deathwing pre or post heresy?

[kire]

I'm hoping some fluff guru can help. i know the deathwing painted there armor white after surviving what should have been a suicide mission. but did this happen before or after the fall. what i'm getting at is would there be deathwing amongst the fallen or just pre-deathwing terminators

also if anyone knows a good source of fluff on the fallen please post iv had a hard time finding more than a vague history

[L192837465]

The armour was painted white in HONOR of those who died on the suicide mission. And if i remember correctly, it was founded after the DA split.

[xarius]

the armour is off white in honour of an 8 man squad who cleansed their entire homeworld themselves from a genestealer cult very post heresy

[Gotthammer]

30 man squad - six survived. Post heresey.

You can get the original Deathwing Rulebook (with story) here: http://files.boardgamegeek.com/file/download/c93f12tjd/Deathwing_Rulebook.pdf

[bob]

Very much post heresy

[Forhekset]

Having read both Horus Heresy Dark Angels books, I can't recall of they had Deathwing at that point. They certainly had Ravenwing.

Neither are mentioned very much in those books. The Ravenwing were elite cavalry units prior to the coming of the Emperor.

The paint change was ages afterwards, but obviously the Deathwing existed before they repainted themselves. But like I said I can't remember if they were mentioned in those books, and if they were it was only offhand like the Ravenwing.

[Gotthammer]

As it says in the original Deathwing story I linked above, the rite of Deathwing is a death ritual performed by the people of Plainsworld (where the DAs solely recruited from at the time). It is where a warrior going on a suicide mission paints their body in funery ash as they don't expect to return to be buried.

Deathwing is also what they call the greatest of the Thunderbirds, the Thunderbird of the Emperor. The people of Plainsworld are periodically visited by this thunderbird in the guise of the Dark Angels terminators who go there for recruiting. (it is several generations betwwen each visit).

Between visits a ship crashes bearing Genestealers who enslave the populace and the returning terminators discuss wether they should fight (likely dying) or retreat and gather a full attack. They discuss their duty (including mention of chaos marines - post heresy), and eventually decide to fight as people of the plains, so perform the rite of Deathwing.

Only six of the 30 terminators survive, and re-found their clans. Many years later the future leader of Deathwing, Gabriel Broken-Knife (where the broken knife icon originally comes from) returns, hears the tale and agrees to honour the sacrifice by keeping the suit colour white (rather than the then black).

[Forhekset]

I downloaded that but didn't read it. So if there was any mention of Deathwing in the HH books, it would be a retcon and thus bad. So I think it's safe to say there wasn't.