Discipline Master

A Discipline Master was a specialist officer often utilised by some Imperial Army regiments during the Great Crusade and Horus Heresy eras of the 30th and early 31st Millennia. These stern task masters were responsible for maintaining discipline within the regiment to which they were assigned. They were also responsible for tracking down Imperial Army deserters that repudiated their oaths to the Emperor of Mankind and shirked their soldierly responsibilities.

Discipline Masters were known to use hunting eagles to help them track their prey. Their fanatical dedication to the service of the Emperor overrode any feelings of compassion, mercy or Humanity when carrying out the summary executions of those found wanting, for which they employed a ceremonial electro-scythe.

The Discipline Master proved to be the precursor to the commissars of the Officio Prefectus who now serve with every regiment of the Astra Militarum and aboard every vessel of the Navis Imperialis, the descendants of the Imperial Army following the reformation of the Imperium after the Horus Heresy in the Time of Rebirth.

History[]

These stern warriors were deployed throughout Mankind's armed forces and were one of the few examples of outside Imperial officials that operated within the Imperialis Militia and the wider Excertus Imperialis. The task of the Discipline Master was primarily to ensure that the principles of the Imperial Truth and the manifest destiny of Humanity to rule the stars were upheld.

Chosen from war veterans from the regular Imperialis Auxilia regiments raised from the more civilised and technologically advanced worlds of the Segmentum Solar in the main, their job was to enforce order on the battlefield according to the writ of law, inspire courage and impose the Imperial Truth on often backward and insular native soldiers to whom the Imperium was often a relatively new master.

The Discipline Masters embodied the rule of distant Terra and so far as the average militia warrior was concerned, had the ear of the Emperor Himself. To falter in resolve within the sight of a Discipline Master in the heat of battle was to fail the Emperor of Humanity in person, a crime for which pain and ultimately death were judged to be fit rewards.

Unit Composition[]

2-5 Discipline Masters - Discipline Masters would form a single unit known as a Discipline Master Cadre. They were often attached to an Imperial Army regiment's headquarters. When inferior units of the regiment were deployed, each Discipline Master would be attached to a separate unit.

Wargear[]

Augmented Weapon - These are close combat weapons of various kinds which possess some form of relatively minor technological or material enhancement to their effectiveness in battle. Such weapons include vibro-blades common to Hive World murder gangs, the neural whips often employed by the Discipline Master cadres, to more exotic weapons such as the thermo-bladed axes of the Malgantine techno-clans and the fractal-fracturing crystalline bayonets of the Ketchall Janissaries. Regardless of the type, it is usually the weapon rather than the strength or skill of the wielder that is relied upon to do the damage, and they are inferior in material strength to the blades of the Legiones Astartes or the power weapons favoured by the Imperium's elite.