Rangdan Xenocides?

[Forward Assist]

Has there been any definitive fluff produced about the Rangdan Xenocides? Specifically what xenos were -cided?

 

The campaign has been mentioned in passing a few times in the FW books. They pop up briefly with the Alpha Legion in Book 3 and the First Legion apparently took heavy losses in the campaign in Book 6 but neither mention what xenos they were fighting.

 

There is another short snippet on one of Book 1 plates about Slaugth being encountered in Rangda but it's unclear if they were the main threat or just happened to be there.

 

Anyone have any pointers towards anything more concrete?

[Olis]

Iirc, the Rangdan Xenocides are described as the largest conflict the Legions faced prior to the Heresy. That line was in Book 6 somewhere.

[Forward Assist]

Yeah, it sounds like a particularly apocalyptic campaign during the Crusade. Because of the scale of the threat, I've inferred the enemy to be some sort of horde like Orks or 'Nids.

[depthcharge12]

I'm willing to wager that the bird/eat skull with a mane depicted on the Dark Brotherhood iconography is a Rangdan xeno.

 

Perhaps Skaven in space?

[Marshal Rohr]

It'll be covered in the Dark Angels book. It was basically only the Dark Angels that were able to respond in time.

[Forward Assist]

Shan't hold my breath then!

[Conn Eremon]

Pg 96 of Tempest also touches upon it. The Third Rangdan Xenocide took place in the 890's. The Dark Angels went from the most numerically superior Legion to roughly equal with the rising Ultramarines, after suffering 50,000 casualties. The overall affair more or less saved the northern Imperium.

 

One thing of possible note is that it refers to them as the "menace from the outer darkness."

[GhostMalone]

Nids..... and so it begins

[Lord Blackwood]

there are a ton of xenocidal campaigns I  wish we could explore  deeper   , they are pretty easy to write about too makes me wonder why they dont pump out more short stories about that sort of things , just good war is hell bolter porn about the legions being super effective against alien races .... I mean I  pretty much wrote a tiny short story about space Wendigos being xenocided  .... O w O   


Im hoping that we get a short story or one of those side novels about this particularly about how the Dark Angels lost 50 thousand bros must have been an absolutely amazing story  though  with  folks crying about how they want to get to the seige of Terra  I doubt we will ...  Prolly will just be one of the Dark Angels Renown battles or something. 

 

[God-Potato of Mankind]

I am eagerly awaiting the multi-page story to be found in the HH book that covers the DA. It's gonna be a good read, oh yes.

[Sandlemad]

I get the impression that when folks in the BL books talk about Ullanor being the last great existential threat to the nascent imperium, they have wars like the Rangdan Xenocides in mind as earlier examples.

[1ncarnadine]

Whatever the Rangdan Xenocides were, they were massive and not limited to the Dark Angels.

 

There's mention in Betrayal, p.99 of a World Eater who was interred in his Contemptor due to Slaugth murder-minds at Rangda.

 

Crysos Morturg's bio mentions the Death Guard sustained heavy losses in a Rangdan Xenocide campaign.

 

p.117 of Massacre notes that at the time Vulkan rejoined his legion, the XVIIIth was dealing with Orks at a time when many of the other Legions were tied up with the Rangda Incursion.

 

There are probably a ton more of these little notes about it scattered around, those are just some of the ones I could remember.

[Perry]

You could tie it in to the old tyranids codex note about an ancient warlord Titan who had historic bio acid battle scars

[Balthamal]

It's not hard to imagine imo. Given that it's always been hinted in fluff that the nids are drawn to warp related "events" for lack of a better term although that's been subtly changed to the Pharos firing lately, it's plausible that any nids who were closer in the intergalactic void shall we say would notice things like the Eye of Terror being born or the Astronomican starting to broadcast across the galaxy

[Forward Assist]

I hope it isn't 'Nids. Firstly, I think linking everything to 40k is a bit too hamfisted. Secondly 'Rangdanids' doesn't quite gave the same ring to it.

[Daemon2027]

I doubt it's Orks Eldar or Hrud as they would have been outwardly named. Could be Nids but I prefer to think they are a future threat. I think it's an unnamed xeno race who's was all but destroyed in the heresy. I think the 40k Galaxy is large enough for lots of xeno races that aren't factions made by FW or GW.

[Charlo]

It's one of those plot threads that they're slowly building so that they can use it later.

 

They'll keep it a mystery until they need to pull something out of the bag I imagine.

 

"Hey the Siege and Scouring are done... Here's a new army - the Rangdan!"

[Sandlemad]

Retribution has the most mentions of the xenocides so far and the most in any one place is the history of the forge world Xana. Its immediate contribution upon joining the imperium was funneling huge amounts of war material, legio cybernetica cohorts, two titan legions and the knights of the new House Malinax to the war effort. They were fairly decimated by the conflict as well.

It's also mentioned as part of the background for the blackshield lord known as the Nemean (strongly hinted to be a former DA) and the Ordo Reductor, which designed ordinatus-scale eradication weapons for 'the Rangdan campaign'.

 

Overall sounds like pretty brutal stuff. Marshal Rohr is right though, we're probably not going to see anything in detail until we get an in-depth look at the Dark Angels in their FW book (even if it looks like the DG, WE and AL were also involved).

 

Well spotted on connecting the Slaugth to it though, the Halo Stars location matches. That'd have a connection to the FFG background and we already know there was a good bit of author crossover with FW. There they are mentioned as infiltrating and destabilising imperial society; maybe they did something similar to multiple other xenos cultures? All in all that could make a huge threat to the imperium.

[God-Potato of Mankind]

Perhaps Rangdan is the name. The Rangdan-xenoform.

 

I doubt it will be 'nids after Pharos.

[Rayray]

I'd be all for some 'Nids. Hamfisted as it may be, giving other players that don't necessarily play 30k access makes campaigns with xenos all the better, and encourages those campaigns with fluff reasons to be in the setting. 

[Marshal Rohr]

It's named after a planet Rangda. It won't be tyranids because FW is not BL or the studio and they will actually respect the integrity of the project. Unlike the studio and BL, FW cares.

[Jarl Kjaran Coldheart]

Or maybe it could be Tyranids, the responding Legions could utterly wipe out the threat and call it case closed in typical obstinate Imperial fashion

 

Then, X amount of years later the Nids return when everything is lost to myth and far fetched history

[noigrim]

Whatever the Rangdan Xenocides were, they were massive and not limited to the Dark Angels.

 

There's mention in Betrayal, p.99 of a World Eater who was interred in his Contemptor due to Slaugth murder-minds at Rangda.

 

Crysos Morturg's bio mentions the Death Guard sustained heavy losses in a Rangdan Xenocide campaign.

 

p.117 of Massacre notes that at the time Vulkan rejoined his legion, the XVIIIth was dealing with Orks at a time when many of the other Legions were tied up with the Rangda Incursion.

 

There are probably a ton more of these little notes about it scattered around, those are just some of the ones I could remember.

 

http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Slaugth

[Jarl Kjaran Coldheart]

Very interesting stuff there

[Soldier of Dorn]

Probably just the Slaugth.