Relictors

The Relictors are a renegade Space Marine Chapter in Warhammer 40k. Most of their fluff was written in the lead-up to the 13th Black Crusade summer campaign... and then barely a mention since then.

This was a crying shame as it shows what happens when Space Marines take the opinion of what a lot of rogue or curious Inquisitors think to do (and that is why the Inquisition wanted to get rid of them since they don't like others playing by their rules).

The Relictors are so named because they developed an unheathly obsession with chaos related artefacts and weapons, coming to believe that such relics could be used against the enemy, fighting fire with fire. Why a normal bolter wasn't sufficing is unclear. The original name of the chapter was the Fire Claws but when they began to seriously get into the whole collect-ten-swords-of-every-type-to-pass level questing they renamed themselves the Relictors. They were put on such a path by a rogue inquisitor who introduced the marines to his views and overtime together they horded an impressive amount of chaotic bling. It was not to last however; the Inquisition was hardly impressed at what they saw as dangerous heresy and the thought of all those traitor chapters obviously played heavily on their minds. They killed their colleague and sent the chapter on a penance crusade to gain the Empeoror's forgiveness. They thought it was all done with but oh boy it wasn't.

It seem the Relictors didn't intend to abandon their ways at all and slowly began to acquire more chaos artefacts again. The Inquisition began to note the rumours of the chapter but didn't do anything though until the Relictors attacked an Inquistional archive and nicked the chaos artefacts the personnel there were guarding. At that point any notion of restraint left the Inquisitors' heads and they sent the Grey Knights against the chapter's orbital fortress monastery. While the chapter was badly mauled it is rumoured a few hundred battle brothers survived and are in hiding now, leaving the door open for you to collect your very own horde of them.

Since this awesome load of fluff, mostly through white dwarf sources, we haven't heard much of the chapter. It could be GW has decided that is all that really needs to be said of the Relictors to make them intriguing enough to get gamers collecting them.

Thinking about it, they are kind of like a darker lighter version of the Blood Ravens and their hording, since they've yet to steal the gear of allied marines, the Custodes, primarchs, and every other race under the sun.