Death Skulls
Warcry	Unknown
Species	Orks
Colours	Blue, festooned with, skulls, bones and talismans
Combat Specialty	Stealing, Plundering

"Wot, dis? Naw, I've had this fer ages. Of course the paint's still wet, it's me favourite. Sell it to ya if ya like. One careful owner."

— 'Fingaz' Rutzeg, Deathskull Loota

The Death Skulls are an Ork tribe or "klan" dedicated to stealing and plundering. The Death Skulls are truly plunderers without equal. They are tremendously good at looting, borrowing, scrounging, scavenging, and stealing things from their fellow Orks, and notoriously bad at returning them. Death Skulls would make capable scientists and excellent engineers if their fascination for new things lasted longer than the time it took to steal them.

The Death Skulls see battle as a two-stage process, often hurrying the killing part in an effort to speed along the scavenging spree that follows. After the battle the Boyz really go to work, feverishly stripping the corpses of the fallen of everything from ammunition to bootlaces. Many Death Skulls will take grisly trophies such as their victim's scalp or skull into the bargain. Only when the loot is returned to the camp does the inevitable infighting break out as the Death Skulls trade, barter and auction off their ill-gotten gains.

Once they have stolen something, they personalise it to establish ownership once and for all. This often involves painting it blue, the colour which they believe attracts the eye of their Gods and protects them from harm. The superstitious Death Skulls even use blue warpaint, sometimes going so far as to paint themselves blue from head to toe the night before battle. They believe the colour blue is lucky and that it attracts the attention and favour of the Ork Gods Gork and Mork, and thus brings them better fortune on the fields of plunder.

This klan has a lot of clever and enterprising Gretchin. The Death Skulls also attract a number of Lootas because of their reputation as a bunch of loose-wallahs, spivs, and wide-boyz. As battlefield plunderers and petty camp pilferers, they often get themselves a bad name among the other klanz for selling dodgy gear that is not good enough for the Death Skull Orks to keep for themselves.

Klan AppearanceEdit

Klan ColoursEdit

Blue is considered to be a magical colour among this klan, who also paint themselves with blue warpaint to attract good luck. Skulls and bones feature prominently among their personal adornments. For instance, helmets are often cast or fashioned in the form of a grinning skull. Death Skull Orks are commonly seen festooned with bone amulets of every kind: pendants, talismans, and cherished bits of long-dead enemies. Such things hold power for the Death Skull klan. Some Death Skull warriors wear dozens of enemy ribs laced together to form a kind of breastplate. They often appear in bizarre styles of dress, the spoils of their battlefield plunder of the fallen to augment their own wargear. This results in a rag-tag appearance of various items of armour and coloured clothing, made up of various uniforms sewn together.

Klan TotemEdit

Death Skull's use a horned death's head as their totem. Sometimes it is depicted as a regular skull with horns or an alternate blue-coloured horned-skull.

Notable Death SkullsEdit

• "Grabber" Gutzbag - A legendary Loota who was so good at habitually liberating vehicles from the enemy, that it was said he could even loot an Imperial Titan and later unleash it on its former comrades. It is seen as the height of comedy for the Death Skulls to use looted vehicles and equipment against their former owners, causing utter chaos within their ranks.
• Grotsnik- Grotsnik, also called Mad Dok Grotsnik, was a typical Ork Painboy obsessed with the performance of "surjery" and rooting around in other people's heads to see what he could find -- or alter. He rose to prominence when he became the personal Dok of the future Ork Warlord Ghazghkull Thraka and Ghazghkull gave him credit for opening up his mind to the messages of the Ork Gods Gork and Mork that subsequently led Ghazghkull to lead the two greatest Ork WAAAGH!s in recent history during the Second and Third Wars for Armageddon.

SourcesEdit

• Codex: Orks (4th Edition), pg. 15
• Codex: Orks (3rd Edition), pg. 23
• Imperial Armour Volume Eight - Raid on Kastorel-Novem, pp. 113, 116-117
• White Dwarf 349 (UK), "Clan Loyalties," by Phil Kelly, pg. 30
• White Dwarf 290 (UK) "Chapter Approved: Ork Claz," by Andy Chambers and Andy Hoare

GalleryEdit

|A variant of the Death Skulls' klan icon

Death Skulls Banner patched together from captured Imperial banners

A Death Skulls Warboss Banner

Death Skulls Orks celebrating another victory

Orks of the Death Skulls klan in battle

Death Skulls Nob, one of the best-armed Orks within their klan

A Death Skulls Loota, one of the most heavily armed Orks within a klan

A Death Skulls Boy; Note that his armour and face have been daubed in the colour blue, for luck

Death Skulls Deff Dred; the vehicles of this Ork klan are often painted blue as well

A Death Skulls Mega-Dred built for Warboss Skalk Bluetoof

A Death Skulls Deffkopta cobbled together from a dozen or more scavenged vehicles

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