Salamanders (Chapter)
| Salamanders | ||
|---|---|---|
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| Battle Cry | "Into the fires of battle, unto the anvil of war!" | |
| Number | XVIII | |
| Founding | First Founding | |
| Successors of | N/A | |
| Successor Chapters | Storm Giants and Black Dragons are suspected | |
| Chapter Master | Tu'Shan | |
| Primarch | Vulkan | |
| Homeworld | Nocturne | |
| Strength | 940 (1 Veteran Company, 6 Battle Companies, 1 Scout Company)* confirmed in novel "Rebirth" | |
| Specialty | Close quarters battle | |
| Allegiance | Imperium of Man | |
| Colours | Green, black, gold | |
The Salamanders are one of the First Founding Space Marine Chapters in Warhammer 40,000. They are known for their love of flamer and melta weapons, preference for close-quarters combat, complete unwillingness to retreat or surrender and being fairly nice guys by space marine standards. They are also infamous for proving that Games Workshop is racist (at least according to /tg/) and are arguably the most shit-upon Chapter fluff-wise, besides the Lamenters, Raven Guard, and Iron Hands. The chapter is named after the mythological fire-lizard of the same name.
Salamanders in WH40K
The Salamanders is a Space Marine chapter based on the Death World Nocturne. Nocturne is a volcanic planet with some truly ridiculous shifting gravity. As such, its people developed a slow, methodical approach to life, coupled with a healthy respect/fetish for fire. Salamanders have somewhat slower reaction time compared to other Astartes (but still blindingly fast compared to humans; it's like comparing Core 2 Duo, Core i7 and Pentium I). The planet's only reason for continued settlement is its rich mineral deposits, making metalworking an important profession to the point of bordering on a priesthood. These traits carried over to the Salamanders, who are known amongst other things for fielding tough, hard-to-break units and for giving every man and his servo-skull a flamer or melta gun.(Put a couple of C'tan with the Lord of Fire power in your necron army for the lulz.) They are also well known for making almost all of their own equipment by hand, with each man held responsible for making and maintaining his own armor. They import the few things they cannot manufacture on their home world directly from the Adeptus Mechanicus, who likes them more than the ungrateful dicks who keep using up all their ammunition on drills and "practice fights". The rest of their wargear is made by the Chapter artificers and Techmarines and they produce some of the best armor and weapons of any marine chapter, because they're not busy repairing every scratch on the armor of the other 940 (1 Veteran Company, 6 Battle Companies, 1 Scout Company). The result is that each marine is equipped with practically master-crafted weapons and wears near-artificer level armor. For comparison, Artificer armor is basically equal to terminator armor in capabilities. Their entire chapter is like that.
The Salamanders
The Salamanders themselves are perhaps the most bro-tier of all Space Marine chapters, the Space Wolves coming in a close second. They regularly act in thankless rearguard or civilian defense actions, as seen on Armageddon, and rather than spend their free time in their super-awesome orbital fortress monastery, they hang out on the planet's surface chilling with the locals, many actually living normal lives among the people or wandering the planet as hermits when not on active combat duty.
In terms of tactics, the Salamanders are one of the simpler chapters; "Wait for it...", "Burn that shit", and "Never say die" are about the sum of their tactics. The number of heat-based weapons they can field is truly alarming, as is a certain special character of theirs who can make them twin-linked. The fact that each man repairs and maintain his own armor ensures that their chapter Artificers can be free to make truly awesome stuff. They field few if any vehicles, and those they do field tend to be big mobile blocks of armor rather than zippy little flyers because of the lulzy gravitation on Nocturne, which ensures you can't fly a Speeder there without risking sudden anti-grav failure.
Of course, if you ask a fa/tg/uy what comes to mind first when they hear the word "Salamanders," you're likely to be answered with a racial slur and/or a number of pictures showing fried chicken and waterm... *BLAM!* DISCRIMINATION AND STEREOTYPING AGAINST THE EMPEROR'S DEFENDERS OF HUMANITY BECAUSE OF THEIR SKIN COLOR IS HERESY!. This is because, due to genetic radiation protection, all Salamanders are black. We're talking coal black, pitch black, hexadecimal code #000000, the missing word in the phrase "...as the void of space." That kind of black (which actually is not uncommon among Central Africans; the reason most black people you can think of are lighter is because they are A: African-American, and thus mixed with Europeans; and B: Of West African descent, for the same reason (Europeans took most of their slaves from the shores). With glowing red eyes.
They're the only known black people in the universe, is what we're trying to say here (Though several other places, including Catachan and Tallarn would beg to differ, not to mention the dark-skinned sons of Elysium).
One would think that with all of the fire motifs in their chapter, that the Sisters of Battle would be best buddies with these Marines. Unfortunately, due to racism, all the GW writers are scared that the Salamanders are snatchin' up all their white womenz (Probably also has something to do with the whole "Promethean Cult" being a definite outlier on the scale of "Acceptable ways to worship the God-Emperor").
Also, that bit about tattoos in the racist jokes under here? Totally true. That's seriously a thing, they just use brands instead.
And if that wasn't enough, the ally matrix in ForgeWorld's Horus Heresy spinoff demonstrates that the Salamanders were the most liked of all the legions. Seriously, the only factions rivaling them for good ties are the Imperial army and the Mechanicum (who everyone kisses up to anyway). Hilariously, one of the 3 chapters they dislike (though not enough to put them on red terms with anyone) are the Ultramarines. They weren't fans of the Word Bearers either, even before the whole Heresy and ritual murder-torture thing.
Racism Allegations
The Salamanders are the only Space Marine chapter that entirely comprises black people and was thought to be the only Space Marine chapter to harbor black people up until Jonah Orion from the Blood Ravens came into the storyline (Most probably stolen from Salamanders as with all other relics). The accusations either came from stereotyping or that being the only Space Marine chapter with black people evoked segregation.
This was explained in early editions by the legion descending from Vulkan; his dark (and toughened) skin was designed to be proof against the heat and radiation of Nocturne, his death-world homeworld. 5th Edition SM Codex explains this trait as the reaction of the Melanochromic organ implant, which indeed changes the skin color according to environment (so Marines should turn black when they face intense sunlight) to radiation on Nocturne. The full physical appearance of a Salamander Space Marines is red eyes (hair color, if they have any hair, is unknown) and their skin is actual black. This skin coloration, while rare, does occur in real-life. For example, among some of the people from West African countries such as Ghana and Nigeria, and it's more common among Central African countries such as Cameroon.
They also have no African features whatsoever. Appearing simply as Caucasians with skin as dark as the void. This makes the Salamanders look like characters from a minstrel show, since they now look like Caucasians wearing blackface. No! No, no! Go jump down a hole Games Workshop, especially Matt Ward, and stay there until you learn something about being racially/ethnically sensitive!
The ideal solution would be to have more ethnic diversity in most if not all the Space Marine chapters (and the other playable factions in the Imperium). Unfortunately, racism allegations aside, this is Games Workshop we're talking about; they're about as sensible as Khorne and as malleable as Nurgle. (Seriously, look at some of their art. It's not like they DON'T have SOME black people. Where else would the Blood Ravens steal Jonah Orion from?)
(Actually the Tome of Fire books by Nick Kyme reveal that the native population of Nocturne IS "black" in the modern day sense, along with some rare albino populations that live in caves and rarely see sunlight. Thus by joining the Salamanders, a neophyte becomes "super-black".)
Gallery
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Sorry Sarge, but your Thunderhammer is Epic Fail.
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If at first you don't succeed. Twin-linked goodness.
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Kill it with FIRE! Always!
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Even in death, I still Burn Shit Up!
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In all honesty though, they're pretty nice guys...
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They're even great with children!
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Vulkan He'stan's artificer suit
