Once more, the Black Templars take the Emperor’s light to the dark corners of the galaxy – now with a brand new Codex. Graham McNeill dons his power armour and gives us a taste of what to expect in Codex: Black Templars.

The origins of the Black Templars lie amid the ashes of the Horus Heresy, when the Emperor’s most trusted warrior, the Primarch Horus, turned upon the Master of Mankind and began his galactic-wide rebellion. Though Horus was eventually defeated, the Emperor was near death, and his vision of a galaxy dominated and ruled from Terra lay in ruins. In the wake of this conflict, Roboute Guilliman, Primarch of the Ultramarine Legion, decreed in his Codex Astartes that each of the Space Marine Legions was to be broken into Chapters of a thousand warriors. No longer would one man wield the power of an entire Space Marine Legion.

However, not all the Primarchs accepted this dictum, and Rogal Dorn of the Imperial Fists refused to have his Legion broken up when the Imperium sorely needed such warriors. Guilliman branded Dorn a rebel for refusing to obey the Codex, and in return, Dorn called Guilliman a coward – for his Legion had been far from Terra in the last days of the Heresy. Matters threatened to come to a head when an Imperial Fist vessel was fired upon. The Imperium seemed certain to plunge into another bloody war.

CRUSADERS OF THE EMPEROR
Given their fleet-based nature, the Black Templars are rarely assembled as a Chapter. Instead, they are divided into a number of Crusades. The size of these Crusades can vary immensely, sometimes as few as 50 to 100 warriors, sometimes the equivalent of several Companies from a Codex Chapter. Only the High Marshal of the Chapter has any idea how many Black Templars Space Marines there are. However, it is obvious that they are far more numerous than most conventional Chapters, although they are dispersed over a much wider area. Each Crusade of the Black Templars continues the first mission of the Space Marines: to seek out the enemies of the Emperor and destroy them before moving onward to find the next foe to be eliminated. Black Templars lust to crush the enemies of Mankind and show no tolerance for heretics, mutants, witches, aliens, or other abomination, against the Emperor.

FIGHTING COMPANIES
In battle, the Black Templars continue to fight in the style of their founder Sigismund and prefer close combat to ranged warfare. Face-to-face with his enemy, a Black Templar can earn glory and respect and be sure that his foe is truly vanquished. The Templars fight with righteous fury and the noblest ideals of honour, and are loathe to retreat before an enemy. They will drive toward the foe relentlessly, their own casualties serving only to spur them on faster, hungry for vengeance on the slayers of their brethren.