Detachment Focus: Shadowmark Talon (Updated October 30, 2025)

In our Detachment Focus series we take a deep dive into an army’s Detachments, covering what’s in them, how they play, and how they’ll fit into the broader meta and your games. In this Detachment Focus we’re looking at the Shadowmark Talon Detachment for the Raven Guard.

Are you sneaky? Subtle? Really good at hide and seek? Does the allure of meticulously edge-highlighting black power armor call to you from the void? Do you want all of that in a Detachment that’s ONLY for Raven Guard, and not something Ultramarines can casually dip into like they’ve also been sneaky this whole time? Then friend, I have the Detachment for you! With the release of Aethon Shaan, the Raven Guard have a “new” Detachment, and as the token Raven Guard player, I am here to tell you all about it.

Changelog

• 2025-10-30: Updated with a competitive list and some new info
• 2025-09-06: Initial publication

Unsurprisingly, Shadowmark Talon is going to play very similar to Vanguard Spearhead, with a focus on movement tricks. There are a few differences, though: The much-loved A Deadly Prize Stratagem is missing, meaning sticky objectives that hurt are out of contention. It’s been replaced with a fall back, shoot, and charge Stratagem that has a carveout for Phobos and Scout units to advance and charge. The “everyone gets precision” strat went from 2 CP to 1 CP, so you’re sure to see a lot more of it. The “flee before a charge” Stratagem has changed to be a more broadly useful reactive move of d6”, with Phobos and Scout units getting to move a flat 6”. And finally, the “uppy downy” strat was improved with its restriction going from being more than 3” away from enemy units, which was already good, to outside of Engagement Range. This is a big buff to an already fantastic stratagem. As for enhancements, they’re largely the same, with one exception: the reactive move enhancement is gone and in its place a “count the turn as one higher for the purposes of Strategic Reserves” enhancement. Which is a solid upgrade.

Broadly, what’s true about Vanguard Spearhead is true about Shadowmark Talon. Shadowmark is a little more efficient with CP, but losing sticky objectives does hurt. The enhancements give a few more options to centurion have-nots, but it’s hard to compete with one of the best datasheets in the game for what they want to do in this Detachment. Movement tricks, a focus on infantry over vehicles, and plenty of jump pack-equipped marines are what you’re looking for here, and are what will win you the day!

Aethon Shaan (85 pts)

Before we get into the nitty-gritty for the Detachment itself, we need to talk about Aethon Shaan. At the time of this writing, he’s the new Raven Guard character, and he provides an important buff to this Detachment: he allows for the Into Darkness stratagem (more on that later) to be used for 0 CP once per battle round. What this means is that he’s pretty much an auto include if you’re taking this Detachment. But the good news is that he’s super good! Let’s get into it.

Aethon Shaan is a jump-pack-equipped Chapter Master with the Raven Guard keyword. He’s got pretty much the same statline as a Jump Pack Captain, except he’s got a blistering 14” movement. For shooting, all he’s got is a piddly heavy bolt pistol, but his close combat weapon is fully ridiculous. They’re called the Claws of Severax (RIP) and they’re 7A, S5, AP-2 and D2 with twin-linked and Sustained Hits 2. That’s wild! This means he’s got the juice to take out just about any 5-man infantry squad, and can even threaten to one-turn a 10-man squad by himself.

As for abilities, he’s got Deep Strike, Lone Operative, and Stealth along with two new ones: Master of Shadows and Blackwing Mantle. Master of Shadows allows you to select one enemy unit in the command phase and until the next command phase, your whole army can re-roll charges against that unit. Sweet! Blackwing Mantle allows you to target Shaan with the Rapid Ingress and Heroic Intervention stratagems for free, even if you’ve already used them in their appropriate phases. Shaan cannot join any units, and somewhat strangely removes Kayvaan Shrike’s Lone Operative ability if you take both in the same army. I guess GW didn’t want you being able to take three different Lone Op characters messing around in your Raven Guard list. Cowards.

At 85 points, Shaan is extremely good. He’s got a massive impact within the Shadowmark Talon Detachment, and at that price will even find a home in other Detachments, too.

Shaan is clearly best when held in reserves – or put back into reserves, if you’re running this Detachment – allowing him to Rapid Ingress for free and immediately threaten the enemy’s backfield. He’s on a 50mm base and is by himself, so he’s very hard to screen out. As a Lone Operative, you can drop him 12.1” away from enemy guns and watch your opponent start to sweat, confident that he can close whatever gaps he needs to with his 14” move + charge on the following turn. He also smooths out variance with charges, and can even be used as a surprise counter-charger. When combined with the Lay Low the Tyrants Stratagem, his presence as a Rapid-Ingressing-Heroic-Intervener can mean no characters are safe.

Within the Detachment, Shaan plays a critical role. While he doesn’t generate you any CP, he will almost certainly save you 3-4 per game. His rule for reducing the cost of Into Darkness is predicated on him being on the battlefield, meaning you may want him on the table to be the target for it on the first turn. But even if you don’t, there’s plenty of savings to be had after you show up, and a nice little 20-40% command point boost during a game really helps take the edge off not having Calgar or Guilliman in your list.

The Video Version

If you’d like to watch a video version of this Detachment Focus, we’ve got you covered here:

Detachment Rule: Masters of Shadow

Each time a ranged attack targets an Adeptus Astartes unit from your army, unless the attacking model is within 12”, subtract 1 from the Hit roll and the target gets the Benefit of Cover against the attack.

We know; we are okay with it. It’s not a banger Detachment rule by any means, but it will add some ranged protection to your army. With the preponderance of plusses and re-rolls to hit in the game it’s not all that great, but we’re not really here for the Detachment rule. The natural benefit of cover does combine well with Armour of Contempt to protect some of your bigger units or vehicles when they’re trapped in the open; forcing an opponent to get to AP-3 or ignore cover in order to actually affect your save is a pretty big deal. This makes it decidedly better on shooting units than melee ones, and when you start looking at winning lists for the Shadowmark Talon you’re going to see a lot of Devastator Centurions and Inceptors.

Enhancements

Spoiler alert: They’re all fantastic! Most Shadowmark lists will want to make heavy use of these, running two or three.

• Blackwing Shroud (25 pts): Infantry model only. The bearer’s unit gets Infiltrate. Simple as. Great for getting a short-range shooting unit like Eradicators, a melee unit like Bladeguard Veterans, or a hybrid unit like Aggressors into position early in the game. Personally I like to put this on a Judiciar in Bladeguard and stick em behind a wall in no-man’s land for pure “come get some” vibes.
• Coronal Susurrant (30 pts): Phobos model only. The bearer gets the Lord of Deceit ability, allowing them to increase the cost of a stratagem by 1 CP if the Stratagem is used within 12” of the bearer. This is a potential game-winner of an ability, and is perfect on the Lieutenant with Combi-Weapon to take advantage of his reactive move and Lone Op abilities to shut opponents down. Another must-take to make one of the game’s most useful (and annoying) characters even better.
• Umbral Raptor (15 pts): The bearer gets Stealth and Lone Operative. Perfect on a Captain with Jump Pack or Captain in Gravis armor, this allows you to turn a points-efficient character into an excellent skirmisher or action monkey.
• Hunter’s Instincts (25 pts): The bearer’s unit can treat the battle round as one higher for the purposes of Strategic Reserves. This enhancement is more or less a must-take for this Detachment. It allows you to walk on a flanker or deep strike on the first turn or threaten the enemy’s deployment zone on T2. I think this one’s great on a character who can vibe with Eradicators (Biologis, Gravis Captain) to get them into position early and allow them to start melting ASAP. Note that it only impacts Strategic Reserves, so you need to specify that you’re using that pool of 500 points for reserving your unit. 

Stratagems

Just like with Vanguard, the stratagems here are legit. Losing A Deadly Prize definitely sucks, but its replacement is good, and the upgrades to three of the six might just make up for the loss.

• Armor of Contempt (1 CP): It’s back, it’s great, and you’ll use it plenty. It’s typically better in melee where you’re less likely have to deal with multiple units attacking you, but when you combine it with the benefit of cover from the Detachment rule you can get some real insane durability boosts against a key threat, like a gatling cannon despoiler.
• Lay Low the Tyrants (1 CP): A whole-ass infantry unit gets precision. In Vanguard this stratagem costs 2 CP, so it almost never saw use. But at 1 CP here, it’ll collect plenty of character heads. Beware.
• Feint and Thrust (1 CP): A unit can Fall Back, shoot, and charge. A Phobos or Scout unit can also Advance and charge. Never a bad addition to any suite of strats, look for an opportunity to use it with Shrike, as he’s in Phobos armor and whatever squad he leads now has access to move 12”, Advance, and charge. Not too shabby.
• Stunning Fusillade (1 CP): An infantry unit that targets something more than 12” away gets +1 to its BS and AP characteristics for its attacks. In addition, if one or more models are destroyed as the result of this attack, the targeted unit must take a Battle-shock test. This strat turns ranged infantry into killers. We all know its best use is for Centurion Devastators, but just about any other ranged infantry unit can benefit. Maybe a cheeky character kill with Eliminators? Why not?! Note that because it’s +1 Ballistic Skill, it stacks with effects that give +1 to hit.
• Raptorial Vigilance (1 CP): An infantry or mounted unit can make an up-to d6” reactive move when an enemy unit ends a normal, advance, or fall back move. Phobos and Scout units can instead move up to 6”. Having a reactive move stratagem in your back pocket is always a good thing, and if you’ve included a lot of Phobos and Scout units in your army, then you’ll get a ton of mileage out of it. 
• Into Darkness (1 CP): Two Phobos or Scout units or one Adeptus Astartes infantry unit can leave the battlefield and go into Strategic Reserves as long as they’re not in Engagement Range of an enemy unit. Ah yes, the “uppy-downy” strat. Critical to this Detachment’s success, this will allow you to get your heavy weapon infantry into position to do as much damage as possible. You’ll probably use this 4-5 times per game, with most or all of them being discounted by Shaan. You may be thinking that Scouts already have this ability innately, but it’s important to note that this can be used to get a unit that’s within 6” of an enemy unit, which turns off their innate ability. Fun fact: The Invictor Warsuit has the PHOBOS keyword.

Playing This Detachment

Well, it’s going to play a lot like Vanguard. Put your damage dealers in Reserves and bring them down again to kill something. Repeat. Get your infantry in position to score points, and have your counter-punching Rapid Ingress threats ready. Centurion Devastators are obviously one of the best choices for this list, able to put out a ton of damage without Oaths of Moment support. Inceptors also can do a ton of damage here, though their meteoric descent rule is a bit of a non-bo with Stunning Fusillade, as they need to be more than 12” away from their target with that strat. You are pretty much always going to want a Combi-Weapon Lieutenant with the Susurrant to cause opponents problems, and the ability to pick up any unit with Into Darkness means you can do some insane things with larger units like an Invictor Tactical Warsuit. As we mentioned earlier, it has the PHOBOS keyword, and so can take full advantage of Into Darkness and Feint and Thrust, meaning you could use it to Scout 8″ with its inherent ability, then Advance and Charge, kill something, then pick it up off the table to bring back in from reserves the following turn. 

At the end of the day, this list is in constant motion. Keep your heavy hitters on the move, flitting here and there to perform surgical strikes, all while reacting to the needs of the mission with your jump pack troops and infantry. Aethon Shaan is critical to success here, and probably needs to be kept alive in the middle turns, even though you’ll want to blend your opponent’s light infantry with him.

The Stratagems and Enhancements here push the lists you’ll build away from raw damage output and more toward “go wide” scoring, giving you a ton of tools to work with for moving around the table and staying out of enemy sightlines.

Strengths

• Mobility. This Detachment gives you a ton of movement tricks, between reactive moves, uppy-downy, and the ability to fall back and shoot/charge. You’ll seldom be stuck in a place you can’t get out of.
• Reserves tricks. You have a ton of freedom to go back into and come out of reserves here, pulling up multiple units per turn and ingressing free with Shaan on the table, plus the ability to come in from reserves early.
• Scoring. All this mobility, combined with Precision, makes a Shadowmark Talon list incredibly good at scoring secondary objectives and stealing away objectives to score primary VP.

Weaknesses

• Damage output. Like vanguard lists, Shadowmark lists specialize in scoring and movement, and less so raw damage output. You don’t have the same damage buffs here that you get in the Stormlance or even the Gladius Detachment.
• Defensive buffs. In a similar fashion, your defensive capabilities in this Detachment are limited to Armour of Contempt and not being in line of sight of enemy units. Once you are seen, your defensive options are limited.
• Phobos units are just not great. Outside of the Combi-Weapon Lieutenant, Phobos Marines just aren’t very good, and having buffs for them just feels like a waste.

Sample Lists

There’s a ton of versatility in how you can run this detachment, owing to just how much flexibility the stratagems here give you. It’s a feast for veteran players, who can use the movement tricks with high power units to always have the answers they need, where they need them.

Brenton Weiss’ List

Brenton Weiss ran this list at the Rumbel on the Rivers GT in late October, finishing as the second undefeated player at the event and besting Chaos Space Marines twice, Grey Knights, Chaos Daemons, and Space Wolves along the way. 

example list - Click to Expand

There’s a lot of good stuff in this list and Brenton makes heavy use of Devastator Centurions and bolter Inceptors as surprise shooting threats using the Stunning Fusillade Stratagem to rock extra AP and Ballistic Skill, which is huge on those Centurion Lascannons and gives you a compelling reason to take bolter Inceptors.

David Gaylard’s List

David took this list to a 7-1 record at the Coventry 40k event in late October, beating Sisters, Astra Militarum, T’au, Death Guard, and Orks on the way to a third-place finish.

Sample list - click to expand

Remember when we said that the Invictor has the PHOBOS keyword? David absolutely took notice. The Warsuit has the PHOBOS keyword, making it eligible for Shadowmark’s Advance/Charge Stratagem (on top of it having a Scout move), so amidst all the other early tricks opponents have to worry about, they also have to consider a robot sprinting across the battlefield, wasting an infantry unit that was skulking behind a wall, then punching them. Which I’m sure they love having to worry about. The other tricks are all here – big Centurion units, the 10-man early arriving Jump unit, and the loads of Inceptors and Incursors.

Final Thoughts

I honestly feel that this Detachment rips. It’s got everything you need to both destroy your opponent’s units and play the mission. It’s fun, fluffy, and has an extremely high skill ceiling. And it’s Raven Guard! I’ve been waiting all edition for something like this, and I can’t wait to give it a spin. My only regrets are that it doesn’t lean harder into jump packs, and it still centers around using Centurion Devastators, a unit that I think looks terrible and do not (and will not!) own. I’m really looking forward to what this Detachment feels like on the table, and I can’t wait to see what lists people come up with!

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