SPACE MARINE CHAPTERSHIPS

By Cliff Etters

CAPTIAL SHIPS

Space Marine Chaptership…………700pts

0-3 Battle Barges
You may include one Space Marine battle barge for every 1,000 points or part thereof in your fleet.

Space Marine Battle Barge…………425 pts

Space Marine Strike Cruisers………145pts

Space Marine Chapterships are only used in major Battles and may not be used in a Raid. No matter what the point value.

The Space Marine Chaptership is ponderous and slow. It may not "Come to New Heading", and only rolls 2D6 to add extra speed during "Full Speed Ahead"

Each Chapter of Space Marines has only 1 Chaptership. Each Chaptership carries the elite First Company of each chapter, Terminator Space Marines. Wearing the heaviest armor known to man, Terminators are the greatest ship-to-ship fighters in the galaxy. Once per battle you may use the Terminators in a teleport attack. All the normal rules for teleport attack apply (see the Battlefleet Gothic rulebook) except that this teleport attack may be made in addition to a normal teleport attack that turn. The Terminator's teleport attack rolls 2 dice for its hit and run attack, and applies both results (including the normal +1 bonus for being Space Marines). Once the Terminators have performed their attack, they may not be used for the rest of the battle. (unless another detachment is deployed aboard one of the chapters Battle Barges. See Adeptus Astartes Fleet List)

Space Marines are the supreme fighting force of the Imperium, and excel at ship-to-ship boarding actions, where their skill is paramount and their lack of numbers is irrelevant. To represent this, Space Marine ships add +2 to their D6 roll when they fight in a boarding action and +1 when they make a hit and run attack.

Enemy hit and run attacks against a Space Marine ship deduct 1 from their dice rolls (and so will fail on a roll of 1 or 2 before modification).

Space Marines excel at planetary landings and attacking enemy-held systems. Their entire organization and the weapons and ships at their disposal are designed solely for the purpose of reclaiming or destroying planets that have fallen into enemy hands.

In a Planetary Assault scenario, Space Marine Chapterships (though do you really want a battleship as large as a Chaptership in low orbit?), Strike Cruisers, and Battle Barges earn 2 Assault points for every turn they spend landing troops or bombarding the planet, rather than 1 point as is normal. In an Exterminatus scenario, a Chaptership or Battle Barge can be used as an Exterminator, unchanged from the following data sheet (Chapterships and Battle Barges are equipped with virus bombs and cyclotronic warheads as standard). In addition, once either is in position to exterminate the planet, you need to roll a 3+ to do so rather than a 4+.

Space Marine Chapterships carry a heavyweight battery of bombardment cannons and as part of their main armament. Bombardment cannons are huge, turret-mounted linear accelerators, capable of launching a salvo of heavy magma bomb warheads. As their name implies, bombardment cannons are used primarily for pounding planetary defenses into rubble and giving devastating orbital support to Space Marine landing forces. Bombardment cannons are equally devastating in ship-to-ship combat, capable of blasting apart any capital ship in just a few salvoes.

Special Rules: Bombardment cannons fire in the same way as weapon batteries with two exceptions.

· Bombardment cannons always hit on a 4 or more, regardless of the target's armor (even vs ordnance).

· Bombardment cannons inflict critical hits on a roll of 4 or more, rather than just on a roll of 6.

Rather than the bombers and fighters employed by Imperial Naval forces, the Adeptus Astartes make exclusive use of the Thunderhawk gunship. They also make use of other types of ordnance not widely used in the Imperial Fleet.

Special Rules

Space Marine Chapterships may fire boarding torpedoes instead of ordinary torpedoes, as detailed in the Ordnance rules in Battlefleet Gothic. Remember that as these are Space Marines, they will have a +1 bonus to their hit and run attacks if they hit an enemy ship.

Thunderhawk gunships combine the abilities of assault boats and fighters and move like any other attack craft, with a speed of 20cm. A Thunderhawk counter that is intercepted by enemy fighters or moves onto an enemy ordnance marker removes the enemy as fighters would. However, roll a dice when this happens. On a score of 4+, do not remove the Thunderhawk marker (though Thunderhawks can only remove one enemy marker in any given ordnance phase and stop moving as soon as they intercept an enemy). Note that against Eldar fighters, which also have this ability, it is possible that you end up with neither marker being removed! If this happens, either marker is free to move away in their next turn, or they can stay in place and attempt to remove their enemy again.

When a Thunderhawk marker moves into contact with an enemy ship's base, they are treated exactly like assault boats (with the +1 bonus to their hit and run attack for being Space Marines). Once a Thunderhawk marker has made its hit and run attack, it is removed from play.

Chapter Bonuses

(very Optional, I mean isn’t the Chaptership powerful enough already?)

You must have your opponent's permission to use the following rules.

Ultramarines and successor chapters: As the penultimate example of Adeptus Astartes, +1 to leadership

Blood Angels and successor chapters: Blood-thirsty and aggressive, additional +1 to boarding actions and hit-and-run attacks. +3 total! (Hey, I bought a copy of Space Hulk. Blood Angels are Dead ‘Ard!)

Dark Angels and successor chapters: When fighting Chaos, they receive a left column shift on the gunnery table due to hearing rumors of the Fallen within the fleet.

Imperial Fists and successor chapters: As some of the most stubborn Space Marine Chapters their reputations preceed them. Once during the battle the Master of the Fleet may cause his enemy to automatically fail a leadership check or lose a reroll.

Space Wolves and successor chapters: Impetuous and aggressive, the Space Wolves receive a free move at the beginning of the game.

White Scars and successor chapters: Move like lightening! Strike like thunder! If the Chaptership is present, the White Scars receive an additional 2D6 movement for all their ships each turn!

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