Eagle Knights Death company

Today we will be looking at the Death Company squads, who are know within the Eagle Knights as the Brotherhood of the Eagles Talon. While these guys will be using the Death Company rules they do not stick to the fluff of the Death Company, as the chapter was part of the Adeptus Mechanicus' attempts to improve the Gene Seed. Within the fluff of the Eagle Knights, not only has this lead to physical deformations and mutations and for the Red Thirst to effect almost every member of the chapter, it has actually held the Black Rage at bay, kind of anyway. While few marines truly fall to the Black Rage, the chapter does suffer from a miniature version, that effects a large part of the chapter. Often referred to the Battle Rage by the chapter, it cause a marine to loose all sense of control, much in the same way as the Black Rage, but its effects are only temporary, usually lasting from just before battle is joined or from the first blows of combat until all enemies have been slaughtered and in some cases, friends as well. Once the enemy is destroyed and there is no one to fight, then the Battle Rage subsides and the marines will have few, if any, memories of the battle. While this does make for effective assault troops, it is not very useful to command, as it means that vast part of the force will quickly become unresponsive to orders. This is why the Eagle knights tend to have lots of assault based troops, and few support troops, with only those able to master the Battle Rage given long range weapons. The Rage can manifest in any Marine at anytime and those that are worst effected are usually placed in to one off two units, those who show some degree of control and response to orders are invited to join the Hawk Brethren, aka Vanguard Vets, while those who show no control and are truly lost to fate during the battle are initiated into the Brotherhood.

There are currently 3 squads assigned to the 3rd Company, these are Squad Gallicus, Squad Pectoralis and Squad Beaudouin

The Brotherhood

Squad Gallicus

First up we have Squad Gallicus. This squad is the primary squad within the Brotherhood attached to the 3rd. They are lead by the Brother Ruppell, a long standing member of the Brotherhood, who has managed to temper the Rage to some degree and while he generally doesn't listen to orders, he manages to retain some semblance of sanity during battle to direct the Brotherhood from one target to the next. This squad is generally used to hit and run, spending most of the time on the move, jumping from one fight to the next, hitting hard and fast before withdrawing. They are armed with 3 plasma pistols and 3 power mauls, the other two being armed with bolter and chain swords (yes, I know there actually axes, but BA's cant take axes, besides they look cool).

Squad Pectoralis

A better view of there equipement.

Squad Pectoralis are the heavy hitters, used to attack the real hard points in the enemies line, be it an important character, units or vehicle. They are armed with two thunder hammers wielding marines and 3 boltgun/chain sword marines. The idea is to whittle down the target with bolter fire before assaulting and destroying the enemy under the weight of two hammers and the possibility of 18 damage. There is one issue with the squad in 8th, as one of the hammer marines is also wielding a bolter, something he cant do now, as you have to swap both weapons for the hammer instead of just the combat weapon. I will be leaving him as he is though, otherwise I would have to do a complete reworking of the model, which i'm not doing.

Squad Beaudouin.

Squad Beaudouini form the third squad and are generally the last squad to be released in to the maelstrom of battle. These are armed only with bolt pistols and chain swords and are used either to mop up weaker or damaged units or they are sent in to assist and support the other two squads, should extra numbers be required or losses need replacing. 

The Squad leader is a bit of a show off, que the gold bling.

We are getting towards the end of the Knights now, as there are only a few characters left to show. These will be up next and then we will do a complete army showcase, will all the current member of the Eagle Knight, plus maybe some (as yet unpainted) extras!