Home › Units › Heretic Astartes (Chaos Space Marines) › Raptors
1 / 4 · Click to enlargeLore & origins
Raptors are the dedicated jump infantry of the Chaos Space Marines and the corrupted descendants of the Legions' assault troops. During the Great Crusade, jump packs were rare and given only to elite units, and belonging to a jump-pack company carried the same prestige that Terminator Armour still carries. Horus understood the value of surprise. His assault companies were held back until an enemy showed a weakness, then dropped into it with meltagun, flamer, bolt pistol and chainsword, and their arrival turned dozens of critical battles. When he rebelled, more than half of all the Legions' jump-pack units went with him, tens of thousands of warriors.
The very role that made them great corrupted them. Troops trained to strike the weakest point in a line turned that tactic into a philosophy of preying on the weak. Their fierce independence and pride decayed into vanity. Those who ventured into the Eye of Terror grew to love the thrill of soaring above lesser beings a little too much. As the machine spirits of their packs were corrupted too, some Raptors fused with their wargear. Some now have blood that burns like high-octane fuel, eyes that can pick out prey miles away, or the power to strike like a meteor.
Raptor squads are said to have first emerged in the Night Lords, the foremost practitioners of terror warfare, and that Legion still fields them in great numbers. They have since spread across the Traitor Legions and countless renegade warbands. Many band together into Raptor Cults devoted to a god whose identity is uncertain, perhaps one of the minor powers instead of the great four. Other Chaos Space Marines see them as preening, self-absorbed egotists, and the Raptors keep aloof in return. Champions still prize their skill, and some deliberately stoke rivalries within a squad to weed out the weak.
Appearance & wargear
A Raptor's warp-tainted power armour mimics a vicious bird of prey or swooping daemon. Long exposure to Chaos has mutated it until it barely resembles the plate it once was. Amplifiers and altered vox-casters jut from helms and armour to magnify their war cries. They always wear the old, stylised jump packs, recognisable by their arched intakes and thrusters. These Heresy-era patterns were lighter and more powerful than modern Imperial packs, but nobody can build them any more, only maintain them.
Weapons & Vehicles
The brutal motorised tooth-bladed sword carried by Space Marines, Imperial Guard officers and Chaos renegades, chewing through armour a…
The signature .75-calibre rocket-propelled mass-reactive firearm of the Adeptus Astartes, firing self-propelled explosive bolts that de…
A volatile directed-energy rifle that hurls bolts of miniature sun-hot plasma capable of vaporising Terminator plate and tank armour—at…
A short-ranged thermal sub-molecular agitation weapon that flash-melts battle tank armour, bunker doors and heavy walkers into bubbling…
A volatile liquid-promethium projector that floods bunkers, trenches and xenos swarms in clinging, self-oxidising gouts of cleansing ch…
An oversized servo-assisted armoured gauntlet sheathed in a matter-shredding energy field, capable of tearing open tank hulls and crush…
A master-crafted blade sheathed in a crackling molecular disruption field that parts ceramite, bone and steel with effortless lethality…
A winged, dragon-like Daemon Engine of the Chaos Space Marines that dives from the skies to shred enemy aircraft with its claws and bat…
Explore all 48 entries in the Weapons & Vehicles armoury.
Battlefield role & tactics
Simple killing is not enough for a Raptor. Before they strike, ghostly voices and horrific threats flood the enemy's vox networks, daemonic faces haunt the skies, and shrieks echo through the night until sleepless defenders reach the edge of madness. Only when the prey is at its most vulnerable do the Raptors drop on it, usually with bolt pistols and chainswords, sometimes with flamers, meltaguns or plasma guns, and in squads of four to nine led by a champion. Lords who fight from the air are attended by great flocks of Raptors and Warp Talons, and Heldrakes are sometimes sent first to clear the enemy's anti-air.
Munitorum & Ordo Xenos Technical Dossier
Classified under Ordo and Departmento Munitorum threat-index protocols as a primary Simple killing is not enough for a Raptor. Before they strike, ghostly voices and horrific threats flood the enemy's vox networks, daemonic faces haunt the skies, and shrieks echo through the night until sleepless defenders reach the edge of madness. Only when the prey is at its most vulnerable do the Raptors drop on it, usually with bolt pistols and chainswords, sometimes with flamers, meltaguns or plasma guns, and in squads of four to nine led by a champion. Lords who fight from the air are attended by great flocks of Raptors and Warp Talons, and Heldrakes are sometimes sent first to clear the enemy's anti-air. asset of Heretic Astartes (Chaos Space Marines), Raptors relies on a tightly coupled symbiosis between operator conditioning and primary armament. Field maintenance and biological recovery logs indicate that extended deployment without liturgical recalibration or bio-stasis rest degrades targeting and metabolic stability by less than 4% per solar week—far outperforming standard sector baselines—while post-engagement recovery teams prioritize the immediate extraction of their core wargear, neural/gene-seed components, or machine-spirit memory cores before enemy scavengers can exploit them.
Notable battles & users
- Haarken Worldclaimer: the Black Legion Raptor lord whom Abaddon sent to conquer Vigilus.
- Lucoryphus and the Bleeding Eye: a cannibal Raptor Cult cell that ended its days alongside the Night Lords on Tsagualsa.
- Rhodaan: an Iron Warriors Raptor captain who took command of the shattered 3rd Grand Company during the Siege of Castellax.
- Warp Talons: Raptors so changed by the warp that they have become near-mindless, fury-like hunters.
Related
Characters (3)
Haarken Worldclaimer · Herald of the Apocalypse
Konrad Curze · Primarch of the Night Lords, the Night Haunter
Abaddon the Despoiler · Warmaster of Chaos, Lord of the Black Legion
