Alternate Heresy Community Project

[Conn Eremon]

Yes, the Blackened Fists are a dead end Legion. This is deliberate, though. For one, the idea of a Legion utterly destroying itself so completely as to cease to exist as a Legion goes far beyond what even the canon Shattered live through. Two, it equalized the playing field, by bring it back to nine vs. nine. That was more of a big deal when we had a XX and a XXI Legion, but with Aquilanus' split of the XX, it is still apt to the situation.

 

But yes, it won't be always so clean. The Corax Coup has a whole heck of a lot of things different in it, and that's going to mean that some canon thongs simply won't exist.

 

But hey. Can you imagine an Executioners successor that faithfully follows the sight, despite it leading them to misfortune after misfortune?

 

As for the First Legion, the lines will be much more blurred by the 41st millennium. Without Jonson, eventually a Consulate is going to ask the fateful question. Why do we follow your lead again? That, and ten thousand years is a long time to build your own identity.

 

Hydra Legion is the loyalist half, Cerberus Legion is the Traitor half.

 

For the XV, it's called the Orders of the Sword. It is their Chapter-like organization.

[Ace Debonair]

Black Dragons as supercharged, warp-ridden scions of the Worldburner.

Do want, very much.

[Nomus Sardauk]

New Successor concept, this time for the Emperor's Children!

 

Emperor's Children Successor: Thunder Talons

 

Colours: Storm Grey with Black shoulders and helmets. Veterans paint canon Night Lords-style lightning bolts on their armour.

 

Heraldry: A gold winged claw (ala canon EC symbol) holding a trio of lightning bolts.

 

War Cry: (Said as a call and reply)

Like Thunder we roar!

Like Lightning we strike!

 

Homeworld: Stormhold.

 

Speciality: Sudden Strikes, Shock and Awe, Assault Squads.

 

Founder: Arman Veritas "the Thunderer"

[Wade Garrett]

I'm going to make yet another suggestion about the Shattering at Vilamus.

 

So far, the only thing we agree on is that it begins with Jonson's Palatinate going dark, Dorn and Ferrus have a mutual kill on Vilamus, and Leman kicks the everloving crap out of Lorgar's Legion at Boros.

 

What if we take out the original Fists/Minotaurs rampage, and have Konrad and Perturabo planning a journey to the Palatinate to force Jonson to explain himself.

 

Konrad uses his authority as Emperor's Justicar to call for Lorgar and Leman to muster, in the event that Jonson does not see reason.

 

Unbeknownst to the others, Corax sees all this behind his back maneuvering as the final straw.

 

As the Executioners and Hoplites embassy pauses at the resupply world of Vilamus, the Warmaster's hordes descend on them, proclaiming Jonson, Perturabo, Konrad, Lorgar, and Anubis as betrayers of the Imperium.

 

Angron is considered a soft heart who will fall in line when threatened, Magnus, Principio, and Etiamus (sp?) are expected to be handled by softer methods, and Fulgrim is Corax's most beloved brother.

 

Which is why they don't land on the immediate hit list.

[Conn Eremon]

Etiamnus*

 

I like it. For the sake of having it be finalized, I am okay with backing this. Returns it to the original ambush and connects all of the newer stuff well enough.

 

Edit: But if this isn't planned ahead of time, if this is a reactionary ambush, why is Anubis on the list?

[Wade Garrett]

Because it's a bit hard to hide the XIII Legion storming Tizca with steel and fire to grab the Emperor Cure.

 

Better to add the Ensharaddon to the list of dead men and mumble some vaguely plausible technobabble about his researches being meant to corrupt/enslave the Emperor.

[Conn Eremon]

Okay, wasn't sure if that assault was now going to be made as a post-Vilamus 'Maybe we should stop Anubis?' decision, in light of Vilamus itself now becoming a bit more rashly decided.

 

But it fits if Corax still had the presence of mind to get Leman to stabbity Lorgar in the back.

[Nomus Sardauk]

Okay, wasn't sure if that assault was now going to be made as a post-Vilamus 'Maybe we should stop Anubis?' decision, in light of Vilamus itself now becoming a bit more rashly decided.

 

But it fits if Corax still had the presence of mind to get Leman to stabbity Lorgar in the back.

Well it could be that Anubis is already on Corax's hit list, we discussed before the idea that Corax (possibly with help from Sanguinius) begins to fear that Anubis might use the cure to gain favour with the Emperor and other Primarchs in an attempt to replace Corax. Or that Corax fears the Emperor will punish him for not saving him at Ullanor, either way, it's in the Warmaster's best interests if Anubis and his cure are stopped.

[Rune Priest Ridcully]

That then raises the question of wherever or not Corax was making plans to somehow incriminate Anubis to justify an attack on him.

[Wade Garrett]

New topic!

 

As Forge World continues to throw new light on the Pre-Primarch Legions, it is beginning to seem that many of them were deliberately molded in the image of their absent Primarchs (War Hounds, Night Lords, Imperial Fists, Alpha Legion) and those who had to be changed (the Word Bearers and Death Guard) were the exception.

 

Should we change the stories of our Legions to reflect this, or assume that, same as canon, the Emperor's XVII were heretic burning iconoclasts, his VIII were born in a lightless hell with no law but what they made themselves, etc?

 

I personally prefer to keep the XII and XVII the same as canon, as I feel the culture clash makes a better story, the X Storm Walkers mesh well with the Minotaurs, and the jury remains out on the Ultramarines, but I wondered how the rest of you felt.

[Conn Eremon]

The premise of the setting is that the Primarchs landed on different worlds. All other changes from canon have to extend logically from that single change.

[Wade Garrett]

So...the XX will be sneaky gits until they meet their siege Primarchs? Or will the Emperor have made them to match the Olympian Twins instead of the Unknown Ones?

[Adra'Melek]

I've tried to match the Infernal Guard from the Dusk Raiders. Benefit of Death Guard being in Betrayal.

[Conn Eremon]

So...the XX will be sneaky gits until they meet their siege Primarchs? Or will the Emperor have made them to match the Olympian Twins instead of the Unknown Ones?

 

The simple answer is that it is ambiguous. Like all canon ambiguity, that makes it a decision each author will have to make for his Legions. Like claiming a Legionary whose canon home world is unknown. Could be Terra, could be the canon Legion's home world. What the author's decide on that kind of matter determines it for our purposes.

 

The long-winded answer is that it depends on why the Legions were the way they were prior to meeting their Primarch.

 

Did the Emperor have an intended use that the Legions were crafted into? If so, what was that use depended upon? What he, specifically, wanted of them, or what he knew the Primarchs would be? 

 

If it's the former, then I would see no change. If it is the latter, then maybe the Legions would have ended up being more similar to what their Primarchs would be once found.

 

But then, how would he have known? By all accounts, the bond that the Emperor had with the missing Primarchs has only been shown as a vague beacon of sorts. I know that this Primarch is in this area. This has had varying effects on different Primarchs though. Guilliman's adopted father was affected by the Emperor's awareness, having dreams. Lorgar felt the presence and (mis)took it for a god. Magnus was able to reach out to it from his own end and have full on communications with the Emperor. Others had absolutely no awareness until discovered.

 

So with that in mind, how much of what the Primarchs would have become would have been known to the Emperor? How much did he know of the canon Primarchs?

If the Executioner theory is to be believed, then we know what the Emperor had wanted of the VI, but we can see of Russ that he simply takes on the role. He wasn't shaped for it like his Legion might have been. Perturabo actually rails against the purpose set to him and the IV. So not all Legions had been molded to match their unknown father.

 

So it seems to me that it is more the case that the pre-Primarch Legions were molded to the purpose that the Emperor had intended of them, by and large. I'm sure there are circumstances that did more to affect a Legion than the Emperor. Such as the gene-seed issues with the III and the XV. The glory that got to the IV Legion's head.

 

But we don't really know, so we can't really say that this is why the Legions were the way they were and so this is how they would be in our alternate versions. It's too ambiguous. So each author gets to decide why they think the Legions were the way they were, and from there determine how their changed Primarch's changed home world affects that. If we are divided on it, then just let it be an author thing. If we can all agree on one way, then all well and good. We can set it as a hard decree, like who gets what canon Legionary being depended upon what home world he is confirmed as hailing from.

 

My own personal preference is to leave the pre-Primarch Legions as they are in canon, and have any distinctions that the changed home world makes on them stem from their Primarch's discovery.

 

So, the First Legion, prior to their Primarch's discovery, is still the First Legion of canon. The first Legion, an extremely well-rounded Legion capable trained to excel at all forms of combat commonly seen by Space Marines, and divided among themselves into be a series of fully self-sufficient fighting forces. Jonson expands on that. In canon, the Lion takes each specialization and creates a Wing for it, having each perfectly complement each other into a truly devastating force. Jonson doesn't divide by specialization, but does heavily divide the Legion in ways that would keep its self-sufficiency. Each Consulate is, in effect, a mini-Legion, divided into Cohorts that are, themselves, self-sufficient. Then you got his large size (I'm seeing canon Luther's recruitment program on Caliban, multiplied by however many worlds are in the Palatinate), and you have our First Legion.

 

The VI Legion was supposed to find their Primarch early, like in canon. However, the distinction comes in that Leman Barbedor, by ignorance, didn't want to be found. No raider wants to come to grips with an empire's vast might, and he would have no way of knowing that there was something extra about it. But then what? Well, from what we know of the VI Legion beyond Fenris' influence, I feel that the Legion would have gone on a hunt. Thrown caution to the wind and straight up turbo out into the great unknown looking for their father. And being so distant from the Emperor, they forge for themselves their own identity. Independent of all the usual factors. In this case, it actually creates a Legion that this Leman would actually feel at home with.

 

The IX are as ambiguous as it gets, as of now, so there's nothing for me to speculate on. I'd rather focus on what the Legion is following the God-King's discovery.

 

The XV are, again, the same as in canon. Suffering horrific mutations that have rendered them nearly extinct. Those incredibly small few who are rescued by the Ghost Fox will be completely swamped by Caliban's character. The Orders of the Sword are much like the canon Thousand Sons and Space Wolves. 99.99999% shaped by their home world and Primarch.

 

This is how I am interpreting it. Keep it the same as in canon, and let the Primarch's discovery create the change. So, if I had the Twins, I'd be keeping them as the super secret future spy ninjas that the Emperor kept under wraps, and have Principio & Etiamnus do whatever they do to reshape the Legion to how they want it to be, based off of their characters as nurtured by Olympia and the natures that the Emperor had instilled within them.

 

Just using them as an example, they're Aquilanus' toys, so he's the one who actually decides how he views it.

[Nomus Sardauk]

I've always been of the opinion that the Legions and their Primarchs shared some sort of subconcious link to their Gene-fathers, possibly psychic in nature, possibly something else, but regardless of it's nature I believe this link would have subtly influenced each Legion towards whatever manner of warfare their Primarch's character suited.

Angron was consumed by the rage of the Butcher's Nails and revelled in tearing his foes apart with his bare hands, this in turn lead to the nascent War Hounds subconciously inheriting his volatile nature and preference for close combat.

The Dusk Raiders showed an aptitude for heavy infantry tactics and were infamous for their stubborn and resilient nature long before they were re-united with Mortarion, traits which that he further cultivated among the Death Guard once he took command.

The Imperial Heralds were known for their utter devotion and ruthless zeal during the Crusade, again, traits that they shared with Lorgar long before Father and Sons ever met.

[Wade Garrett]

The Dusk Guard favored surprise night assaults and used fear as a weapon.

 

The Death Guard believed if you were unable to march to an objective on foot, enemy fire be :cussed you should go join Fulgrim's pretty pony princess Legion, and used the Geneva Conventions section on proscribed weapons as a how to manual.

 

The Imperial Heralds were the Firemen from Fahrenheit 451 in power armor. Lorgar is genderbent Joan of Arc.

 

Perturabo had to cull ten percent of the IV to make them be the relentless machine he wanted instead of a bunch of glory seeking individualists.

 

While fighting the Ultramarines on Armatura, "That used to be us" is running through Khârn's mind like a broken record.

 

But this is not the "Wade and Forge World have officially passed the honeymoon stage" thread.

 

So I'll just reiterate that I am not changing the X, XII, XIII, and the XVII from their canon pre Primarch forms and let it be done.

[Conn Eremon]

Works fine for me, Wade.

 

Personally, I like having that huge split between the War Hounds and Celestial Lions, and the Imperial Heralds and the Imperial Hounds.

[Wade Garrett]

I was thinking of having Angron heal the rift in his Legion by mustering the entire XII, Terrans and Maccragians alike, on the Training World of Bodt and declaring the Great Games:

 

Mock battles, blood duels, and contests of skill and strength in which every Lion would take part.

 

Many planned to use the occasion to settle old grudges, but instead...

 

Here I can't decide if Angron would have chained rivals from the old Legion and the new together and forced them to compete in pairs in the old War Hound way, OR if he would have asked the other Legions to send cadres and pitted the Lions against those warriors. Or done both.

 

Not that all the Legions would take part in Angron's frivolity, of course.

 

Either way, perhaps Chemosian Perturabo finally gets to build that great arena he's been drawing up plans for, and the Lions emerge as true battle brothers.

 

Lorgar....

 

"If a man falls to his knees before you begging for mercy, and you set him ablaze, soon, no one will ever kneel to you at all."

 

-Lorgar Cleftjaw, disbanding the Circle of Ashes after the Compliance of Ariaggata.

 

After a vicious rebuke from their Primarch, the original members of the Imperial Heralds cease their iconoclastic ways.

 

But their injured pride and disdain for their gene sire's unyielding honor codes festers, and having the majority of their number left to guard the Hounds' ships in orbit only exacerbates matters.

 

It is possible Lorgar meant the role to mollify his chastised warriors, as the Hearthguard is a position of great honor given to proven warriors on the Jarl's homeworld.

 

It is equally possible he simply didn't trust them to wage war in his name without immolating those he would spare, and meant it as the slap in the face it was taken as.

 

And so as Corax and Barbedor lay their plans for Boros, perhaps the greatest betrayal comes not from two Legions the XVII were never close to, but from sons and brothers who don armor of granite grey and the sigil of a book ablaze, once again unleashing the Emperor's own fury against barbaric heathens.

[Wade Garrett]

Something else that's been bugging me....

 

In the canon Heresy, the superstar Primarchs were Horus, Guilliman, Dorn, and the Lion.

 

They won the most battles, conquered the most worlds, were honored and decorated above all others...basically, if you were a Primarch and you intended to have a nice long brooding session about not being up to snuff, those were the four you griped about (right, Ferrus and Pert?)

 

So, who holds those roles in the Coup?

 

Corax and Jonson are the obvious choices, but that still leaves us with 2-3 spots.

 

For starters, I don't see Lorgar, Angron, Ferrus, or Barabbas in those roles.

 

Angron's like canon Lorgar, more skilled as a leader and a warrior, but still the one who has conquered the least.

 

Barabbas is in that Ferrus/Mortarion/Perturabo spot. Devastating in battle, but his issues (MICROMANAGE ALL THE EVERYTHING) and lack of people skills hamstring him.

 

Lorgar serves the Emperor only reluctantly, and the Devourer...do I really have to explain why he isn't favored?

[Conn Eremon]

Scars showed the same thing happen among the Fifth. I think it is rather fitting for our Seventeenth.

 

 

Been thinking more on the Consulate vs. Cohorts front.

 

I think I like the idea, and I welcome Wade's input as it involves his Primarch, of Angron championing the 3rd Founding, and setting the precedent of there being successive Foundings beyond the original Legion break up.

 

My reasoning is that Angron sets himself up as a counter to Jonson's power. Jonson's 2nd Founding divides his Legion into the Consulates, themselves long operating as independent mini-Legions in their own right. With the interconnectivity of these Consulates, the 2nd Founding in truth does little to divide the First Legion, while working to break the cohesion of the other Legions more than adequately.

 

So after some time, perhaps equivalent to the canon 3rd Founding, Angron advocates an extra level of breakdown. The Consulates are broken down into Cohorts, while fostering greater divergence and individuality. Other Legions might also splinter into smaller units, like Chapters into Battalions, or simply split into two, like a Chapter becoming two smaller Chapters.

 

No restrictions on size needs to be set, so the smaller Successors could raise their strength enough to be more to their former level. But it would force a divide into what is left of a Legion identity, which at this point is most evident in the Successors of the First. In this way, the First Legion truly stops existing. Their Successors remain the most closely connected of any other former Legion, but not to the extent that they are Legion in all but name.

 

And this sets a precedent down through the millennia, long after the High Lord of the Astartes and the Lord Commander of the Imperium have passed. When a Founding is decreed, the powers that be gather Successors that fit their criteria, and split them. One retains the old identity and the other forms its own. That criteria has many different elements. Are they of sufficient size to be tolerably split? Are they of great renown, or are favorably viewed by the Imperium at large? Has their power grown enough to make those in charge feel challenged.

 

Edit: Take the Badab War. Lufgt Huron increases strength, becoming three to five times the normal size of a Chapter. In ours, if a Founding was announced, then this Successor would be chosen to be broken up and the new Successors tasked elsewhere. There, it Huron disobeyed such a decree, the war would begin.

[Conn Eremon]

If Corax and Jonson are Horus and Guilliman, I would call Fulgrim as Dorn.

[Nomus Sardauk]

If Corax and Jonson are Horus and Guilliman, I would call Fulgrim as Dorn.

Perhaps Konrad as Lion? I remember someone called him the Emperor's Justicar before, like Canon Dorn being the Emperor's Praetorian.

It certainly sounds like a title the Emperor would bestow upon a favoured son, plus Konrad seems like the kind who'd be at the forefront of the crusade, axe in hand.

[Wade Garrett]

If Corax and Jonson are Horus and Guilliman, I would call Fulgrim as Dorn.

The III are still going to have the gene seed catastrophe that reduces them to 2, 000 or so Astartes, right?

 

If Fulgrim can take that and rise to a position equal to the canon VII, it makes his whole "All my brothers look down on me! I'm weak!" schtick look utterly ridiculous.

 

I'd say Perturabo, Bron, and Sanguinus are all better candidates for top billing.

[Conn Eremon]

Perturabo is a good candidate for the loyalists side, but I see it more like how FW has shown the Iron Hands and Ferrus Manus to be among the best, rather than the Lion or Dorn. I would put Bron over Sanguinius, because even though he is one damn charismatic fellow coupled with some frighteningly preternatural strength even for a Primarch, he and his Legion operate like a less berzerkerfied World Eater with an interest in the cultist hordes that the Word Bearers take with them everywhere. Certainly successful, but no Dorn or Lion.

 

As for Fulgrim, doesn't it pretty much fit with what we have of him (feel free to correct me , Ace)? He forever views himself as a lesser, but he constantly strives to improve. Even though he succeeds, becoming one of the more predominant Legions, it isn't enough for him to break that cycle of poor self-esteem.

 

It's a Primarch who demands perfection, hailing from a world that allows for no weakness. He doesn't feel like he succeeded well enough on Medusa, so he thinks of himself as weak. However, his constant strive for improvement, coupled with the incredible drive and fortitude he had learned on Medusa, sees him and his Legion rise to a position of favor in everybody's eyes but his own.

 

I've actually been equating him with Dorn this whole time. It's how I have been viewing his return to Terra alongside the Emperor's body and his role in being the figurative head of those rebelling against the Warmaster and actions during the Siege.

 

And honestly, this III has less holding it back than the canon one did. Ours had a self-confidence issue, but the Legion was a meld of Medusan mettle and Emperor's Children efficacy. The canon III rose pretty high on its own, and had a lot more to contend with in its own hubris. I mean, prior to their fall, the canon Third were one of the Legions, even known to have outperformed the Ultramarines at their own game. Our Third should go beyond that, because it has more going for it.

[Wade Garrett]

Well, as of Unremembered Empire it seems that Roboute Guilliman of all people had a bit of hero worship/inferiority complex going on where the Lion and the I Legion were concerned.

 

So maybe it isn't that implausible.

 

And with that, I will segue into talking about Ferrus Mordax and the Minotaurs. My notes:

 

-Name was not chosen at random, the minotaur was deadly because it was a fusion of beast and man. It ties into the Legion belief that perfection is achieved by synthesis, canon Iron Hands reject the flesh in favor of steel.

 

Minotaurs seek the symbiosis, the fusion of the "All flesh" way of the other Legions and the battle automata of the Mechanicum.

 

-There is a certain elegance and grace to their modifications, bionic and otherwise. At first it is through the influence of Corax, who didn't want his Kin Guard looking like crude clanking monstrosities, later it's because of Slaanesh (I've always liked the idea Slaaneshi stuff has a sort of Eldar/Dark Eldar style to it, because the Profligate One was brought into existence by eldar excesses).

 

-Even before ascending to the position of Warmaster, Corax uses the X Legion as a vanguard for his Chainsworn, hurling them at targets that would bleed the XIX too much. Instead of resentment, the Minotaurs revel in their role as the deadliest weapon in Lanista's arsenal, trusted to accomplish tasks no other Astartes could.

 

-The xenos suicide squads, war beasts, gene seed failures, and those who had to be fitted with "crude" augmetics are used as fodder by those farther along the Path of Perfection. They test the enemy, "Oh, you think you're worthy of crossing blades with me? You EARN that privilege, kill these megarachnids and then we'll see about that."