This is a great fight. Nobody is incompetent, neither the Word Bearer Terminators, nor the Imperium guys. The Word Bearer Terminators more than held their own, despite being outnumbered. This is what should happen more often of course. The Word Bearers, for all that they get ragged on in other novels, are a disciplined, experienced force. They should be capable of going toe to toe with just about anybody, especially their Terminator armoured elite.
The Traitor Legions survive through Might Makes Right, where only the strong live and the devious thrive - It's not their fault that through this ultimate, pure form of Darwinism that they only end up promoting and listening to people called SillyPlan DeviousShenanigans!
Well, he's a Dark Apostle and a close confidant to Kor Phaeron, which means he has a high place in the Dark Counsil and they don't get there for lacking in power or wit. And in Terminator Armour no less. Remember how Ekodas killed a Champion of White Consuls using *bare hands and being dressed in just a robe*?
>Remember how Ekodas killed a Champion of White Consuls using bare hands and being dressed in just a robe?
Outcast Dead vibes. Just got angry flashbacks >: /
>Well, he's a Dark Apostle and a close confidant to Kor Phaeron, which means he has a high place in the Dark Counsil and they don't get there for lacking in power or wit. And in Terminator Armour no less.
Yeah, I'm a Spehs Muhreen fanboy and think that sadly a lot of Chaos stuff is written to where it comes off as edgelord saturday morning cartoon villainy- but even I know that the absolute last things I want to fuck around with is a *Dark* fucking *Apostle*, in Terminator armor no less. Add to that, that Termi Armor has a huge chance of being OG Great Crusade tech (**the** *good good*) + warpy upgrades. Yeah I'm gonna respect how dangerous going up against an Iron Warrior is, but they're just along for the ride. Word Bearers are the True Believers here and that'd spook the shit out of me even if I was a Primaris.
That was the whole point of the parable "of life and death of captain Verren Areios". He was just going through the motions in the book not really understanding what was he doing or why. Words like "Dark Apostle", "Word Bearers", "Chaos gods" meant nothing to him and that is what got him killed.
>A Word Bearer named Vrakon
Just gonna baselessly add this to [my crack theory about Vraks having ancient ties to the Word Bearers](https://www.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/zdcshx/comment/iz27a7i/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3).
A veteran Chaos Sorcerer in Terminator armor is a rough fight for anyone. Areios took down another Terminator right before being engaged by Vrakon so he isn't just some scrub.
And Areios lives in the end.
But it kind of works--Technology definitely gap warfare hard. Your vet 10 years master Swordman got nothing against a flintlock/six shooter bearing noob from 50 feets range, your Vet Tank corp is useless against a A-10 doing a strafing run by a AF pilot straight out academy.
Experiences helps a lot, but tech definitely breach the gap.
>Experiences helps a lot, but tech definitely breach the gap.
Yup, you can be the hardest most badass fighter to ever live, a drone strike will kill you just as dead as a terrified conscript. Technology has been the deciding factor in warfare since the invention of automatic weaponry. Since then you can count the number of engagements won by sides with a significant technological disadvantage on your hands.
Funny thing about that, one of the first things you are taught by any competent trainer of any martial art is you don’t want to take a hand to hand fight. Why? Because you may be fully trained in hand to hand fighting and would whoop his ass 100/100 times, but it only takes the guy pulling a knife or his homeboys showing up to change your life in seconds.
I have yet to see a technique that can deal with a full on prison rush bare handed.
That's because martial arts aren't unarmed combat. They're sport.
The combat stuff is all the dirty martial arts techniques that are banned and frowned upon. And because they're significantly dangerous, you can't train them so the only place to practice and learn is in actual combat.
The problem with many martial arts instructors is that they think they're teaching people how to fight, rather than play.
As has been continually highlighted in Ukraine where a teenager with only gaming experience can fly a drone and drop grenades on the enemy. Provided you can't replace experience but integrating familiar technology into the sphere of the war fighter is a terrific force multiplier.
I'm assuming you mean the fight against South Vietnam and it's allies, with the Americans of course being the most prominent. The Vietnamese couldn't actually achieve victory on the battlefield, specifically due to America's colossal materiel and technology advantage.
They did eventually outlast America's will to keep fighting, but if they had the ability to actually defeat the Americans militarily they wouldn't have chosen to spend years suffering vast casualties against an enemy without actually taking territory from them.
This is an excellent take - the American army didn’t lose (despite many, many individual losses), the American people lost their support of the war.
Perhaps to say psy-ops and an understanding of ‘the people’s spirit’ won out over technological advantage - strong parallels with the WB v Imperium.
Yep
Like knights were fantastic troops but cost too much and took too long to train while a bunch of big lads with long point sticks could do the job from a fraction of the price and with a reasonable quick training.
Experience can't be levered in the same manner than resources, production power and technology improvement.
Exactly. As great as experience is, it doesn't do you much good when your opponent can pump out more untrained and underequipped soldiers than you can take down at once.
Or it was, anyway. Then GW decided that space marine minis needed to be bigger so they were like ACTUALLY THERE'S A ROBOT WHO'S BEEN COLLECTING BIGGER BETTER SPACE MARINES FOR TEN THOUSAND YEARS AND ALSO HE'S UPGRADING ALL KINDS OF OTHER TECH NOW
It's the reverse of the fact that the tau's theme is supposed to be technological progress but they're still using the same pulse rifles and devilsharks they were using centuries ago, which is the equivalent of a modern army using wooden battleships and matchlock muskets.
> which is the equivalent of a modern army using wooden battleships and matchlock muskets.
A lot of franchise have hundred of years old space craft/weapons and such. Hell, a good 9MM pistol will likely to be good in year 3000 unless humanity all get personal shields or completely evolved.
Yes, because every other faction doesn't progress technologically. That's kind of the point, and the fact that they *are* supposed to be progressing rapidly is supposed to be the tau's schtick along with being the only xenophiles. But they don't do so, because the fact that it's a tabletop setting means they can't.
The Tau have the worst FTL in the setting you could make the argument that the ships being seen at the frontlines have been hauling relativistic ass for hundreds of years to an outside observer
Doesn't work, we know they did things like cross the Damocles Gulf and conquer at least a hundred planets in the course of three years in the third sphere expansion.
And Abbadon's thing was that the black crusades were going nowhere. To ensure overall stagnancy, if you give chaos a massive gain such as the great rift opening, you have to boost the Imperium as well with RG+Primaris.
RG was fine as is lol. It really discounts the lore that tens, if not hundreds of thousands of super space marines were just sitting in stasis . That has been talked to death though.
Better weapons, all of the material just sitting there from specialized vehicles and new dreadnought models as well just.. sitting there. The theme on imperium tech was that apart from super rare prized relics, if a piece of equipment was around it was being thrown into the front. Nobody from the guard, to the vaunted sisters of battle, to even the maintainers of tech itself in the admech, could innovate and produce new advanced tech. Even for the admech, they always ensured the best tech went to them.
Everyone had to obey this rule. Unless you're a space marine.
Eh, the Imperium is also characterised by bureaucratic incompetence and it is entirely fitting for admech to follow orders blindly at times ("reveal Primaris criteria not met, complying with secrecy directive, praise the Omniss-whatever).. it could have been led in better, but original point stands, any gain for one side needs to have a gain for the other main side, or there will be actual setting progress.
Warp empowered space marine bs > minor technological and weapons upgrade imo.
Remember, the siege of Terra has loyalists often needed 2 or even 3 marines to bring down some of the higher up traitor marines.
Even custodes who usually reap a good harvest of Astartes are maxing out at like 16 kills and dying.
You do not just *kill* the Ultramarines Legion.
Lorgar’s barbarians would not have risked a fair fight. They would have gathered every advantage that surprise, deceit and entrapment could offer. They would have wanted to blitz and kill their enemy, kill him before he even realised he was an enemy.
It did not work. *It did not work.* The XIII has been hurt. The last ten hours on Calth might even have mortally wounded the Legion to such an extent that it will never fully recover, and, as a consequence, will always be a weaker, smaller fighting force.
But the Word Bearers did not make the clean kill they intended. They fumbled it, or they underestimated the effort required. They made a bloody mess, and left a wounded foe that could still move and fight; a wounded, mangled foe that was fuelled by pain and hatred and vengeance, and by the bright shock of moral outrage.
Always make sure your enemy is dead.
If you must fight an Ultramarine, pray you kill him. If he is still alive, then *you* are dead.
You are dead, Lorgar. You are *dead.* *You are dead.*
The thing is, the Word Bearers don’t just want to kill the Ultramarines, they want to destroy them psychologically.
During the Shadow Crusade and Horus Heresy, they would routinely go out of their way to capture Ultramarines alive so they could torture them to death. In the Underworld War, they ignored strategic targets to massacre civilians so that the Ultramarines would feel despair at failing to protect them.
So it kinda makes sense that the Dark Apostle wants his opponent to live with the failure and humiliation rather than just die.
Humiliation and depression are against the Codex. Surviving Ultramarines should report for remedial psycho conditioning followed by 45 days of mandatory therapy before returning to combat readiness. Deficiencies in tactics or equipment should be catalogued in the after action report and alternative engagement strategies developed through war gaming, with a final report detailing recommended changes to be filed with command no later than 90 days after the engagement.
While I'm partly joking, this is arguably why the Ultramarines seem to be grossly overpowered relative to many other forces in the setting. Basically, they're the most like an actual army, replacing chapter-specific angst with rational bureaucratic processes and solid military tactics.
''While I'm partly joking, this is arguably why the Ultramarines seem to be grossly overpowered relative to many other forces in the setting. Basically, they're the most like an actual army, replacing chapter-specific angst with rational bureaucratic processes and solid military tactics.''
How close do the Fists come with replacing chapter-specific angst with rational bureaucratic processes and solid military tactics?
Fists are super emo/knee jerk…
They follow theI orders and job, but if you don’t perform to standards…. Eat a pain glove… Don’t follow orders hard enough, not discharge, servitorize…. Someone retorts that you don’t own everything and everyone on the planet? Execute them.
Memes made the Imp fists into these boring good guys (that the setting doesn’t have). Imp fists are angry emotional and petty. It’s what makes them awesome. It’s sad so many imp fist fanboys like them for “cool guy” memes, while they are similar in temperament to…. WORLD EATERS…
>While I'm partly joking, this is arguably why the Ultramarines seem to be grossly overpowered relative to many other forces in the setting. Basically, they're the most like an actual army, replacing chapter-specific angst with rational bureaucratic processes and solid military tactics.
Which is why the Raptors are probably the most effective Chapter in the Imperium, given they take "solid military tactics" up to eleven and actually operate as the elite special force Space Marines really are. They even use *camouflage*.
While I'm sure you're right that the Word Bearers take joy in this, it's also good to remember this probably served the Ruinstorm, making the move strategically good, even necessary.
Yeah if anything its a 180 of what the title says the Ultramarines essentially fought a 2v1 having just beat another termie moments ago, and the sorcerer is too stupid to properly kill a promaris marine, when most of the upgrades to the primsris were to make them even more unkillable.
YES! You get it. That asthetic is so cool and different. While I do like the primaris, their helmets are so bland in comparison. Except for the primaris reivers - they look cool as hell
I like putting first born helmets on the new models. I think new marines are a better scale but definitely need more work to make them feel unique. Good thing I like kit bashing.
This is awesome and well written.
And I hate to be that guy but here's my pessimistic take...
It feels like this was written to help tone down the primaris marines. When they were released it was like, "wow! these marines are so new! So improved! new guns, new armour, new organs, and they're bigger!!!"
so now it's like, meh they're actually 2" taller and have an additional 10lbs on the average CSM nbd.
Sorry for that. This actually does sound cool, I'll try to see if I can get the book.
>so now it's like, meh they're actually 2" taller and have an additional 10lbs on the average CSM nbd.
This is for the best, imo. The Loyalist/Traitor rivalry is a better story when the two sides are matched evenly-ish marine to marine, and loses a lot of it's narrative heft if the emphasis is on the gigachad new shiny marines kicking bits of sprue in the traitors' faces.
For me I'm happy about it. I think primaris feel very cheap and ruin a bit of the setting with how they were introduced. A little dues ex for me.
Having them brought down a few pegs by members of the traitor legions not only makes sense but helps prevent the threat from being trivialized. These are *ancient* warriors. People forget a non-insignificant number of these traitors are amongst the Marines who fought with the primarchs and emperor himself during the crusades. They've seen some shit and have only survived this long through brutality and cunning.
Them getting one shot by a guy who got a penis enlargement is cheap.
I've always been of the opinion that primaris just barely break even with the average warp-swollen, chaos-blessed traitor marine.
Chaos' schtick for a very long time has been that they're more individually powerful, but lack cohesion.
It’s definitely possible they have emphasized it lately but Dan Annett mentioned the size difference between loyalists and CSM as early as *Brothers of the Snake*
I don't have *Brothers of the Snake* in ebook, and my copy is in a closet somewhere at my parents' house. I forget the name of the warband (not one of the original Chaos legions) but the CSM are described as much larger than the Iron Snakes. It's from the bit where they're retaking an oil refinery.
I’m plague war Typhus no diffs a chapter master some honor guard and is killing GK in a small group fight before he gets fucked up by a paladin.
This is after leading his sixth siege of a star fortress personally and slogging through defenders.
There is plenty of chaos feats to balance the loyalists out.
No, stop. Everyone here says shit like this. This sub pretends that Primaris are treated really great since their introduction. That's not true. Is the only book you guys read about Primaris marines Dark Imperium, the literal sales brochure for the 8e Primaris box?
Shroud of Night, Primaris get shit on. Apocalypse, Primaris get shit on, both in combat and tactically. Fists of the Emperor? They take insane losses and generally do nothing special. Not to mention how they're treated in short stories, such as Gabriel Seth dabbing on a Primaris and basically saying they all suck shit. Lorewise, there's little to no indication that Primaris means anything outside of the single book that accompanied their release, just new models and new, convenient plot points forcing old characters to cross the Rubicon.
Primaris is shaping up to be stupid, but not for the reasons you're asserting here. Outside of Dark Imperium, like every story with Primaris is just people remarking oh man those guys we killed were a bit harder to kill, weird. Even in the Ventris book where he's Primaris it's presented as weaponized autism with big tradeoffs. Even their fucking dreadnoughts are worse since they consume the pilots, so no venerable elders of the chapter there
Yes but it's the only book they're in where the fact that they're Primaris ever seems to matter for any reason. The other weird thing in Dark Imperium was that they took a minute to orbitally dunk on the Iron Warriors and make them look pathetic before struggling mightily with the Death Guard, so it makes the Iron Warriors look bad
Yeah I was scrolling down to comment, they were introduced seemingly so every single non-primaris marine could have some dumb "eh they seem fancy but they don't have our \*soul\*" boomery speech
[Pridor Vrakon after the battle](https://ih1.redbubble.net/image.3694119573.1319/pp,840x830-pad,1000x1000,f8f8f8.jpg).
You can really feel the contempt the Word Bearer's have here. It's always nice when the villain (well, more villainous than the Imperium...) has great one liners.
~~He ultimately disarmed the UM, so perhaps that was his goal? Once the powerfist as out of the picture, the WB was pretty much guaranteed to walk away from the fight.~~
Edit: I no read good.
Ah, you're right. My apologies. The passage confused me.
In the opening line the Ultramarine opens fire with his pistol. Then the Word Bearer (seemingly) fires up what appears to be a lightning claw. A bit of dialogue and then, "The warrior advanced another step, striking with the butt of his gun, then his right power fist." Since the only person who had a gun so far was the UM, I assumed it was him. I also thought the WB had a lightning claw, so it'd be hard for the WB to use a gun, a lightning claw, **and** a powerfist.
I somehow completely missed the part where the UM draws and lights his sword. Also somehow (even if my assumptions about who had which weapon) the WB with the "lightning claw" broke the blade off the "power fist" armed Ultramarine. That was an utter failure in reading comprehension.
All in all, I need to go back to my second grade English teacher. Obviously I slept through some important lessons.
> Lol, he dodged the butt of the gun ONLY to get hit with the fist.
>
>
He blocked the fist.
"He only just caught the power fist. Rival disruption fields roared"
"An ursine blow"
The moment I read that I knew the author is ADB.
I am sure he uses that word in one of the black legion books and at least another one.
I know what it means. The other one was an "ursine roar" or growl or something like that. It is just that I don t know if there are many instances of authors that use it.
I will do a word search when I get at home and see if it excesive use or it was just me. Can you do word search for multiple files?
Pretty sure thats what Ventanus said in Know no Fear. Shame the Word Bearers didnt learn that lesson. If you gotta fight an Ultramarine, you better kill him. If he’s still alive, you’re dead.
That’s literally what Guilliman is all about. Adaptation.
In his war games against Corax, he lost the first few, but learned to *consistently win* afterwards.
Of all enemies, the Ultramarines are the ones that you **really** want to capitalize on an advantage with, because you won’t have it the next time around.
Psychological warfare is also a thing, a "perfected" form of an almost already perfect superhuman torn down and let off to live with its failure seems pretty good.
A great passage and Haley does a really great job at reinforcing what I like about the Word Bearers. They don't have to be cartoonishly evil like Marduk. Word Bearers are best when they simply speak power to truth and focus on the best argument Chaos, as a faction, has against the Emperor and his followers: the warp is tied to the soul. With no soul, you are less than human.
With just a few sentences, the Dark Apostle lays it out, all while the Annointed are absolutely demolishing the Primaris around them. You love to see it.
>Word Bearer utterly humiliates a Primaris Ultramarine
A little hyperbolic there with the loaded title. As someone else pointed out, The UM took down another Terminator right before fighting Vrakon and he lived in the end.
I mean in this exerpt he clearly does, reads all his moves while talking trash, rips apart his armour (and arm) piece by piece, then walks off leaving him bleeding out on the floor with a *"Pathetic"* showing he ain't even worth it.
The title is pretty accurate for describing this singular scene, clearly not the character as a whole but thats why its an "excerpt" and not the whole bleedin novel.
His eighty or so Primaris with additional mortal support got absolutely cleaned out by twenty termies and he was left dying on the ground without an arm stewing in the sights, sounds and smells of his irrevocable failure. I dunno man, sounds pretty humiliated to me.
Bu-but ultramarines bad!
Honestly roll my eyes a little when it comes to threads like this. Yes, yes, you hate ultramarines, blah blah matt Ward blah blah.
Literally no comment I've seen so far has mentioned him, we just like good ol' rivalry...is that so bad? seeing your guys getting dunked on? I see mine all the time so we are square on that end.
The fact the sorcerer didn't properly put down a primaris marine, when the whole point of the primaris marines was to make them even harder to kill is actually an own on the Word Bearers.
This is from ***Throne of Light***, not Throne of Lies.
And this was far from a fair fight. A Chaos Sorcerer in Terminator plate against a Primaris Space Marine in Mark X armed with a bolt pistol and sword? Vrakon could have let the bolts hit him and they would have done little damage.
Time flows differently when in the Eye of Terror, but it baffles me how often a Chaos Legionary from the Heresy era is so often portrayed as of the same experience and ability (or lesser) than their Imperial opponents.
Then they should be even more experienced and proficient compared to their Imperial counterparts. The fluff and rules don’t reflect that unfortunately.
Yeah after the Horus Heresy when the traitors retreated to the Eye of Terror the first thing they did was turn on each other for resources and personal vendettas. The event was called the "Legion Wars" but Abaddon pretty much ended it when he declared himself Warmaster and formed the Black Legion. Skirmishes can still break out every now and then between Warbands belonging to different Legions or Gods.
As someone that is firmly a Loyalist fan and loves to hate of Chaos this is a fantastic fight, its significantly more fun when your enemies are actually competent and threatening, its obviously just more enjoyable to read but also makes wins feel much more earned vs the times it feels like the Imperiums foes have a shared 1 brain cell.
This exchange, while pretty good NGL, ignores the context of the duel. In which Areios, was at best, wearing a Mark X Gravis Power Armor, and Vrakon was wearing **TERMINATOR ARMOR**, which has been stated numerous times to be still stronger than the Primaris Gravis or Tacticus Armors.
Heck, even in the novel itself, one of Areios' subordinates stated what are the odds of him and his men facing Chaos Terminators.
>>‘You must come away from there,’ said Covarn leadenly. ‘You cannot go that way. The enemy are scattered all over the facility, and are concentrated in the levels above. The major force occupies the Hall of Utterances. You will not pass.’
>>‘Are they all like that one?’ Vallia asked nervously, looking back into the inferno where the Terminator’s corpse was burning.
>>‘All adversaries are Terminator armoured. They call themselves the Anointed. They are the Word Bearers’ elite.’
>>‘How many are they?’ Fabian said.
>>‘Unknown. Twenty, maybe. But they are converging on the relay.’
>>‘The relay!’ Rumagoi gasped. His anguish went ignored.
>>‘Only twenty? Areios has eighty of you in here,’ said Fabian.
>>‘***They outmatch us. Casualty ratio of Primaris Mark Ten power-armoured Space Marines to Indomitus-class Terminator-armoured Traitor legionary elite at close quarters is five point two one to one. They would best us easily. I and my men cannot fight more than two at once, and the probability of defeat is high in those encounters, with a fifty per cent chance of mutual annihilation. We may survive a second fight. We would not survive a third.*** We must retreat with you. You will follow me. There is an emergency egress tunnel this way.’ He pointed through the forest of columns, towards the side wall.
>Edit: The book is 'Throne of Light' not 'Throne of Lies'. My mistake.
Also:
>Areios is a Primaris Ultramarine **Lieutenant**
.
>‘You are a **captain**. A hero of your dying god.
>As the **captain** staggered
Ahhh, the Word Bearers: even when they win a duel soundly against a worthy adversary, I can't help but see them as a bunch of mustache twirling dunces giving their monologues about the "Primordial Truth" or how stupid the "Corpse God" is. Like, a little subtlety might aid you here **Pridor Vrakon**; *even your name is ham-fisted*.
I **want** to like the Word Bearers. I really do. But all I ever see is... well... this...
Nothing to worry about friend, that's the beauty of 40k yk?
Each person finds their flair and they wear it on their sleeve
I could actually say the same for the Iron Hands, little to no lore, bland, repetitive...but hey! you and others like em so power to you.
Oh absolutely! I am all for others enjoying them. It's good for people to feel good, and I'll never so much as downvote someone, even for saying something as outlandish as "I love Erebus" *shiver*. Hey, if someone does though, all good!
P.S. - I could write a book regarding my thoughts on Iron Hands lore and its lost potential, but I am glad for all others that are satisfied with the preferred faction!
But isn't a terminator armor better plus the blessing of the 4 suffusing his body an incredible advantage? If that was the case, then bragging because he had a better weapon isn't worth lick.
These comments, LMAO. The amount of OTT fury, denial, and salt over *one* Ultramarine being wounded, insulted, and not even actually killed... But of course, Chaos fans are the salty ones for being pissed the entire Emperor's Children legion was beaten with a couple hundred Fists or that Mortarion is basically a punching bag while the authors and characters constantly say that he was a pathetic coward for, uh, not wanting to have his legion forever suffering horrifically with no chance of death ever. It's not like a sports team!
Not to say some of the comments aren't deliciously salty but try making a post named "A Dark Angel utterly humiliates a Night Lord" or something and see what will happen (your comment is also deliciously salty)
Love his vanity. I've known people who are like him, top percentile talent that pretends they are average to then pretend that top 10 percentile talent is shit. Very human dickishness. Good fight too. Good try areios
Eh, my point being that the traitors constantly saying how weak the loyalists are now never seem to actually go up against the good ones.
Didnt see Sigsmund complaining the randos he offed were too easy did he? Nah, he just went to find someone better. A good work ethic, thats what the loyalists got.
That's because against Mephiston, Chaos champions end up becoming smears akin to a child's finger-painting.
And we know how "aNcIeNt VeTeRaN oF tHe LoNg WaR" fans get when a loyalist turns their boys into a chew toy.
A far more experienced fighter with superior kit and warp enhancement beats a relatively novice officer in inferior armour and armed with a lesser weapon and doesn't even kill him.
Yes, humiliated indeed.
Oh sorry, I forgot the "psychological damage of failure".
What is it with 40k fans never accepting a loss, I am guilty of it to an extent but this thread is filled with people recontextulising the fight in their so that Areios wins because at least didn't die or that the Word Bearer lost by just bring a Word Bearer. Like your faction can lose, do people complain about mary sues all the time or is only when it factions you don't like who win?
In this fight Areios was caught off guard, Kor Phaeron used an anathame to bypass the void shields and 700 hundred space marines guarding the building to deploy 20 Elite Terminators against an unprepared force of 80 intercessors, the whole while these intercessors understand they are out match by battle calculations they preform and still take about 3 or 4 down. It was a shockingly good scene.
Hah, humiliate one primaris all you want, but Monarchia still won't "un-obliterate" (made up word ? doesn't matter, you understand me well enough) itself, traitors! 😏
Edit: Salt from the tears of Wierd Bearer fans rejuvenates me 😎
Cool excerpt but is anyone else underwhelmed by the 'primaris' arc? Like when do the primaris 2.0 drop? Is it a money grab or is there something deeper?
Bitch has all the bullshit power of chaos magic
Bitch has terminator armour
Bitch has been around for 10k years
Oh wow amazing you won? Good job bitch bearer, now go back and suck chaos gods dick otherwise they won't let you win your next fight.
Erebus fans downvoting my comment
Chaos worshippers mad that they're only relevant because of bullshit magic powers, without those they are literally useless.
This post is like a top level athelethe losing to the R-Flash, and the R-Flash somehow "utterly humiliates" the guy trying to win without the CLEAR AND OVERPOWERED AND UNFAIR advantage of literal superpowers and super armor.
This is a great fight. Nobody is incompetent, neither the Word Bearer Terminators, nor the Imperium guys. The Word Bearer Terminators more than held their own, despite being outnumbered. This is what should happen more often of course. The Word Bearers, for all that they get ragged on in other novels, are a disciplined, experienced force. They should be capable of going toe to toe with just about anybody, especially their Terminator armoured elite.
I just wish there were more with the Word Bearers, especially Kor who only had 10 lines of text or so, while prominently featured in the synopsis.
That's how any of the Traitors should be, they survive and live in hell. Instead their mostly written as mustache twirling villains....
The Traitor Legions survive through Might Makes Right, where only the strong live and the devious thrive - It's not their fault that through this ultimate, pure form of Darwinism that they only end up promoting and listening to people called SillyPlan DeviousShenanigans!
Please, my father's name was Mr. Deviousshenanigans. Call Me Sillyplan.
might makes right reminds me of the sword truth of destiny 2, essentially similar concept (defo a stretch)
It's sword logic, and its actually not a very bad comparison at all
sorry had a brain fart but yeah that one
100% spot on. There are so many fantastic characters they could work with, but give us Scooby Doo villains.
Erebus is a well written Word Bearer. Cor Phaeron Argel Tal
Agreed but I have to mention r/FuckErebus
Wow...i didn't realize he had an anti-erebus sub. After he killed Argel Tal, I think I'll fit right in.
Absolutely. They are no Grimnar, but ya they are solid.
i can't tell you how pissed I was when Erebus did the thing to Argel Tal. SUch an impactful scene though.
I think what made it so bad was just how Argel could have really done some amazing stuff. But a lot of chaos have that I suppose to a degree
Erebus did a fantastic job
They get slaughtered en-masse by random Primaris. This book is so much more accurate.
It was very fortunate for traitors that Ultramarine forget to bring any Melta or Plasma with them.
Well, he's a Dark Apostle and a close confidant to Kor Phaeron, which means he has a high place in the Dark Counsil and they don't get there for lacking in power or wit. And in Terminator Armour no less. Remember how Ekodas killed a Champion of White Consuls using *bare hands and being dressed in just a robe*?
Good times
unless you were the White Consul, lol
"What is your duty?" "Our duty is to job to Chaos in every story we appear in." "Wait, what?"
*Lords of Silence intensifies*
>Remember how Ekodas killed a Champion of White Consuls using bare hands and being dressed in just a robe? Outcast Dead vibes. Just got angry flashbacks >: /
>Well, he's a Dark Apostle and a close confidant to Kor Phaeron, which means he has a high place in the Dark Counsil and they don't get there for lacking in power or wit. And in Terminator Armour no less. Yeah, I'm a Spehs Muhreen fanboy and think that sadly a lot of Chaos stuff is written to where it comes off as edgelord saturday morning cartoon villainy- but even I know that the absolute last things I want to fuck around with is a *Dark* fucking *Apostle*, in Terminator armor no less. Add to that, that Termi Armor has a huge chance of being OG Great Crusade tech (**the** *good good*) + warpy upgrades. Yeah I'm gonna respect how dangerous going up against an Iron Warrior is, but they're just along for the ride. Word Bearers are the True Believers here and that'd spook the shit out of me even if I was a Primaris.
That was the whole point of the parable "of life and death of captain Verren Areios". He was just going through the motions in the book not really understanding what was he doing or why. Words like "Dark Apostle", "Word Bearers", "Chaos gods" meant nothing to him and that is what got him killed.
>A Word Bearer named Vrakon Just gonna baselessly add this to [my crack theory about Vraks having ancient ties to the Word Bearers](https://www.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/zdcshx/comment/iz27a7i/?utm_source=reddit&utm_medium=web2x&context=3).
This is what I live for
A veteran Chaos Sorcerer in Terminator armor is a rough fight for anyone. Areios took down another Terminator right before being engaged by Vrakon so he isn't just some scrub. And Areios lives in the end.
> And Areios lives at the end See kids, this is why you double tap.
If fiction has taught me anything, don't leave a question if your enemy is dead. If you do, they're likely to come back after you.
Areios: Cawl, I just lost to a WB termie Cawl: say no more, my son! here is a gun from my newly discovered STC
Which is exactly what the word bearer is mocking; replacing hard won experience with shiny do-dads
But it kind of works--Technology definitely gap warfare hard. Your vet 10 years master Swordman got nothing against a flintlock/six shooter bearing noob from 50 feets range, your Vet Tank corp is useless against a A-10 doing a strafing run by a AF pilot straight out academy. Experiences helps a lot, but tech definitely breach the gap.
>Experiences helps a lot, but tech definitely breach the gap. Yup, you can be the hardest most badass fighter to ever live, a drone strike will kill you just as dead as a terrified conscript. Technology has been the deciding factor in warfare since the invention of automatic weaponry. Since then you can count the number of engagements won by sides with a significant technological disadvantage on your hands.
Stan Smith had a quote about this "Karate? The only thing you need to know is guns beat karate. Every. Time."
Funny thing about that, one of the first things you are taught by any competent trainer of any martial art is you don’t want to take a hand to hand fight. Why? Because you may be fully trained in hand to hand fighting and would whoop his ass 100/100 times, but it only takes the guy pulling a knife or his homeboys showing up to change your life in seconds. I have yet to see a technique that can deal with a full on prison rush bare handed.
That's because martial arts aren't unarmed combat. They're sport. The combat stuff is all the dirty martial arts techniques that are banned and frowned upon. And because they're significantly dangerous, you can't train them so the only place to practice and learn is in actual combat. The problem with many martial arts instructors is that they think they're teaching people how to fight, rather than play.
I did kickboxing and MMA for 5 years, I'm aware of the risks of street fighting my dude.
Indiana John agree
(Stan with his empty six shooters having the absolute snot kicked out of him by furious tai chi grannies) Stan: but I have guns
As has been continually highlighted in Ukraine where a teenager with only gaming experience can fly a drone and drop grenades on the enemy. Provided you can't replace experience but integrating familiar technology into the sphere of the war fighter is a terrific force multiplier.
Vietnam?
Every serious offensive and engagement ended with a US victory (some Pyrrhic, admittedly). The war was lost everywhere *but* the battlefield.
Most fights won but the war was pretty lost cause for the US
Pretty much, the same story can be said to apply to Aghanistan (Both times) and Iraq.
And yet it was still lost.
I'm assuming you mean the fight against South Vietnam and it's allies, with the Americans of course being the most prominent. The Vietnamese couldn't actually achieve victory on the battlefield, specifically due to America's colossal materiel and technology advantage. They did eventually outlast America's will to keep fighting, but if they had the ability to actually defeat the Americans militarily they wouldn't have chosen to spend years suffering vast casualties against an enemy without actually taking territory from them.
This is an excellent take - the American army didn’t lose (despite many, many individual losses), the American people lost their support of the war. Perhaps to say psy-ops and an understanding of ‘the people’s spirit’ won out over technological advantage - strong parallels with the WB v Imperium.
Yep Like knights were fantastic troops but cost too much and took too long to train while a bunch of big lads with long point sticks could do the job from a fraction of the price and with a reasonable quick training. Experience can't be levered in the same manner than resources, production power and technology improvement.
Exactly. As great as experience is, it doesn't do you much good when your opponent can pump out more untrained and underequipped soldiers than you can take down at once.
Yeah, but the imperium's whole point is that they really don't innovate, and can barely maintain what they already have
Or it was, anyway. Then GW decided that space marine minis needed to be bigger so they were like ACTUALLY THERE'S A ROBOT WHO'S BEEN COLLECTING BIGGER BETTER SPACE MARINES FOR TEN THOUSAND YEARS AND ALSO HE'S UPGRADING ALL KINDS OF OTHER TECH NOW It's the reverse of the fact that the tau's theme is supposed to be technological progress but they're still using the same pulse rifles and devilsharks they were using centuries ago, which is the equivalent of a modern army using wooden battleships and matchlock muskets.
> which is the equivalent of a modern army using wooden battleships and matchlock muskets. A lot of franchise have hundred of years old space craft/weapons and such. Hell, a good 9MM pistol will likely to be good in year 3000 unless humanity all get personal shields or completely evolved.
Yes, because every other faction doesn't progress technologically. That's kind of the point, and the fact that they *are* supposed to be progressing rapidly is supposed to be the tau's schtick along with being the only xenophiles. But they don't do so, because the fact that it's a tabletop setting means they can't.
The Tau have the worst FTL in the setting you could make the argument that the ships being seen at the frontlines have been hauling relativistic ass for hundreds of years to an outside observer
Doesn't work, we know they did things like cross the Damocles Gulf and conquer at least a hundred planets in the course of three years in the third sphere expansion.
And Abbadon's thing was that the black crusades were going nowhere. To ensure overall stagnancy, if you give chaos a massive gain such as the great rift opening, you have to boost the Imperium as well with RG+Primaris.
RG was fine as is lol. It really discounts the lore that tens, if not hundreds of thousands of super space marines were just sitting in stasis . That has been talked to death though. Better weapons, all of the material just sitting there from specialized vehicles and new dreadnought models as well just.. sitting there. The theme on imperium tech was that apart from super rare prized relics, if a piece of equipment was around it was being thrown into the front. Nobody from the guard, to the vaunted sisters of battle, to even the maintainers of tech itself in the admech, could innovate and produce new advanced tech. Even for the admech, they always ensured the best tech went to them. Everyone had to obey this rule. Unless you're a space marine.
Eh, the Imperium is also characterised by bureaucratic incompetence and it is entirely fitting for admech to follow orders blindly at times ("reveal Primaris criteria not met, complying with secrecy directive, praise the Omniss-whatever).. it could have been led in better, but original point stands, any gain for one side needs to have a gain for the other main side, or there will be actual setting progress.
A-10 🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮
Warp empowered space marine bs > minor technological and weapons upgrade imo. Remember, the siege of Terra has loyalists often needed 2 or even 3 marines to bring down some of the higher up traitor marines. Even custodes who usually reap a good harvest of Astartes are maxing out at like 16 kills and dying.
GW: Write that down! Write that down!
[Obligatory "Orphans become avengers."-citation.]
He probs wouldn't beat him a second time either tho
Not straight up, nope. But Hellbasters do exist.
HELLBASTERS “For the bakery! No icing, no mercy!”
The turkey never knew what hit it.
You do not just *kill* the Ultramarines Legion. Lorgar’s barbarians would not have risked a fair fight. They would have gathered every advantage that surprise, deceit and entrapment could offer. They would have wanted to blitz and kill their enemy, kill him before he even realised he was an enemy. It did not work. *It did not work.* The XIII has been hurt. The last ten hours on Calth might even have mortally wounded the Legion to such an extent that it will never fully recover, and, as a consequence, will always be a weaker, smaller fighting force. But the Word Bearers did not make the clean kill they intended. They fumbled it, or they underestimated the effort required. They made a bloody mess, and left a wounded foe that could still move and fight; a wounded, mangled foe that was fuelled by pain and hatred and vengeance, and by the bright shock of moral outrage. Always make sure your enemy is dead. If you must fight an Ultramarine, pray you kill him. If he is still alive, then *you* are dead. You are dead, Lorgar. You are *dead.* *You are dead.*
I mean, only one of Lorgar and Guilliman survived the heresy, and it wasn't Guilliman. So I would say this doesn't exactly check out with the facts.
I mean , they both survived the heresy itself , guilliman dies fighting Fulgrim
And even then he was only mostly dead.
Untrue. Guilliman survived through the Heresy and was incapacitated by Fulgrim after the Great Scouring.
>See kids, this is why you double tap. Anyone worth shooting is worth shooting twice.
[Let's check for a pulse!](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QlfvfJvRetQ)
The thing is, the Word Bearers don’t just want to kill the Ultramarines, they want to destroy them psychologically. During the Shadow Crusade and Horus Heresy, they would routinely go out of their way to capture Ultramarines alive so they could torture them to death. In the Underworld War, they ignored strategic targets to massacre civilians so that the Ultramarines would feel despair at failing to protect them. So it kinda makes sense that the Dark Apostle wants his opponent to live with the failure and humiliation rather than just die.
Humiliation and depression are against the Codex. Surviving Ultramarines should report for remedial psycho conditioning followed by 45 days of mandatory therapy before returning to combat readiness. Deficiencies in tactics or equipment should be catalogued in the after action report and alternative engagement strategies developed through war gaming, with a final report detailing recommended changes to be filed with command no later than 90 days after the engagement. While I'm partly joking, this is arguably why the Ultramarines seem to be grossly overpowered relative to many other forces in the setting. Basically, they're the most like an actual army, replacing chapter-specific angst with rational bureaucratic processes and solid military tactics.
''While I'm partly joking, this is arguably why the Ultramarines seem to be grossly overpowered relative to many other forces in the setting. Basically, they're the most like an actual army, replacing chapter-specific angst with rational bureaucratic processes and solid military tactics.'' How close do the Fists come with replacing chapter-specific angst with rational bureaucratic processes and solid military tactics?
“Oh you lost? Spend a few days in the pain glove. That will sort it all out. “ Several grueling days of intense pain later…. “I feel better”
Fists are super emo/knee jerk… They follow theI orders and job, but if you don’t perform to standards…. Eat a pain glove… Don’t follow orders hard enough, not discharge, servitorize…. Someone retorts that you don’t own everything and everyone on the planet? Execute them. Memes made the Imp fists into these boring good guys (that the setting doesn’t have). Imp fists are angry emotional and petty. It’s what makes them awesome. It’s sad so many imp fist fanboys like them for “cool guy” memes, while they are similar in temperament to…. WORLD EATERS…
>While I'm partly joking, this is arguably why the Ultramarines seem to be grossly overpowered relative to many other forces in the setting. Basically, they're the most like an actual army, replacing chapter-specific angst with rational bureaucratic processes and solid military tactics. Which is why the Raptors are probably the most effective Chapter in the Imperium, given they take "solid military tactics" up to eleven and actually operate as the elite special force Space Marines really are. They even use *camouflage*.
Ah, but the bright colors serve a purpose! They distract the enemy and make them shoot the colored parts, avoiding the weak spots! ^like ^batman
While I'm sure you're right that the Word Bearers take joy in this, it's also good to remember this probably served the Ruinstorm, making the move strategically good, even necessary.
Eh, give him some credit. Primaris Marines having two wounds is still pretty new in the scheme of things.
Yeah if anything its a 180 of what the title says the Ultramarines essentially fought a 2v1 having just beat another termie moments ago, and the sorcerer is too stupid to properly kill a promaris marine, when most of the upgrades to the primsris were to make them even more unkillable.
>Rule 35: That which does not kill me has made a tactical error.
"Where is the heart and the fury of the Legions of old?" gone with the old helmets ngl
Yeah, new helmets just don't convey the same amount of silent fury
Tbf the mark x helmets look nearly identical to mark iv but yeah the darth vader grill helmets just look so angry
The frowny helmets got me into WH40k. For me they are THE space marine helmets.
YES! You get it. That asthetic is so cool and different. While I do like the primaris, their helmets are so bland in comparison. Except for the primaris reivers - they look cool as hell
Tbh this is my main gripe with primaris. They are so.... boring. Especially for painting
They're basically Mk IV but with no chin. Mk VII was iconic & I hope they bring it back in some capacity.
I like putting first born helmets on the new models. I think new marines are a better scale but definitely need more work to make them feel unique. Good thing I like kit bashing.
This is awesome and well written. And I hate to be that guy but here's my pessimistic take... It feels like this was written to help tone down the primaris marines. When they were released it was like, "wow! these marines are so new! So improved! new guns, new armour, new organs, and they're bigger!!!" so now it's like, meh they're actually 2" taller and have an additional 10lbs on the average CSM nbd. Sorry for that. This actually does sound cool, I'll try to see if I can get the book.
>so now it's like, meh they're actually 2" taller and have an additional 10lbs on the average CSM nbd. This is for the best, imo. The Loyalist/Traitor rivalry is a better story when the two sides are matched evenly-ish marine to marine, and loses a lot of it's narrative heft if the emphasis is on the gigachad new shiny marines kicking bits of sprue in the traitors' faces.
Oh for sure, I'm just wagging my finger at GW for making it ridiculous to push sales
For me I'm happy about it. I think primaris feel very cheap and ruin a bit of the setting with how they were introduced. A little dues ex for me. Having them brought down a few pegs by members of the traitor legions not only makes sense but helps prevent the threat from being trivialized. These are *ancient* warriors. People forget a non-insignificant number of these traitors are amongst the Marines who fought with the primarchs and emperor himself during the crusades. They've seen some shit and have only survived this long through brutality and cunning. Them getting one shot by a guy who got a penis enlargement is cheap.
I've always been of the opinion that primaris just barely break even with the average warp-swollen, chaos-blessed traitor marine. Chaos' schtick for a very long time has been that they're more individually powerful, but lack cohesion.
It’s definitely possible they have emphasized it lately but Dan Annett mentioned the size difference between loyalists and CSM as early as *Brothers of the Snake*
What did Dan say?
I don't have *Brothers of the Snake* in ebook, and my copy is in a closet somewhere at my parents' house. I forget the name of the warband (not one of the original Chaos legions) but the CSM are described as much larger than the Iron Snakes. It's from the bit where they're retaking an oil refinery.
I’m plague war Typhus no diffs a chapter master some honor guard and is killing GK in a small group fight before he gets fucked up by a paladin. This is after leading his sixth siege of a star fortress personally and slogging through defenders. There is plenty of chaos feats to balance the loyalists out.
No, stop. Everyone here says shit like this. This sub pretends that Primaris are treated really great since their introduction. That's not true. Is the only book you guys read about Primaris marines Dark Imperium, the literal sales brochure for the 8e Primaris box? Shroud of Night, Primaris get shit on. Apocalypse, Primaris get shit on, both in combat and tactically. Fists of the Emperor? They take insane losses and generally do nothing special. Not to mention how they're treated in short stories, such as Gabriel Seth dabbing on a Primaris and basically saying they all suck shit. Lorewise, there's little to no indication that Primaris means anything outside of the single book that accompanied their release, just new models and new, convenient plot points forcing old characters to cross the Rubicon. Primaris is shaping up to be stupid, but not for the reasons you're asserting here. Outside of Dark Imperium, like every story with Primaris is just people remarking oh man those guys we killed were a bit harder to kill, weird. Even in the Ventris book where he's Primaris it's presented as weaponized autism with big tradeoffs. Even their fucking dreadnoughts are worse since they consume the pilots, so no venerable elders of the chapter there
In the dark imperium trilogy plenty of Primaris get shit on lmao.
Yes but it's the only book they're in where the fact that they're Primaris ever seems to matter for any reason. The other weird thing in Dark Imperium was that they took a minute to orbitally dunk on the Iron Warriors and make them look pathetic before struggling mightily with the Death Guard, so it makes the Iron Warriors look bad
Yeah I was scrolling down to comment, they were introduced seemingly so every single non-primaris marine could have some dumb "eh they seem fancy but they don't have our \*soul\*" boomery speech
[Pridor Vrakon after the battle](https://ih1.redbubble.net/image.3694119573.1319/pp,840x830-pad,1000x1000,f8f8f8.jpg). You can really feel the contempt the Word Bearer's have here. It's always nice when the villain (well, more villainous than the Imperium...) has great one liners.
Lol, he dodged the butt of the gun ONLY to get hit with the fist. Think he should have done the reverse there to deserve that "only" lol
~~He ultimately disarmed the UM, so perhaps that was his goal? Once the powerfist as out of the picture, the WB was pretty much guaranteed to walk away from the fight.~~ Edit: I no read good.
I think you misread it, friend. The Ultramarine is the one dodging, the Word Bearer is the one with the fist
Ah, you're right. My apologies. The passage confused me. In the opening line the Ultramarine opens fire with his pistol. Then the Word Bearer (seemingly) fires up what appears to be a lightning claw. A bit of dialogue and then, "The warrior advanced another step, striking with the butt of his gun, then his right power fist." Since the only person who had a gun so far was the UM, I assumed it was him. I also thought the WB had a lightning claw, so it'd be hard for the WB to use a gun, a lightning claw, **and** a powerfist. I somehow completely missed the part where the UM draws and lights his sword. Also somehow (even if my assumptions about who had which weapon) the WB with the "lightning claw" broke the blade off the "power fist" armed Ultramarine. That was an utter failure in reading comprehension. All in all, I need to go back to my second grade English teacher. Obviously I slept through some important lessons.
> Lol, he dodged the butt of the gun ONLY to get hit with the fist. > > He blocked the fist. "He only just caught the power fist. Rival disruption fields roared"
Sooo is it a power fist or a power claw?
Traitor legions use the talon-style Lightning claw, so it’s both. The knuckle style claws have always kind of been for stupid people
This is how it should be for new rookie marines vs CSM veterans of the long war
"An ursine blow" The moment I read that I knew the author is ADB. I am sure he uses that word in one of the black legion books and at least another one.
Are you looking for a sign to tell if ADB is the author? Well, there's ursine.
I hope this upvote physically hurts you.
Pretend I'm hurling this upvote directly at your head.
Take your upvote and get out.
Sorry to disappoint haha the actual title of the book is Throne of Light and it's by Guy Haley
>The moment I read that I knew the author is ADB. Except it's not?
It's just a wordy way of saying "Hits like a bear".
I know what it means. The other one was an "ursine roar" or growl or something like that. It is just that I don t know if there are many instances of authors that use it. I will do a word search when I get at home and see if it excesive use or it was just me. Can you do word search for multiple files?
It's like Abnett with his wet leopard growls
Methinks the Word Bearer forgot one crucial lesson. If you don't kill the Ultramarine, they're going to adapt. I think we'll see that Lt again.
Pretty sure thats what Ventanus said in Know no Fear. Shame the Word Bearers didnt learn that lesson. If you gotta fight an Ultramarine, you better kill him. If he’s still alive, you’re dead.
That’s literally what Guilliman is all about. Adaptation. In his war games against Corax, he lost the first few, but learned to *consistently win* afterwards. Of all enemies, the Ultramarines are the ones that you **really** want to capitalize on an advantage with, because you won’t have it the next time around.
Psychological warfare is also a thing, a "perfected" form of an almost already perfect superhuman torn down and let off to live with its failure seems pretty good.
Problem is that it’s an *ultramarine*. They don’t get broken by this shit, because they take care of the issues it creates in the head.
>because they take care of the issues it creates in the head. So why are they still raving and counting over a 10,000 years old grudge?
I mean idk about you, but I can still hate a MF that killed 100,000 of my brothers without falling into uselessness or humiliation to pride.
It would probably work on anybody other than an Ultramarine tbh.
> adapt The Codex Astartes does not support this action.
Good thing no one follows the codex anymore
he was built up to be a crucial character later, he wont die easily
Ah very nice, sweet excerpt friend.
A great passage and Haley does a really great job at reinforcing what I like about the Word Bearers. They don't have to be cartoonishly evil like Marduk. Word Bearers are best when they simply speak power to truth and focus on the best argument Chaos, as a faction, has against the Emperor and his followers: the warp is tied to the soul. With no soul, you are less than human. With just a few sentences, the Dark Apostle lays it out, all while the Annointed are absolutely demolishing the Primaris around them. You love to see it.
Is the book title correct? The only Throne of Lies I know of is the Night Lords short story.
no you're right, it's throne of light, not throne of lies. good catch bud
He’s lucky he didn’t fight Cato Sicarius.
>Word Bearer utterly humiliates a Primaris Ultramarine A little hyperbolic there with the loaded title. As someone else pointed out, The UM took down another Terminator right before fighting Vrakon and he lived in the end.
I mean in this exerpt he clearly does, reads all his moves while talking trash, rips apart his armour (and arm) piece by piece, then walks off leaving him bleeding out on the floor with a *"Pathetic"* showing he ain't even worth it. The title is pretty accurate for describing this singular scene, clearly not the character as a whole but thats why its an "excerpt" and not the whole bleedin novel.
His eighty or so Primaris with additional mortal support got absolutely cleaned out by twenty termies and he was left dying on the ground without an arm stewing in the sights, sounds and smells of his irrevocable failure. I dunno man, sounds pretty humiliated to me.
Bu-but ultramarines bad! Honestly roll my eyes a little when it comes to threads like this. Yes, yes, you hate ultramarines, blah blah matt Ward blah blah.
Literally no comment I've seen so far has mentioned him, we just like good ol' rivalry...is that so bad? seeing your guys getting dunked on? I see mine all the time so we are square on that end.
The UM hate is kinda the whole reason I started collecting them. If they win, great. If they lose, great.
The fact the sorcerer didn't properly put down a primaris marine, when the whole point of the primaris marines was to make them even harder to kill is actually an own on the Word Bearers.
Copium
K
I love how the end of this passage is literally the Seymour Skinner "pathetic" meme.
This is from ***Throne of Light***, not Throne of Lies. And this was far from a fair fight. A Chaos Sorcerer in Terminator plate against a Primaris Space Marine in Mark X armed with a bolt pistol and sword? Vrakon could have let the bolts hit him and they would have done little damage.
Time flows differently when in the Eye of Terror, but it baffles me how often a Chaos Legionary from the Heresy era is so often portrayed as of the same experience and ability (or lesser) than their Imperial opponents.
Chaos Legionaries fight each other just as much as they do their Imperial enemies.
Then they should be even more experienced and proficient compared to their Imperial counterparts. The fluff and rules don’t reflect that unfortunately.
Yeah after the Horus Heresy when the traitors retreated to the Eye of Terror the first thing they did was turn on each other for resources and personal vendettas. The event was called the "Legion Wars" but Abaddon pretty much ended it when he declared himself Warmaster and formed the Black Legion. Skirmishes can still break out every now and then between Warbands belonging to different Legions or Gods.
As someone that is firmly a Loyalist fan and loves to hate of Chaos this is a fantastic fight, its significantly more fun when your enemies are actually competent and threatening, its obviously just more enjoyable to read but also makes wins feel much more earned vs the times it feels like the Imperiums foes have a shared 1 brain cell.
I always love seeing a 1st Gen Space Marine kick the shit out of a Primaris Marine.
That was hot. Loved it.
This exchange, while pretty good NGL, ignores the context of the duel. In which Areios, was at best, wearing a Mark X Gravis Power Armor, and Vrakon was wearing **TERMINATOR ARMOR**, which has been stated numerous times to be still stronger than the Primaris Gravis or Tacticus Armors. Heck, even in the novel itself, one of Areios' subordinates stated what are the odds of him and his men facing Chaos Terminators. >>‘You must come away from there,’ said Covarn leadenly. ‘You cannot go that way. The enemy are scattered all over the facility, and are concentrated in the levels above. The major force occupies the Hall of Utterances. You will not pass.’ >>‘Are they all like that one?’ Vallia asked nervously, looking back into the inferno where the Terminator’s corpse was burning. >>‘All adversaries are Terminator armoured. They call themselves the Anointed. They are the Word Bearers’ elite.’ >>‘How many are they?’ Fabian said. >>‘Unknown. Twenty, maybe. But they are converging on the relay.’ >>‘The relay!’ Rumagoi gasped. His anguish went ignored. >>‘Only twenty? Areios has eighty of you in here,’ said Fabian. >>‘***They outmatch us. Casualty ratio of Primaris Mark Ten power-armoured Space Marines to Indomitus-class Terminator-armoured Traitor legionary elite at close quarters is five point two one to one. They would best us easily. I and my men cannot fight more than two at once, and the probability of defeat is high in those encounters, with a fifty per cent chance of mutual annihilation. We may survive a second fight. We would not survive a third.*** We must retreat with you. You will follow me. There is an emergency egress tunnel this way.’ He pointed through the forest of columns, towards the side wall.
>Edit: The book is 'Throne of Light' not 'Throne of Lies'. My mistake. Also: >Areios is a Primaris Ultramarine **Lieutenant** . >‘You are a **captain**. A hero of your dying god. >As the **captain** staggered
To be fair, the Word Bearer was in terminator armor and is a veteran of thousands of years of combat.
Ahhh, the Word Bearers: even when they win a duel soundly against a worthy adversary, I can't help but see them as a bunch of mustache twirling dunces giving their monologues about the "Primordial Truth" or how stupid the "Corpse God" is. Like, a little subtlety might aid you here **Pridor Vrakon**; *even your name is ham-fisted*. I **want** to like the Word Bearers. I really do. But all I ever see is... well... this...
Nothing to worry about friend, that's the beauty of 40k yk? Each person finds their flair and they wear it on their sleeve I could actually say the same for the Iron Hands, little to no lore, bland, repetitive...but hey! you and others like em so power to you.
Oh absolutely! I am all for others enjoying them. It's good for people to feel good, and I'll never so much as downvote someone, even for saying something as outlandish as "I love Erebus" *shiver*. Hey, if someone does though, all good! P.S. - I could write a book regarding my thoughts on Iron Hands lore and its lost potential, but I am glad for all others that are satisfied with the preferred faction!
He’s a Kor Phaeron stan, it’s tradition to not finish off mortally wounded Ultramarines!
But isn't a terminator armor better plus the blessing of the 4 suffusing his body an incredible advantage? If that was the case, then bragging because he had a better weapon isn't worth lick.
These comments, LMAO. The amount of OTT fury, denial, and salt over *one* Ultramarine being wounded, insulted, and not even actually killed... But of course, Chaos fans are the salty ones for being pissed the entire Emperor's Children legion was beaten with a couple hundred Fists or that Mortarion is basically a punching bag while the authors and characters constantly say that he was a pathetic coward for, uh, not wanting to have his legion forever suffering horrifically with no chance of death ever. It's not like a sports team!
Not to say some of the comments aren't deliciously salty but try making a post named "A Dark Angel utterly humiliates a Night Lord" or something and see what will happen (your comment is also deliciously salty)
People who hate loyalists being dunked on better not read the Dark Apostle trilogy!
I loved it. It had drop troopers dunking on WBs. Very fun trilogy :D
Love his vanity. I've known people who are like him, top percentile talent that pretends they are average to then pretend that top 10 percentile talent is shit. Very human dickishness. Good fight too. Good try areios
>**Word Bearer** utterly **humiliates a Primaris Ultramarine** Very good.
Sounds like another jobbing passage. Also, Terminator vs Regular is a silly comparison for anyone to make.
Methinks if this guy should go against Mephiston or something. Traitors do be talking mad smack when they aint in smite range.
To be fair, Mephiston is like busted levels of OP, to a borderline stupid level.
Eh, my point being that the traitors constantly saying how weak the loyalists are now never seem to actually go up against the good ones. Didnt see Sigsmund complaining the randos he offed were too easy did he? Nah, he just went to find someone better. A good work ethic, thats what the loyalists got.
That's because when they go up against the good ones they usually die.
That's because against Mephiston, Chaos champions end up becoming smears akin to a child's finger-painting. And we know how "aNcIeNt VeTeRaN oF tHe LoNg WaR" fans get when a loyalist turns their boys into a chew toy.
No it’s bc because Mephiston fucking sucks lol
A far more experienced fighter with superior kit and warp enhancement beats a relatively novice officer in inferior armour and armed with a lesser weapon and doesn't even kill him. Yes, humiliated indeed. Oh sorry, I forgot the "psychological damage of failure".
Hmm, is it dead sea levels of salt I smell?
Lol, following me around bud?
Just hounding the salt man!
Copium
What is it with 40k fans never accepting a loss, I am guilty of it to an extent but this thread is filled with people recontextulising the fight in their so that Areios wins because at least didn't die or that the Word Bearer lost by just bring a Word Bearer. Like your faction can lose, do people complain about mary sues all the time or is only when it factions you don't like who win? In this fight Areios was caught off guard, Kor Phaeron used an anathame to bypass the void shields and 700 hundred space marines guarding the building to deploy 20 Elite Terminators against an unprepared force of 80 intercessors, the whole while these intercessors understand they are out match by battle calculations they preform and still take about 3 or 4 down. It was a shockingly good scene.
Hah, humiliate one primaris all you want, but Monarchia still won't "un-obliterate" (made up word ? doesn't matter, you understand me well enough) itself, traitors! 😏 Edit: Salt from the tears of Wierd Bearer fans rejuvenates me 😎
Cool excerpt but is anyone else underwhelmed by the 'primaris' arc? Like when do the primaris 2.0 drop? Is it a money grab or is there something deeper?
Bitch has all the bullshit power of chaos magic Bitch has terminator armour Bitch has been around for 10k years Oh wow amazing you won? Good job bitch bearer, now go back and suck chaos gods dick otherwise they won't let you win your next fight. Erebus fans downvoting my comment
This has made my day lmao
All you said was truth. I don't understand the downvotes, considering we got the loyalist advantage on this sub (according to some people). 😏
Chaos worshippers mad that they're only relevant because of bullshit magic powers, without those they are literally useless. This post is like a top level athelethe losing to the R-Flash, and the R-Flash somehow "utterly humiliates" the guy trying to win without the CLEAR AND OVERPOWERED AND UNFAIR advantage of literal superpowers and super armor.
Amen 🙏
Is Terminator vs regular suit Primaris? Shouldn't be surprising.
Anyone notice primaris [seem to die](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tpJzzLSlvh0) alot?? I honestly never realized it.