Plague Marines - Wargear: Many Plague Marines, particularly those who were originally members of the Death Guard Legion, still prefer to wear the Mark III Iron Pattern suits of power armour first used during the Great Crusade.Even though more modern marks of power armour had become available to them before the Horus Heresy, the Death Guard retained a large stockpile of the heavier Mark III Pattern, preferring it both for its durability and the ease with which they could customise it to better handle the rigours of the often-toxic battle zones in which the Legion excelled.The armour of Plague Marines, regardless of its type, usually suffers from severe corrosion and structural breaches over its millennia of service with a corrupted Heretic Astartes.Plague Marine power armour is often further modified with the inclusion of a heretical pattern "open vent" reactor backpack and blasphemous inconography as well as swelling or even cracking like a broken egg shell to contain the grotesquely mutated physique of its wearer.The flesh of the Plague Marines is always bloated, distended and corpulent, seething with corruption and decay and it is a terrible sight to behold. The stench alone given off by Plague Marines is enough to incapacitate many enemy troops.Yet this seemingly necrotic and decaying flesh makes the Plague Marine almost impossible to kill with small arms fire and they are able to shrug off injury and damage that would destroy even the superhuman physiology of the standard Astartes.When Imperial forces enter combat against these horrific servants of Chaos, the mass concentrated firepower of weapons more commonly employed to deal with armoured vehicles is recommended as the key to bringing down these monsters of corruption.A Plague Marine's decaying flesh also attracts maggots and flies. These insects commonly accompany all of Nurgle's forces, and some of his faithful even cultivate them, considering them sacred animals.It is not uncommon for a Plague Marine to maintain a hive of maggots on his body which constantly produce a new cloud of large black flies through the structural cracks in his power armour.Plague Marines often make use of Horus Heresy-era or more updated versions of standard Imperial ranged weaponry intended for the Adeptus Astartes, including Bolters, Bolt Pistols, Plasma Pistols, Missile Launchers and other standard weapons.These weapons often develop the same signs of corruption and ill-repair as a Plague Marine's armour and the tortured Machine Spirits of these weapons make them prone to catastrophic failures that would likely kill even a Space Marine. Yet given the Plague Marine's unhallowed tolerance for injury and pain, these dangers often prove inconsequential for one of Nurgle's chosen.Of unknown origin and design, Plague Marines sometimes carry a "cleaver" type of close combat weapon not inaccurately called a "Plague Knife" by Imperial observers.Wielded with the superhuman strength and speed of a Chaos Space Marine, these unpowered blades can pierce most forms of body armour, and can breach the protection offered even by the hardened ceramite casing of power armour if a vulnerable location is struck.If the skin of a victim is penetrated, the contaminated and necrotic slime that coats the blade will almost invariably infect the wound and poison the bloodstream, leading to a slow and agonising death in over 90% of cases.Even the genetically-augmented immune systems of the Astartes are not entirely protected from this effect. As yet the Magi Biologis of the Adeptus Mechanicus have no known antidotes or pharmaceuticals to combat this toxin.Rumours persist that some of these weapons are further empowered by the dark sorceries and taint of the Warp, against which no flesh can be spared, much like the Kinebrach Anathame that mortally wounded Horus before the start of the Heresy. Only the Ordo Malleus knows the truth.Plague Marines also carry weapons known as Blight Grenades or Death-Heads of Nurgle. These grenades are made from the heads of conquered foes of Nurgle. Constructed by Nurglite Chaos Sorcerers, the severed head is covered with a waxy mix of organic slime and contaminated blood until it is watertight.The brain cavity is then filled with pus and left to fester, becoming a poisonous gas. The result is a missile that bursts on impact, releasing a deadly acidic vapour laced with various pathogens that is capable of eating through most forms of personal armour.The full range of Plague Marines wargear is as follows:Power Armour (Any pattern)BolterPlague KnifeBlight GrenadesKrak GrenadesPlaguesword (Optional replacement for Plague Champion's Plague Knife)Bolt Pistol (Optional replacement for Plague Champion's Bolter)Plasma Pistol (Optional replacement for Plague Champion's Bolter)Plasma Gun (Optional replacement for Plague Champion's Bolter or for 2 Plague Marines' Bolters)Power Fist (Plague Champion only)Meltagun (Optional replacement for 2 Plague Marines' Bolters)Plague Spewer (Optional replacement for 2 Plague Marines' Bolters)Plague Belcher (Optional replacement for 2 Plague Marines' Bolters)Blight Launcher (Optional replacement for 2 Plague Marines' Bolters)Bubotic Axe (Optional replacement for any Plague Marine's Bolter)Mace of Contagion (Optional replacement for 2 Plague Marines' Bolters)Great Plague Cleaver (Optional replacement for 2 Plague Marines' Bolters)Flail of Corruption (Optional replacement for 2 Plague Marines' Bolters)