The best legion (please don't hurt me...) *Hides*

[Olis]

Get back on topic, brothers. If you wish to discuss the merits of canon and various passages thereof, start a new thread.

[Kol Saresk]

Night Lords are the best because they're blue. With lightning bolts!

[Legatus]

When I started them, they were black. Then, in 4th Edition, GW gave the Black Legion the former Night Lords scheme, and turned the Night Lords into Thousand Sons. Come to think of it, they also turned Ultramarines into Thousand Tons. For some reason GW just wants me to play blue and gold Marines.

 

Edit: I opened up a thread about canonicity in the Amicus, in case there is further interest in the issue.

[Kais Klip]

*raises hand*

 

I'm 0 for 2 today, so forgive me if I'm wrong, but I thought Lorgar's original aspects were devotion, which was altered into zealotry by his upbringing on a religious world?

 

The Word Bearers were always known for their fanaticism, even before Lorgar. The massacre book puts its along the lines off "and as all fanatics, they did not care what they believed, only that they did." Thus their flip from extreme secularists to extreme worshippers.

[Hyaenidae]

One can be devoted to something without worship. I interpreted the Massacre entry entirely different than you, sir, and I really do think it comes down to interpretation of each individual reading it.

 

Myself, I viewed it as "they were grimly devoted to the Imperial Truth, but their culture was radically changed by their charismatic gene-father, like so many other Legions when their fathers returned to them." That change may not have been a totality, either; much like Lhorke of the War Hounds. Some oddities always fall through the cracks, and in a Legion of men who hold devotion above all, differences can exist. Some of those differences may be in opposition to the masses.

 

It may be my personal view, but it's a view I plan to exploit shortly.

[Kol Saresk]

I always read devotion as loyalty. Kind of funny since I pretty much grew up in a church, but when you think about it, many people "believe" without really being "devoted".

[Wade Garrett]

"And as all fanatics, they did not care what they believed, only that they did"

 

Well, that's a strong contender for the most idiotic statement ever made in 40k fluff.

 

That's why we've had long and bloody wars between Muslims and Christians, Sunni and Shia, & Catholics and Protestants, because to a fanatic what you believe in and how you believe it is very, VERY important.

 

In my opinion, the super atheist Imperial Heralds and the juvenile delinquent Night Lords are prime examples that making stupid fluff I'll be ignoring isn't limited to GW and BL.

[TheForgottenAngel]

1st Legion

 

It's in our name, numero uno. What's else to know?

[GhostMalone]

I view devotion as the giving up of all personal views and personal gain for that goal.

 

Zealotry on the other hand is another extremity but I don't think it's devotion if they have their own agendas (Erebus & Kor)

[Conn Eremon]

de·vo·tion (d-vshn)

n.

1. Ardent, often selfless affection and dedication, as to a person or principle. See Synonyms at love.

2. Religious ardor or zeal; piety.

3.

a. An act of religious observance or prayer, especially when private. Often used in the plural.

b. devotions Prayers or religious texts: a book of devotions.

4. The act of devoting or the state of being devoted

 

 

Devotion and zealotry are very similar, and neither absolutely have to be religious in nature.

[GhostMalone]

But doing things for power and self betterment isn't devotion, Argel Tal was devoted Erebus is far from devoted

[Kol Saresk]

I don't think Cormac was saying Erebus was devoted, just putting up the definitions of devotion.

[Conn Eremon]

Since zealotry was being spoken of as different than devotion, I was pointing out that the two are actually rather similar, to the point that one can define the other.

 

However, the fact that it says "often" selfless does mean that there can be a selfish form of devotion.

 

Erebus for instance could be said to be devoted to the Dark Gods because of the power promised by them. It is still devotion, however those who are selflessly devoted might see that as an impure faith.

[GhostMalone]

True true, I still feel though as they are similar it's still different in my opinion.

 

Your right I know but my mind just has a clear division on the terms.

 

I don't consider argel tal as a zealot as I don't see lorgar as a zealot I see them as devoted to their cause even though they know the cost.

 

Those bastardised versions of the gal vorbek on the other had are zealots to me rather than devoted

[Conn Eremon]

I think that is more about the context of the word. Or connotations. Whatever.

 

Someone who is devoted is often more seen in a positive light than a zealot. By strict definitions the two are very similar, but are used differently enough.

 

Which is why you don't see Argel Tal as a zealot, but as devoted, because he is given a positive light. On the flipside, Erebus the villain other villains despise is labeled a zealot. Technically, you are using different words to describe the same thing. But in context, you are saying something different.

[Wade Garrett]

Regarding Erebus:

 

I disagree with the idea that he serves the Dark Gods solely for his own gain.

 

Remember, Lorgar says that Erebus plays his games of scheming and treachery "at the behest of the gods", in contrast to Kor Phaeron, who plays for his own reasons.

 

Think of the Emperor. Think of the pressure, of the responsibility, of knowing that you alone are shaping the fate of humanity.

 

That's the burden Erebus bears. Lorgar seeks to advance his own ends, hearing the gods, but not always heeding them, much like his foster father Kor.

 

Alone in the Legion, Erebus has completely submitted to the will of the True Pantheon. And so he gathers power. And so he betrays allies, and hesitates to risk himself.

 

Because when you're the chosen one, the one who will enlighten all mankind to the truth, you can't allow yourself to die, for example, in a meaningless brawl with a raging madman incapable of grasping that sometimes necessary sacrifices must be made to shape the skeins of fate.

[Noctus Cornix]

Ahhh the Word Bearers, the one Legion that I despise and love with equal measure...

 

I believe we must, to put this matter into perspective, is look into what devotion is by nature. Most often we think of such devotion as selflessness and placing the needs and desires of your God above your own. This is true, yes but we must also remember that our society is engrained with centuries of domesticated religions to enforce the ideals off ethics, morality, charity, and love. They are religions that while steeped in blood like many that have come before, are created with the ultimate intention of peace.

 

No, devotion at its very core when stripped of the layers coated over its shell by centuries of domesticated religions, is a code. It is a set of guidelines bestowed upon man by their Deity and it is devotion that sees man follow just such code to the letter until it is engrained into your very being.

 

The primordial truth, the teachings of Chaos, is anathema to all we know about religion. The Gods of Chaos care nothing for peace, for tranquility, or for harmony. They are beings born from the negative energy of all living beings, extrapolated and twisted into living, hungering creatures that crave for the souls of mortals. It is hardly what anyone would call a religion worth serving but it is theirs, alien as it is from what we understand. They are fickle and proud Gods, extending their love and favor upon but a few and those few may have the right to transcend into their 'loving embrace'. All others, faithful or heathen, will fall into the roiling abyss and feasted upon by their greedy children.

 

That is why, in but a short time, the Word Bearers devolve into murderous, and hateful Legion, festering with greed, cowardice, and ambition for themselves. For that is the will of the Gods. Only a few may rise into the true favor of such a fickle God, and only by brute force, ambition, and treachery can one arise to such coronation. It is a devotion that festers with selfishness because it is also what it feeds upon.

[Wade Garrett]

I'd hardly call it an alien mindset...look at the heroes and divinities the Greeks admired. Would Zeus be content with utter peace? Were Ares or Poseidon pillars of benevolence to their worshippers?

 

Or the Norse. What's heaven? Feasts and quaffing, a rousing round of bloody slaughter, then Odin sews us back together and we do it all again.

 

The Chaos gods may wander far

from the tenets of the Abrahamic religions, but they're hardly eldrich Lovecraftian beings whose motivations we are incapable of grasping.

[Noctus Cornix]

I did say that they are alien to the more domestic religions we practice today. Please don't nitpick around the original point of the post.

[TemujinZero]

We can get a glimpse of the intended role of the Word Bearers from their actions before they were reunited with their already tainted Primarch.  The Imperial Heralds were recruited from the offspring of defeated foes, and were employed as extinguishers of beliefs and ideologies incompatible with the Imperial Truth.  I think that devotion is an accurate enough description of their character, but a more precise term would be dogmatism.  The Emperor was not associated with faith, but he was rather enthusiastic about imposing his ideology on the rest of the galaxy.  The Word Bearers were his ideological enforcers, exactly the sort of legion that would be dispatched to stamp out 'false' beliefs such as those that would eventually take root in the Word Bearers themselves.  So the religious zealots intended role was dogmatic secularism.

[Wade Garrett]

Already tainted, you say?

 

Did you miss the bit where Lorgar purged the Covenant and turned Colchis to a planet of Emperor worship?

 

If simply being on a Chaos touched planet makes you tainted, then Johnson and Russ are corrupt as well.

[Conn Eremon]

Led to believe it was purged, anyways. Or did you miss the part where some Colchisians, notably Kor Phaeron and Erebus, held to their old faith and even seeded it across many of the worlds visited by the Word Bearers long before Lorgar was convinced and (re)converted?

[Wade Garrett]

If I wanted to be a pedantic hairsplitter, I'd retort that according to 'The First Heretic', Kor actions pre-Monarchia amounted to being less zealous than he should have in the eradication of sects matching the Old Faith of Colchis.

 

And at this point we veer into the realms of conjecture and speculation.

 

We know very little about the pasts and motivations of Kor or Erebus. How much did they know Pre-Pilgrimage? Was Lorgar's fall something Kor planned from the moment he laid eyes on the infant Primarch, or was it more akin to Luther, with the foster father listening to dark whispers as his son left him behind and his own mortality started to take its toll?

 

We really don't know, neither Index Astartes or any of the Word Bearer novels have shed much light on the subject (bar a throwaway line in IA: Word Bearers speculating that Kor was more loyal to his adoptive son than to Lorgar's new faith).

[TemujinZero]

Already tainted, you say?

 

Did you miss the bit where Lorgar purged the Covenant and turned Colchis to a planet of Emperor worship?

 

If simply being on a Chaos touched planet makes you tainted, then Johnson and Russ are corrupt as well.

Yes, already tainted.  The Word Bearers were supposed to be dogmatic ideological secularists.  Lorgar's taint led to this being undone in favour of zealous religious faith in the Emperor as a deity, which directly led to Monarchia and eventually to the Heresy.  The taint was religion.  Massacre even describes Lorgar's gradual twisting of his new legion away from their former secular beliefs.  

 

The question is which represents the intended vision for the legion - Lorgar as he was when he was found on Colchis, or the Imperial Heralds before they were reunited with their Primarch.  I think the answer is clear - Lorgar was already on a path that was completely at odds with the Emperor's vision when he was found.  He was tainted in a way that allowed him to take charge of his legion and eventually bring them over to the side of the primordial annihilator.  If he had been led directly towards worshipping the ruinous powers he would have been purged as soon as he was found and the XVIIth would have met the same fate as the IInd and the XIth.  The very people that raised Lorgar into what he was when he was discovered secretly maintained their old faith - we can't know for sure if they were knowingly playing the long game, but they certainly played it very well.  Kor Phaeron effectively turned the Richard Dawkins Primarch into the author of the galaxies two biggest religions.

[Wade Garrett]

A legion of dogmatic secularists who all shouted "Gimme that old time religion!" after one quiet conversation with their Primarch. Whoever the Emperor hired to indoctrinate/educate the Terran Legionaries apparently did a less than stellar job of it.

 

As the Forge World fluff potrays it, we have three stages with the Seventeenth:

 

The Emperor says be atheistic, they're Atheists → Lorgar says don't be an atheist, worship the Emperor, they're Emperor Worshippers → Lorgar says don't worship the Emperor, worship Chaos, they're Chaos worshippers.

 

This isn't a Legion of unquestioning zealots, as of Massacre the effect of their gene seed is "Renders the iniates into dimwitted yokels who drift whichever way the prevailing wind is blowing."

 

Which does fit the Al Bundy in power armor model Forge World would have me believe represents Lorgar very well.

 

But drooling stupidity is not the defining trait of MY Seventeenth Legion, and I consign this fluff to the same Pit of Shame that currently holds "Deliverance Lost", Black Templars that pray the Emperor sends them Librarians again, Uriel Ventris-SAVIOR OF THE ULTRAMATINES, and Khaldor Draigo, the man who won Warhammer 40,000.