A Grey Knights Battle-Brother in typical panoply, including: Aegis Power Armour, Nemesis Force Halberd and wrist-mounted Storm Bolter.
A Grey Knights Battle-Brother represents the most common of the Space Marine warriors within the ranks of the Grey Knights Space Marine Chapter. Comparable to the Tactical Marines of Codex Astartes-compliant Chapters, Grey Knights Battle-Brothers are equipped and trained to fulfill the widest range of battlefield roles for an Astartes.
Armed with the Grey Knights' iconic wrist-mounted Storm Bolter, these Battle-Brothers provide the bulk of a Grey Knights force's firepower, which they are able to lay down in a devastating fusillade even as they advance implacably towards their objective.
Most Battle-Brothers are Veteran Space Marines well-versed in the many disciplines of war. In their eternal struggle against the Daemons of Chaos, no enemies hold any fear for a Grey Knights Battle-Brother and no battlefield holds any terror for them.
Role
Grey Knights Battle-Brothers are fearsome warriors trained for a single deadly purpose: the eradication of daemons and other Warp-spawn. Unlike other Astartes, a Grey Knight has been completely removed from normal life and has had his entire former personality and identity washed away by a mind-wipe, standard years of psychological conditioning and genetic enhancement using the unusually pure gene-seed of the Grey Knights which has been engineered from the sacred genome of the Emperor of Mankind Himself.
A Grey Knight exists to vanquish his foes and only ever leaves the towering walls of the Chapter's fortress-monastery on Titan to answer the call to arms. Of course, Grey Knights Battle-Brothers are more than mere killing machines; they are also cunning and intelligent, schooled in millennia of lore and secrets about their foes and able to carefully consider threats and act with meticulous planning. All of these traits make them a favoured tool of the Inquisition's Ordo Malleus and the warriors of choice when it comes to combating the greatest and most fearsome threats the Warp has to offer.
On Titan, unlike on other Space Marine Chapter homeworlds, there is no initial training for a Grey Knights Initiate as a Scout Marine as in other Chapters. There is only an unyielding and brutal regimen whose success at turning raw recruits into the finest human warriors in the galaxy has been honed over the course of standard centuries.
Only a fraction of the youths who enter the fortress-monastery on Titan as Grey Knights Neophytes survive the gruelling trials set before them. Those who finally emerge do so armoured with a superhuman physique, unyielding will, razor-sharp battle skills and an all-encompassing knowledge of daemonic lore and psychic sorcery. In short, from the moment a Grey Knight Initiate's training is complete, he is to be counted amongst the mightiest of Space Marines -- and his abilities will only improve once he is tested in battle. Only on Titan can recruits be trained so completely -- and so fast -- but only there is it so necessary.
The life of a Grey Knight is one of sacrifice and duty as he faces the worst horrors of the Warp and sends them screaming back to their foul masters. He will never know peace or respite and he will never know mercy from his enemies, not that a Grey Knight would ever hope for such things. For a Grey Knight, life only has meaning in service to the Emperor of Mankind and deeds only carry weight when undertaken in His name.
Should he live long enough, however, and survive the countless trials and struggles against his daemonic foes, he can hope to rise up within the Chapter and take on another mantle, such as that of a Paladin or a Purifier, and be counted as an elite warrior among the Emperor's elite.
Wargear
- Artificer Aegis Power Armour
- Aegis Terminator Armour
- Wrist-Mounted Storm Bolter
- Nemesis Force Weapon
- Frag Grenades and Krak Grenades
- Psyk-Out Grenades
- Liber Daemonica - The Liber Daemonica is an enduring symbol of the Grey Knight's devotion to his mission, and contains the cardinal tenets of lore culled from the dark knowledge caged within the Sanctum Sanctorum's walls. Every Grey Knight carries a copy of the Liber Daemonica in a ceramite case on his breastplate. These gnarled tomes contain the Chapter's rites of battle and detail the traditional duties of every Grey Knights' rank. The books themselves are also potent psychic talismans in their own right, with pages illuminated in silver and bound to a spine carved from the thigh bone of a martyred Imperial saint.
Psychic Powers
All Grey Knights Battle-Brothers are potent psykers and possess the ability to wield their abilities in potent combination with their fellows:
- Hammerhand - Focusing the raging power of their minds, Grey Knights can augment their already prodigious might. Even unarmed, such a warrior can crush flesh and bone in close combat -- given blade or warhammer there is little limit to what they can slay.
Notable Grey Knights Battle-Brothers
- Battle-Brother Dvorn - A member of Justicar Alaric's squad during the Hunt for the Daemon Prince Ghargatuloth, Dvorn is firmly wedded to his Nemesis Force Hammer, an unusual weapon choice for a Grey Knight but perfectly suited to his aggressive personality. He has survived three major encounters with the Forces of Chaos and after the Massacre of Sarthis Majoris, Dvorn was granted his own suit of Tactical Dreadnought Armour and a place amongst Brother-Captain Arvann Stern's retinue of Terminators.
Sources
- Codex: Grey Knights (5th Edition)
- Codex: Daemon Hunters (3rd Edition), pg. 7
- Grey Knights (Novel) by Ben Counter
- The Hammer of Daemons (Novel) by Ben Counter
- The Emperor's Gift (Novel) by Aaron Demski-Bowden
- The Killing Ground (Novel) by Graham McNeill