Dark Angels Armour and Squad Markings

Painting placement guide
Shoulders, company knees and squad identity← Collection overview
Marking a model
Left and right mean the model’s own sides. Chapter, company, battlefield role, squad and personal honours each identify a different aspect of the model. A unit attached to a mixed strike force does not automatically become Deathwing or Ravenwing. Start with the chapter map.
Placement
Standard power armour
Wearer-left
Chapter badge
Wearer-right
Role / squad
Terminator armour
Wearer-left
Crux Terminatus
Wearer-right
Chapter / wing badge
Power armour normally has Chapter identity model-left and squad insignia model-right. Terminators reserve the left for their Crux and shift identity right. Codex Astartes shoulder convention.
Armour exception
Studded shoulder exception: when Mark VI-style studs occupy the wearer's left pauldron, put Chapter identity on the right and relocate or reduce the role/squad device. The armour layout overrides the usual shoulder arrangement. GW's explanation of the studded pauldron.
Green Dark Angels use white Chapter identity, red role badges, and model-left company knees. Ely's Dark Angels placement guide.
Helmet and rim colours normally follow the armour, rather than Ultramarines-style rank helmets or company-coloured rims. Forehead ornaments, robes and personal heraldry add distinction. Ely's studio-convention checklist. This army’s sergeant shields add a rank marker alongside the company knee and squad identification.
The battle companies are 3–5. Ely’s isolated ‘2–5’ conflicts with the Ravenwing’s role as the 2nd Company.
Company knees: visual key
These patterns were checked against the diagrams linked from Lexicanum's individual company entries, citing Codex: Dark Angels (7th edition), p.13. Diagram-left/right below means looking directly at the badge, not the model's left/right limbs. Old scans are colour references only in the broad sense; pale fields may read white or bone. They are not paint swatches.
3rd Company
Red diagonal `/` band over dark green.
4th Company
Upper half black/white chequers; lower half pale.
5th Company
Quartered: pale upper-left/lower-right; dark green upper-right/lower-left.
6th Company
Vertical split: pale left, dark green right.
7th Company
Broad dark-green downward-pointing chevron on pale field.
8th Company
Diagonal split: black upper-left, dark green lower-right.
9th Company
Red horizontal band across pale field.
10th Company
Plain green; no separate patterned company knee.
Deathwing and Ravenwing identify their specialised companies through livery and badges; use their Deathwing and Ravenwing pages for exceptions and squad heraldry.
Battlefield roles
Dark Angels role devices: double-ended vertical arrow, Battleline; four-way arrow, Close Support; blast, Fire Support. Ely's Dark Angels guide.
Knotley’s 2026 codex review lists the following infantry roles. This is background organisation, not the game’s BATTLELINE keyword:
Battleline
Infantry examples
Intercessors, Heavy Intercessors, Infiltrators.
Close Support
Infantry examples
Assault Intercessors, including jump packs; Inceptors, Incursors, Reivers, Infernus.
Fire Support
Infantry examples
Aggressors, Desolation, Eliminators, Eradicators, Hellblasters.
For the full role list and discussion, see Knotley’s 2026 codex review. The historical notes cover older squad types and their markings.
Unresolved · Infernus
Infernus markings vary between sources. The printed categorisation says Close Support, while GW miniatures and earlier presentation display Fire Support. Lexicanum favours the studio markings and suggests a codex typo, but this is its interpretation. Close Support follows the printed category; Fire Support follows the studio miniatures. Conflict and citations.
Squad numbers and attachments
The usual battle-company plan is 1–6 Battleline, 7–8 Close Support, 9–10 Fire Support. Reserve squads can extend a reinforced company to 11–20, without repeating that fixed role allocation. The 10th's Vanguard numbering is also more flexible. A ten-man squad split into two combat squads can retain one squad number; two tabletop units do not necessarily mean two permanent organisational squads. Codex Astartes organisation and numbering.
Keep a roster recording parent company, attached company, squad number and chosen badge. Applying the generic attached-company heraldry convention to Dark Angels knees is a reasonable planning interpretation; it does not justify repainting Deathwing bone or Ravenwing black green. Retaining a reserve company's own identity is the more conservative option when no specific attachment example is being followed.
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Collection overview · Our army scheme