It's 100% feasible to play a DA that's not in the know.

Just food for thought, but none of the Forbidden Lores the Dark Angels get have to do with the Fallen. The Forbidden Lores emphasis their secretive nature and their dealings within (and without) of the imperium. What do you do when you don't trust someone? you find out their secrets, you find reasons NOT to like them (and are sometimes surprised to find nothing to dislike heh). Rites of Battle specifically throws in Forbidden Lore: The Fallen. The DA use circles within circles for secrets, and your induction into knowledge of the Chapter is slow and steady. The first inclination that there are any renegade dark angels (at all) is when you hit the Ravenwing, when you get into the Deathwing, you know that the fallen exist, you know they're traitorous dark angels. The details are divvied up within those ranks, until you hit Supreme Grand Master who knows alllll the secrets, the whole story. That leaves (aside from members of the Deathwing assigned as Sgts to squads in other companies) all DA Tech-marines (aside from the Master of the Forge), and about 800 marines who don't know about the Fallen, and probably have no idea that there can even BE a renegade Dark Angel (unlike other more... liberal... chapters).

All of that being said, if you want Non-Fallen Oriented DA story goods, check out Purging of Kadilus Harbor (Nazdreg & Gazkhul vs DA 3rd Company w/Belial before he was 1st company captain). It doesn't get anymore non-fallen oriented dark angel than that aside from in the Deathwing Anthology that has the story of Two-Heads-Talking and the origin of the Deathwing's white armor vs Genestealers (though that anthology has a good story about a Fallen & a badass fallen dreadnought that I would love to model heh). You could also technically read the two Dark Angels Horus Heresy books, and Aaron D-B's shortstory in the upcoming HH Anthology for a look at Dark Angel mentality.

As to the blatantly obvious Fallen Blackshield, one of the reasons to play it is because it IS obvious, it's so obvious, if your PCs don't play here and are that flavor of skeptical, no one will think of it, kind of like hiding in plain sight heh.

My Librarian, Brother-Lexicanium Gideon Keyes, has no clue what the Dark Secret is of his home Chapter. He knows there is one, and has encountered the Fallen (quite by accident), but he has no real understanding of why they are bad, only that they are bad and must be stopped.

It's fun playing a zealous yet clueless Dark Angel.

BYE

BrotherHostower said:

And then Ross throws it back out.

> Rule Question:
> I have a few questions about Deeds. Many are about specific word choices that seem to go against what has been previously printed.
>
> 1) Initiate of Secrets (page 75) provides Forbidden Lore (Dark Angels). Is this an error - since no such Lore skill exists - or is it just a limited form of Forbidden Lore (Adeptus Astartes) and/or Forbidden Lore (Traitor Legions)? Regardless, it seems hard to advance (and possibly useless to do so) since both previously mentioned Forbidden Lore skills are on the Dark Angels Chapter Advances.

The correct skill should be Forbidden Lore (Adeptus Astartes), although Forbidden Lore (Traitor Legions) would also be appropriate at your GM's discretion.

<<<additional questions and answers removed, see the Living Errata thread for the full set>>>

Ross Watson
Senior RPG Developer
Fantasy Flight Games
rwatson@fantasyflightgames.com

BrotherHostower said:

'The butler did it' is never a good story arc, when in Scene One the butler is shown to have a mysterious secretive past. I'd be horrified and assume extreme levels of drug abuse if my players didn't spot the obvious twist coming from a mile off.

If we're talking Black Shields, then an ex-traitor of one of the other Founding Chapters would be much more entertaining.

Or even an ex-member of one of the DA Successors. That way he'd be steeped in DA Lore and would be an obvious suspect as Unforgiven. Feed the PCs clues: His knowledge of DA lore and whatnot. Then the big reveal is that he was a member of a Successor Chapter who was inducted into the secret of the Unforgiven and was so disgusted at how lame his parent Chapter had been in wasting resources for 10,000 years, lying to 80% of the Chapter, misleading the Inquisition and killing innocents just to keep the secret instead of properly devoting themselves to protecting humanity, that he went and threw it all in for the Deathwatch.

But dont forget that ALL Chapter's Librarians and Interrogator-Chaplains are automatically members of the Dathwing Inner Circel!!

That means, they have the full knowledge about the "Fallen" and the History of the Dark Angels!!

my 2 cent

Custodes said:

I'm fairly certain the 'inner circle' isn't just a club with one level of security- a junior librarian doesn't necesarily have to be part of the few in the chapter than know everything. That said, your typical librarian should know something about the secret.

Yup. It's repeatedly stressed in fluff that it's about layers of secrecy, as per secret societies such as Freemasons in our own society.

HappyDaze said:

I can see the chapter masters making sure everyone is trained in Interrogation at least. This way you no only don't have to train them when they are worthy of the secret and their ability in this area may even be a criteria of evaluation for advancement. It is useful to be able to interrogate the Orc Nob to find out where the warboss is and if that gives you practice for later interviews with the fallen then mission accomplished.

But your right about most DA not being fully in the loop. I have two DA in my campaign and one of them roled the Ravenwing background and is a librarian so he is somewhat in the loop. The other is a techmarine and knows nothing about the fallen. It is pretty fun dynamic because even though they are equals in the DW the techmarine always obeys the DA lib, and even looks to him to "approve" the Space Wolf kill team leaders decisions*. Never enough to actually be insubordination, but enough to be noticed by the observant.

*My group decided to have a permanent squad leader, and actually decided who that would be with the traditional DA vs SW duel.

Chrynoble said:

Quite the opposite really. The Chapter Master doesn't want his average trooper to be exposed to the lies of the enemy. Interrogation is a difficult art reserved to those with proven loyalty to the Chapter.

I play a Consecrator who is not clued in. He has all the skills of a first company veteran but has not yet been inducted into the inner circle. By joint decision with the other players (we rotate GMs in that game), he is first company of that chapter but not all of them know the terrible truth, a difference from the Dark Angels.

What he does know: there are black armoured traitors who must be destroyed or captured at all costs. One of these traitors shot him with a strange plasma weapon and ever since his geneseed has been...damaged. (OOC: he has the Geneseed Anomaly deed of disdain).

He is keeping a vengeful eye out for more traitors but at the moment that is a minor issue compared to the activities of the hive fleet. He has been seconded to the Deathwatch and he takes his duties very seriously.

There are definite layers of knwoledge within the Dark Angels. Standard DA indoctrination includes the idea of watching for treachery and being vigilant at all times. After that comes the idea that even loyal brothers can turn through weakness. Then comes the idea that some Dark Angels have turned and are stilll out there....This si the level that I would imagine quite a lot of experienced Dark Angels would be at. The fact that some loyalist marines might turn traitor is not unknown to any space marine Chapter. Indeed the Dark Angels likely raise this possibility earlier in indoctrination than other Chapters such as the Ultramarines.

After this however coems the real secrets, that there are numerous traitor Dark Angels. That the Dark Angels can't account for all of them, that they turned during the Heresy, and that they represented a sizeable proportion of the Chapter and the ones defending the homeworld no less.

Point of all this is that a Dark Angel PC may well know that their are traitor Dark Angels out and about but have no clue as to their nature.

Forbidden Lore Horus Heresy when he encounters one in Pre Heresy armour might fill him in though.

I think "Chapter Secrets" is the Forbidden Lore skill that should govern whether or not a given Dark Angel knows about the Fallen. When you get down to it, though, the Dark Angels keep telling allegorical myths about the Fall of Caliban.

I play a Consecrator who is not clued in. He has all the skills of a first company veteran but has not yet been inducted into the inner circle. By joint decision with the other players (we rotate GMs in that game), he is first company of that chapter but not all of them know the terrible truth, a difference from the Dark Angels.

What he does know: there are black armoured traitors who must be destroyed or captured at all costs. One of these traitors shot him with a strange plasma weapon and ever since his geneseed has been...damaged. (OOC: he has the Geneseed Anomaly deed of disdain).

He is keeping a vengeful eye out for more traitors but at the moment that is a minor issue compared to the activities of the hive fleet. He has been seconded to the Deathwatch and he takes his duties very seriously.

It all sounds perfectly plausible. Lately, both GW and (especially) BL materials introduced a crazy, almost Byzantine variety in levels of initiation, with the 1st and 2nd Companies having their very own Inner Circles. Your guy clearly must know something, as it would be quite rare to let a Deathwing member join the Deathwatch without it having to do something with the Hunt, but as a new addition to the First, he's surely not clued in on Inner Circle secrets to Deathwing Knights extents.

Actually, with certain restrictions suggested by common sense, a player is quite free to set the level of knowledge his character possesses. The more important question, I feel, is what does the rest of the Imperium as a whole, or other Space Marine Chapters, know about the events at Caliban. I quite like Gav Thorpe's DA novels as they offer a good insight into the minds of various Unforgiven characters at differing points in their initiation process, but when it comes to the details of what is proscribed knowledge and what is not, he offers a crazy restricted view. One of his characters asks how the Lion died, and boom, instant Ravenwing for you, my boy (where he learns the history of the Horus Heresy, and he is fed with a story of Horus killing the Lion - Luther comes up much, much later). Even that could sort of fly in the isolated and controlled environment of one Chapter, but the Primarchs, as the most important figures of the Imperium's religion, are widely known and discussed, That must at least superficially include their deaths or disappearances, right? So, what is the cover tale? What do the Ultramarines, or Fists, or Ecclesiarchy figures teach about the Lion's demise? What is the benchmark , against which the levels of lies and initiation can be measured? I don't remember reading anything about that anywhere, so I'm sort of hoping more educated Unforgiven players can come to the rescue. That, or Lynata with yet another half-forgotten tidbit buried in the ancient, yellowing pages of a decades-old White Dwarf

I play a Consecrator who is not clued in. He has all the skills of a first company veteran but has not yet been inducted into the inner circle. By joint decision with the other players (we rotate GMs in that game), he is first company of that chapter but not all of them know the terrible truth, a difference from the Dark Angels.

What he does know: there are black armoured traitors who must be destroyed or captured at all costs. One of these traitors shot him with a strange plasma weapon and ever since his geneseed has been...damaged. (OOC: he has the Geneseed Anomaly deed of disdain).

He is keeping a vengeful eye out for more traitors but at the moment that is a minor issue compared to the activities of the hive fleet. He has been seconded to the Deathwatch and he takes his duties very seriously.

It all sounds perfectly plausible. Lately, both GW and (especially) BL materials introduced a crazy, almost Byzantine variety in levels of initiation, with the 1st and 2nd Companies having their very own Inner Circles. Your guy clearly must know something, as it would be quite rare to let a Deathwing member join the Deathwatch without it having to do something with the Hunt, but as a new addition to the First, he's surely not clued in on Inner Circle secrets to Deathwing Knights extents.

Oh he knows there are traitors that the Unforgiven hate more than others. The particular black-armoured foes he'd recognise if he saw them again, and he's aware they're especially vile traitors. By terrible truth, I meant that they're Dark Angels who turned during the Heresy. What I've read about the Consecrators implies that they're incredibly secretive, even by Unforgiven standards. It stands to reason that they'd be that much stingier with handing out details on their darkest secrets.

What I've read about the Consecrators implies that they're incredibly secretive, even by Unforgiven standards. It stands to reason that they'd be that much stingier with handing out details on their darkest secrets.

Yeah, they're a weird bunch. With all those implications about them scattered in Unforgiven lore, I'm honestly surprised the Dark Angels still cruise around in the Rock, and didn't hand over the ignition keys to the Consecrators when they turned 18

Seriously though, what's your take on the Consecrator's big secret? What's your theory, why did they inherit the original colour scheme along with truckloads upon truckloads of the oldest of relics?

They're almost certainly a 'second founding' lot - it doesn't make sense to have all those toys and not be. So they're as old as the Dark Angels chapter.

The Cypher dataslate implies the change of colour scheme occurred on Caliban - the fighting between different factions of the legion had already started before the Lion's ship hoved into orbit and fired/was fired upon*. One of the two sides repainted their armour green to distinguish friend from foe.

What we don't know yet, is which side that was - not having seen past the end of Fallen Angels (aside from briefly in Grey Angel) - we don't know along which lines the legion splits - Terra/Caliban, Luther/Zahariel, or what. But - random conspiracies aside - the side which painted their armour green are presumably the lot the Lion threw his weight in with when he arrived.

Possibly the Relictors were people who surrendered/changed sides when the lion turned up and they realised they were on the "wrong" side, or else they might have been an astartes cadre who were never at caliban - and hence never got to know about the whole thing until after the fact.

* depending on whether you believe Astelan's "Confessions" or not.

They're almost certainly a 'second founding' lot - it doesn't make sense to have all those toys and not be. So they're as old as the Dark Angels chapter.

The Cypher dataslate implies the change of colour scheme occurred on Caliban - the fighting between different factions of the legion had already started before the Lion's ship hoved into orbit and fired/was fired upon*. One of the two sides repainted their armour green to distinguish friend from foe.

What we don't know yet, is which side that was - not having seen past the end of Fallen Angels (aside from briefly in Grey Angel) - we don't know along which lines the legion splits - Terra/Caliban, Luther/Zahariel, or what. But - random conspiracies aside - the side which painted their armour green are presumably the lot the Lion threw his weight in with when he arrived.

Possibly the Relictors were people who surrendered/changed sides when the lion turned up and they realised they were on the "wrong" side, or else they might have been an astartes cadre who were never at caliban - and hence never got to know about the whole thing until after the fact.

* depending on whether you believe Astelan's "Confessions" or not.

The Heresy artwork tends to depict the First Legion's armour during the Crusade as being a much, much darker green - a green-tinted black. The Heresy novels so far have been fairly consistent in presenting The Lion as being pure - his was a Legion tested by Chaos, but he remained true to the Emperor in spite of a world tainted by the Dark Gods (this is hinted in The First Heretic - Lorgar is shown visions of ten infant Primarchs emerging from their pods, all of whom subsequently turned to Chaos... except one). The doubt cast upon the Legion is mentioned during the conflict with the Night Lords - the idea that The Lion's loyalty would always be in question, even if The Lion himself never wavered.

Of course, there's a lot we don't know about the subject. More importantly, there's a lot the Dark Angels don't know... and I tend to regard that as the big secret - that there's this grand disgrace hanging over the Legion's honour, but the deeper you get into the Inner Circle of the Unforgiven, the more you learn of the holes in their knowledge, and the fact that the schism that tore the First Legion apart is largely a mystery.

They seek to capture and interrogate the Fallen because the Fallen might actually know something about what happened... but the Fallen only know part of the story, and many of them lie.

Yeah, they're a weird bunch. With all those implications about them scattered in Unforgiven lore, I'm honestly surprised the Dark Angels still cruise around in the Rock, and didn't hand over the ignition keys to the Consecrators when they turned 18

Seriously though, what's your take on the Consecrator's big secret? What's your theory, why did they inherit the original colour scheme along with truckloads upon truckloads of the oldest of relics?

And only with a slight delay.

The Consecrators have inherited some superb wargear, all older war material. There must be a reason why the parent chapter didn't simply keep all of those relics and near-relics for their own use. And there is their name: Consecrators. As in those who consecrate.

So my answer: the Consecrator armoury are the captured wargear of the Fallen. The Consecrator's most secret and sacred mission is to "consecrate" that wargear in battle against traitors and other enemies of mankind. Perhaps not even other enemies, their appearances are rare and in events such as the "Arralus Intervention".

And only with a slight delay.

The Consecrators have inherited some superb wargear, all older war material. There must be a reason why the parent chapter didn't simply keep all of those relics and near-relics for their own use. And there is their name: Consecrators. As in those who consecrate.

So my answer: the Consecrator armoury are the captured wargear of the Fallen. The Consecrator's most secret and sacred mission is to "consecrate" that wargear in battle against traitors and other enemies of mankind. Perhaps not even other enemies, their appearances are rare and in events such as the "Arralus Intervention".

Mate, it's awesome. I just love this idea. This would actually explain how come they all have the weird old marks despite being the N ^th founding. Yay for well-thought-out fan theories!

Cheers! The ambiguity in the setting allows all sorts of fun notions to play with. And this stuff is background that may or may not become relevant to the campaign. None of us are that keen on making it Fallen-centric.

Oh well, having a good idea doesn't necessarily mean it has to immediately become the central point of a grand campaign. I like it because it neatly plugs a hole I couldn't fill convincingly. So far the best explanation I could come up with was that a pre-heresy DA group surfaced later because warp shenanigans, but I didn't like that - it involves too much hand-waving

That could work and it would explain their extreme isolation and secrecy. Stranger things have happened in background, to be fair.