Blood Angels - Legion Organisation: In all of its incarnations, the IXth Legion defied the standard by which the Legiones Astartes were measured. In its earliest days, it operated with such a simple order of battle and command structure that it could barely be called an army, consisting only of massed infantry companies with few specialised troops of any kind.Most often these troops were equipped as "reaver" squads, close quarters optimised and wielding arms requiring limited resupply, the perfect warriors for operations undertaken at arm's length from the main force of the Great Crusade. The aberrant quirks of the Legion, the Red Thirst that haunted its warriors, wreaked havoc on its discipline and made any attempt at large scale organisation difficult.Tactics were often developed and employed at the company or even squad level during combat rather than being part of a larger Legion-wide approach to strategy. This unique manner of operation, fighting at a distance from other units and with limited oversight by the early Imperium's Divisio Militaris, served to limit the impact of the Legion's more aberrant practises on the morale of allied units.As such there was no concerted effort to bring the Legion into compliance with others of the Imperial Host, and it was a matter of tacit complicity among the various generals and commanders that fought alongside the IXth Legion that it was to be allowed to operate in a manner of its own choosing.Its first commanders were more warlords than true officers, they enforced discipline at the point of a sword, earned respect with the strength of their arms, and they walked the battlefield as visceral forces of nature. When these respected commanders advanced, the warriors of the IXth Legion followed. When they held the line, their followers dug in, and when they laid down their blades, those around them ceased the killing. It was a brutally efficient structure, one that could be impeded only by the infliction of massive casualties, for even if one warlord fell, there were a dozen veterans ready to step forwards and take his place.This was all to change with the return of Sanguinius. The winged Primarch was to bring a sense of order to the often fractious Legion, stamping a new structure onto it in the hopes of containing its hunger. Though in essence this new order would seem to be in accord with the Principia Bellicosa, the schema by which the other Legions were organised, in actuality it also varied a great deal from the standard pattern.It retained the basic structure of companies, initially forming the Legion into 200 companies of approximately 300 Astartes warriors each, although by the last years of the Great Crusade this would have increased to 300 companies each of 500 warriors. However, past this basic structure there were many discrepancies, each chosen by the Great Angel to serve a purpose in his plans.These companies were grouped into "Hosts" for campaigns requiring greater force of numbers than that possessed of a single company, though each Host was a temporary creature broken and made as tactical need required.Sanguinius next created three "Spheres" to encompass his Hosts, three chambers by which he would give order and purpose to the warriors of the Legion. Each was separate and distinct from the Three Hundred Companies and the strictures of the Principia Bellicosa, forming a distinct strata of organisation that allowed the transhuman warriors of the IXth Legion to focus their hunger and rage towards a single end and to conquer it.Yet it was not merely a blunt tool, but an elegant and artful plan designed to promote the finer qualities of the Legion while providing an outlet for the more base. It was the Great Angel's masterwork, the fulfilment of an oath and the salvation of his children.The outermost of the three Spheres, the Third Sphere, would encompass the rank-and-file of the Legion, the warriors that plied blade and Bolter on the battlefield. Known within the Legion as the Malak, these warriors had but one duty -- to fight at the order of their captains. They obeyed, they killed and they practised the arts granted them by the Primarch, and by these simple disciplines and the endless focus of their transhuman minds they staved off the depredations of their hunger.Within this Sphere there were but few distinctions, simple titles and orders for those who excelled in specific arts of war and peace, exemplars of their tasks and angels of small actions. These were the marksmen, poets and duellists of the Legion, its strong right hand and beating heart, and though these were but small honours, they were held dear by those who won them.The Second Sphere was composed of the commanders and leaders of the Legion, the powers and dominions that stood at the side of Sanguinius. To them fell the duty of command, of the execution of Sanguinius' wishes with alacrity and sound judgement. Unlike those who fought at their command, they bore the burden of free will, of time to think and ponder as they would while the curse stalked them.They were the planners and strategists of the crimson host, they directed battles and wars as lesser men directed symphonies, utilising each instrument at their command to its utmost. As the rank and file found peace in their studies, so too did each of the mighty become a master of many disciplines, those of the pen and brush as well as those of the blade and gun.Though they were not the single-minded fanatics of Legions such as Angron's red reapers or Roboute Guilliman's famed tacticians, there were few who could match them in the arts of war taken as a whole.The First Sphere, the final demarcation of Sanguinius' new Legion, comprised the ranks of the "Immortals." These warriors stood within the presence of the Primarch; they did not operate within one of the Three Hundred Companies but as the guards and servants of the Great Angel himself.Each, when inducted into the ranks of the First Sphere, gave up his common name to take on another and gave up his identity to do the work of the Primarch without guilt or regret, without the self to interfere with their duty. They were Sanguinius' wrath, his stern resolve and his watchful eyes each given form and purpose. Upon these warriors he depended for the most dangerous of tasks, to fight upon those battlefields and to act upon those errands that would tarnish the soul and bring the hunger roaring to the fore.By the armour of the new names and persona that the warriors of the First Sphere wore like their own, they put off the toll of their actions and emerged from their service untarnished, to take their places in the ranks once again.