The Raven Guard had always been the smallest of the Marine legions, but after Istvaan V, their 80,000 legionnaires were reduced to barely 3,000 surviving veterans. In the fighting that followed, Ferrus Manus was killed, Vulkan was captured, and Corvus Corax barely escaped with his life. There they were betrayed, as four legions turned on them, decimating the loyalist legions almost immediately. When Horus turned traitor, the Raven Guard were one of seven legions sent to Istvaan V, joining the Iron Hands, Salamanders, Iron Warriors, Word Bearers, Alpha Legion, and Night Lords to put an end to the Warmaster’s rebellion.
The Raven Guard served the Imperium faithfully during the Great Crusade, taking part in covert operations and regularly employing guerilla tactics to accomplish their goal. This changed somewhat when the legion was reunited with its primarch: Corax purged the legion’s Terran commanders and placed a greater emphasis on stealth and quick strikes over terror tactics and brutal suppression. As the XIX Legion, the Raven Guard were primarily used for infiltration, recon, counter-insurgency, and suppression missions on behalf of the Emperor. These would essentially be replaced by the 4th edition Space Marines Codex, which released with a model for the Raven Guard’s Captain of the Third Company, Kayvaan Shrike. And while Raven Guard and their Primarch Corax finally received mention in the 2nd edition release of 40k, they wouldn’t receive rules until almost a decade later in December 2002, when they finally saw rules in their own Index Astartes article in White Dwarf #276. This led to some interesting quirks where Crimson Fists and Raptors existed before their own founding chapters.
With the release of the new Codex Supplement for Raven Guard, we’re taking a look at the XIX Legion – who they are, their history and heraldry, and how to paint them.Īlthough the Raven Guard are a First Founding Chapter, like several notable chapters from that founding they wouldn’t receive their first mentions in the fluff until the release of second edition, first appearing in White Dwarf #166 ahead of the release of the 2nd edition boxed set for Warhammer 40,000 when all of the First Founding chapters were finally named. In our How to Paint Everything series, we take a look at different armies of the Warhammer universe, examine their history and heraldry, and look at several different methods for painting them.
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