I am a very intense Warhammer player, especially 40k. I have realized that most information given on Warhammer is the rules and basic explanations on how the games work. I am going to now list the races I personally know the most information about. I hope as other people read this they will edit my article in hopes to give some people a better view of how the races work.

The Imperium

The Imperium is formed by three main military fractions; the Space Marines, the Imperial Guard, and the Sisters of Battle.

Space Marines

The Space marines are superhumans, genetically engineered to be super-strong, super-fast, and super-smart. They receive the finest weapons of the Imperium. The Space Marines are also divided into fractions known as Chapters. Each Chapter has its own history and battle tactics.

Black Templar

The Black Templar Chapter are one of the Second foundings of the Imperial Fists Chapter, and so still belive Rogal Dorn to be the Primarch. Rogal Dorn did not wish for his Legion to be split after the Horus Heresy so when they did the new Chapters had to prove that they were not heretics. The Black Templars never colonised a Home World and instead became the first crusade Chapter.

The Crusade, undertaken by High Marshal Sigismund, started 10,000 years ago soon after the Horus Heresy, and since the Chapter has never been fully assembled.

The Black templers are a fleet based Chapter using a large amount of the normal ship (Battle barge, Strike cruisers and whatnot), and many stranger ships such as forge ships and training vessels. Each Crusade will have at least one of each ship type, and will often be joined by parts of other Crusades. Each crusade is led by a Marshal, while te High Marshal is the head of the chapter and monitors the process of all the current crusades.

While the Chapter has no home world, it maintains Chapter Keeps on each world they conquer or reclaim for the Emperor. These Keeps take in Neophytes from the local population for training to become full battle brothers, and also act as points for a Crusade to be started.

The Black Templar tactics tends to wards short range fire fights and close combat assaults. This has made them important in many wars, especially Armageddon where they battled, to great success, on several Ork Hulks and in cleansing over run Hives.

Ultramarine

The Ultramarine Chapter is the name sake of the largest of Space Marine legions. When the second founding split the legion, it broke into now less than 23 Chapters, and the Ultramarine Geneseed is the most common Geneseed with 1/3 of the Space Marines being in some part Ultramarine.

The Primarch Roboute Guilliman was one of the most influencial and powerful of the Primarches, and headed the Terran Lords after the Horus Heresy. The Chapter is really a prime example of how to build a Space Marine Chapter. It follows all the rule and guideline laid out in Codex Astartes, written mainly by Roboute Guilliman. The Codex lays out Chapter organisation, standard battle tactics and much more.

Due to the Ultramarines being the goodie goodie Space Marine Chapter, many dislike them. They have earned a large amount of nicknames, unfortunately, few of which can actually be put in a guide entry.

The Ultramarines do not come with a single tactic attached to them, unlike many other Chapters. The do however, have a very versitile force and can field any of the standard units with backup from all the normal vehicles.

Space Wolves

Dark Angels

Blood Angels

Imperial Fists

White Scars

Imperial Guard

The Imperial guard are the second faction, who are based mainly upon tanks. They love heavy weaponry and their armies sometimes consist entirely of tanks. Need more info on these guys.

Sisters of Battle

The final faction is the female faction. These tough troops use flamethrowers and the such to eliminate. Need more info on these girls

Eldar

The mysterious and ancient Eldar race was once the most powerful in the universe and far greater then the Imperium has ever been. Then came the Great Fall. Chaos destroyed Eldar race leaving the remainder to travel the galaxy in gigantic ships called Craftworlds. They are more technologically advanced than the rest of the races, except for the Tau. They are however, the most intuned with their psycic powers. Which has helped them encounter the truth. They fear death above all things as they believe when someone dies they become absorbed into a shadow world controled by Chaos. Thus they have developed spirit stones which trap a soul inside them once the wearer is killed. They are saved from Chaos but now must live the rest of there lives as power for the intense Eldar Technology.

The main warriors of the Eldar are known as Aspect Warriors. Each Aspect has it's own unique fighting style. The leaders of the Aspects are known as Exarchs. (But I personally call them Space Marine Killers) The most common of these warriors are the Dire Avengers. They are swift and their exarchs are armed with the dangerous Diresword. The Pheonix Lord (The one who created the aspect and is extremely powerful)for the Dire Avengers is Asurmen, the Hand of Asuryan. Below is a list of the Aspects and their abilities.

Warp Spiders- Warp Spiders use their warp jump generators to jump in and out of warp space unexpectedly springing traps on the enemy. Traps which usually result in a lot of deaths. With the Exarch's special abilities they can take full advantage of these assaults.

Striking Scorpions- The Striking scorpions are fierce and proud. The built in blasters in their helmets make them even more deadly close combat troops. Most men who tangle with one of these warriors won't live to tell about it. The Pheonix Lord of the Striking Scorpions is Karandras, the Shadow hunter. He is not the first exarch of the Striking Scorpions. Before him came Arhra, the Father of Scorpions, who turned to evil and is now known as the Fallen Pheonix. Rumors say he might be the leader of the Dark Eldar Incubus.

Howling Banshees- The only female aspect these warriors are not judged by the gender, but how easily they can tear an opponent to shreds. They use the Banshee Masks, which let out a terrifying shriek to give them an edge in combat. "Flutter like a butterfly, sting like a bee." The leader of this aspect os Jain Zar, the Storm of Silence (note that Jain Zar actually "means" Storm of Silence. this also goes for the rest of the Pheonix Lords).

Fire Dragons- Armed with deadly fusion guns and melta bombs the fire dragons live and breath "BLOW UP THAT STUPID TANK" or "KILL THOSE SPACE MARINES". Of course even the most powerful demons of chaos can be taken do by a squad of these hardened fighters. The Pheonix Lord of the Fire Dragons is Fuegan, the Burning Lance. Feugan is probably the most loyal of the Pheonix Lords.

Shining Spears- The only aspect that rides jetbikes, these are the essence of hit strong and fast....or get torn to pieces.

Swooping Hawks- The Swooping Hawks dive out of the sky and assault the enemy. With their awesome Exarch powers they can be practically unstoppable in close combat after they fire their weapons.(sort of) Their Pheonix Lord is Baharroth, the Cry of the Wind. Baharroth is believed to be the finest pupil of Asurmen.

Dark Reapers- The Dark Reapers represent the destroyer. They excel at blowing enemies up from long range. Their Pheonix Lord is Maugan Ra, the Harvester of Souls. When the Eye of Terror expanded it caught Maugan Ra's craftworld in it's grip and all was destroyed. The only survivor was himself.

Tyranids

From the fringes of our galaxy came the deadly predators of the universe known as Tyranids. Unbeknownst to the Imperium the first real encounter of this bio-demons were on the moons of Ymgarl where they discovered the Genestealers who are the shock troops of the mighty Hive Fleets. Then came the first great Hive Fleet code-named Behemoth. It was only stopped at the homeworld of the ultramarines, who are now famous for being Tyranid Killers. Tyranids often steal the best DNA from other races and then use it to create powerful monsters able to destroy even the mightiest space marine armies. Below is a list of creatures believed to have stolen DNA and the grounds that make them suspicious.

Genestealers-Human

Biovores-Orks (physical features)

Zoanthropes-Eldar (psycic powers)

Tyrant Guard-Astartes (Fused Ribs and Black Carapace)

Soon I will add more information on races. Anyone is gladly encouraged to contribute. I will be adding more information on the races already given, and will soon be adding info on Tau. I need more info on the rest of the races. Send me info at [email protected].

Thanks!