Horus Heresy What Ifs

[Wade Garrett]

In this thread, we will discuss the effects of dropping a different Primarch and Legion into three specific scenarios:

 

1. Being ambushed by Kor Phaeron and the Word Bearers at Calth

 

2. Being sent to Prospero to drag Magnus back in chains/execute him and his entire Legion

 

3. Trying to reason with Angron and his Legion on the Night of the Reaper/Cyclops/Lion/Warhawk/Gorgon/Haunter/etc.

 

So, what do you think? Would the paranoia of the Iron Warriors make them more likely to endure Calth? Would Guilliman try even harder than Russ to speak to his brother, or would he strike first even harder out of respect for the Crimson King's prowess? Would Corax being raised by the slaves of Deliverance make him better able to relate to Angron?

[Conn Eremon]

1. Word Bearers.

 

2. Thousand Sons.

 

3. World Eaters.

 

Hilarity ensues. In lockstep with confusion.

 

Edit: Actually the third one has promise, as the Last Night of the Hounds. Dibs!

[Wade Garrett]

And just to get it out of the way early:

 

THE NIGHT OF THE HYDRA

 

"Angron. The Nails implanting must cease." said Sheed Ranko, pretending to be Alpharius.

 

"Sheed. It saddens me that you don't recognize your own Primarch." replied the scarred giant.

 

"Lord Alpharius!" Ranko gasped. "But wait, if you are... then where is the real Angron?"

 

"What makes you think there was ever a 'real' Angron in the first place?"

 

I can't believe he hasn't figured out that's really Omegon. thought "Lhorke".

[depthcharge12]

Dark Angels with the world eaters.

 

 

 

Night of the Knight.

[DuskRaider]

Your first one is a bit confusing. Do you mean which Legion would better endure the Word Bearers' attack, or who would succeed in their place?

 

As for the other two... I think a Legion like Salamanders would have better handled the razing at Prospero. Why? Because Vulkan has a level head. To me, Russ lost a lot of credibility when he didn't confirm his change of orders with the Emperor. Vulkan wouldn't have gone in guns blazing, mainly because he's level headed. Guilliman or the Lion would have also handled the situation a lot better.

 

As far as Night of the Wolf... Angron respects warriors. He doesn't like gloating, he prefers to deal with those on an even keel. A Primarch like Horus, Mortarion, or Perturabo may have been a better fit. They seem to be the three that have a better relationship with Angron as well, mainly because they know what to expect of him and approach it from there.

[Conn Eremon]

Your first one is a bit confusing. Do you mean which Legion would better endure the Word Bearers' attack, or who would succeed in their place?

 

As for the other two... I think a Legion like Salamanders would have better handled the razing at Prospero. Why? Because Vulkan has a level head. To me, Russ lost a lot of credibility when he didn't confirm his change of orders with the Emperor. Vulkan wouldn't have gone in guns blazing, mainly because he's level headed. Guilliman or the Lion would have also handled the situation a lot better.

 

As far as Night of the Wolf... Angron respects warriors. He doesn't like gloating, he prefers to deal with those on an even keel. A Primarch like Horus, Mortarion, or Perturabo may have been a better fit. They seem to be the three that have a better relationship with Angron as well, mainly because they know what to expect of him and approach it from there.

1. I believe he meant the former.

 

2. He did, as it was the Emperor's proxy who gave him the change of orders.

 

3. Same approach Russ takes, though. That Angron will understand it as a warrior would. He didn't, however. It'd be interesting to see how those three would change their approach. Horus apparently preferred using his brother's defects even before he fell, though. His Night of the Wolf would probably be designed to exacerbate the issue, using a stooge in his place.

[Wade Garrett]

Taking the Ultramarines place being ambushed at Calth, sorry if I was ambiguous.

 

For instance, would the Night Lords likely response of "Every man for himself and Hell take the hindmost" response gotten them out of the trap with less casualties, or would their lack of cohesion led to their destruction?

[Conn Eremon]

The Night Lords would have been an interesting choice for Prospero. Though their terror tactics are known to be less effective against Marines, I am sure it would have had a profound effect in the Warp, which would affect the Thousand Sons.

[Iron Hands Fanatic]

Well, if you applied the Gorgon / his legion to the 3 circumstances, then:

 

1. Part of the Iron Hands strategy seems to effectively be allowing the enemy assault to break upon their ranks, and then slowly advancing to drive the assault back, using extreme firepower & endurance. Because of this, the word bearers would have probably been drawn into a lengthy ground war - even though the IHs are a considerably smaller legion than Lorgar's, they have superior firepower, and it would have taken a long time to whittle them down - which would have committed the vast majority of the Word Bearers to engaging the IHs over a long period

 

2. The Iron Hands aren't super assaulty, and would probably be pretty evenly matched with the Ksons longe range psychic powers with their own advanced weaponry -that said, the IHs are considerably larger than the Thousand Sons, so success in the long term probably wouldn't be difficult - also, extensive bionic modification is supposed to dim a warrior's 'spark' in the warp - maybe making them harder targets for the librarians?

 

In terms of Ferrus Himself - because he's extremely loyal, if he thought the orders from the warmaster were legit, he probably wouldn't have hesitated in trying to kill magnus - they're probably pretty evenly matched physically, being some of the biggest primarchs, but obviously Ferrus doesnt have all of magnus's special warp glitter

 

3. Ferrus is very logical, so he probably wouldn't have antagonised angron & the WE, and being a warrior who doesnt seek personal glory, boast, etc. I suspect angron would have a reasonable amount of respect for him, esp with his attitude towards weakness - lets face it, neither of them are nice guys. However, if angron did go all crazy / piss the gorgon off, ferrus would have probably been perfectly happy to smack him in the face with forgebreaker, and the Iron Hands would've followed suit without hesistation

[Wade Garrett]

A point in the Tenth Legion's favor at Calth is that I doubt they would have held off on retaliating for as long as Roboute and the Ultramarines did.

 

I imagine as soon as the Word Bearers opened fire Iron Hands would have been shooting back.

[Demus Ragnok]

A point in the Tenth Legion's favor at Calth is that I doubt they would have held off on retaliating for as long as Roboute and the Ultramarines did.

 

I imagine as soon as the Word Bearers opened fire Iron Hands would have been shooting back.

This.

 

There would have been, "Lord we have incoming fire. Confirmed? Yes Lord."

 

"Fleet this is Ferrus Manus, all batteries destroy the Word Bearers."

[Legatus]

Guilliman.

 

2. Being sent to Prospero - Ultimately, I think it would still have played out like a tragedy, since that was the intention behind this story. However, there are a few factors to consider. The Ultramarines seemed to get on better with the Thousand Sons than the Space Wolves did. An Ultramarine Librarian spoke out in favour of the Librarian project at the Council of Nikaea. In 'Battle for the Abyss' the Ultramarine Captain steps in to protect the Thousand Sons psyker from an enraged Space Wolves leader. And in one book (was it 'A Thousand Sons'?) Ahriman shows appreciation for how Guilliman had prosecuted the Crusade. So that is a factor in favour of a non-violent solution of the conflict.

Another factor is the difference in force strength. The Thousand Sons were one of the smaller Legions. That meant that they were on a similar level with the Space Wolves, but the Ultramarines Legion would have outnumbered them three to one or even four to one. That might have persuaded the Thousand Sons into submitting, instead of choosing to make a stand.

So I think it is very probable that there may have been a peaceful solution. But as I said, I think the intention for this confrontation was to have it be a tragedy, and in the end that is the main consideration.

 

 

3. Confronting Angron over his practices - Same thing. Angron wasn't meant to be brought to reason. He was meant to go over the edge. I guess an appeal to his honour and his ideals may have worked. Suggesting that in the spirit of his fallen comrades, he could keep on fighting against oppression on a thousand worlds. But then Angron seemed to be of the mindset that the Emperor himself was an oppressor. So I don't really think that would have worked out better.

Again the Ultramarines would have outnumbered the World Eaters by two or three times, whereas they would have been of similar strength to the Space Wolves. That may have given the World Eaters pause to reconsider attacking. On the other hand, they are the World Eaters.

I like to think that a lot of the Primarchs were able to appreciate the "good" Guilliman was doing in his Campaigns (other than some like Lorgar, Jonson or Horus, who didn't appreciate the competition), which may have applied to Angron as well on a level. He once fought for freedom after all. But I don't think a lot of BL authors would go with that.

[Wade Garrett]

I disagree about how Angron would view Guilliman, Legatus.

 

I think he'd see either

A. An aristocratic oppressor in shining armor just like the ones that killed his brothers and sisters

 

B. The standard everyone is always whispering he falls short of, never mind that Guilliman was raised by loving parents in the citadels of the elite while Angron had pain engines hammered into his skull in the slave pits.

 

And he'd hate him for it.

 

In Guilliman's favor, he wouldn't be goaded into a brawl as easily as Russ was (see The First Heretic, where his response to having a power maul slammed into his chest is to brush the dust off and ask "Are you done?") and he's more likely to respond to Angron's taunts with logical arguments than "RAAAR ME SMASH HERETIC!"

[Legatus]

Entirely possible. But if Ahriman was able to see how well Guilliman was received by the people he liberated, others might have noticed that as well. And in earlier descriptions Angron was described as motivated by helping and protecting people. On the other hand he might just have been annoyed at Guilliman's seeming effortlessness in his endeavours.

[Conn Eremon]

Guilliman was already used in the censure of a brother. Lorgar. While Lorgar was the one who understood Russ' intent during the Night of the Wolf, he misunderstood Guilliman's role and attitude at Monarchia.

 

I'm not disagreeing, just putting it out there that the Night of the Battle-King could easily have gone just as wrong. Angron doesn't seem like the guy who could understand more easily than Lorgar, thanks to those Nails.

[Wade Garrett]

As I understand NoW, Russ's message to Angron was that the Nails and his own attitude were destroying the World Eaters, causing them, their allies, and civilian populations caught in their path to die when it was completely unnecessary.

 

Angron's message to Russ is that he does not care. Not about the lives of civilians, his sons, or even his own life. All that matters is that blood flows and the Nails are placated.

 

It's tough to reach someone like that, especially coming from Russ's perspective, where loyalty to the pack and the alpha are paramount.

 

At the same time, Lorgar was able to get through to him on the voyage to Nuceria, so he isn't completely lost even after Isstvan...at least, until Aurelian engineered his "ascension".

[Uvenla]

On point 1, if we consider that it was the Iron Hands instead of the Ultramarines being ambushed at Calth. I would say that result would be more grim for the IH considering that even with their superior firepower is nothing if you can't bring it to bare. Even worse considering the scrapcode virus affecting the grid if still there AND the IH's in the same way would only result in chaos. They would fight to the last man but the coordination of the IH wouldn't be as one made by the Ultramarines.

[Wade Garrett]

I think you have a point. Where the Ultramarines sought to improvise and adapt to their situation, a "stuborn" Legion like the Iron Hands, Imperial Fists, or

Death Guard might have simply stood its ground and fought to the bitter end.

 

Which is not to say those three wouldn't drag plenty of Word Bearers with them into the grave.

 

On the issue of scrapcode in the Tenth's bionics, there were plenty of skitarii fighting with the Thirteenth on Calth, and those guys are fairly augmented themselves.

 

If they could keep clean, it suggests the Tenth could do the same.

[Uvenla]

Yes, I don't remember completely but I know it was mentioned in Fear to tread that many of the skitarii died from it while some that wasn't connected to some figga-ma-jigg manage to survive or well the major part seemed to have.

I will look into it!

[Conn Eremon]

I honestly saw that as a missed opportunity on Abnett's part, perhaps unintentional, rather than them being actually protected or exempt from the scrapcode.

[Kol Saresk]

IIRC, those who were connected through the noosphere(think wi-fi, but rare) were vulnerable to the scrapcode as it was traveling through the network. Those who were not connected to the network at large, were thus safe from infection.

[Demus Ragnok]

IIRC, those who were connected through the noosphere(think wi-fi, but rare) were vulnerable to the scrapcode as it was traveling through the network. Those who were not connected to the network at large, were thus safe from infection.

It seems that the opposite happened in Mechanicum. Those using the traditional com net were infected while those using the noospheric interface avoided infection.

[Kais Klip]

I think its a matter of how connected the Iron Hands would be to the orbital grid. On that point, I believe their skills, or rather those of Ferrus, would have hampered the Word Bearers more than they were in KNF, assuming that Ferrus would invest personal pride in such works to defend the system.

[Conn Eremon]

Maybe. It's true his defenses might be more up to the task, but he would also be more interconnected, which in this case could make him more vulnerable in spite of enhanced security.

[Kol Saresk]

 

 

IIRC, those who were connected through the noosphere(think wi-fi, but rare) were vulnerable to the scrapcode as it was traveling through the network. Those who were not connected to the network at large, were thus safe from infection.

It seems that the opposite happened in Mechanicum. Those using the traditional com net were infected while those using the noospheric interface avoided infection.

That's because in Mechanicum you basically had two different networks: the noosphere and "the hardlines". Only the hardlines was infected.