IA - The "Black" Legion

[bluntblade]

And I forgot the Harbingers and Eagle Warriors.

[simison]

Slynnt is another candidate for the Khorne Arch-champion.

[bluntblade]

Sorta. He's probably the leading champion of Khorne within the Black Legion, if not the one who commands the most warriors (if he even cares about that).

[simison]

Raktra has the opposite impression.

[bluntblade]

Oops. He did start that way, but then I shifted him into the BL. And Dorak just seemed to offer more possibilities for Chaotic gruesomeness.

[Raktra]

Yeah my bad there, I mustn't have been clear enough/got the wrong idea from your short story piece with him as the BL-esque representative.

[bluntblade]

Yeah, I could see Ju-Long or Guan being good choices.

Ju-Long would be interesting since I planned for him to become a blackshield not long into the Insurrection, who then joins back with the Warriors for the Siege of Madrigal. Having a rival in Raiden could be a good motivation for his return.

Guan would also make sense, being essentially an exemplar of the Warriors, and their greatest swordsman. He'd be the one likely to be friends with Raiden, and seeing it as his personal duty to kill him could be a nice tragic moment.

This idea is resonating with me more and more. The Suzerainty will be in a position to lay claim to most of the territory around the Maelstrom, for one thing.

 

Wondering about Susanoo Empyon being Raiden's initial rival, and perhaps the one everyone initially expects to seize control of the Maelstrom, assembling a broad coalition of warbands as he makes himself more powerful by appalling means (maybe shenanigans from Vizenko).

 

In that context the Blackening would take on some additional significance as Raiden forges a Legion with which to contest power with Empyon. "You burnish the old colours to hide your shame, as do your followers - no matter the shade of their armour. We, on the other hand, burn out the shame. From this we create unity. From this we take new purpose for ourselves. And with these we shall cast you down."

[bluntblade]

Gathering up and noting down a few bits and bobs for BL shenanigans down the millennia:

• The Second Black Crusade is sent into reverse after the Battle of the Hulian Gulf, where the Storm Blades, Imperial Sons and Stone Dragons rout a Black Legion host and kill the Lord Purgator - though Raiden, like Abaddon, achieves some strategic goals
• One Black Crusade, preferably a later one, sees a Second Founding Order (preferably one from the Bears) obliterated in a colossal mechanised battle, with the Dark Mechanicum assets of the Legion playing a key role
• The Blight of Zeal (as it seems opted to call it, when the dominant faction of the Ecclesiarchy seizes power and pitches its fanatics against the Astartes and Mechanicum) is carefully nurtured by the Black Legion, who take in large numbers of embittered Renegade Space Marines
• Among these is a Librarian from an HW Successor, who becomes Exhumos, Lord Corruptor by 40K - oh and it seems I actually named his Order, the Marines Redoubtable

 

If anyone else gets ideas for this, please feel free to chuck them in.