Departmento Cartographicae map detailing the Badab System, ca. 911.M41
The Badab System is an Imperial star system of the Badab Sector that lies within the Maelstrom Zone of the Segmentum Ultima. With the difficulty of traveling through the region, this area of space has become a haven to pirates, Heretics and Renegades. The Maelstrom Zone is a region of lawless wilderness containing an estimated 20+ Ork empires, numerous Hrud infestations, and countless human pirate strongholds.
The Badab System was the heart of the demesne created within the Maelstrom Zone by Lufgt Huron, the Renegade Chapter Master of the Astral Claws Space Marines who bore the infamous title of the Tyrant of Badab. The Badab System served as the heart of Huron's rebellion against the Imperium during the terrible conflict known as the Badab War.
Its primary world, Badab Primaris, was finally conquered by the forces of the Loyalist Space Marines in 912.M41 at the cost of all life on that once-thriving Hive World. The fall of Badab Primaris finally brought the terrible internecine conflict to its close.
Planets of the Badab System[]
- Badab I (Pyrantis) - Pyrantis is a Molten World with a surface temperature so high that even solid rock will liquefy. Landing is impossible. Pyrantis is inimical to human life and possesses no population.
- Badab II (Badab Primaris) - Badab Primaris is now a Dead World that was once a thriving Hive World that was home to 5.17 billion people and served as the capital planet of the Badab Sector before the terrible conflict known as the Badab War scoured it of all life. It served as the throne world of Lufgt Huron, the Tyrant of Badab, and was home to his infamous Palace of Thorns as well as the fortress-monastery of Huron's Astral Claws Chapter of Space Marines. Much of the surface of Badab Primaris is currently covered in millions of tonnes of radioactive fallout, processed slag debris and the extensive ruins of depopulated hive cities and industrial plants. The toxicity of its atmosphere is deadly and inimical to all life. Before the final assault of the Loyalist Astartes upon the world in 912.M41, Badab Primaris was protected by the High Guard orbital station, a modified Inviolate-class Star Fortress that once served as the Astral Claws' Chapter base before they assumed rule over Badab Primaris after 782.M41. The Star Fortress was destroyed by the Loyalists' attack.
- Badab III (Rigeal) - Rigeal is a Dead World with a Class 7 corrosive atmosphere that is inimical to human life. Rigeal is circled by several Orbital Fleet Anchorage Stations and a Tertiary-class Orbital Ship Yard Facility. Its estimated population is 3.1 million, all of whom are concentrated in the orbital habitats.
- Badab IV (Badab Secundus) - Badab Secundus is a Dead World that was formerly life-sustaining, but its biosphere was irreparably damaged. Still, Badab Secundus is home to a population of 1.1 billion people who live in sub-hive scale sealed habitation domes. This population is on the hostile world to maintain the System Tithe Store Facility where the Badab System stockpiles all the resources required to meet the Imperial tithe and an Imperial Penitentiary Station located on the Badab IV-B moon. The planet's population is also engaged in extracting strategically valuable fissile materials from the world's crust
- Badab V (Lamius) - Lamius is a gas giant with a liquid metallic core and a hydrogen-helium atmosphere. There is limited scale exospheric gas mining operations ongoing in its upper atmosphere to gather the valuable isotope of helium-3 used as fuel in plasma generators despite the volatile continent-sized storms that often scar its surface.
- Badab VI (Sigma) - Sigma is a Dead World that was a formerly industrialised and heavily settled Imperial planet until the 39th Millennium when a catastrophic orbital shift occurred which caused the world's entire atmosphere to freeze. The entire surface of the planet is now covered in permafrost, making it uninhabitable. However, Sigma was orbited by a modified Ramilies-class Star Fortress known as Sentinel-Sigma that served as the Badab System's primary astropathic relay and which oversaw the defences of the Ring of Steel. It is unknown if the Star Fortress is still in operation.
- Badab VII - Small terrestrial planet used as a graveyard for wrecked starships and other cast-off machinery. No sustainable life.
- Ring of Steel - The Badab System was encircled by an integrated globular pattern defence cordon named by Lufgt Huron the "Ring of Steel" which was centred on the orbit of the world of Sigma. The Ring of Steel was an in-depth defensive frontier comprised of 5 tiers of space defences. From the outer portion of the ring to its innermost reaches, these defences consisted of defence gun platforms, clusters of drift mines, auto-locational Eyrine Pattern Assassin Mines, plasma web casters and shrapnel fields intended to passively damage incoming enemy starships. The Ring of Steel was broken in 912.M41 by the assault of the Loyalists, though their spaceborne forces suffered heavy casualties in ships and men as the Tyrant of Badab had intended.
Sources[]
- Imperial Armour Volume Nine - The Badab War - Part One, pp. 7, 10, 14-16, 35
- Imperial Armour Volume Ten - The Badab War - Part Two, pp. 15, 31, 34-37, 39-42, 44-49, 53
- Warhammer 40,000: Compendium, "The Badab War", pp. 33-35
- White Dwarf 101 (UK), "Index Astartes: The Badab Uprising" by Rick Priestley