Shadow Wolves

The Shadow Wolves were a Codex-compliant, Loyalist Space Marine Chapter derived from the Imperial Fists' gene-seed and their Primarch, Rogal Dorn. As Scions of Dorn, they were known to be a zealous and faithful Chapter by reputation, fighting for the strength and honour of their Emperor and the Imperium for thousands of years, until they met their ultimate fate at the hands of a Tyranids splinter fleet in 987.M41, when their homeworld of Varadon was ravaged by the foul Tyranid-breed xenos. The Shadow Wolves were in full force as they attempted to defend their homeworld from the predations of the soulless and merciless xenos armies of the Great Devourer. Astropathic distress beacons had been sent screaming into the warp weeks before the attack, when their fortress monastery finally fell to the enemy. The Black Templars swiftly answered their brother Chapter’s summons, attempting to fight their way through the army of chitinous armour and claws, but the unrelenting ferocity of the swarming tides hampered their efforts. In the end, only a handful of the Wolves remained, their blades broken and their bolters spent, they died in honourable battle as they made their defiant last stand, still intoning the litanies of Hate, chanting their bitter fury at their alien foes even as they were utterly annihilated. A lone Shadow Wolves battle brother, though horrendously wounded and on his knees beneath the Chapters standard, attempted to maintain his Chapter’s honour to the last, for their War Banner would never be allowed to fall whilst one of the Shadow Wolves yet lived. The dying battle brother held it aloft defiantly, keeping the banner upright and proud even as the xenos creatures tore into him, dying a beautiful death.

Chapter Organisation
Like their parent Legion, the Shadow Wolves are the epitome of Codex doctrine. All ranks are able to make tactical decisions and are encouraged to act on their own initiative. The Shadow Wolves combine all arms in flexible balanced battle groups each of which can present an opponent with a diversity of threats, then press their attack so swiftly that the foe is overwhelmed before they can react. The Shadow Wolves have retained the traditional skills in urban and siege warfare, although they are quite willing to engage and defeat the enemy in open battle in any environment. They will use fortifications on the defensive, but only after all of the more aggressive options have been exhausted. The Wolves’ only weakness is perhaps a reluctance to accept the possibility of defeat that sometimes blinds them to the risks inherent in their aggressive stratagems.

Combat Doctrine
The Shadow Wolves are a fairly pragmatic Chapter of Astartes, for they seek to cause maximum attrition amongst the foe while minimising their own casualties by any means necessary. Fluidity, timing and technique are all subservient to their simple, primordial desire as an Astartes to be the last men standing in any fight. To them, survival is everything, for displays of prowess with a Bolter or blade is worth little to the dead. Not for them the Imperial Fists’ bombastic last stands or the Black Templars’ relentless advance and indiscriminate purges.

Chapter Colours
The Shadow Wolves’ Chapter colours are primarily dark purple Power Armour with silver trim on the autoreactive shoulder plates and silver on the knee pads. The eye lenses on the helmets are dark blue.

Chapter Badge
The Shadow Wolves’ Chapter badge is a silver coloured wolf’s head on a field of dark purple.

Chapter Fleet

 * The Purest Intent (Strike Cruiser) – This strike cruiser was constructed on the minor forge world of Shevilar and granted to the Shadow Wolves Chapter of the Adeptus Astartes. It had been lost with all hands, captured by xenos raiders in 966.M41, thirty-two years before the Third War for Armageddon in 998. The derelict hulk had been requisitioned by the Orks, and was a part of the massive Ork WAAAGH! that threatened Armageddon. It was shot down by Armageddon’s orbital defences after it drifted dangerously close to the planet, crash landing just outside the Hive City of Helsreach.

Trivia
The Warhammer 40K author, Aaron Dembski-Bowden helped to invent the Shadow Wolves Space Marine Chapter, on behalf of his wife Kaite. At the time of their creation his wife had just started to get into the 40K universe in a big way and having read the first three books of the Horus Heresy series, she fell in love with the Pre-Heresy Luna Wolves Legion. Inspired by this, Aaron proceeded to write a cameo for them in the novel Helsreach, making them a part of official canon. He made them a Codex-adherent Chapter with lots of wolfish iconography. He didn’t give them the savage aspect of the Space Wolves, yet he inferred that the Shadow Wolves use lots of canine imagery, similar to the Luna Wolves.