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From besties to indifferent/resentful: Russ and Khan


b1soul

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I kinda liked the idea that Russ and Khan were good friends because of cultural similarities.

 

This was the version presented in Collected Visions (which could now be viewed as a white-washed/edited in-universe account of the Heresy)

 

I loved Scars but I'm a bit more ambivalent about this retcon. What do you guys think?

Considering the Khan's own standing with the Imperium at large, it's not suprising for him to ditch the Wolf King, especially with what happened on Prospero. Being brosefs does not excuse murder. That is the Khan's own integrity at work here. 

In Scars, the Khan and Russ are not bros...

 

In Collected Visions, the Khan abandons Russ very reluctantly because of the strong friendship between them

 

In Scars, the Khan is buddies with Horus and Magnus. The WS resent the SW, and hate being compared to the VI legion. The Khan abandons Russ because he suspects Russ of having committed a traitorous fratricide. On the other hand, Russ is indifferent to Khan and his legion. There is no friendship between them.

Ah, I get what you mean now. Well, The "executioner" is the loneliest job there is ;)

 

When you think about it, it does make sense that they are not friends. One is a founding member of the Librarius, which Russ opposes because he does not trust others outside of his shaming priests. The Khan is a supporter of liberty and freedom in all things, especially within his own legion. Russ is an agent of censure.

 

So when people only look on the surface and see two barbaric legions, when one is actually very philosophical and spiritually open, that does hurt.

I quite like the change to them being distant. I especially like the White Scars feelings on comparisons between their two legions. Honestly, I think players do tend to think of them as being similar just because they each wear fur, and Vikings and Mongols both were barbarians and lived right next to each other so similar right?

 

I like the reminder that they have no more in common culturally than any other two legions do. I'm open to contrasting opinions however, is there any reason to think Russ and the Khan have anything special in common? Note: obviously they have things in common, I mean noticeably more than with their other brothers. Same with the legions.

Honestly, I really like the White Scars. I like the IDEA of the Space Wolves, but the execution (no pun intended) is severely lacking. I just wish the Age of Darkness Allies chart showed the kindred between Khan and Mortarion, that would be an awesome allied detachment.

I quite like the change to them being distant. I especially like the White Scars feelings on comparisons between their two legions. Honestly, I think players do tend to think of them as being similar just because they each wear fur, and Vikings and Mongols both were barbarians and lived right next to each other so similar right?

 

I like the reminder that they have no more in common culturally than any other two legions do. I'm open to contrasting opinions however, is there any reason to think Russ and the Khan have anything special in common? Note: obviously they have things in common, I mean noticeably more than with their other brothers. Same with the legions.

 

This - with the Scars' culture / traits during 30k actually being fleshed out since Collected Visions, conforming to a previous description of the Legion's alliances based on an incarnation of the Scars which was extremely minimal would have been tricky at best, and could have made them seem very shallow.

 

I much prefer that the stereotypical assumption that two Legions influenced by a tribal / nomadic culture had to somehow be best buddies was discarded - adding depth to each Legion's character is always going to cause some conflicts with earlier background, but the benefits far outweigh the costs. One significant step that BL / FW's HH series have taken is developing the Legions as original entities, not just as facsimilies of their 40k Chapters / Traitor Warbands - how each force developed over 10,000 years is one of the things I find most interesting about the Legions.

I think the change is totally worth it because of the interesting angle that Khan's friendship with Magnus gives us. Russ deserves some fallout from Prospero, and it totally makes sense that some of the loyalists would be angry at the wolves for destroying another legion, especially among those that defended the Librarius.

I feel that the allies chart represents the relationships of the legions with each other rather than the primarchs. In the majority of cases these two would be similar, but I wouldn't say it's always the case.

 

Yeah, that's true. Mortarion and Konrad are pretty close, and the Night Lords accept the XIVth as Brothers, but the Death Guard hold them at arm's length. Isn't it the same with Sons of Horus and White Scars? I don't have my book in front of me...

I personally think how Russ and the Khan interact differs from how their Legions interact.

 

Remember, Russ aint the barbarian he tries to appear as. Many of the higher echelon of the Imperium sees through this. He adopted Fenris not because he wanted to, but because the Emperor ordered it. Russ was ready to leave Fenris behind. It's only when the Emperor commands he stay and raise the Legion from Fenris does he really adopt the planet.

 

WLK

The similarities between SW and WS, to me...

 

Both have rather superstitious and tribal outlooks

Tend to get rather savage and wild in battle

Like trophies and talismans

 

Beyond that...yeah, I would say they differ significantly, about as much as Mongols differ from Norsemen

 

Some differences, the Scars seem to respect their enemies more, Shiban almost respects the ferocity and fighting spirit of the Orks.

 

Also, they advocate restrained use of stormseers/rune priests...but the Scars don't assume that they're the only ones with the restraint to pull it off. It's interesting that the Scars and the SW fall on different sides of the Librarius debate

I think the change is totally worth it because of the interesting angle that Khan's friendship with Magnus gives us. Russ deserves some fallout from Prospero, and it totally makes sense that some of the loyalists would be angry at the wolves for destroying another legion, especially among those that defended the Librarius.

The other Legions took the Emperor's decree exactly as he stated it regarding anyone that decided to break it.  The other Legions, even those that defended it, took the decree seriously and disbanded their Librariums.  It was only the 1k Sons that chose to break it and break it in such a way as to completely screw over the Emperor's project.  It seems that all the other Legions knew that it would fall upon the Wolves to sanction, so I am pretty sure they are not angry at the Wolves for doing so.  The only fallout Russ really seems to be getting is from his own conscience in what he had to do and being misled by Horus in how he was told to do it.

 

I think the change is totally worth it because of the interesting angle that Khan's friendship with Magnus gives us. Russ deserves some fallout from Prospero, and it totally makes sense that some of the loyalists would be angry at the wolves for destroying another legion, especially among those that defended the Librarius.

 

The other Legions took the Emperor's decree exactly as he stated it regarding anyone that decided to break it.  The other Legions, even those that defended it, took the decree seriously and disbanded their Librariums.  It was only the 1k Sons that chose to break it and break it in such a way as to completely screw over the Emperor's project.  It seems that all the other Legions knew that it would fall upon the Wolves to sanction, so I am pretty sure they are not angry at the Wolves for doing so.  The only fallout Russ really seems to be getting is from his own conscience in what he had to do and being misled by Horus in how he was told to do it.

Both the Scars and the Wolves kept stormseers/rune priests around despite the Edict of Nikaea

 

I think the change is totally worth it because of the interesting angle that Khan's friendship with Magnus gives us. Russ deserves some fallout from Prospero, and it totally makes sense that some of the loyalists would be angry at the wolves for destroying another legion, especially among those that defended the Librarius.

The other Legions took the Emperor's decree exactly as he stated it regarding anyone that decided to break it.  The other Legions, even those that defended it, took the decree seriously and disbanded their Librariums.  It was only the 1k Sons that chose to break it and break it in such a way as to completely screw over the Emperor's project.  It seems that all the other Legions knew that it would fall upon the Wolves to sanction, so I am pretty sure they are not angry at the Wolves for doing so.  The only fallout Russ really seems to be getting is from his own conscience in what he had to do and being misled by Horus in how he was told to do it.

 

The Wolves were almost wiped out by the Alpha Legion after the Khan refused to come to their aid, in no small part because of his reaction to learning about the destruction of Prospero.  The Wolves were already short of friends amongst their fellow legions, as Russ laments during their retreat in the Alaxxes Nebula, and Magnus had a number of friends and supporters who opposed the edict.  Keep in mind that many primarchs, the Khan included, have no idea about the disaster on Terra that led to Magnus being condemned, nor the role of Horus and Valdor in twisting Russ' orders.

 

The decree was also ignored, either subtly or completely, by several legions, notably the White Scars and the Wolves themselves and would eventually be ignored by almost everyone besides Dorn once the Heresy started.

The reason that the Scars kept their Stormseers despite the edict is because the majority of the legion was at (or on their way) to the Chondax system and had no idea of the outcome of Nikaea.

 

For the same reason the Stormseers did not strictly hold the chaplain role as the role was not passed to other legions until after Nikaea. That being said the Stormseers do seem to hold an important position in the legion as advisors.

 

The White Scars appear to bear a similarity to the Space Wolves in their understanding of chaos and the warp. I personally think that the Khan would have stopped using librarians/Stormseers if he had been aware of Nikaea.

 

Even after A Thousand Sons I am dubious as to whether the Space Wolves actually believed that their rune priests were different from librarians or whether they were just full of hubris and felt they were cautious enough to carry on using their warp powers (in other words, ironically mirroring the hubris of the Thousand Sons).

 

edit: I'm also a little surprised that people here seem to be so certain about the Khan's feelings and motives. He chooses to go to Prospero rather than help the Wolf (and what did that take, a few days/weeks?). A Prospero he learns why Magnus was attacked and comes to terms with the fact that Magnus was already corrupt when the Wolves attacked. When The Khan speaks to Mortarion he is critical of the Emperor and Horus. The Khan goes on to say that the legions will go their separate ways (somewhat ironic that they become codex adherent) and the novel ends with 'so when the hour comes ... whatever the fates demand, the White Scars will be on Terra'. I take from this that The Khan has yet to choose his path/side.

The reason that the Scars kept their Stormseers despite the edict is because the majority of the legion was at (or on their way) to the Chondax system and had no idea of the outcome of Nikaea.

That's not the only reason, both the Khan and Yesugei mention that the Scars would ignore the edict anyway. The Khan says something along the lines of 'the decision at Nikea doesn't matter to me, but id rather my brothers didn't have to make a difficult decision' in Scars.

Since the Khan had already impaled the Noyan-Khan who had tried to turn the legion to Horus' side...I interpreted "will be on Terra" to mean "will be on Terra to defend the Emp"

 

I don't think the Khan came down that hard on the Horus sympathisers only because they had tried to pressure him to join Horus when he would have joined Horus regardless

 

On top of that, the Khan had just rejected Mortarion's advances on behalf of team Horus

 

I'm pretty sure that the Khan had realized Horus was corrupt and had made up his mind to pick the lesser of two evils: help the Emperor

@ Firegolem - I couldn't remember that line, but I trust you that it's there.

 

@b1soul - Yeah, that's fair enough regarding Horus. There was a line where The Khan says something like 'they're all corrupt' and it's not clear if he's talking about the traitors or all of the primarchs. I agree that it appears extremely unlikely that he would go to Horus and we know he ends up on Terra fighting for the loyalists, but I think what he says still leaves the option of his legion just going off and doing their own thing (even though we know they don't). I quite like the idea of him choosing to fight with the loyalists because the traitors will give him the better fight rather than fighting for a particular cause.  

I am pretty sure he Impaled him because he assumed to know his Khan's will and tried to force his hand. In tribal cultures, that is a death sentence to usurp command. Loyalty to the throne is just a bonus here.

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