Codex: Dark Angels

Warhammer 40,000 3th Edition

by Jervis Johnson

A Space marine is a towering warrior, whose brute strength is tempered by inhuman skill. Armed with a fearsome bolter, protected by a suit of power armour and the product of intense training and genetic manipulation, he is far beyond a mortal man, transformed into a lethal superhuman killing machine. The Space Marines are organised into Chapters, each a self-sufficient army and the most deadly group of warriors in the Imperium's arsenal. The Dark Angels are one of these Chapters, the very first to be founded at the dawn of the age of the Imperium. Once teetering on the very brink of heresy, they hide a dark and terrible secret. A secret that drives the Dark Angels to search through space and time, toward a final apocalyptic battle that will bring them redemption or damnation...

Genres: 40k, Games, Science Fiction, Fiction, Role Playing Games

25 pages, Paperback

First published May 1, 1999

About the author

Jervis is a games designer for Games Workshop.

Reviews

[Taddow · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Dark Angels are my favorite Adeptus Astartes Chapter in the Warhammer 40,000 universe. I still remember that day, long ago, when I bought the old Terminator Squad box that included eight models (of which one was a Captain and one was a Librarian) and painted them up in the original black-color of the Chapter. Reading this Codex now in its entirety, it was nice to see how they have morphed into their present state with their background being quite extensively fleshed out and the creation of new specialized army units that really work with their theme as a Chapter that really stands apart from the others.

[Brian · Rating 3 out of 5]

Bit repetitive if you have read the Space Marine codex or White Dwarf magazine. Good hobby and game info. If you are reading the Horus Heresy books do not read this until you have finished Descent and Fall of Angels since there would be some spoilers.

[Mikael]

I remember having a blast reading about these edgiest of Space Marines.

[Fabian Scherschel · Rating 3 out of 5]

This codex is now quite outdated and a replacement is expected to arrive very soon. I've read it mostly to gain historic perspective and insight in a period of Warhammer 40K that I completely missed.

The Codex is well written, but generally does not hold up against a modern-style codex from Games Workhop, especially when considering the new Chaos Space Marines one. From a gaming perspective, some things are weird here. The fact that tactical squads are more expensive than for normal Marines, for example. Their loadout seems limited too. The army has a lot of character, but in comparison to others from the time, feels underpowered. I am guessing this stems from an attempt to scale back on the one-upmanship the codex writers regularly seem to engage in. If that was the case, the attempt was abandoned quickly.

Reading this book gave me a lot of historical perspective of the Dark Angels within the 40K universe but I would not necessarily recommend it to others. A new codex is supposedly coming out very soon; read that instead.

[John Somers · Rating 2 out of 5]

6/20.