A mighty Chaos Champion of Tzeentch wearing a suit of Chaos Armour.
Chaos Armour is a set of finely-wrought but menacingly baroque plate armour favoured by Chaos Champions and Chaos Lords.
Some sources claim that those Warriors of Chaos lucky enough to earn a suit through their deeds can find their bodies fused with the armour until warrior and battle-plate are one.
Function[]
While all the warrior peoples of Norsca and the Northern Wastes wear some form of armour bearing the twisted marks of their unholy devotion to Chaos, the full plate armour known as Chaos Armour is a very different ilk from the iron plates and mail favoured by the Norscans and Kurgan. Many of these sets of armour hail not from mortal smithies, but from the hellish forgeworks of the Chaos Dwarfs who dwell in the Dark Lands. These Dwarf-forged sets find their way to the North via trade contacts the Chaos Dwarfs have opened in Norsca and in the Eastern Steppes.
The tribes of the North trade furs, meat, ore, and slaves to the depraved Chaos Dwarfs in order to make use of the armour for their mightiest warriors and honoured chieftains. Other sets are blood-encrusted heirlooms of the lines of Norse and Kurgan nobility, said to have been gifted to the progenitor of the line by the Dark Gods themselves. Such sets bear the numerous pitted scars of countless battles, and are festooned with the grim trophies of victory that the Northmen take from the defeated.
The Norscans are commonly described as a people with only two talents -- the forging of mighty implements of war and the spawning of mighty warriors with the deadly will to use them in battle. Such is their skill in the former that some Norscan smiths are capable of forging sets of plate armour capable of turning aside a blade as well as the finest Bretonnian alloy.
Yet even this, they claim, is crude compared to the sets of armour they have witnessed being forged on the anvils that border the Realm of Chaos. Many Norscans believe that the forging of Chaos Armour and Chaos-corrupted weapons requires the investment of the smith's very soul into the creation itself. The forging of such other-worldly armour is beyond the capabilities of most tribal blacksmiths, and indeed, all but the most skillful or most reckless actively refrain from such activity, believing the creation of true Chaos Armour to be a matter for none but the gods themselves.
The arms and armour of Chaos
Whatever its make, Chaos Armour provides a level of personal protection matched only by the gromril armour of the Dwarfs. Arrows clatter harmlessly against the dark metal, halberds shatter in two when hammered against the sabatons and gorgets of the Chaos Warriors, and even the finest warhammers can make naught but a mild dent when struck against the armour of Chaos. Such is its strength that only weapons of arcane origin stand a chance of penetrating this hellish battle-plate.
Ornate and weirdly wrought, it is forged from unknown materials that seem to writhe and change before a foe's very eyes. Reflecting in its colours and ornamentation the patron god of its wearer, many Northmen warriors often affix their sets with crude and barbaric talismans that recall the traditions of their own tribes. Many a regiment of Chaos Warriors have gone into battle enshrouded in great cloaks of bearskin and wolf, wearing necklaces fixed with wolf-teeth and the fangs of yet other beasts that are better not to mention.
Occasionally, it pleases the Dark Gods to grant these warriors a hellish unity with their armour, transforming it into a second-skin that cannot be removed. Such warriors are regarded as blessed by their compatriots, for they have now fully committed themselves to the warrior's path -- becoming true lords of battle.
Those who endure this fate silently rage against what they have become, and throw themselves into battle with the rage of a Berserker, desperately seeking death and a release from their prison of metal and pain...
Inscribed Chaos Armour[]
"Chaos Armour, inscribed with powerful litanies of hate, will glow hot and vengeful when struck."
- —Description of Inscribed Chaos Armour from Total War: Warhammer II.[4]
Chaos Armour is a gift from the Chaos Gods, an arcane suit of full plate armour that is difficult to penetrate with conventional weapons. Yet as blasphemous as it may seem, it can be further improved upon. By inscribing the litanies of hate found in the Liber Malefic, the armour is hardened even more against strikes from the foe.[4]
Canon Conflict[]
Warhammer lore is contradictory on whether or not Chaos Warriors are permanently grafted to their suits of Chaos Armour. Most sources state that it is only an occasional "gift" from the Chaos Gods, one that drives its recipient insane.
Several Chaos Warriors such as Vardek Crom, Sigvald and Egil Styrbjorn have also demonstrated otherwise.
There are other stories where Chaos Warriors directly purchased and had their Chaos Armour crafted for them by the Chaos Dwarfs.
Sources[]
- Liber Chaotica: Khorne (Background Book), pp. 40, 54
- Warhammer Armies: Hordes of Chaos (6th Edition), pg. 24
- Warhammer Armies: Warriors of Chaos (7th Edition), pg. 46
- 4: Total War: Warhammer II (PC Game)