Adeptus Mechanicus army rules, detachment abilities, stratagems and lore for Warhammer 40k, with links to the full unit datasheet table.
The Adeptus Mechanicus is the official Imperial name within the Adeptus Terra for the Cult Mechanicus or Cult of the Machine based on Mars which provides the Imperium with its scientists, engineers and technicians.
The tech-adepts of the Mechanicus are the primary keepers of what is viewed as sacred wisdom, a privileged caste of Tech-priests who jealously guard the knowledge required to maintain and construct much of the Imperium's advanced technology.
In ancient times, before the current Age of the Imperium officially began following the end of the Horus Heresy, the Adeptus Mechanicus was instead called the Mechanicum. The Adeptus Mechanicus was formally separated from the larger Mechanicum of Mars by order of the Council of Terra in 012.M31. This occurred after the Red Planet had fallen to the control of the Hereteks who represented the Traitor faction of the Mechanicum loyal to the Warmaster Horus later called the "Dark Mechanicum."
The Mechanicus acknowledge the Emperor of Mankind as the ruler of the Imperium of Man, but not the religious truth of the Imperial Cult or the Ecclesiarchy, and are granted an unusual amount of political and religious autonomy within the Imperium's structure, a role protected by the ancient Treaty of Mars. The Mechanicus essentially maintains an empire-within-an-empire in Imperial space, and its interests usually, but not always, coincide with those of the wider Imperium.
Instead of the Imperial Creed, the servants of the Mechanicus follow their own dark and mysterious scriptures and worship the strange deity they call the Machine God or the "Omnissiah."
As part of this faith, the Adeptus Mechanicus believes knowledge is the true manifestation of divinity in the universe, and all creatures and artefacts that embody knowledge are holy because of it. The Emperor is the supreme object of worship for the servants of the Mechanicus, for He is the living avatar of the Machine God that is the Omnissiah.
The Emperor was recognised by the ancient Mechanicum as the fulfillment of the prophecy of the coming of the Omnissiah because He comprehends so much, and understands more about the true nature of reality than any other being in existence.
The Tech-priests of the Adeptus Mechanicus also regard organic flesh as weak and view the removal and replacement of biological tissue with mechanical, bionic parts as sacred. Most elder Tech-priests have few organic parts left and eventually become more machine than man.
The Adeptus Mechanicus is based on Mars, the very first Forge World of the Imperium, and they are the sole rulers of the Red Planet. They provide the technical and scientific experts of the Imperium and field armies of massive Titans, Questor Mechanicus Knights, Electro-priests, Skitarii and Combat Servitors.
The Adeptus Mechanicus is the one Imperial adepta that as the Cult Mechanicus actually predates the Imperium of Man itself, and was known originally as the Mechanicum of Mars. Though the Adeptus Mechanicus was formally integrated into the Imperium by the Treaty of Mars (known as the Treaty of Olympus Mons to the Mechanicum) over 10,000 Terran years before the "present" of the 41st Millennium at the dawn of the Emperor's Great Crusade to reunite Mankind in ca. 800.M30, it retains an unparalleled degree of autonomy from the rest of the Adeptus Terra for an Imperial Adepta.
This autonomy was guaranteed to the Mechanicus in the Treaty of Mars to provide the Tech-priests with immunity to the dictates of the atheistic Imperial Truth and to allow the Mechanicus to continue to exercise sovereignty over all of the Forge Worlds it had settled across the galaxy during the Age of Strife. In return, the Mechanicus agreed to aid in the construction of the massive fleets and the provision of the technical aid necessary for the Imperium of Man to launch the Great Crusade.
Whereas nearly all the citizens of the Imperium observe the tenets of one of the various sects of the Imperial Cult that worships the Emperor of Mankind as the God-Emperor, the Adeptus Mechanicus is virtually synonymous with the Cult Mechanicus, another faith that could easily be considered heretical by the rest of the Imperium if the Adeptus Mechanicus was not essential to the survival of the Imperium and if the Tech-priests had not proven their loyalty to the Emperor in countless ways.
The Adeptus Mechanicus is vitally important to Humanity because the Imperium, despite its technologically advanced state, has a very limited scientific knowledge of how its technology actually functions. This has only reinforced the prevailing Imperial view that the building and use of advanced machinery is almost a magical or religious act, fraught with ritual and inviolable instructions.
The Adeptus Mechanicus, with its inherent understanding of the Machine Spirit and the Machine God, has a near-monopoly on Standard Template Construct (STC) designs and other advanced Imperial technological knowledge. As a result, the Mechanicus wields a tremendous amount of power in the Imperium as the primary manufacturer, maintainer and repairer of everything from basic farming equipment to interstellar warships.
The birthplace of the Adeptus Mechanicus was the ancient Forge World of Mars. Mars was colonised very early in human history, long before the start of even the Dark Age of Technology, and developed a society different from Terra both culturally and in terms of technological advancement. The arid, rusty surface of Mars was terraformed, and under a man-made oxygen-nitrogen atmosphere, the Martian colony flourished, though it remained politically independent from Terra. When the era of human interstellar colonisation began, both Terra and Mars served as the co-equal mother worlds of countless new human colonies across the galaxy.
During the Dark Age of Technology, the two empires of Terra and Mars co-existed under the aegis of the decentralised human interstellar government of that era, to the mutual benefit of both. At the height of its splendour during that era, and even later in the anarchic Age of Strife, Mars despatched hundreds of colony fleets into the void. Many perished in the terrible Warp Storms that engulfed the galaxy at that time before the birth of the Chaos God Slaanesh, but others survived or made their way forward at sublight speeds in realspace.
Lore excerpt from Warhammer 40k Wiki on Fandom, available under CC BY-SA 3.0.
34 Adeptus Mechanicus datasheets on the current roster, each with its points, model statistics, keywords and abilities.
5 Adeptus Mechanicus datasheets that are no longer part of the current army roster. They are kept for reference and for players whose collections still contain the models.