Libertania and the Crimson Guard
By author Ferd42
The Sixteenth Primarch: Libertania
Name:
Libertania.
Appearance:
Slightly shorter than the Primarchical average.
Somewhat plaid skin and short brownish-red hair—ironically not crimson. Libertania has deep-set features and a somewhat squat head.
Both on and off the battlefield, she tends to wear armour, painted as standard for the Legion, with a duplicate Legion symbol used as a rank marker.
Talents and Personality:
The Sixteenth Primarch genuinely seems able to inspire devotion among her followers, be they mortals or Space Marines. She is highly skilled at duelling with a pair of twinned Power Swords.
Libertania is humble for a Primarch, and while not really inspiring or massively persuasive, she is fairly sociable.
Homeworld:
Agedo, a Hive World that sits at the meeting point of several fairly stable Warp routes. For this reason Agedo has been the focus of many would-be empires, both domestic and extra-terrestrial, and so a battleground.
More recently it has become a peaceful trade and production centre, various cities being more or less left to run themselves, although a fortress does exist.
Psychic potential:
Libertania has a natural level of foresight, which she can use to, for instance, predict enemy ambushes or sword-strokes. Although she has tried to focus this power into more long-term predictions, she struggles to predict with any clarity beyond a day.
Background:
Libertania's lifepod crash-landed on Agedo, and she was discovered and raised in the camp train of one of the many mercenary bands which roamed the wastes of that planet. As with her siblings, she grew quickly and found her way to be among the soldiers. During her early life she served both the onworld hive city mayors, the Ran Nas Dominate and the Sufanleck Federation. However, she decided that, whatever their supposed ideals, they were all as bad as each other at abusing the people whom they wanted to rule.
Hence, once she worked her way up to the leadership of her band, she broke it off on her own, gathered support, besieged the nearest hive and took it for herself. There was perhaps nothing unusual in and off itself in this, except that, rather than as normal setting up a dynasty, she instead appointed a council of locals to run things (having no idea how to do it herself), adjusted a few laws, then gathered what forces she could set off to the next hive.
So it came to pass that by the time the Emperor had become aware of his daughter's location and arrived, most of the planet was under the control of governments established by her. At first she was suspicious of the Emperor, seeing his Imperium as simply another form of tyranny. However, she did come to the conclusion that the Imperial Truth was just, and he apparently managed to reassure her that his controls were only truly temporary.
The XVI Legion: the Crimson Guard
Name:
The Crimson Guard.
Insignia and Appearance:
The Crimson Guard's insignia is a side-view of an eagle, pictured as if in the process of flying upwards and to the right/forwards, rendered in white.
The rest of their Power Armour is crimson, with white trim. While not adverse to some honour markings and the like, the Legion does not allow the full customisation of plate found in some of its sibling Legions.
Armour tends to carry fairly standardised rank markings. However, the wearing of crests, capes or furs is unusual.
Gene-seed Status:
Generally the Crimson Guard's gene-seed is fairly reliable in terms of acceptance rate, although not notably so compared to other Legions. It does tend to result in Space Marines who have more pallid coloured skin and rather thickset features.
In terms of stability it appears that the Legion tends to have an overactive Omophagea Gland, particularly among pyskers, resulting in both an overactive desire to eat the flesh of foes, although perhaps with more success at gaining the memories of the eaten. This is accepted by the Legion, and they are fairly open about it, and it does not affect them to the level of rendering them beasts.
Legionary Assets:
In total the XVI Legion numbers around 150,000 Space Marines, slightly below average due to the risks involved in air assaults. However, the Legion posses a reasonably large fleet for its size, although most of it is tooled for ground assault work rather than fleet combat. The Legion's flagship is a Wrathful-class assault carrier, which is based on the hull of a Gloriana-class battleship, but trading some of the batteries for gunship hangers.
The Legion also maintains an auxilia, recruited from worlds that the Legion has liberated. Referred to as Free Cohorts, these forces tend to have a much less strict standard of discipline than the Imperial Army would. In some cases this can allow strong formations to get on with the job without hindrance. However, more often it results in bands more interested in looting than fighting. Some in the Legion are concerned about this, but a proper solution is yet to be found.
The Legion does not create an empire-within-an-empire. However, particularly after the Emperor rediscovered its Primarch, it has taken to leaving small forts on liberated worlds to oversee recruitment, both to the Legion and to the Free Cohorts. In addition to this, the political situation on these worlds can be monitored. Generally these forts are organisational part of the Wing that conquered the world.
Legion Organisation:
The XVI Legion's organisation follows the Principia Belicosa that were established by the Thunder Warriors:
—A squad is of 10 Space Marines.
—A company is of 100 Space Marines.
—A chapter is of 1,000 Space Marines.
—A Wing is of 5,000 Space Marines. (For an unknown reason, the term 'brigade' has been dropped from use.)
—A march is of 50,000 Space Marines. This is the largest subdivision, under the full Legion.
However, titles, even "Sister-Sergeant", are not generally used. Instead they are referred to as "Sister x", or "Sister x leading y formation".
A notable specialised role is that of saboteur, advanced recon and harassment specialists that normally work alone. Of course, their proper title is "Sister x, acting as saboteur".
The only expectation to the no ranks rule is that of "Pysker-sister", psykerhood being a trait and so worthy of recognition.
Expertise and Combat Doctrine:
The Legion focuses around airborne assault, making heavy use of gunships, land speeders, drop pods and jump packs to attempt to deliver a heavy blow right on at what they believe to be the enemy's weak spot. Follow up actions are also conducted in an air-cavalry role. Hence although the Legion does maintain tanks and artillery, some of the work that they would be asked to do in other Legions is done by aerospacecraft piloted by Astartes. Generally, little attempt is made to control the actions of squads once deployed. Astartes are seen as being trusted to make decisions on the ground.
Prior to airborne assaults, saboteurs will usually use stealth to attempt to "clear the way", by both reconnaissance and destroying important defensive works. Against xenos, this can extend to poisoning water or food, or deactivating environmental shielding, but such practices are considered cruel against human populations.
Free Cohorts are permitted whatever doctrine they choose to adopt. They generally work as ground-based support during longer-run campaigns.
Legion Weaknesses:
The Legion would struggle with assignments along the line of "hold that hill", relying mainly on a form of offensive. It would also struggle with fleet-to-fleet combat. Furthermore, if a hive were proof against an aerial assault, the Legion would have to resort to bombardment by bomber or starship.
Their lax approach to control can mean that, once unleashed, it can be difficult for them to change their approach.
Their interpretation of the Imperial Truth can mean that planets which could have achieved a negotiated settlement will instead have to be conquered.
Furthermore, airborne assaults can lead to fairly high attrition rates.
Their auxilia is among the weaker of the Legions.
Lastly their approach to government of worlds can be arbitrary. In fact they do not have a good idea of what government should look like beyond a hatred of nobility, religion and that which they see as "tyranny". Often minor conflicts with the Imperial administration can appear because of this.
Beliefs and Practices:
The Crimson Guard are strong believers in the Imperial Truth, although not perhaps so much the Imperium itself. They firmly believe that the atheism of the Imperial Truth is necessary to deliver people from tyranny. They also hold nobility in contempt and will destroy and refuse to negotiate with noble families. Xenos are seen as inherently tyrannical towards humans, and any attempt to negotiate with them as folly.
However, there is much concern in the Legion that the Imperium itself is merely becoming another form of tyranny, though this is mostly focused on the administration rather than the Emperor himself, currently.
Recruitment and Discipline:
Recruitment follows many of the standard practices. The Crimson Guard recruit from a fairly wide interplanetary base to attempt to get the candidates with the best chance of success.
Discipline as such is pretty lax. However, concerns or beliefs deemed to be tyrannical or religious are punishable by summary execution.
Characters of Interest:
Palia—The oldest and most experienced psyker of the Legion. Currently attempting to help her Primarch extend the powers of her foresight.
Thorilia—A famed air ace currently serving with the First March.
Rholia—Although currently commanding the whole of the Third March, Rholia is unusual in making her name in the command of land-based battle tanks.
Aedit—Current commander of the Second March, having made her name in jump pack assaults.
Exandit—Current commander of the First March.
Battle-cry:
"To the future!"
Legionary History:
The XVI Legion was first raised during closing days of Terra's Unification Wars, in which they took no real part beyond a few future officers seconded to other Legions for training. At this point the Legion was fairly ordinary. They used ranks. They recruited from slums of hives and were a fairly individualist bunch.
Their first deployment was during clearances of xenos from the asteroid belt, deployed largely in gunships. Possible origin of airborne role, though Emperor probably always planned that they should do so.
Reunification with their Primarch was towards the middle of the Great Crusade, leading to the abolition of ranks and introduction of a full anti-tyrannical mindset. Several former commanders were demoted. However, by and large, reunification seems to have been a fairly happy event for the XVI.