Helbrecht

As sanctioned by the Imperium, he shall now remove your behind with his boot.

""WAAAAAAAHHHH!!!""

– What Hellbrecht sounds like in the BT audiobooks. Seriously.

"MY HEAD IS HERESY!!!"

– Big E pointing out Helbrecht's hairetical pate

Helbrecht: more like... puts on sunglasses... HELL YEAH!

In all seriousness, though, Helbrecht is the High Marshal of the Black Templars, which is sorta like a Chapter Master, except he also gets to command a massive fleet. He's basically the single most independent commander in the Imperium, and he alone decides where the Black Templars will go. He also rolls with some 10 to 25,000 marines At minimum (as of Faith & Fury) as opposed to the Codex-mandated 1,000.

Helbrecht plowed through the ranks of the Crusade fleets jumping from Neophyte where he helped some Sororitas push a warrior cult deep into a continent spanning volcano mountain stronghold, to Sword Brethren for slaying a Warpspawned Vampire that was controlling the Hive World of Cephian IV. From there he fought for decades alongside Marshall Daidin, and took command of his crusade when he died. He eventually became High Marshal and fucked over xenos populations as he declared a new crusade against the Cythor Fiends in an area of space where no one had ever returned from. Many more crusades of extreme rape followed. He also destroyed Imotekh the Stormlord's flagship, the Cairn-class tombship Inevitable Conqueror by slinging it into a star in revenge for being defeated and having his hand cut off. He helped out on Armageddon where he SWORE REVENGE on Ghazghkull and decided to chase him all around the galaxy. Good ol' Yarrick was planning to do the same thing and asked to hang out with the Black Templars. Helbrecht said yes, and thus began the greatest buddy cop movie of all time.

But seriously, he's the incredibly badass commander of the incredibly badass Black Templars, and his sword is made of the sword Rogal Dorn used on Horus's battle barge. People like him for a reason. To be fair, he got his ass beaten several times in duels with other warlords, but it's OK, as he is more of an admiral and general than close combat monster, and therefore is automatically better than Wardian Mary Sues or Space Wolves Gary Stu Wank, who slay Avatars instead of doing their jobs as commanders. Besides, he has Emperor's Champions for kicking the shit out of enemy close combat monsters.

Never mind he stabbed a Daemon Prince to death with only a knife back when he was an initiate.

Helbrecht is actually an interesting character because he doesn't punch avatars to death or skullfuck bloodthirsters on a daily basis. He gets beat down by Imotekh because Imotekh kept regenerating his wounds, wearing Helbrecht down before taking Helbrecht's hand as a reminder. Helbrecht, being a Black Templar, took this loss as an affront to his honour, his bionic hand a constant reminder of his failure. He eventually gets payback erasing the stain of dishonour, mind you he was only a marshal at this time. This happens again with the Cythor Fiends no spoilers but things don't go as planned and Helbrecht sees this as a failure. He forges on leading the Black Templars in Armaggedon however he doesn't singlehandedly rape the largest ork boss he can find and rout a thousand greenskins, he takes an axe to the stomach but ensures a bloody victory. Helbrecht is a master swordsman. He is a solid tactician and superb admiral but he's not invincible or flawless. He actually loses battles and makes mistakes which is why people like him. His spirit is unquenchable and his character isn't corrupted with I'M A TACTICAL GENIUS. And get this, he is not some Mary Tzu or other flawless tactician either. What he is is an effective pragmatist who knows when to kill and when to lead. Helbrecht is awesome. Deus-Imperator Vult!

Although his voice makes him sound like a nerd.

On the Tabletop

7th Edition	Pts	WS	BS	S	T	W	I	A	Ld	Sv
High Marshal Helbrecht:	180	6	5	4	4	4	5	4	10	2+/4++

8th Edition	Pts	WS	BS	S	T	W	A	Ld	Sv
High Marshal Helbrecht:	150	2+	2+	4	4	6	5	9	2+/4++

9th Edition	Pts	WS	BS	S	T	W	A	Ld	Sv
High Marshal Helbrecht:	160	2+	2+	4	4	8	6	9	2+/4++

Pre 9th: Helbrecht is a Space Marine Warboss, no kidding. He has ATSKNF, and Chapter Tactics: Black Templars (Adamantium Will and Crusader, plus he gets Rage and Counterattack if anybody dies to shooting), and his unique rule gives him the rather awesome ability to call a WAAAAGH give all black templars on the field Fleet and Hatred for one assault phase of your choosing. His warlord trait gives him and his squad Furious Charge, which is great. Gear wise he has artificer armor, an iron halo, frag and krak grenades, a combi-melta, and a relic power sword that gives him an extra D3 attacks on the charge.

Honestly, Helbrecht is used a lot like Ghazghkull. Send him up the field charging at your enemy's lines with a bunch of Marines/Boyz, call the WAAAGH! when you're getting close, and everything in your opponent's army will die from that charge. He's pretty good on his own with a potential 7 attacks on the charge plus whatever bonuses he can pick up from USR's, plus he gives his whole unit Furious Charge. He's a relatively straightforward character; just run him up to the enemy and kill whatever's in front of him.

For some reason GeeDubs decided that the chapter master of a FLEET based chapter shouldn't have orbital bombardment.

9th: Come 9th edition Helbrecht is a monster of a frontline commander, with capital F. His warlord trait gives him 1+ to advance and charge rolls, and +1 to charge rolls to any BLACK TEMPLAR units, allowing his boys to join in any fight he is throwing down in. Additionally, to make him an even scarier commander, in the fight phase his 6" aura gives 1+ strength to all BLACK TEMPLAR CORE units, and re roll all attack rolls of 1 while in the command phase he can let one BLACK TEMPLARS CORE/CHARACTER unit re-roll all hit rolls. Finally, both his gun (now a combi-melta bolt rifle so he gets some good range on his gun) and his sword have 2 profiles (and his thralls ready to throw some meager hands as well) allowing him to either clear chaff or pop a fucking Rhino filled with heretics or shave the legs off a knight.

The one major drawback to all this awesome is the fact that he's now a Primaris Marine. While this gives him quite a bit of access to some powerful stratagems, it also means that his transport options are now severely scaled back. Gone are the days of cramming him into a Land Raider full of eager initiates and neophytes, now he has to live with the smaller Impulsors and Repulsors with only one Crusader Squad.

In 9th He is an easy choice for a HQ slot to lead your Black templars into battle.

Gallery

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  Sitting like the boss that he is.

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  Dat big-ass sword...

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  For his level of badass, the servitors fight among themselves to earn the right to clean his giant sword for him

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  He came here to slay orks and burn heretics and he's just run out of orks... (ironically the servitor cleaning his sword is more famous than the model itself)

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  The original artwork for the primaris model - with fucking artist credit (MG)