Background of The Angels of Judgement

[cypher371]

Ok as you may have seen, i have written two army lists based on my Space Marine Chapter.
Here is there history and background fluff. Note: I have edited this post in response to the replies so that the story seems to better fit realism of the 40k universe...


The Angels of Judgement:


The Angel's of Judgement make domain in the Angelus Sector, which was subsequently named after their first Supreme Grandmaster; the only known space marine to be elevated to the rank of Living Saint. The Angels of Judgement wear power armour adorned in shining gold and coloured the purest white. They often wear symbols and iconography of robed angels and winged hourglasses.
Little is known about the origins of the chapter and even less is known about who their progenitor chapter is. The chapter originally went by the name: The Angels of Devastation. It was their sole purpose to hunt and wipe out heretics within the Imperium, especially within the astartes which lead some to believe they had some underlying goal in their actions. They became so trained in eradicating renegade space marines that they developed it into a fine art. It wasn't until M37 that the Angels of Devastation faced the darkest time of their history.
The Chapeter's Librarians were haunted with visions of the Chapter Chaplains going renegade and preaching heresy against the folly of the Librarium. As such the Raziel, Grand Master of Librarians warned Angelus of these visions. Angelus knowing full well the influence of the Chaplains, feared for the worse and ordered the Chaplaincy to be eradicated before it was too late.
With the first and second company at his back, Angelus stormed the Chapter Monastery. He was faced by a Ritual Mass, in which Lord Chaplain Orion was conducting a serviceof prayers and preaching. The chapter's 7th to 10th companies were present. Orion questioned Angelus on his sudden and aggressive arrival, in which Angelus replied "We have been forewarned and we will not allow you to succeed. In the name of the Emperor, I demand that you stand down and face judgement."
Orion looked saddened and said, "It is as I feared. The chapter's Eyes have been clouded by the taint of chaos..." Orion looked to the Four companies assembled before him and announced the chapter's Librarian's as being the "playthings" of the Lord of Change. He turned to Angelus and opened his mouth to speak, only to find a bolt of plasma thump into his chest. Within seconds the Chapter found itself in civil war as brother fought brother.


Uriel the Confessor


Upon hearing of the events going on in the Chapel of Angels, Uriel the Master of the Third Company ordered the 5th and 6th companies to go and aid Angelus and he sent the 4th company to go found out what was going on at the chapter's Libraries.
Uriel heard a report from the 4th company saying that the Librarians are trapped deep within the libraries and are currently trying to hold of a daemonic outbreak. Fearing for the worst Uriel went and reported the outbreak to a representative of the ecclesiarchy. The ecclesiarch informed Uriel that outbreaks have been happening all over the sector and that he'll send assistance as soon as posssible. The aid was in the form of a commandery from both the Order of the Ebon Chalice and the Order of the Bloody Rose.
Upon returning to their homeworld, Uriel and the third Company found the landscape around the chapel to be in ruins. Uriel found Angelus in what remained of the assembly hall in the monestary. He was knealt down listening to the last words of Orion.
Orion looked at the new arrivals and with one last breath said "Tzeencth". Angelus then looked at Uriel and said "We are beyond redemption... we must gather strength and destroy the Librarians. They are the true heretics."
Uriel looked at the mess and said "No, we need not be redeemed, we have no heretics amongst our ranks, the librarians are being attacked by daemons, we need to go now and try to undo this mess. The librarians were always aware of the dangers that their gift may bring. It's not their fault, there have been similar reports all over this sector."
"Then there may still be a light at the end of the road after all." Angelus stood up and began to make haste to the libraries.



To Be Continued...

[rafis117]

The ending was a bit abrupt, but the rest was great.

P.O.I. - What is their geneseed? What founding?

[cypher371]

Annoyingly enough i kow exactly how i want to put it but i just can't get it into words... writer's block lol.
I've tried to drop a few hints as two their geneseed... For example their Original Name The Angels of Devastation was taken directly from the Standard of Devastation and their hunting for astartes heretics goes back to the fall of Caliban when they faced their brothers for the first time... so basically the Dark Angels Geneseed only that they've suffered more which lead to complete re-organisation afterwards.

I'll work on fixing the end of this one before I conclude with part two.

[rafis117]

I figured that they were Unforgiven, since they are the ones who tend to use the Angel name and iconography (though we haven't seen any for this chapter!), and the BA (and their successors) use something blood-related in their name (encarmine or sanguine, for example).

[cypher371]

Oh good i'm glad i dropped enough subtle hints to give the idea of them being an unforgiven chapter. I can't wait to finish writing up the history i hope you like how it unfolds. And i'll redo the assault on the library.

[pilot00]

I liked the story so theres some little details i think are a bit moot.Even if a chapter is divided in civil war(and especially one unforgiven chapter)going to the ecclisiarchy and requesting assistance is a bit weird.

First if word reaches the inquisition then the chapter is doomed.They will be considered tainted(especially if the transgression is chaos worship such in this case).

Second all space marine chapters keep to themselves.More so the unforgiven ones,even when there is need for communication and war planning with their allies.They simply organize their plans by themselves execute their missions and leave a small message that their work is done and simply depart without further communicae.See the siege of vraks for example.

The third is based in my opinion alone.A space marine by becoming a marine is the epitome of humanity.His mind is steel.He devotes hours of prayer and litany to the emperor.His service to mankind is such that every day he is faced with self sacrifice,penitence,war and unshakable faith.He lives only to serve mankind and the emperor(at least in theory).Thereby space marines are tailored from their infancy in what it will take a regular human to become a living saint.Thereby at least half of the space marines would become saints.And what of the grey knights?Their purity and faith is beyond even that of a space marine,it is known that not a single grey knight fell to chaos or corruption.If a grey knight captain cant be cannonised then what chances are for a regular SM?

[cypher371]

Unlike most unforgiven chapters i wanted this one to have more of an active roll in the politics of the imperium and be more public like in the way as the ultramarines. I also wanted it to stray away from the rest of the unforgiven chapters as they develop more progressive ideals by seeing the fallen as another battle in the heresy and no more of a big deal than the rest of the traitors (if that makes sense? not sure how to really word it).

In terms of turning to the ecclesiarchy the company master had little knowledge of what was going on and fearing the chaptrer's faith being shattered by the lack of chaplains he turned to the strongest body of faith within the Angelus Sector and that was of course the ecclesiarchy.

I haven't said anything about chaos worship just words to put ideas in your mind of what's going on. In actuality there are no traitors within the chapter all will hopefully be beter revealed when i have more time to write the second part.

In reference to the living saint thing, you're right that if everyone knew the life of a space marine then they'd all be declared living saints... however as this story will hopefully reveal, Angelus' actions will be witnessed by enough non-astartes members for him to be declared a living saint by those who aren't astartes.

Obviusly i see where your coming from and i hope it all makes sense when part 2 is written up.

[rafis117]

Ah, but Brother, remember, for the secrets of the Unforgiven are to never be spilled for all time; we guard against the Heresy of our damned kin, and we guard against the Inquisition, who would destroy us for hearing a rumor of the folly of the Lion's sons. Against this we guard, and against the damned heretics from ten millenia ago. We are Unforgiven to this day, and our secrets are our own.

Bottom line, besides the roleplaying (which is very fun XD), the Unforgiven do not fraternize. Ever. Their leadership wears the robes to symbolize their knowledge and their secrets; for half of their legion Fell, long ago. If the Inquisition got word of this, one of the Founding Chapters would be declared excommunicado and hereticus. Instantly. They have guarded this secret for 10,000 years, and if 1,000 of theirs spontaneously decide to tell everyone, the heavens themselves wouldn't hide the offenders.

Additionally, who would be in a Chapter Monastery besides Astartes? Further, Marines have died more valorously and more defiantly than Angelus, and their names not even committed to record.

Unless the Tzeentch, the Lord of Change himself, were to waltz into the presence of the Angelus and the latter personally banished the foul Chaos heretic god back personally in single combat, he's probably not going to be honored as a Living Saint. Living Saints are ones who personally save worlds or kill monstrous and/or demonic heretics of a nature that their very sight would make normal humans go completely insane. Over and over.

All that your martyr did was make some false accusations and take a plasma bolt to the chest. Not particularly heroic...

[cypher371]

Hey hey, the story's not finished yet but thankfully all of this is helping me to rework everything in the next half, so that it may be more believable... it may even end up being three parted now.

It's odd though isn't it how the unforgiven are supposed to have onbe of the puirest geneseeds yet the highlords never ask for it... and its a damn shame that Lion El was abit too big headed... oh well, i'll still remain a Son of the Lion.

[pilot00]

Also canonization comes after death.It is declared.But living saints are not declared/canonized by the priesthood.Living saints are filled with the power of the emperor and become supernatural beings.One example is saint Celestine.If you have a witch hunters rulebook read at her story.Pretty much reminds me of Jean d' ark as a sister of battle though(She found her armor and sword in a ruined temple after having visions),and she was grievously wounded if i remember right and miraculously recovered.

Dont mark me wrong i liked your story too much,but somethings must be kept in order so you wont have ppl calling your fluff cheassy or worse.Also it is unlikely any of the unforgiven to turn matters to the ecclisiarchy.A simple investigation by an inquisitor is enough to render at least 5 chapters excomunicae!An unforgiven chapter might as well destroy itself rather than let others know of their crime.(at least thats how i view it)

[cypher371]

Of course canonisation comes after death... you can only be a martyr for dying for what you believe in.
Ok i'll spoil more The daemonic outbreak gets to such a point that neighbouring systems need assistance, in all the mess The angels of Devestations "civil war" is covered up and all witnesses swear a pact to keep what transpired a secret, a majority of the battle sisters step down and become repentia while the rest of the two mission join up and create a new order, the Angels of Devestation are recorded as wiped out while mysteriously a new space marine chapter emerges who are called the angels of judgement and for some reason they have close ties to the ecclesiarchy and the common folk within the sector.

The sororitas should have called in an inquisitor to deal with possible Space marine heresy but as they witnessed true dedication to the emperor they helped support the cover story by reporting to the ecclesiarchs and inquisitors about a daemonic outbreak which resutls in the chapters homeworld beign destroyed for safe measure and hiding the evidence. As far as the Dark Angels are concerned, they lost one of their second founding.

Does tht seem to make better sense?

[pilot00]

I hate to be the bad guy in this but i would wager the sisterhood would condem the marines rather than cover them up.After all they are utterly zealous and after all a military wing of the ordo hereticus.An unforgiven chapter would better put to the sword any witnesses of their past rather than trust them with oaths(after all oaths like traitors are meant to be broken!).Or worse mind scribe them lobotomize them and make them servitors(i think in the new DA codex it states somewhere this happening to a lot of witnesses).

The only way for a chapter to be funded is to be decreed by the emperor,i.e. the highlords of terra.A chapter that appears out of nowhere will be the target of the inquisition in no time.

As far for the daemonic outbreak i take it that your chapters librarian had something to do with this(willingly or not).Thereby the sisters and inquisitors have all the proof they need to declare your chapter excomunicate.Better to end the corruption by cutting it from the root than allow a single space marine fall to the dark powers.

Again i remind you that all those are opinions based on my perspective and there are more fluff veterans that can advice you better than me.But if you want consider to make your chapter to be not of the unforgiven but from a generic codex chapter such as ultras,fists,and so on.The 'flawed' chapters are treading a fine line between heresy and loyalty and publication of their status is not acceptable.They have gone to great lengths as to sacrifice entire planetary populations and even attacked other chapters in order to ensure that their secrets are kept.

One of the most extreme events i remember is when a black templars strike force had Cypher in its custody.The DA fleet appeared and demanded the prison been handled to them in which the templars obliged.Then the DA fleet destroyed the templar cruiser and vanished.

[cypher371]

yes i remember that story all too well. made me laugh because i'm not a fan of the templars.

The secret of the unforgiven would have been kept secret by the at the time unwanted allies.

I can see where your coming from, i just wanted to find away for an unforgiven chapter to "forget" its unforgiven roots and start afresh and for some reason have close ties with a sororitas order (another of my creation) known as The order of the Sanguine Chalice.


Any ideas?
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yes i remember that story all too well. made me laugh because i'm not a fan of the templars.

The secret of the unforgiven would have been kept secret to the at the time unwanted allies of the chapter.

I can see where your coming from, i just wanted to find away for an unforgiven chapter to "forget" its unforgiven roots and start afresh and for some reason have close ties with a sororitas order (another of my creation) known as The order of the Sanguine Chalice.


Any ideas?

[pilot00]

You can have it like the angels of Absolution.They are an unforgiven chapter that although it shares the goals of the rest of the chapters it stands apart by the very fact that they believe their sins redeemed.Perhaps your chapter captured one of the fallen much sought after(not Cypher that would be cheese)and they decided that their quest complete.As for their ties with the sororitas,a genestealer cleansing in a corrupted planet might forced a group of space marines and the a group of the sisterhood to band together to slay the patrairch and after this insident close ties were forged.

Those are a small ideas that you can expand around.

[cypher371]

That makes sense, i like the idea of them seeing themselves as redeemed, definately something to think about.