So, we actually know WHEN the two Legions were hunted down?

[Leif Bearclaw]

 

 

I'm just confused with the whole 'Send the wolves to do it' lark, but saying that I am quite black and white in my perception of the legions,

 

aka, i'd never expect to see iron hands willing joining Horus's lot, same as i'd never expect to see the ultras willingly harbour word bearers etc, just seems that with the ammount of conditioning SPHESS MERHEENES go though that any soldier would be little more than a brainwashed pawn to be used and directed, the fact that they are picked as children then go through all the YOU belong to the imperium and serve only the Imperium every day of heir natural life, how can a marine/soldier remain focused and sworn to one set of ideals and still even show any hint of a personality? I know having battle brothers could help you get through it, as in generic human interaction, but the thought of a legion having any true sense of real self identity and then willingly turning upon their masters (even if aided by chaos) seems completely :S to me.

 

I could see why the imperium would rather view them as mindless subordinate monsters of a distant past and would rather forget about them all together.

Well it comes down to who each marine ultimately believes their 'master' to be. The majority of the Traitors seem to have been caught up in the cults of personality the demi god Primarchs generated. They served their fathers, so when the father rebelled, they followed due to their ultimate loyalty being to the Primarch, not the Emperor. Whereas other Marine's loyalty was to the Emperor and the ideals of the Crusade, and so they remained loyal. This is especially apparent for the Death Guard, where the majority of the Terran veterans either remained loyal or weren't trusted to turn.

  

True, this i realise, just the whole deciation to ones legion seems strange, i prefer the story arch of mechanicum, where you get the chance to see why normal (well half mechanised) men would apply their reasoning to justify their belief in the side they picked,  I always consider Space marines to be less than even  people at times, blind faith in a legion that does nothing to reinforce even the basic concept of hummanity at induction? i know chaplains and that are supposed to offer support and guidance but how can they when they are a biproduct of the same system which churns out sm's?

 

Sorry, don't mean to go of on a tangent but to me, if I can try and get in the head of an astartee, it helps me to make some kind of mental note which helps me to understand why the 2 missing legions may of turned traitor or simply buggered off.

 

Also, the less imperialised legions, like Night lords, Space wolves (in particular) and white scars, which allow a more natural approach the inducting a recruit actually seem more normal to me than their counterparts, but then why send  a less conditoned legion to take down another? apart from their generic feral savagery of course.

 

As far as the Wolves go, they were apparently designed with that role in mind. Hopefully we'll get some more/better info on that subject when FW finally grace us with Inferno.

 

Although athere's a couple of things to bear in mind. Pre Heresy, Astartes killing Astartes was anathema to most Legions (remember in Horus Rising how Loken struggled to kill his possessed sergeant?). Whereas the Wolves, either by design to Fenrisian character, didn't have this reluctance. This is sort of illustrated in the opening of Prospero Burn's, where one clan wipes out another clan, that they'd previously got on well with, once they believe the clan is tainted by maleficarum. Taking that outlook on life into the Astartes would make the VI Legion the most reliable if called on to assault other Legions, the VI won't hesitate, but are still under control.

[A D-B]

 

True, but many, many citizens in m41 do know about the Traitor Legions is some capacity, to the extent that the rank of Warmaster is often viewed with suspicion. Even if he's just the devil in the myths, the name of Horus is known. 

 

 

Another "Yes and no..." thing, depending on the author writing at the time. General 40K lore has it that the overwhelming majority of the Imperium knows nothing at all about the past that we take for granted, even in terms of Horus as a myth, or the rank of Warmaster being bad juju ten thousand years ago. It's a setting with staggering (and yet, realistic) levels of ignorance, given the distances between worlds and the difficulties communication between them, with the Imperial hierarchy censoring pretty much everything for the good of the people. I mean, there are plenty of planets where the Emperor is a Sun God, or a Harvest God, or the God of Ancestor-Spirits, or just God, or whatever else - and they're just as Imperial as anywhere else: all that matters is that they worship the Emperor and pay their tithes.

 

Even among the more traditional worlds we think of as "Imperial" - of which there are squajillions, naturally - it's important to remember how little is really known. Abaddon is the name whispered in dread; Abaddon is the name of the nebulous, unknowable "other"; the Great Enemy. And for every "He's the clone son of Horus" meme in the setting, there's likely a dozen others that just see the word Abaddon as a vague title of evil, or an inherited mantle passed down the years, or whatever else. Practically no Imperial worlds will have any idea he was, say, the Luna Wolves' First Captain. Just that his is the name that makes seers and psykers vomit blood when they dream of him, and that it's a name that entwines with myth, woven throughout the Imperium's history, noted by the most diligent scholars.

 

Not because they remember him, really. Because he's essentially always there, returning again and again.

 

On a related note: We have a very pluralistic and blunt view of the setting, as fans. We see "THE HERESY" and then "THE DARK MILLENNIUM" and that's largely it. It's incredibly difficult to perceive the scale of the Imperium compared to most other science-fiction settings, especially the most famous and interesting aspects of the lore to fans are things that 98% of the Imperium knows practically nothing about. 

 

One of the things I like to use for perspective is something that applies even to us as fans, where importance is sometimes tied to just how frequently something's mentioned in the lore rather than the actual scale of it. F'rex, Armageddon is seen as this crucible of ultimate war, when it's really just one planet in a war-torn system. Even an important world like that is still just Tuesday in terms of the Imperium going to war, hyperbole of the in-universe characters and their emotive logic aside.

 

The best example I know (and one that I absolutely loved when it was brought up in an IP meeting) is something like the Nova Terra Interregnum. I've said this at signings and in seminars a few times because it's such a beautiful example. Last time was at the HH Weekender, and Alan Bligh joined in, agreeing and elaborating. We see "THE HERESY" and "THE DARK MILLENNIUM" but that's a massively incorrect dichotomy. There are events during the Imperium that genuinely have been almost as major or as damning as the Horus Heresy, because the Imperium goes through these cycles of rising and falling - building up after a disaster, only to plunge down to the edge of absolute dissolution and extinction once more. It's what the Imperium is; it's why the borders always shift and shrink, as parts of it go silent and rot off, then get reclaimed, whether aliens are doing it or not. The next events of that magnitude are obvious: the coming of the tyranids, f'rex, the silencing of almost the entirety of Segmentum Pacificus in 999.M41, or the Thirteenth Black Crusade and the Crimson Path to Terra. They're what's happening "now", and beginning to happen.

 

But the events in the past just haven't been mentioned much, or are part of the endless sequestered stuff that goes on within the setting. Ten thousand years across a million worlds that don't communicate much is, essentially, an eternity. The Nova Terra Interregnum is the best example, because for an entire millennium a quarter of the Imperium decided it didn't believe in rule of the God-Emperor and shrugged off the laws of the Adeptus Terra and the High Lords. The conflict halved the Adeptus Mechanicus. The effects of it lasted two thousand freaking years - that's how long it took to purge the remnants of that last rebellion.

 

The Horus Heresy is famous. We have models, rulebooks, the Emperor was still around and the primarchs were there, so there's a massive fuss about it. Not just because it's major, but because it's so different. It's the keynote moment at the beginning of the Imperium. But there are other massive, massive events that (in Alan Bligh's words, who explained it better than I did at the time) might even have been as big as the Heresy, they're just not mentioned in brief overview rulebooks. We don't know about them (perhaps "yet", perhaps we never will), but given the nature of the Imperium and the rise and fall motif that runs through it, there are some compelling possibilities.

 

Man, I love this setting.

 

 

I feel that for such an extreme reaction, especially in the 'enlightened' time of 30k, something worse than mere treachery probably befell the II and XI.

 

 

Rick Priestley's said in interviews a few times that his inspiration behind it was a reference to the Roman Legions that lost their eagle standards 'round about here. The Roman Legions that failed.

 

It's important to remember that this isn't the official answer, as there is no answer, but I like the original inspiration. It's cool.

 

When I think about the Lost Legions at all - which, admittedly, is practically never unless there's another forum bonanza going on about them - I just tend to think the coolest possibility is that even worse than treachery that tears the galaxy apart... is simple failure. And even better than that is (my personal favourite) the fact that by M41 even the highest-level records simply have no mention of them at all, in any context, because that's the most Imperium-style clusterfudge of administration ever, and totally 40Ktastic.

 

 

 

tl;dr -- This is part of the problem with the more direct HH series' mentions of the Lost Primarchs, to be honest. The Traitor Legions are the ones purged from Imperial record. They're Excommunicate Traitoris, and purged from the records, specifically so the Imperium doesn't learn about them. That's the point of their excommunication. The Lost Legions' references have skewed that a little, so it seems like they're the ones specifically purged and that the Traitors are just left on the record as bad guys. That was never true though - it wasn't then and it isn't now. There's no record of them in M41 and no one knows why. That's the only truth. It's still the Traitor Legions that were specifically purged and silenced, to keep the Imperium's future generations in the dark about all that happened in the Heresy.

 

EDIT II: There's a brilliant scene in the Soul Drinkers series where an Imperial purge team goes into a library to erase all references of the Soul Drinkers when they're sentenced as Excommunicate Traitoris. The purge teams take flamers to all of the relevant archives, burning loads of other stuff in the process, and - if I recall correctly - kill a bunch of librarians as well. 

 

That's the Imperium for you. Silencing the past is serious business.

[A D-B]

I've had to edit that a bunch of times for clarity, so apologies for anyone that feels the need to re-read all the extra details.

[Kol Saresk]

I decided to go back, catch what I missed, and started making replies as I was coming along, then I got to A D-B's post. And his first few paragraphs stole my thunder.

That said, what about Segmentum Pacificus going silent? I have not heard this before and I almost feel ashamed.

[A D-B]

I decided to go back, catch what I missed, and started making replies as I was coming along, then I got to A D-B's post. And his first few paragraphs stole my thunder.

That said, what about Segmentum Pacificus going silent? I have not heard this before and I almost feel ashamed.

(Gracious apologies offered herein for thunderous theft.)

I think it was first mentioned in the previous rulebook, where Terra had essentially lost contact with entire swathes of another Segmentum. It's been mentioned as Ultima Segmentum as well, but off the top of my head I think the Pacfiicus reference is tied to the Night of a Thousand Rebellions.

[Kol Saresk]

Ah, okay. So I need to definitely shell out the extra money for that fluffy book of fluffiness then since its now separate from the rule book and slightly cheaper.

[Emperor's Furor]

Is Nova Terra the same planet from Horus Rising? That would be a cool little tie in if the planet of the second rebellious empire was the world in which someone claimed to be the Emperor during the Heresy.

[Kol Saresk]

Is Nova Terra the same planet from Horus Rising? That would be a cool little tie in if the planet of the second rebellious empire was the world in which someone claimed to be the Emperor during the Heresy.

Yes, but that isn't what the "Nova Terra" was referring to. It basically meant the "New Terran Empire". Not really a place, just an idea of a "New Terra free from the rule of the High Lords".

 

[url=http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Nova_Terra_Interregnum#.U6xUjW04Lg8]

[Emperor's Furor]

There's a planet called Nova Terra though where the council sat.

[Kol Saresk]

 

I feel that for such an extreme reaction, especially in the 'enlightened' time of 30k, something worse than mere treachery probably befell the II and XI.

 

Rick Priestley's said in interviews a few times that his inspiration behind it was a reference to the Roman Legions that lost their eagle standards 'round about here. The Roman Legions that failed.

 

It's important to remember that this isn't the official answer, as there is no answer, but I like the original inspiration. It's cool.

 

When I think about the Lost Legions at all - which, admittedly, is practically never unless there's another forum bonanza going on about them - I just tend to think the coolest possibility is that even worse than treachery that tears the galaxy apart... is simple failure. And even better than that is (my personal favourite) the fact that by M41 even the highest-level records simply have no mention of them at all, in any context, because that's the most Imperium-style clusterfudge of administration ever, and totally 40Ktastic.

 

 

 

tl;dr -- This is part of the problem with the more direct HH series' mentions of the Lost Primarchs, to be honest. The Traitor Legions are the ones purged from Imperial record. They're Excommunicate Traitoris, and purged from the records, specifically so the Imperium doesn't learn about them. That's the point of their excommunication. The Lost Legions' references have skewed that a little, so it seems like they're the ones specifically purged and that the Traitors are just left on the record as bad guys. That was never true though - it wasn't then and it isn't now. There's no record of them in M41 and no one knows why. That's the only truth. It's still the Traitor Legions that were specifically purged and silenced, to keep the Imperium's future generations in the dark about all that happened in the Heresy.

 

I don't know if this was an edit or not, but it is a pretty awesome inspiration. And IIRC, didn't a Legion go north of Hadrian's Wall and just "disappear" as far as historical records go? Or am I imagining that for some reason?

 

+++SPOILER+++

 

Anyway, I think one thing that tried to slew back to the original inspiration was the short story Lost Sons by James Swallow. And I think this because it presented the idea of what was done while the Blood Angels were trapped in the Signus cluster. And the idea was that after a certain amount of time and with so few remaining Blood Angels left(I think there was like five on Baal) Malcador decided that all of their remaining assets were to be seized and put towards the defense of Terra. And it was suggested that it had been done before, although no reasoning was given as to why.

 

So the "maybe they failed" aspect can be a really strong motivator. After all, part of the Great Crusade was propaganda for morale. And can you really convince Humanity the Legiones are the right tools for reconquering the universe, if two entire Legions can fail so badly that both basically become extinct? Or if one of them goes sailing into another part of the galaxy and just "disappears"? Personally, if I was in the midnset of the Emperor and His War Council, I'd just stop talking about them. Wouldn't erase them, just let them fade from memory to the point most people don't even know they existed. Because any mention of their victories would eventually ask "Whatever happened to them?" and then you would have to answer. It would keep the wound fresh, a constant reminder of that failure, that loss.

There's a planet called Nova Terra though where the council sat.

Maybe it is. Although I don't think I've ever heard Sixty-Three Nineteen being referred to as Nova Terra yet.

[Leif Bearclaw]

 

I don't know if this was an edit or not, but it is a pretty awesome inspiration. And IIRC, didn't a Legion go north of Hadrian's Wall and just "disappear" as far as historical records go? Or am I imagining that for some reason?

No you're right, it was the 9th Legion, which disappeared sometime in the 2nd century. Although apparently there are some theories that the Legion was destroyed elsewhere in the Empire.

[Ash Da Flash]

 

 Even an important world like that is still just Tuesday in terms of the Imperium going to war

 

 

Extra kudos for the Street Fighter: The Movie reference.