Warhammer 40k - Lexicanum

Blood Pact

What they conquer and tear down by force of arms

is bad enough, but the damage done by the very
dread of them is disastrous.

-Marshal Blackwood, 775.M41[4a]

Chaos Portal
Khorne

This article is about the Chaos cult; for

the novel, see Blood Pact (Novel).

An Imperial soldier's rendition of a

Blood Pact soldier[4b]

The Blood Pact is a highly organized Chaos Cult

devoted to Khorne. Unlike many cultist warbands,
the Pact fought as a disciplined army, similar in
training and organization to the Imperial Guard.
Originating as the personal army of the warlord
Urlock Gaur, they quickly became a dominant
"elite" of the Chaos forces opposing the Sabbat
Worlds Crusade, and caused the people of the
Imperium no small amount of suffering and woe.
[4x][8]

History

The exact origin of the Blood Pact is unknown,

but it is generally held they originated some 3,000
years ago on a planet known as Ghourra,
sometimes pronounced Gaurra, at the edge of
the Sabbat Worlds.[4x]

At that time, the tribal society of Ghourra was

ruled by a feudal overlord, or Gaur (sometimes
referred to as "Ghour" or "Gour"). The Gaur
surrounded himself with an elite priesthood who
conducted the ritual observances by which the
Gaur made tribute to his god, Khorne. This
militant-priesthood evolved over time into a
bodyguard force which practiced its martial skills
as diligently as it had once conducted its bloody
sacrificial rites.[4x]

As the Gaur's influence grew and spread to

neighboring worlds, it was this bodyguard force
that led his conquering armies. It soon became a
mark of respect to be 'bloody-pacted" to the
Gaur. Numbers grew, recruited from vassal
worlds, and the bodyguard force eventually
became an army in its own right; the current
Blood Pact.[4x]

Uniquely, every single member of the Blood Pact

(and Imperial tactical estimates suggest there
may be as many as three quarters of a million
Blood Pact warriors) is personally inducted into
service by the Gaur himself. To prove his
allegiance in blood to both the Gaur and the
Blood God, each aspirant ritually gashes his
hands on the sharpened edges of the Gaur's
battle armor.[4x][8]

The Imperium's first encounter with the Blood

Pact occurred in the aftermath of the Battle of
Balhaut in 765.M41, when Archon Nadzybar was
slain in personal combat with Warmaster Slaydo.
A member of Slaydo's bodyguard unit, Sergeant
Commodus Ryland, was captured and
interrogated by a cultist, identifying herself as a
warrior of the Blood Pact, loyal to Urlock Gaur.[5]

After a period of infighting between Nadzybar's

Magisters and Paters, Gaur emerged to take
Nadzybar's place as the new Archon.[4x] Although
the Gaur was never counted among the most
charismatic or tactically brilliant of Nadzybar's
lieutenants, his possession of a sizable,
disciplined army - the Blood Pact - allowed him to
dominate the other Chaos warhosts.[4x]

Gaur's Blood Pact had been encountered in

combat during the early years of the Crusade, but
never properly identified. However, once he
became Archon, the Blood Pact became a
backbone element of the Chaos host. It is
believed many other arch-enemy units and
divisions, wishing to prove their loyalty to the new
Archon, converted to the Blood Pact. Within just a
few years, the Crusade forces came to recognize
the Blood Pact as elite infantry of the arch-enemy.
[1]

This recognition was aptly demonstrated at the

Battle of the Akkorite Peninsula on Belshiir Binary
in 771. A vital and much-contested world due to
its promethium wells, refineries and processing
depots, Belshiir Binary was the site of a notable
Blood Pact victory. A force of two hundred Blood
Pact troopers, supported by just four stalk-tanks
and two Loxatl brood groups, cut off and
annihilated a force of three thousand Imperial
Guardsmen. The outnumbered Blood Pact force
was commanded by an officer called Vesh
Etogaur (the second word possibly indicative of
rank, as in 'demi-gaur' or colonel) whose strict
command led to the Pact force lying in baking
heat for three days without breaking cover until
the Imperial forces had moved into the cone of
their ambush. The resulting combat lasted
twenty-two minutes. No members of the Guard
unit survived the slaughter, and the Akkorite
Peninsula refinery remained under Chaotic control
for a further fifteen months.[2][4x]

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Blood Pact Fighters[6]

Blood Pact warriors usually resemble a

particularly ragged or barbaric regiment of the
Imperial Guard. They wear fabric battledress
uniforms either looted from the corpses of
Guardsmen, or manufactured to resemble a basic
Imperial design. Over this are worn packs,
webbing and the usual assortment of infantry kit,
including a steel bowl-helmet. Because their kit,
equipment and battle dress is essentially a mix of
plunder and homemade, no two Blood Pact
troopers are ever identical. Their appearance is
rough and ill-kempt: their clothing torn, patched
and dirty, and helmets chipped and dented.[4x]

A Blood Pact member is most characterized by

their ritual iron visor, known as a "grotesque," and
which is worn by all human members. These
generally portray a grimacing, or leering face,
often coupled with an exaggerated hooked nose
or chin. These masks are usually a black color,
although it has been known for senior officers to
wear one of gold or silver.[4x]

Their armor and clothing is all a drab red, the

color of dried blood. In fact, one of the Pact's
rituals prior to battle is to dye their clothing with
the blood of their enemy. As a result, the Blood
Pact warriors exude a revolting, charnel stink,
made even less palatable by the unguents and
oils with which they anoint their bodies and their
own lax standards of hygiene. Their support
vehicles all tend to be painted this universal
crimson as well.[4x]

A Blood Pact warrior's hands always remain bare

to display the ritual scars across the palms and
knuckles, made at the time of induction to the
Pact. Often this ritual scarring covers other parts
of the body and face. The deeper and more
severe the wounds, and the amount, are part of a
unofficial honour system and devotion to Khorne.
[4x]

Organisation

The Blood Pact, originally consisting of soldiers

from the worlds around Ghourra, is a diverse
organization. As the Blood Pact rose to
prominence amongst the forces holding the
Sabbat Worlds, many lesser war bands and
forces submitted to their rule and were absorbed.
The leaders of the Pact willingly encourage the
integration of other Chaos war bands, especially
traitor Guard regiments and soldiers.[4x] The
Blood Pact is also allied with alien races and
mercenaries, such as the Loxatl.[4x][8]

The Blood Pact is a highly organized army,

consisting of soldiers rather than blood-crazed
cultists. They often have support in the form of
plundered tanks, often looted from defeated
Imperial armies or manufactured on captured
Forge Worlds. They are drilled and trained in
warfare techniques to a standard of competence
at least equivalent to the Imperial Guard. They
have excellent (often captured) communication
systems, and a firm chain of command, meaning
that they can be confidently deployed with
tactical precision. A Blood Pact General is called
an Etogaur. The Blood Pact can hit specific
targets or accomplish specific missions, and
individual warriors have the intelligence and field
training to operate independently, if necessary, for
the Pact's interests. This is what makes them so
dangerous. They are not mindless fanatics; they
are excellent battlefield soldiers in the sworn
service of Chaos.[4x] The Warband also had the
ranks of Sirdar, High Sirdar and Arnogaurs. While
one of the Blood Pact's fundamental decrees was
that they did not kill each other, the Arnogaurs
were the exception. They were given the sacred
dispensation to kill any Blood Pact member who
broke their master, Urlock Gaur's commands. The
Blood Pact also used Gore Mages, artillery
Usurper Gun vehicles and Chaos Space Marines.
Among them were the World Eaters[7a] and Dark
Tusks.[7b]

Certain elite or veteran sections of the Pact form

the so-called Death Brigades, representing the
finest and most ruthless storm squads in the
Blood Pact. Though few in number, the Death
Brigades are often encountered at the spearhead
of assaults, as the private company of senior
Chaos leaders, or deployed on specialist
missions, and are the most dreaded of all Blood
Pact units.[4x]

Combat Methods

Unlike most Khorne worshipers, the Blood Pact

favors a more disciplined and tactical style,
emphasizing the martial aspects of the Blood God
over those of the berserker. This means that the
average Blood Pact trooper will be armed with a
lasgun or autogun as his primary weapon. In
close-quarter environments such as trenches or
when storming techniques are required, they
favor plate or chain mail tunics and arm
themselves with billhooks, trench clubs and
grenades. Some are able combat specialists in
the field of demolition or sniping.[4x]

Blood Pact units will often contain a mix of heavy

and support weapons akin to those of the
Imperial Guard. Some Imperial tacticians claim
that the officers of the Blood Pact deliberately
style themselves on the Imperial Guard, and it is
certainly the case that traitor Guardsmen are used
to hone and improve the basic combat abilities of
the Pact. Such traitors, due to their relative
rareness, are distributed throughout the Pact's
numbers to disseminate good techniques. Others
point out that Blood Pact armaments resemble
those of the Imperial Guard because these are the
most commonly plundered. Several munitions-
producing Forge Worlds - especially Neffethyl and
Urdesh — were amongst the planets conquered
in the Sabbat cluster, and from them the Blood
Pact have enjoyed a ready supply of Guard-
quality weapons.[4x]

The Blood Pact - thanks to these captured Forge

Worlds - have numerous armor and artillery
formations. Blood Pact armor is generally slightly
inferior to standard Imperial issue, most of it
being Urdeshi-pattern variants such as the SteG
4, and the AT70 Reaver Battle Tanks, though they
do also have more limited numbers of the larger
and more powerful AT83 Brigand-pattern tanks as
well as a few of the rare Baneblade super-heavy
tanks. The Blood Pact also field a lighter-armored
variation of the Defiler known as the Stalk Tank.
All Blood Pact armoured vehicles are painted red,
inscribed with numerous obscene Khornate
slogans, and are often decorated with the skulls
and hides of their enemies.[1]

In addition to their fearsome weaponry and

vehicles, the Blood Pact have special psykers
known as Gore Mages. These dark wizards can
possess Blood Pact warriors with Daemonic
spirits, turning them into ferocious, almost
unstoppable creatures that they call Blood
Wolves. Also, Gore Mages radiate a sense of
irrational fear and have access to many other
powers involving blood.[3]

Notable Members

Urlock Gaur — Warlord of the Blood Pact.[8]

Saul

Mabbon

Sagittar Slaith — One of Urlock Gaur's

lieutenants.[8]

Vesh Etogaur

Mabbon Etogaur

Nautakah — World Eater, who held the rank of

Arnogaur.[7a]

Haliuk — High Sirdar.[7a]

See also

List of Chaos Cults

Sons of Sek

Sources

This article needs work on its citations.

For help on citation see the citation
guidelines.
You can help Lexicanum by fixing it.

1: White Dwarf 292 (UK), [Needs Citation]

2: Blood Pact Article (found on the old Black

Library website, accessed through the internet
archive).

3: Blood Pact (Novel), [Needs Citation]

4: The Sabbat Worlds Crusade (Background

Book)
4a: pg. 81

4b: pg. 80

4x: [Needs Citation]

5: Regicide (Short Story)

6: Warhammer Community: Look Inside the

Sabbat Worlds Crusade (Posted December 4
2019) (Last accessed 12/4/2019)

7: Urdesh: The Serpent and the Saint (Novel)

7a: Chapter 3 - Section 16

7b: Chapter 3 - Section 29

8: The Guns of Tanith (Novel) — The Saint

(Omnibus), Prologue

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