''first'' betrayer (not [[Kharn|Khârn]]) Seriously, does any of that really matter. do you really need more of a mission briefing? if so why are you playing this game?}}
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OpllUQ38CKY]

Then the latest Doom came out in May 2016. This rendition can basically be described as "3d Brutal Doom II" only sexier, with features like [[Rip and tear|ripping enemies apart with your bare hands]] and having to stay on the move to avoid being torn to shreds. The plot is also about as bare minimum as the original (albeit with a surprising amount of lore hidden away in the Codex), kicking the player straight into the action with waking up on Mars, immediately [[Rip and tear|smashing a zombie’s skull]], and basically being told “demonic invasion, go kill everything.” Also, the player this time around is someone the demons call the “Doom Slayer", who has traveled through “Worlds and Time” (hinting that the Doom Slayer could very well be the original Doomguy from the first two games, having also survived Doom 64 and has been traveling Hell since but that's deliberately left ambiguous in-game, names will be used interchangeably), and millennia ago [[Awesome|kicked Hell’s ass so hard that the best the demons could do is seal him away so that he wouldn’t destroy Hell]]. Then the UAC decides to deal with an Energy Crisis by quite literally [[Humanity Fuck Yeah|slamming an Oil Derrick on a Hell Portal to siphon off Hell Energy for power]], and just for giggles starts tomb raiding Hell for artifacts and treasures as well, ultimately running off with the Doomguy's sarcophagus. The demons see that the Doomguy’s prison/tomb is empty, and the subsequent invasion is actually a panicked attempt to stop the Doomguy from being woken up. Obviously they fail and he butchers ever last one of them.

Samuel Hayden is the guy in charge of the UAC, a cyborg the size of a 40k [[Space Marine]]. He and Vega, the Mars UAC AI, are basically quest givers for the most part. His subordinate Olivia Pierce pretty much ran a cult while Hayden was pillaging artifacts from Hell, [[Grimdark|being the only one to make it back from the expeditions]]. When shit hits the fan he decides to wake the Doom Slayer up. Of course, once awake, he goes on a rampage and busts the UACs shit, as Hayden's disregard for human life is too far even for Doomguy to take, expressing his outrage without the need for a voice actor.

So now it's up to the Doom Slayer in awesome power armor to [[Rip and Tear|rip and tear]] and dakka every demon he comes across to stop Olivia while wrecking UACs energy production. After going to hell at least once due to Olivia breaking an Argent Accumulator and making it back to Mars, then after Hayden installs a "tether" to him, Hayden sends Doomguy on a quest to find the Helix Stone, picking up the most powerful version of the BFG 9000 yet on the way(more on that below). Once he reaches the Helix Stone it directs Doomguy to acquire the Crucible, a relic in the Titan's Realm. So Doomguy has to kill the Cyberdemon to get back to hell, make a long trek and fight three bosses, two of them at once, for the Crucible and returns to Mars again. Then to finally stop Olivia, Hayden, being the bastard that he is, even sacrifices his old friend, Vega, though unlike everyone else, at least our player character is nice enough to make a backup. The first major hint that Hayden is a corporate douchebag is that he doesn't tell Doomguy that the backup function even exists. The Doom Slayer uses the Crucible to shutdown Hell's energy wells and releases the spirits of his old friends, the Night Sentinels.

Once Olivia is found, she transforms into the Spider Mastermind. If you've been collecting all the stuff like you should have, she can easily be(and the other bosses) can be cheesed by the best weapons even on the highest difficulty, with the [[Cheese|Rich get Richer]] Rune fully upgraded. Once she's dead its the final cutscene, Where Hayden steals the "Crucible" which turns out to be an energy blade that makes a Lightsaber look like a toothpick, Then sends the Doom Slayer off to who knows where with the tether he installed into the Praetor suit earlier. So he can have a gopher who isn't dead or something. Then you experience one of the best credit sequences made for a video game in over a decade.

Mick Gordon's soundtrack gives the game the best metal music ever. BFG Divison being the standout in the soundtrack. Used for two whole levels and the final boss music is a Glitch remix of it. There is also some inspiration from RPG style FPS a la Metro 2033 and [[Samus|Metroid Prime]]. As collecting Argent Energy, weapon mods and Runes allow them to upgrade the Praetor Suit to suit their preferred play style. The engine allows the Doom Slayer a wide range of first-person animations. As his destruction of UAC property and actions portrays an "I'm too old for this shit" attitude. Having to fight demons for centuries doesn't make for a happy camper.

The damage of the BFG 9000 itself is notable. This thing instantly vaporizes every non-boss enemy on-screen!(and them too if you exploit a glitch. However what a player does that the devs didn't intend is dubious in canon.) You read that correctly you don't have to aim it directly at your targets to kill them. You just have to find the right opening to make it kill every demon you can. As the Plasma Bolt throws out lightening or much more likely, solar flares. That would mean the Plasma the BFG fires is likely firing a fucking miniature star with each shot! The F in BFG may stand for Fermentation, Grimdark! with science!. We can wait while you Google it.

Don't be impressed just yet. A Baron of Hell is 2000 pounds and because it turns everything into gibs it comes in contact with.
That means it has to have 7 Gigajoules of energy and would have to be heated up to over 100,000 degrees Celsius! [[Anal_Circumference|A temperature range which is only seen in small stars and nebula!]] That's not just [[GrimDark]], that's just fucking cold in the most brutal way possible and speaks to the insanity of the UAC for building this thing. Are we sure somebody didn't screw up the name? Though Brown Dwarf Gun 9000 doesn't sound as cool.(Though why is it green? Because it's blue-green! As blue in space equals very fucking hot!) In all possibility, if the Doom Slayer didn't wear his Praetor suit. Firing the weapon would instantly annihilate him too! (since Photons are their own particle and antiparticle the word is valid) No apologies for the science jokes. They are necessary evils in explaining how the BFG 9000 works.

It also says a lot of the bosses as a direct hit will merely stun them (without using the weapon wheel glitch) while shaving off large portions of their health. So you need either a very advanced suit of Powered Armor or a significant amount of mass to survive a direct hit from the plasma bolt and its flares. The only real con to using the BFG 9000 is it's limited ammo of four shots. Though a good player can get around that if they set up their Runes correctly.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ig_gQAITzIk| Science and math mostly explained in this Youtube video ]. So yeah, the BFG 9000 shoots miniature stars.

===DOOM Eternal===
Doom Eternal was announced at E3 and a gameplay reveal was shown at Quakecon 2018. From the look of it, it's glorious. It's set on a demonically infested Earth and the now post-Exterminatus Mars and Phobos Research Center, the latter of which featuring the BFG10000 (a stationary ship-sized version of the BFG9000). The Doom Slayer has a shitload of new abilities: gone is the Preator Suit and hello Predator Suit!
It includes a shoulder-mounted flamethrower/grenade launcher (which you can fire WHILE you fire your Chaingun!), a retractable arm blade to split demons in half, a dash move, the super shotgun has been upgraded with a grappling hook, A FUCKING DEMON SWORD (which has been confirmed by the devs to be another Crucible, which raises the question as to how many of those things are there?) and shitloads of other toys. Some demons from the old Doom games have returned (such as the Arch-Vile and Arachnotron). The designs have also been updated; for example, the Mancubus looks more like its Doom II design, and the Baron of Hell has dual flaming swords. There is also an awesome feature called "Destructible Demons", where demons will actually show more damage on their bodies the more they get hit. There will also be a player mode called Invasion, a [[Dark Souls]]-inspired feature where players can join another player's campaign and fight them as demons (it can be turned off if you want). Overall, a lot of amazing things are in this game.

Also, check out [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h0Bx4G3bOu4 this video where the Doom Slayer's presence scares the shit out of humans and demons alike]. Awesome.

Of course, we can assume Samuel Hayden fails to save Earth from its energy crisis. Also obvious is that whatever hell-cult took over the UAC on Mars wasn't an isolated case, as it seems to have dug itself deep enough to make Earth undergo its own apocalypse. Based on the above clip, a significant portion of upper management is part of the cult as they tell their terrified subordinates to let the demons through; another clip tells employees to outright welcome demons to Earth, going full-on Quisling even as they’re being turned into zombies left and right. One would think Hayden would replace his dead Elite Guard with cyborgs loyal to himself who ''wouldn't'' be influenced by a bunch of fanatics. But since this is a video game series that mocks corporate malfeasance every chance it gets, Hayden's doctorate seems to have been sparse on the ability for strategic planning. This is all speculation though, as we've only seen two members high ranking members of the UAC so far in the reboot series.

On top of all that, the Doom Slayer appears to have a demonic counterpart now, wearing armor that looks similar to his Praetor Suit and equipped with a super shotgun and demonic axe. Who is he? Where did he come from? Whatever the case it’s looking like Doomy may have found a worthy adversary. In a notable first for the series, there are also signs of an opposing (but not necessarily friendly to humanity) force opposing Hell, with screenshots and box art showing vaguely angelic (or at least non-demonic) vistas and enemies to be fought. Because of course, the Doom Slayer would be able to tear Heaven down too.

==Doom: The Board Game==
Yes, there is a Board Game - made by [[Fantasy Flight Games]] no less - giving the vague '/tg/ related' qualifications this site uses.
It was released around the time Doom 3 was released, though it wasn't that remarkable and is pretty hard to find nowadays.

One guy plays the baddies, the other 1-4 players play a band of unfortunate marines. The heroes start with 2-3 powerup cards, and the baddies get 5 cards from his own deck and during the game, he gets to draw more (the rate of which is equal to how many marines there are) and if his deck is empty, he gets to insta-kill one of the Marines. His guys are more varied in their movement but they can only shoot once.

The marines have three options: move 8 spaces without shooting, move 4 spaces and shoot once, or shoot twice without movement. They need to explore the board, find computers and other events as the board provides. The baddies, meanwhile, can either upgrade his monsters or bring more to the board.
Either way, his goal is to score 6 kills on the Marines.

A new board game got released shortly after May 2016 Doom, which, to my understanding, is basically just the same shit as before with a new coat of paint.
* It's different, but not too different. Similar in concept and design, with the main differences seeming to be in how the Marines play, and victory conditions for certain scenarios. Absolutely beautiful models however, and incredibly fun. Highly recommended.

==Movie==
Also (roughly) around the same time as Doom 3 was a movie starring Karl Urban and former WWE superstar Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson. It pretty much replaced the whole Hell plot with some genetic experimentation to give people superpowers that only succeeds in creating hyper-aggressive mutants, and a squad of Marines sent to investigate the mayhem. It wasn't that good, with the only really 'good' scene being this one scene where it's all FPS-style like the original games and has monster killing.

Another movie was released in 2019, named ''Doom : Annihilation.'' When asked what they thought about this, id Software simply replied: "We are not involved in the movie."

==External Links==
*[https://doomwiki.org/ Doom Wiki] for all your Doom-related autism needs
*[https://www.doomworld.com/idgames/ /idgames/], the home of pretty much every Doom mod worth playing (and pretty much every Doom mod that isn't worth playing) since 1994.

[[Category:Video Games]][[Category:Awesome]]

Doom

2019-12-04T05:57:33Z

2601:585:8301:76D0:69AC:2336:691C:A216: /* Doom 4 (aka DOOM aka DOOD aka Brutal Doom HD) */

{{/vg/}}
{{Oldschool}}
{{awesome}}
{{Cleanup}}
[[File:Doom cover poster.jpeg|thumb|If you don't already have the first level's music in your head, you may be on the wrong site.]]
{{topquote|Over the centuries, mankind has tried many ways of combatting the forces of evil... prayer, fasting, good works and so on. Up until Doom, no one seemed to have thought about the double-barrel shotgun. Eat leaden death, demon...|[[Discworld|Terry Pratchett]]}}

The granddaddy of the first person shooter, the original ass-kicking demon-slaying 3D slaughterfest, '''''Doom''''' is a franchise that demands respect even in the hallowed halls of /tg/. It was actually inspired by a [[Dungeons & Dragons]] campaign played by the founders of id Software; John Romero had given a demon lord the key to overrunning the material plane in exchange for a magic [[Katanas are Underpowered in d20|katana]] because he's an edgy little bitch like that, and John Carmack (the DM) decided it made a good premise for their new 3D game. The katana in question would later be used in Romero's game ''Daikatana'', which was a total failure for reasons that aren't important enough to go over right now.

The plot? What do you think this is, [[Fags of 4chan#Board Fags|urchin?]] Here's your plot: you are a Space Marine (no, not the 40K guy, a jumped-up soldier who is sent to fight on other planets, so closer to the [[Imperial Guard]]) stationed on Mars. Somehow, demons break through into our reality and slaughter everyone else. Your job? Fight your way to where, you hope, there's a ride off of this rock, and make bloody mincemeat out of everything standing between you and salvation. Standing in your way are armies of zombified fellow marines and eggheads, fireball-tossing imps, hulking flesh-eating demons, cyborg-demon monstrosities, and various other hell-spawned nasties who want to kill you horribly. Good luck. You'll need it...

Although not the very ''first'' of the FPS genre (even its predecessor, [[Wolfenstein]] 3D, wasn't the first, as the history of the genre goes back all the way into 70's), Doom was definitive to the genre, so much so that "Doom Clone" was the standard nickname for many years afterwards. People are still playing it and making it even more awesome with [[Homebrew|their own custom modifications]] 24 years later, which isn't something you hear that often outside of /tg/; this is one of the main reasons why the franchise is so well-respected.

Fun fact: that iconic Doom monster, the Cacodemon, was actually inspired by the artwork for an Astral Dreadnought on the cover of the [[Dungeons & Dragons]] 1st edition [[Manual of the Planes]] splatbook. Also relevant to /tg/ is that Sandy Petersen, co-designer of [[Ghostbusters RPG]], creator of [[Call of Cthulhu]], and author of some [[RuneQuest]] stuff, worked on the game. He designed some levels (more in the sequel) and made some contributions to the monster design.

==Classic DOOM (aka The Good Shit)==
{{topquote|Welcome to DOOM, a lightning-fast virtual reality adventure where you're the toughest space trooper ever to suck vacuum. Your mission is to shoot your way through a monster-infested holocaust. Living to tell the tale if possible.|README.TXT, Doom 1.8 shareware}}
The original Doom was fast-paced and bloody compared to what came before, but wasn't afraid to vary the pace with more labyrinthine levels or make you shit your pants by dropping you into a crowd of demons when you least expected it. (Fun fact No. 2: The extra levels included in the full version of Doom were built by the same guy who wrote [[Call of Cthulhu]] in just 10 weeks.) Doom II on the other hand was a circle-strafing explosion-rich gorefest, and is what basically everyone thinks of when they think of both Doom and 90s FPS gameplay in general. Plot was bare-minimum: Demons took over Phobos and ate Deimos, kill them all. Or, in Doom 2's case, Demons are trying to infest Earth in revenge, kill them all AGAIN. But this time, ''it's personal''. (No, seriously, they killed your pet bunny Daisy.) The Doom engine is extremely mod-friendly for a 90s game (as both Carmack and Romero had been big into software tinkering in their day) and id Software actually paid a modding group for the right to sell two of their expansion packs commercially. Slightly more obscure but still relevant is Doom 64, which replaced the high-speed explode-o-rama with a stronger horror theme and more deliberate pace. id Software then for a time turned toward more multiplayer-oriented games with the ''Quake'' series and gave Doom a rest.

===The Doom Comic===
{{topquote|'''DYNAMITE! I'M COOKING WITH GAS! I'VE GOTTA HANDFUL OF VERTEBRAE AND A HEADFUL OF MAD! YEAH, THAT'S YOUR SPINAL CORD, BABY! DIG IT!'''|You, the moment you read that heading}}
The origin of [[Rip and Tear]]. Possibly the most ridiculously, amazingly, stupidly 90s thing that has ever been put to paper with the possible exception of [[Snowflame]]. It has to be read to be believed. [https://www.doomworld.com/10years/doomcomic/ So go read it.]

===Monsters===
[[File:Reaperminis.jpg|thumb|right|Limited-edition monster minis from [[Reaper Miniatures]]. Admit it, you want that Cyberdemon for your Daemons of Chaos army.]]
*'''Former human''': Wet toilet paper. Only dangerous until you get a shotgun.
*'''Former sergeant''': Still wet toilet paper, but full of broken glass; if one of these assholes gets behind you before you find armor you're probably dead. Likely to be your first source for shotguns.
*'''Imp''': The first true demon you encounter with a dodgeable projectile and more health than the formers. The first meaningful enemy you meet, and runner-up for most iconic non-boss monster.
*'''Demon''': Otherwise known as '''Pinkies'''. Giant hairless gorilla with a mouth that could give a [[squig]] lessons in eating. [[Derp|They can't walk and bite at the same time]] so you can just step out of their way, but they tend to come in large groups and dance around like spastic toddlers (which makes them harder to shoot) as they run up to you.
**'''Spectre''': Demon with Predator-style optic camo. An absolute bitch to deal with in dark environments, which is naturally where you find them.
*'''Cacodemon''': Mr. [[Astral Dreadnought]] Head. These fuckers can fly and you can't look up, so have fun fighting them in close quarters where they can float out of your field of view. Dangerous, but get a rapid-fire weapon and they become a joke as you stunlock them until they are all dead. ''The'' most iconic non-boss monster, partially because of its sheer WTFery but mostly because of how easy it is to chibi/make plushies out of.
*'''Lost Soul''': Floating flaming skulls that fly at you at approximately SANIC miles per hour. Fairly weak, but very fast and has a habit of nibbling at you while you focus on something more dangerous.
*'''Hell Knight''': Now we're talking. [[Space Marine]] sized and equipped with a punch and moderate projectile attacks (fireballs). Shooting him in the face with a shotgun will kill him pretty quickly.
**'''Baron of Hell''': Super hell knight with double the health. Big and equipped with nasty melee and projectile attacks. Shooting ''him'' in the face with a shotgun just '''pisses him off'''. Super shotguns will work though.
*'''Former commando''': Unlike the other formers this guy is no joke: he's durable enough to not die when breathed on and his hitscan chaingun is almost as powerful as yours. Using hordes of these guys in an open arena with no cover is the pinnacle of dick moves in Doom mapping.
*'''Revenant''': [[Meme|Agitating skeleton aka '''DOOT'''.]] One of the few monsters that moves anywhere near as fast as you do, plus he runs up and tries to punch your head off if you move inside the minimum range of the homing rockets he shoots. It is an established fact that any given Doom map is automatically casuals-only unless the mapper adds at least 100 revenants.
*'''Mancubus''': [[Festus the Leechlord|HELLO I'M FUCKING FAT.]] Slow, but very tank and he has dual heavy flamers for arms that hurt like hell. Fortunately, this also applies to any nearby demons, so you can make them kill each other for your amusement just by standing between a mancubus and another monster.
*'''Pain elemental''': [[Meme|Meatball demon.]] Like a cacodemon, but instead of shooting fireballs, it shoots Lost Souls. Has the opposite problem to the pinkies in that [[Derp|you can stand in front of its face]] and prevent the lost souls from spawning.
*'''Arch-vile''': One of the few monsters that that's faster than the player at a full run. Sets you on fire [[Psyker|with its mind]] and revives any monsters it comes across so you have to kill them all over again. Meeting one of these guys in a slaughtermap will make you [[Khorne|hate everything forever.]]
*'''Cyberdemon''': [[Rip and tear|Is huge, and therefore has huge guts.]] Basically a (Chaos possesed?) Carnifex with a rocket launcher for an arm, and significantly faster than he looks. Without a doubt the fuckingest monster in the classic game, and practically tailor made for soaking up BFG shots.
*'''Spider Mastermind''': Doom 1’s final boss, despite being inferior in almost every way to the Cyberdemon you fight earlier. Go figure. Even more XBOX HUEG than the Cyberdemon, but has a super-chaingun instead of a rocket launcher and refuses to let up until either you or it are dead. Has the critical weakness of BFG shots up the ass due to the way its hugeness interacts with the mechanics of the classic BFG.
**'''Arachnotron''': Babby Masterminds that go fast and shit plasma at you.

==Doom 3==
In the early 2000s, Doom 3 came along. It blows chunks compared to the classics, but since the classics are so damn good it ends up being passable anyway. Since Valve had made "story-driven" shooters and "realistic" scripted encounters the in thing id decided to rip off Half-Life, grafting on elements of the original Doom that had been scrapped at the concept stage. Unfortunately the gameplay was too slow and similar to the rest of the genre, the scripting and story interludes just made the gameplay even clunkier and the big technological gimmick (per-pixel lighting) meant you had to choose between seeing what you're supposed to shoot with a crappy little flashlight and actually being able to shoot it. Supposedly the lighting effects were resource intense during development and this was the "solution" (of course we know better that they wanted to make it a quasi survival horror). Naturally the first mod for the game was duct tape.

==Doom 4 (aka DOOM aka DOOD aka Brutal Doom HD)==
{{topquote|They are rage, brutal, without mercy. But you? You will be '''worse'''. [[Rip and Tear]], until it is '''DONE'''.|A direct order from what is either [[God-Emperor of Mankind|God's]] [[Living Saint|seraphs]], [[Khorne]] himself, or his champion (at the time) ,and your co-conspirator, the ''first'' betrayer (not [[Kharn|Khârn]]) Seriously, does any of that really matter. do you really need more of a mission briefing? if so why are you playing this game?}}

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OpllUQ38CKY]

Then the latest Doom came out in May 2016. This rendition can basically be described as "3d Brutal Doom II" only sexier, with features like [[Rip and tear|ripping enemies apart with your bare hands]] and having to stay on the move to avoid being torn to shreds. The plot is also about as bare minimum as the original (albeit with a surprising amount of lore hidden away in the Codex), kicking the player straight into the action with waking up on Mars, immediately [[Rip and tear|smashing a zombie’s skull]], and basically being told “demonic invasion, go kill everything.” Also, the player this time around is someone the demons call the “Doom Slayer", who has traveled through “Worlds and Time” (hinting that the Doom Slayer could very well be the original Doomguy from the first two games, having also survived Doom 64 and has been traveling Hell since but that's deliberately left ambiguous in-game, names will be used interchangeably), and millennia ago [[Awesome|kicked Hell’s ass so hard that the best the demons could do is seal him away so that he wouldn’t destroy Hell]]. Then the UAC decides to deal with an Energy Crisis by quite literally [[Humanity Fuck Yeah|slamming an Oil Derrick on a Hell Portal to siphon off Hell Energy for power]], and just for giggles starts tomb raiding Hell for artifacts and treasures as well, ultimately running off with the Doomguy's sarcophagus. The demons see that the Doomguy’s prison/tomb is empty, and the subsequent invasion is actually a panicked attempt to stop the Doomguy from being woken up. Obviously they fail and he butchers ever last one of them.

Samuel Hayden is the guy in charge of the UAC, a cyborg the size of a 40k [[Space Marine]]. He and Vega, the Mars UAC AI, are basically quest givers for the most part. His subordinate Olivia Pierce pretty much ran a cult while Hayden was pillaging artifacts from Hell, [[Grimdark|being the only one to make it back from the expeditions]]. When shit hits the fan he decides to wake the Doom Slayer up. Of course, once awake, he goes on a rampage and busts the UACs shit, as Hayden's disregard for human life is too far even for Doomguy to take, expressing his outrage without the need for a voice actor.

So now it's up to the Doom Slayer in awesome power armor to [[Rip and Tear|rip and tear]] and dakka every demon he comes across to stop Olivia while wrecking UACs energy production. After going to hell at least once due to Olivia breaking an Argent Accumulator and making it back to Mars, then after Hayden installs a "tether" to him, Hayden sends Doomguy on a quest to find the Helix Stone, picking up the most powerful version of the BFG 9000 yet on the way(more on that below). Once he reaches the Helix Stone it directs Doomguy to acquire the Crucible, a relic in the Titan's Realm. So Doomguy has to kill the Cyberdemon to get back to hell, make a long trek and fight three bosses, two of them at once, for the Crucible and returns to Mars again. Then to finally stop Olivia, Hayden, being the bastard that he is, even sacrifices his old friend, Vega, though unlike everyone else, at least our player character is nice enough to make a backup. The first major hint that Hayden is a corporate douchebag is that he doesn't tell Doomguy that the backup function even exists. The Doom Slayer uses the Crucible to shutdown Hell's energy wells and releases the spirits of his old friends, the Night Sentinels.

Once Olivia is found, she transforms into the Spider Mastermind. If you've been collecting all the stuff like you should have, she can easily be(and the other bosses) can be cheesed by the best weapons even on the highest difficulty, with the [[Cheese|Rich get Richer]] Rune fully upgraded. Once she's dead its the final cutscene, Where Hayden steals the "Crucible" which turns out to be an energy blade that makes a Lightsaber look like a toothpick, Then sends the Doom Slayer off to who knows where with the tether he installed into the Praetor suit earlier. So he can have a gopher who isn't dead or something. Then you experience one of the best credit sequences made for a video game in over a decade.

Mick Gordon's soundtrack gives the game the best metal music ever. BFG Divison being the standout in the soundtrack. Used for two whole levels and the final boss music is a Glitch remix of it. There is also some inspiration from RPG style FPS a la Metro 2033 and [[Samus|Metroid Prime]]. As collecting Argent Energy, weapon mods and Runes allow them to upgrade the Praetor Suit to suit their preferred play style. The engine allows the Doom Slayer a wide range of first-person animations. As his destruction of UAC property and actions portrays an "I'm too old for this shit" attitude. Having to fight demons for centuries doesn't make for a happy camper.

The damage of the BFG 9000 itself is notable. This thing instantly vaporizes every non-boss enemy on-screen!(and them too if you exploit a glitch. However what a player does that the devs didn't intend is dubious in canon.) You read that correctly you don't have to aim it directly at your targets to kill them. You just have to find the right opening to make it kill every demon you can. As the Plasma Bolt throws out lightening or much more likely, solar flares. That would mean the Plasma the BFG fires is likely firing a fucking miniature star with each shot! The F in BFG may stand for Fermentation, Grimdark! with science!. We can wait while you Google it.

Don't be impressed just yet. A Baron of Hell is 2000 pounds and because it turns everything into gibs it comes in contact with.
That means it has to have 7 Gigajoules of energy and would have to be heated up to over 100,000 degrees Celsius! [[Anal_Circumference|A temperature range which is only seen in small stars and nebula!]] That's not just [[GrimDark]], that's just fucking cold in the most brutal way possible and speaks to the insanity of the UAC for building this thing. Are we sure somebody didn't screw up the name? Though Brown Dwarf Gun 9000 doesn't sound as cool.(Though why is it green? Because it's blue-green! As blue in space equals very fucking hot!) In all possibility, if the Doom Slayer didn't wear his Praetor suit. Firing the weapon would instantly annihilate him too! (since Photons are their own particle and antiparticle the word is valid) No apologies for the science jokes. They are necessary evils in explaining how the BFG 9000 works.

It also says a lot of the bosses as a direct hit will merely stun them (without using the weapon wheel glitch) while shaving off large portions of their health. So you need either a very advanced suit of Powered Armor or a significant amount of mass to survive a direct hit from the plasma bolt and its flares. The only real con to using the BFG 9000 is it's limited ammo of four shots. Though a good player can get around that if they set up their Runes correctly.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ig_gQAITzIk| Science and math mostly explained in this Youtube video ]. So yeah, the BFG 9000 shoots miniature stars.

===DOOM Eternal===
Doom Eternal was announced at E3 and a gameplay reveal was shown at Quakecon 2018. From the look of it, it's glorious. It's set on a demonically infested Earth and the now post-Exterminatus Mars and Phobos Research Center, the latter of which featuring the BFG10000 (a stationary ship-sized version of the BFG9000). The Doom Slayer has a shitload of new abilities: gone is the Preator Suit and hello Predator Suit!
It includes a shoulder-mounted flamethrower/grenade launcher (which you can fire WHILE you fire your Chaingun!), a retractable arm blade to split demons in half, a dash move, the super shotgun has been upgraded with a grappling hook, A FUCKING DEMON SWORD (which has been confirmed by the devs to be another Crucible, which raises the question as to how many of those things are there?) and shitloads of other toys. Some demons from the old Doom games have returned (such as the Arch-Vile and Arachnotron). The designs have also been updated; for example, the Mancubus looks more like its Doom II design, and the Baron of Hell has dual flaming swords. There is also an awesome feature called "Destructible Demons", where demons will actually show more damage on their bodies the more they get hit. There will also be a player mode called Invasion, a [[Dark Souls]]-inspired feature where players can join another player's campaign and fight them as demons (it can be turned off if you want). Overall, a lot of amazing things are in this game.

Also, check out [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h0Bx4G3bOu4 this video where the Doom Slayer's presence scares the shit out of humans and demons alike]. Awesome.

Of course, we can assume Samuel Hayden fails to save Earth from its energy crisis. Also obvious is that whatever hell-cult took over the UAC on Mars wasn't an isolated case, as it seems to have dug itself deep enough to make Earth undergo its own apocalypse. Based on the above clip, a significant portion of upper management is part of the cult as they tell their terrified subordinates to let the demons through; another clip tells employees to outright welcome demons to Earth, going full-on Quisling even as they’re being turned into zombies left and right. One would think Hayden would replace his dead Elite Guard with cyborgs loyal to himself who ''wouldn't'' be influenced by a bunch of fanatics. But since this is a video game series that mocks corporate malfeasance every chance it gets, Hayden's doctorate seems to have been sparse on the ability for strategic planning. This is all speculation though, as we've only seen two members high ranking members of the UAC so far in the reboot series.

On top of all that, the Doom Slayer appears to have a demonic counterpart now, wearing armor that looks similar to his Praetor Suit and equipped with a super shotgun and demonic axe. Who is he? Where did he come from? Whatever the case it’s looking like Doomy may have found a worthy adversary. In a notable first for the series, there are also signs of an opposing (but not necessarily friendly to humanity) force opposing Hell, with screenshots and box art showing vaguely angelic (or at least non-demonic) vistas and enemies to be fought. Because of course, the Doom Slayer would be able to tear Heaven down too.

==Doom: The Board Game==
Yes, there is a Board Game - made by [[Fantasy Flight Games]] no less - giving the vague '/tg/ related' qualifications this site uses.
It was released around the time Doom 3 was released, though it wasn't that remarkable and is pretty hard to find nowadays.

One guy plays the baddies, the other 1-4 players play a band of unfortunate marines. The heroes start with 2-3 powerup cards, and the baddies get 5 cards from his own deck and during the game, he gets to draw more (the rate of which is equal to how many marines there are) and if his deck is empty, he gets to insta-kill one of the Marines. His guys are more varied in their movement but they can only shoot once.

The marines have three options: move 8 spaces without shooting, move 4 spaces and shoot once, or shoot twice without movement. They need to explore the board, find computers and other events as the board provides. The baddies, meanwhile, can either upgrade his monsters or bring more to the board.
Either way, his goal is to score 6 kills on the Marines.

A new board game got released shortly after May 2016 Doom, which, to my understanding, is basically just the same shit as before with a new coat of paint.
* It's different, but not too different. Similar in concept and design, with the main differences seeming to be in how the Marines play, and victory conditions for certain scenarios. Absolutely beautiful models however, and incredibly fun. Highly recommended.

==Movie==
Also (roughly) around the same time as Doom 3 was a movie starring Karl Urban and former WWE superstar Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson. It pretty much replaced the whole Hell plot with some genetic experimentation to give people superpowers that only succeeds in creating hyper-aggressive mutants, and a squad of Marines sent to investigate the mayhem. It wasn't that good, with the only really 'good' scene being this one scene where it's all FPS-style like the original games and has monster killing.

Another movie was released in 2019, named ''Doom : Annihilation.'' When asked what they thought about this, id Software simply replied: "We are not involved in the movie."

==External Links==
*[https://doomwiki.org/ Doom Wiki] for all your Doom-related autism needs
*[https://www.doomworld.com/idgames/ /idgames/], the home of pretty much every Doom mod worth playing (and pretty much every Doom mod that isn't worth playing) since 1994.

[[Category:Video Games]][[Category:Awesome]]

Black Templars

2019-12-04T05:56:26Z

2601:585:8301:76D0:69AC:2336:691C:A216:

{{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 one to six thousand
|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 Betrayer to the last survivor of the Night Sentinels (the direct predecessors to both the [[Grey Knights]] and the Black Templars) [[Doom]] (2016)}}

{{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]], Sigmisund 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 1000-6000 marines in their ranks. This is primarily because they're scattered throughout the galaxy so their approximate number is unknown. This means that their chapter alone could wipe out the [[Tau|weeaboo communists]] 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]].
*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. ]

==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.
</gallery>

{{Template:Marines-Official}}

Black Templars

2019-12-04T05:55:55Z

2601:585:8301:76D0:69AC:2336:691C:A216:

{{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 one to six thousand
|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 Betrayer to the last survivor of the Night Sentinels (the direct predecessors to both the [[Grey Knights]] and the Black Templars) [[Doom]] (2016) ([https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OpllUQ38CKY]}}

{{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]], Sigmisund 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 1000-6000 marines in their ranks. This is primarily because they're scattered throughout the galaxy so their approximate number is unknown. This means that their chapter alone could wipe out the [[Tau|weeaboo communists]] 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]].
*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. ]

==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.
</gallery>

{{Template:Marines-Official}}

Black Templars

2019-12-04T05:55:09Z

2601:585:8301:76D0:69AC:2336:691C:A216:

{{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 one to six thousand
|Allegiance = [[Imperium of Man]]
|Colours = Black and white [[Pauldrons|shoulder pads]]
}}
{{awesome}}

{{Topquote|[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OpllUQ38CKY]They are rage, brutal, without mercy. But you. You will be worse. Rip and Tear, until it is done.| The Betrayer to the last survivor of the Night Sentinels (the direct predecessors to both the [[Grey Knights]] and the Black Templars) [[Doom]] (2016)}}

{{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]], Sigmisund 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 1000-6000 marines in their ranks. This is primarily because they're scattered throughout the galaxy so their approximate number is unknown. This means that their chapter alone could wipe out the [[Tau|weeaboo communists]] 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]].
*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. ]

==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.
</gallery>

{{Template:Marines-Official}}

Black Templars

2019-12-04T05:54:14Z

2601:585:8301:76D0:69AC:2336:691C:A216:

{{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 one to six thousand
|Allegiance = [[Imperium of Man]]
|Colours = Black and white [[Pauldrons|shoulder pads]]
}}
{{awesome}}

{{Topquote|[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OpllUQ38CKY|They are rage, brutal, without mercy. But you. You will be worse. Rip and Tear, until it is done.]| The Betrayer to the last survivor of the Night Sentinels (the direct predecessors to both the [[Grey Knights]] and the Black Templars) [[Doom]] (2016)}}

{{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]], Sigmisund 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 1000-6000 marines in their ranks. This is primarily because they're scattered throughout the galaxy so their approximate number is unknown. This means that their chapter alone could wipe out the [[Tau|weeaboo communists]] 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]].
*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. ]

==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.
</gallery>

{{Template:Marines-Official}}

Black Templars

2019-12-04T05:51:30Z

2601:585:8301:76D0:69AC:2336:691C:A216:

{{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 one to six thousand
|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 Betrayer to the last survivor of the Night Sentinels (the direct predecessors to both the [[Grey Knights]] and the Black Templars) [[Doom]] (2016)}}

{{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]], Sigmisund 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 1000-6000 marines in their ranks. This is primarily because they're scattered throughout the galaxy so their approximate number is unknown. This means that their chapter alone could wipe out the [[Tau|weeaboo communists]] 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]].
*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. ]

==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.
</gallery>

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