Corswain
Corswain was a member of the Dark Angels legion during the Great Crusade and Horus Heresy. He was captain of the 9th Order, later the de-facto second in command of the entire legion, and is remembered as one of the greatest warriors of the era, being placed on a level of reverence as Raldoron and Sigismund. He was also a legendary swordsman, being considered one of the best out of all the legions with only Sigismund being placed higher than him.
History[edit]
Corswain was born on Caliban and inducted into the Dark Angels when the 1st legion arrived. Quite uniquely (at least to begin with) Corswain was not a member of the knightly Order, "the Order", Lion El'Jonson had joined when he had landed on Caliban. He was therefore tasked (and also groomed by the lion) to bridge the differences between the Terran born and Calabanite Astartes as he would have had a more neutral upbringing than members of the Order, to help the legion merge together in a more cohesive fashion. As Corswain rose up the ranks of the legion, he dedicated his time to "studying the blade" and because of his skill joined the ranks of the Paladins of the 9th Order, and would become part of the Lions body guard.
When the Heresy was revealed, the Dark Angels were balls deep in a war against a Xeno species and it would take them months to disengage the enemy to join the war effort. Knowing Horus had supplies and Ordinatii war-machines at a nearby forgeworld the Lion took Corswain and a small elite group of the Dark Angels to secure and deny Horus access to them. Corswain fought in the battle against the Sons of Horus and the traitor Mechanicum legion which saw the Dark Angels see off the Sons of Horus and claim the Ordinatii for themselves (which the Lion then promptly gave to Perturabo, thinking he was loyal. Oops). Corswain then accompanied the Lion and the now combat ready 1st legion, to the Thramas sector to fight the Night Lords and saw first hand the fucking spectacle that turned out to be. During the campaign a truce was called and a meeting between the Lion and Curze took place, but peace talks quickly broke down and both legions started killing each other again. Konrad Curze was able to get the better of the Lion and was beating him into the dirt, until Corswain dived in from left field, rammed his sword through Curzes back, and started chocking out the Primarch by wrapping a chain round his neck, royally fucking up Curze and forcing the Night Lords to retreat with their incapacitated Primarch, while the Dark Angels dragged away the Lion.
After this scuffle the Lion realised he needed a sure fire way to kill or incapacitate Curze so he swung round to go and retrieve the Tuchulcha and push away the Death Guard that were also trying to claim it. After using the Tuchulcha to ambush the Night Lords and the comatose Curze, the Lion seemed to realise that there was more happening than what was going on around him and gave command of half of the remaining legion to Corswain and ordered him to seek out and destroy Typhon, and his part of the Death Guard, while the Lion took the Tuchulcha and disappeared into the Ruinstorm and into Ultramar. Corswain would then lead his half of the legion in a campaign of annihilation against the traitor Legions, while taking significant casualties in return.
The Siege of Terra[edit]
Corswain wouldn't properly resurface again until The Siege of Terra, when suddenly he, and part of the Dark Angels legion, came screeching into the Sol system and hailed the Loyalist fleet that had been forced to retreat to Saturn, saying that they were here to reinforce Terra. The loyalists were very happy about the reinforcements and the armada ordered Corswain to fall in with them and to be ready to help evacuate the Emperor if the time called for it, however Corswain didn't think that hiding in Saturn's rings was manly enough and so came up with his own plan. Going to the Phalanx Corswain told the fleet that he planned to land on Terra and relight the Astronomicon so that the other legions and fleets could make it back to Terra. This plan was met with a resounding "are you mental?" by the other commanders, but Corswain pointed out that he had arrived at Terra by chance and that unless they relit the Astronomicon no other reinforcements would be likely to arrive in time. Realising he had a point, the Armada agreed to his plan and sent the Imperator Somnium, one of the Emperors flagship from the Great Crusade, to aid him as it had the technology to hide the Dark Angels and the fire power to punch a hole through part of the traitor fleet. The Imperator Somnium was cleared of all personnel except for the servitors and 3 Custodes and it, along with the Dark Angels ships, ripped a hole in the traitors line and allowed the Dark Angels to enact "Teh Shteel Rhein Prohtekwal" on the Hollow mountain while the Imperator Somnium fought to its death above them.
The Hollow mountain was defended by the Emperor's Children, who were not expecting the First Legion to suddenly fall out of the sky on their heads. They proceeded to get fucked up by the Dark Angels and not even Vassukella, Daemon Prince of the Ruinstorm, was able to stop them. After securing the Hollow Mountain, Corswain sent a message to Rogal Dorn that he had arrived, secured the Hollow Mountain and was currently figuring out a way to relight the Astronomicon. A Dark Angel under his command called Vassago suggested using the old lore of Caliban to do so, which seeing no better way Corswain agreed to. What Corswain didn't know was that Vassago was a member of, you guessed it, the Fallen that had joined Corswain's forces when he had returned to Caliban to reinforce his part of the legion. Vassago had orders from Luther to make sure Caliban came out on top of the Heresy, and was initially instructed with killing Corswain but had decided against it after seeing the traitor forces and realised that they would most likely attack Caliban if they won. Vassago was then surrounded by other members of the Fallen and bitched at for not killing Corswain, and then confronted by a hooded figure (who's probably Cypher) and attacked.
Regardless of their success at relighting the beacon and calling Ultramar for aid, Corswain and his knights were ordered by Sanguinius to stay frosty and hold the Astronomicon as long as possible against relentless traitor attacks (presumably comprised of Typhus and every other Death Guard remaining in the Siege seeking vengeance against the 1st for the Barbarus Bootyblasting) rather than join up with the other legions for the last stand at the Eternity Gate.
(More information when the Siege series actually gets finished)
Corswain would survive the Heresy and go on to fight against the Fallen at Caliban, the details of what happened and if he even survived that battle (he probably did, because he's pretty tough) are currently unknown.
Tabletop[edit]
Horus Heresy 1.0[edit]
| Pts | WS | BS | S | T | W | I | A | Ld | Sv | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Corswain: | 200 | 7 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 5 | 4 | 10 | 2+/4++(3++) |
Corswain is a duellist through and through, and should be used as a character seeking missile. He has a godly 7 in WS, but only has a 4 in BS meaning you want to get him into the thick of it as soon as you can. 4 wounds also means he's quite meaty and can take some punishment before he goes down. He has Precision Strikes meaning you can take the head off the squad Sergeant or that terminator with the Heavy Flamer if you want, and Scion of the Deathwing means you get to re-roll the first failed to hit roll in a challenge (meaning added on top of Master-crafted Corswain can re-roll 2 attacks in a challenge). Finally if he is your Warlord, he automatically has the Paladin of Glory warlord trait, which gives him Fearless and +1 to wound score to see if you win combats.
His Wargear is nothing to be sniffed at either:
- The Blade: An unimaginative name, but a pretty decent sword. It's an AP1, Master-crafted Terranic Great Sword with +2 strength but it only gets Instant Death on duels, though this isn't really a problem since it wounds MEQs and TEQs on 2's and ignores their armour saves and Duels are when you really need Instant Death.
- The Armour of the Forest and Mantel of the Champion: Gives Corswain a 2+ armour save and a 4++ invuln save that get's boosted to a 3++ in close combat, another reason to get him stuck in as quickly as possible.
One of the most effective ways to run Corswain is to attach a squad of Deathwing Companions and slap them all into a Landraider and the roll it towards the enemies warlord and HQ's. This is a fairly expensive tactic but it's also brutally effective as Corswain will make quick work of your opponent warlord and the Companions will keep him alive.
Considering he's custom built for duelling he does fairly well against all but one of the Legion duellists (take a wild guess who). His biggest problem against them is that he has an Initiative of 5 and has no buffs to it, meaning he will usually hit second against Sevatar and Eidolon, and since he doesn't have Eternal Warrior if he's wounded, he's dead. However his biggest bonus is that he has a 3++ Invuln save and has a better WS than pretty much every other legionary in the game (WS7/7.5 thanks to the Dark Angels legion rules), meaning he has a good chance of surviving the initial round of attacks and getting a wound in, to inflict Instant Death on his opponent and winning the fight. Unless he's fighting Sigismund, who has Eternal Warrior, an Instant Death weapon and forces successful Invuln saves to be re-rolled, meaning he only has to wound Corswain once (who now has a dodgy Invuln save) to win, while Corswain is stuck chipping off each one of Sigismunds wounds who is still fighting at full strength.
Horus Heresy 2.0[edit]
| Pts | M | WS | BS | S | T | W | I | A | Ld | Sv | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Corswain: | 200 | 7 | 7 | 5 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 5 | 4 | 10 | 2+/4++(3++) |
Corswain is back in the second edition with an updated set of rules, as well as significant shifts to the whole meta that make him more deadly.
The biggest shift is how weapon skill works along with his Legion trait; as a member of the Deathwing he gets a +1 to hit in melee with The Blade. But because differences in WS result in bigger bonuses and penalties, Corswain is able to hit anything of WS6 and below on a Master-Crafted 2+, and is wounding T4 on a 2+ at AP1. While anyone who attacks him with WS6 or below is hitting him on 5+ (or 6+ at WS3 or below)
He no longer requires to get through into a challenge to inflict Instant Death, though the blade inflicts Murderous Strike on a wound roll of 4+, so it's not happening all of the time, but can be useful considering now that most elite squads are made up of two wound models, so he is able to wade in and start taking out squads of dudes on his own.
- Eternal Warrior is now the sole province of Primarchs and Sigismund this edition. Literally no-one else has it. Corswain was never beating those guys anyway, but this means that everyone else has to be wary of him.
- If he does get into a challenge, he also has the Duelist's Edge (2) rule, which bumps his initiative up by two points to seven. Meaning he strikes before pretty much everybody he can feasibly kill; solving much of the problem he suffered in the last edition.
Other useful notes is that he gained a point of Ballistic Skill, just because. Also, the Deathwing Rite of War no longer sucks balls and causes an auto-lose. On top of the other bonuses and FoC chart changes, Corswain can gain +1 attack while being within 12" of an objective. Which is tasty.
Corswain is still no Sigismund this edition, but he has certainly come into his own.