I doubt that, I don't think the subfaction bonuses are gonna be directly combat related. I expect we'll be able to see in the dark or something though.
Because if you actually knew anything about the Night Lords, you'd know they don't have standard armor. All of their armor is scavenged off the corpses of their kinsmen or the bodies of loyalists. Winged helms weren't standard during the Great Crusade and Horus Heresy, and they aren't standard now because of active combat. The bat wings GW sells don't mean shit because they're from a different age. They were made several editions ago and are still trying to get rid of the damnable things because they aren't really popular. They're outdated because IIRC they were made around the time of the third edition. We're on the seventh. This for example, is first claw. Almost all of their armor is scavenged. Only Xarl retains his wings. They're not uniform because the Night Lords have no uniform.
This, pretty much this. Even the first Captain, Sevatar wore batwings, and in the battle versus the Dark Angels, his batwings on the helm got clipped off by bolter fire. They are more ceremonial yes, but that didn't stop some from wearing them.
Not entirely true. A large portion of the legions during the time of the Heresy were transitioning to Mark IV armor. Their standard was pretty much like any other legion, either transitioning or not. So, it's safe to assume their standard was Mark IV or Mark III. A lot of the art likes to give them the studs of Mark V "heresy" armor even. Now a days, like most Warbands/Chapters/legions that have turned from the Imperium, they don't really hesitate to take whatever they can. I'd imagine only the Iron Warriors, and the Word Bearers are legions that truly have their own manufactories and such are more "uniform". About the wings - again, it honestly varies... some wear them, some don't. At we've seen countless times on the forums here alone - people have subjective tastes. Some like them, some don't. Some don't care. To say they're not popular is... well not entirely true. As for the second point, they're just one warband, and just one example. If you remember correctly - they didn't really have the resources (especially towards the beginning of the series) because the Covenant of Blood was understaffed/undermaned. They had no apothecarium to make new astartes, nor minerals to make new armor - they just repaired the current. That's not to say all warbands are like that though. The Hunters Premonition was larger and had more supplies and everything. But the Covenant and the Premonition aren't the only named ships in the Night Lords fleets that we know. You're right about Night Lords not being particularly uniform - this was true even during the Great Crusade... but there were some standards.
Except every Night Lord warband is a scavenger by nature. The Night Lords are not the Black Legion, nor are they the Thousand Sons. They hold dominion over no empire, but rather are vultures that pick off the scraps left by others or strike the weakest prey available. They also do not carry the blessing of any Chaos God, while they are mutated, they lack any support by a daemon or one of the malevolent entities in the warp adjusting events in their favor. It's even repeated in the Talos Trilogy that the whole legion is decaying. We have no reason to believe that there is a Night Lord warband that is fully equipped and has uniformity resulting from a lavish amount of resources from current evidence. The bat-winged helm should certainly not be a starting helm or available with ease. It should be an extremely rare and hard to obtain item.
I agree with you on that. Bling should always be something you have to earn or find. Maybe a instance in a crashed battle barge where you can find it after clearing the ship's remains of gene stealers? So a bit of throwback to space hulk & some hard to find stuff. It'd make me happy.
I never said Night Lords, or any CSM for that matter, has a standard uniform - I already said there's variations to their armor, and each individual Marine. There's many things to consider - mutations, bionics, scavenged wargear; even so NightLords have some standardized aspects to them. Bat wings are their icon though - there's no arguing about it, and you can claim to know all you want. In fact, you have not offered any evidence showing that Night Lords DO NOT wear their bat wings in battle - you've only proved my point that some do, and that the miniatures and the art from Game Workshop are accurate (which is a no brainer). You've even had forum members point out to you that they DO wear the wings in battle, according to some of the fluff. So at this point, you're arguing just to argue, and I don't care to go on about it. I can agree on the point that, Night Lord marines should have to earn the bat wings, and other cool gear, as they level up and earn commendations - but that pretty standard in any MP game, particularly in MMORPGs anyhow.
Herpa derp. I already posted this, it's about as canon as you get with the appearance of first claw outside of the Book considering ADB presumably squealed like a schoogirl upon this getting sent to him. Only Xarl wore his wings. Otherwise the Night Lords had either presumably lost theirs in the years of combat or just don't. The FW Raptors don't wear the traditional wings, and the pic you posted only shows one, and well, it's just a pic.
