The Imperial Knights are an interesting faction. Divided into those who swore loyalty directly to the Emperor, and those loyal to the teachings of the Omnissiah, and as extension, the Mechanicum, the Knight Households are found and brought back into the fold of the ever-expanding Imperium during the Great Crusade. The reason why so many Knight Households are dependent on the Mechanicum is simply because they don't have genius engineers, technicians or experts to repair their suits for them, maintain the Knights or fix the damned weapons, so...well, they turn to the Mechanicum for that.
In 40K, each Knight Household will have dedicated Sacristans, trained and indoctrinated by the Adeptus Mechanicus to large amounts of failure because it turns out that the Sacristans have a deeper loyalty to their Knight House than the dreary cogs of the Mechanicus. At least according to
Knights of the Imperium by Graham McNeill anyway. In 30K, the Knight Households still have Sacristans to repair and maintain their suits for them, and also Forge Worlds to build them. They are actually trained by an Archmagos Prelate. Awesome. This holds true especially for the Knight Households that remain in contact with far-flung Forge Worlds, and they develop symbiotic relationships. Basically, you protect me, I fix your awesome suit for you.
Those who swear fealty to the Mechanicum are often rewarded with esoteric augmetics, and have much improved suits such as the Cerastus Knight Atropos. Pretty good deal, if you ask me. One of these oaths is known as the Sidon Protocols, because one of the writers read the cool mecha manga
Knights of Sidonia. Anyway, the Sidon Protocols is a complex web of obligation and duty that binds both House and Forge in a dangerous accord where failure to uphold the protocols leads to the Forge World robbing the Knight Household of its independence and autonomy. In return? All they get is the right to wear the Opus Machina...dude, the Aquila looks cooler. Join the Emperor's side if all you want is a cool crest.
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| Back in our time, Knights look like this... |
Anyway, why are they called Questoris? Apparently Knights who join the Expeditionary fleets of the Great Crusade receive this title of Questoris. These Households are able to maintain some measure of autonomy, thus retaining the right to sanction independent military operations and join the Ordo Questoris. They are basically household forces independently detached into the service of the Expeditionary fleets and the Great Crusade armies. Many of these autonomous Knight Houses were found by Imperial forces and thus ended up being loyal to the Emperor directly rather than to the Mechanicum, but they sometimes suffered because they lack the technological expertise needed to maintain and repair their suits. Nonetheless, the Questoris Knight Houses are more savy at bargaining with Forge Worlds and thus can have the best of both worlds, retaining loyalty to the Emperor while receiving some fringe benefits of repair and stuff. Too powerful to be subservient to Mars, but too reliant on them for trade, they maintain their autonomy yet forge interdependent links with Forge Worlds. Funnily enough, Questoris is now used to refer to the most common Knight chassis. So basically Knights Errant, Paladin, Warden, Gallant, Crusader, Styrix and Magaera are considered Questoris-class Knights, whereas you have the Cerastus chassis that includes Knights Lancer, Archeron, Castigator and Atrapos, and the Acastus chassis that covers Knights Porphyrion and Asterius. The smaller Armiger chassis would be both Armiger Knights and Armiger Knights Moirax with exotic Mechanicum weaponry, and they retcon the lore to have Dominus Knights exist during the Horus Heresy despite none of the novels mentioning them before. The poor Knights Castellan and Valiant are better off in the 41st Millennium, given how their rules suck during the Heresy, heh.
Thankfully, most Imperial Knight Houses remained loyal to the Imperium despite the events of the Horus Heresy, as well as the betrayal of the Fabricator-General of Mars, who decided to side with the warmaster. Following the example of House Taranis, most Knight Households kept their oaths to the Imperium and wrought heavy destruction upon the Traitors. After the Siege of Terra and during the Scouring, the Loyalist Knights sought out and almost completely destroyed every single Knight House that had turned Traitor. Awesome. House Devine, the Traitor Knights in
Vengeful Spirit, were driven back to hiding in the Warp after House Terryn and a bunch of Loyalist Houses set upon them with destructive vengeance. Serve them right.
Knights of the Imperium! We march!
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