sonsofcorax.freeforums.org

Hello all!


Fairly new to the forums. I had some ideas in the new codex, and having started to get into more depth with the Ravenguard fluff [index astartes ect...]

Was thinking of a Ravenguard Succcessor Chapter. In honour of your forum, I present:








Which is a pretty appropriate name for a brother chapter!


EDIT: have changed the name to something more unique...

I was hoping someone could help me with a nice avatar or siggy based on this:


After everyone gets sorted out with the new codex, I will try posting some ideas for the chapter.

Under the new codex, RavenGuard armies led by Shrike can now Fleet and Infiltrate a single squad with Shrike.
I have incorporated some fluff I feel makes them unique and can partially account for some of this abilities..


Some priliminary ideas:



FOUNDING

The Shadow Reapers of Corax are a successor chapter of the Ravenguard. While one of the first 3rd Founding Chapters, they have had problems mustering to full strength due to complications with their geneseend. They follow the Codex Astartes in the same manner as the Ravenguard do; fairly rigid organizationally on the company level with subtle variations lower down that make them more flexible and adaptable to exploiting weaknessess by favouring surgical scalpel strikes rather than blunt hammer blows on the enemy line...

While there are almost 8 millenia between their split from the Raven Guard, there seem to be other divergences and factors in they do not wish to draw attention to...


HOMEWORLDS



While they have no known official Chapter Keep establishing a homeworld, there base of operations is considered as the Southern Reaches of what remains of the Clax System. This region of space is filled with nebulas and fields of asteriods, on the farthest Northwest corner of Segmentum Ultima, bordering the Northeast edges of Segmentum Solar...


http://www.joachim-adomeit.de/wh40k/spacemap/map.html




As most Imperial Scholars shall note, the swirling mass is now known as The Storm of the Emperors' Wrath. Named after a warp storm that spontaneously engulfed Lord Vandire's fleet as he sought Sebastien Thor in the Age of Apostasy...


HISTORY


This region of space is not been kind to settlers. Most of the stars in the sub-sector are hostile to carbon based life and unihabited. The main system the Reapers take recruits from has a giant binary star that tans their skins a curious dark, golden yellow. Through the millenia, the characteristic pale white skin of RavenGuard geneseed has given way this golden yellow as the genestocks have amalgamated.

The worlds in this system are quite varied. The inner system planets have seen limited industrial colonization in the form of mining and moisture farms and radiation feedback generatoriums. Colonists eke out a living in factories of crawlers, bombarded by binary cosmic rays...

The two outer hospitable planets are kept in a primitive, untouched feral state by the Chapter. With an orbital station and Astartes patrol monitors, they insure that prospectors from the inner worlds do not poach and smuggle on the planet on pain of death.

These planets contain populations of humans that were cut off from the Imperium during the Age of Apostasy. The subsequent bubbling warp storm of Vandire's demise lead to a breakdown in society in this system as critical shipments vanished and anarchy prevailed. The inner planets saw their human populations die out. Their proximity to the radiation of the stars killed them off as the technology they used to protect themselves fell into disrepair.

Only the outlying planets were of a sufficient distance from the star to sustain feral life and a bronze age level of technology...


Only when the storm abated somewhat did the Imperium return to reclaim it. They found the inner planets ready for recolonisation and by edict, the feral human populations of the outlying planets where left to the escorting Chapters stewardship.

Having helped reclaim this area of space for the Emperor, the Shadow Reapers were tasked with its defence.

After only a few thousand years in which the chapter was brought up to strength using the local population, there were anomalies with aspirant development.

While it would be Heresy to speculate, there are whispers that their unique suns were believed to cause a higher than normal rate of psychic mutation among the human population.

Unfortunately, for those that did have the gift, it came at a price. Inducted Aspirants with psyker potential did not respond well to the gene-therapy muscle/metabolism enhancements of the Adeptus Astartes Biscopia Organ...

In the dark times that follow the defeat of the Warmaster, the Imperium sought to consolidate and rebuild itself in the wake of the Heresy. The constant battles of attrition against Xenos and Vandire Reign of Blood meant that geneseed, particularily Ravenguard seed was drastically low in supply and even though relatively close to Holy Terra, shipments were few and far between. These pysker applicants that survived implantation could not be culled as they had an important secondary role as geneseed replicators...

The Reapers of Corax had no choice but to make due and came to some hard decisions...


DEVIATIONS/COMBAT DOCTRINES

Pysker-Aspirants, while still stronger and more formidable than normal men, they did not meet the cut for the capabilties expected of a Space Marine as dictated in the Index Astartes.

Thus, the chapter deemed that their Librarians and Aspirants with latent psychic ablities were to be used almost exclusively in peripheral non-combat roles from that point on.



Thus, the Reapers of Corax field no HQ Librarians on the battlefield proper.


The larger intakes of pysker recruits however, meant that the Scholum Librarius of the Shadow Reapers were able to create "Choirs" of rudimentary trained Initiates to become channels and amplifiers for the Codiciers and Epistolaries of the Chapter.


They were trained use their powers of foresight as tacticians and advisors, operating from orbiting strike cruisers and forward air-mobile command posts. By boosting their powers thru the Choirs, Librarians could see the battle and all its possible permutations unfolding. By data-linking with battlefield HQ's and squad leaders, they vastly improve situational awareness to the troops on the ground.

In addition, it was discovered that the channelled power of the choirs allowed the Librarians to cordon, focus and sharpen their strike cruisers' teleport beams providing deadly accurate, rapid deep strikes without the customary disorientation and skin crawling sensations most marines must battle thru initially upon landing...

This was seen as a boon to the deployability of the chapter. Not realizing the danger, nor the scale of extremely demanding and exhaustive task the high command demanded of them, the Choirs were stretched to the breaking point. After a series of mass teleport deployments led to unacceptable non-combat losses to both the choirs and the units they were channelling, new Dictates were put in place. These led to a return to standard drop pod assaults and deepstrike deployments, only using the Choir as originally intended, stealing themselves for rare occasions when a single unit needed to be placed with outmost accuracy and immediacy in a key juncture of a battle...

CHAPTER TACTICS:

To the chapters enemies, marines seem to able to cut them off at every turn and manueuvre as Reapers units are able to see thru every feint and change of tactic almost before the enemy commanders utter them...


Scouts and brightly coloured Bikers gain intel and sow confusion in the enemy ranks as contact is made. Loud, conspicuous, yet hard to pin down and hit; the bikers draw attention away from the bulk of the army as it moves in for the stealthy kill.

Even light armour is used as part of the subterfuge. In conditions that are appropriate to their deployment, bright yellow Predators or a rare Vindicator announce their presence by bulldozing over terrain, trailing oily smoke screens from their exhaust and firing heavy weapons to further fixate and distract the enemy from the real threat closing the noose of the trap...

Rhinos drop off tactical squads out of sight as they pass between shadows of cover on foot while the now-empty transports gun there engines and feint advances on dummy objectives to continue to stretch and disarray the enemy's formations...

The stealthy fieldcraft of the Scout and Tactical Squad Reapers on the approach to springing an assault or ambush is legendary and upholds the honor of their Ravenguard Brethren...

While it is certainly true that Shadow Reaper Scout Squads have access to Light-Adaptive Cloaks, there have been unsubstantiated (some might say ludicrous) rumours of camouflage use among power armored warriors of the Reapers of Corax.




These practises would be blasphemy against the tenets of the Codex Astartes, and have been vehemently denied by the Reaper High Command.




In any case, there have never been any corraborating witness statements to this effect, and Shadow Reaper marines always return from the battle with nothing besmirching their flawless yellow and black plate except battle damage from the odd chip or las-burn...


Through it all, the foe is way-layed by masterful ambushes and encirclements. In the height of the enemy's confunsion, the Choir and their Librarian handlers prepare for the moment they have building their reserves of will for. A single, surgical strike of the most powerful unit in the Adeptus Astartes. The Terminators. In a terrifyingly accurate teleport assault, a cadre of hand-picked veterens in Tactical Dreadnought Armour burst into the enemy ranks; guiding by the now exhausted Choirs hexagammic wards, it's as if the terminators themselvese know exactly where the foe is positioned and orientated before they appeared even appeared out of thin air.

Striding powerfully forwards without pause, they spit torrents of bolter and heavy weapons fire, flexing fingers of power fists crackle with barely restrained destructive energies, as they reach their prey...

Ideas to be expanded:

-Limited amount of Terminator suits [about 60 for the whole chapter]...

-Terminator Squads directly attached to Battle Companies [10-12 suits a sufficient fighting force for the company; Strike Cruiser's Psychic Choirs not over-taxed by guiding these smaller numbers during Choir-Assisted Teleport Assaults]...

-Leaders of Companies are Assassin-Captains; not only outstanding leaders, but have proven their tenacity in executing an enemy leader...

-They are expected to command from the front... and seek enemy command formations...

-Assassin-Captains are masters of the quick close-quarters kill. In addition to their personal Astartes combat weapons, they carry a variety of hidden blades,stars and gas grenades laced with potent agents. They are most often equipped with Jump-packs. These allow them to Infiltrate silently on foot along with their squads and retinues to spy out the enemy...

-Once located, Shadow Reaper squads cover fire and advance to isolate enemy HQ's from aid...

-Once leadership targets are found, the Assassin-Captains separate and launch themselves at their victims...








I tried scaling this to 6kb for the avatar, but I am a GIMP noob and the pic is tiny...


EDIT: on the model, I would convert the chest skull into a raven head

cheers,

SoR

I have to admit i really like the scheme, and it would be nice to have such a chapter.

just a quick question is the armour meant to be gold or the colour it is? i know the B&C painter is great but not having a proper gold colour has always been one of its downfalls,

I'd like to see some other marines with this scheme, maybe even an assualt marine, but if your ever looking for help and ideas, we'll be more then happy to help

i do like the look for the termie, he has nice colors.

on a side note, jasper... can you change your color away from red please??? this is the same as i use for in post corrections, and i'd rather like to keep it that way thanks

thanks all!

I was going for a dulled golden yellow as to not be too garish. I feel the deep black goes really well with it. The back carapace should be mostly black, so there would be more or less a 50/50 distribution of the colours. The B&C painter is great, but the front view gives the impression that it's alot more yellow than black.

How is it you guys are able to make such large detailed avatars and siggy's in only 6kb?

I use the scale tool in GIMP as a simplistic way of reducing images, but I don't know the tricks to bringing up details in reduced pics while keeping in limits...

Nice colour scheme Although, i think there are already a few chapters who lay claim to that name. I think GW also has a canon chapter called the Sons of Corax.

Anyway, as for the sig, that is one of those magical things that our master artificier Levitas knows of. Unfortunately, he's currently in the midst of moving across the atlantic and i'm not sure when he'll be back. However, sit tight nonetheless.

thanks guys!


I will be adding a tac trooper, his scheme will be more subdued to reflect their more stealthy nature...

Hmmm...


In that case, what do you guys think of these....

so far my favourite is:


The Shadow Reapers of Corax [Shadow Reapers for short]

others I have considered:


The Reapers of Corax [my next favourite, nice forceful name without being too much of a mouthful]

The Shadows of Corax

The Spectres of Corax



Talons of Corax [ i feel this is a bit too chaos-y]

colour scheme is amazing!!!
only thing is (obvi this is just my opinion)
reapers of corax sounds like they are going to reap corax (if that makes any sense)
the other names however are awsome!

but its totally up to you and im glad your having an easier time of making a name than i did with my chaos/tau >_<

i definitely like the shadow reapers one, and the shadows of corax. though, in my opinion, if you did the shadows, you would want them the be darker, black or something like that.

Yeah, I liked the 'shadows' idea alot, but I also realized some of there tactics are a departure from true ravenguard and this is where they form there own unique identity.

See, the Scout Squads and Tacticals are primary striking tools of the chapter. They follow the ravenguard emphasis on stealthy and ambush. They primarily in black plate with use of Camo-Cloaks. The nice highlights of yellow could easily by darkened by light adaptive panels or regular fieldcraft coverings...

The bikers, tanks, and terminators are far more brightly schemed as to draw attention to themselves and fixate the enemy.

Thus the majority of the force can move into striking range with the enemy unawares.

Hence I picked Reapers because significant elements of the army purposely stand outside of the shadows...


EDIT: i've come up with some cool ideas for camo after talking to some ppl about the Codex Astartes.

Seems my Imperial Fist point of view made me forget that camouflage is indeed a sanctioned tactic!

With the new Camo Cloaks granting Stealth USR to Scouts, I thought it would be interesting to make that part of the fluff.

After all, if the Imperial Guard have Cameolein Cloaks, wouldn't marines have access to similiar tech of so inclined?

Great background
Nice to see different approach on the Raven Guard.
Looks well thougth and supported by our new dex.

Where did you find the map?

click on the linky just above my star map.

Or google "warhammer starmap"

I then editing it using GIMP.


EDIT: moved this thread to Project Logs [as it has indeed become one!]

have posted editing to fluffy there...