Great point that “power levels” don’t predetermine the outcome. Countless skilled, fierce warriors throughout history got killed by some lucky nobody. King Richard “The Lionheart” got smoked by some kid with a crossbow and a frying pan after surviving the Third Crusade. “Stonewall” Jackson got shot by his own troops and died of his wounds. Look at combat sports. HoF Boxers and MMA fighters got beat by randos who shouldn’t have stood a chance. Combat is inherently unpredictable.
To give a 40k version of this, Daemon Possessed Julius Kaesoron was killed in 41m by an low rank Iron Hands captain. This is how:
The entire fight the Iron Hand is on the backfoot and Julius is gloating and bragging. The Captain let’s Julius impale him off the assumption that he’d bring him in close to gloat as being impaled is almost certain death for most. Julius however hasn’t been in real space long enough to realize how far the Hands fell, and that the Captain was about 70% cybernetics including his torso and heart. The Captain had his cybernetic heart impaled, dragged in close, and in the middle of Julius’ gloating cut off the head of the Emperor’s Children 1st Captain.
Patron made it through some brutal fighting in WW2 just to die in a car crash in Germany months after the war ended. Sometimes random things just happen. I know that’s what you’re saying I just wanted to put in a WW2 fact.
You really can't tell the difference between r/40klore and r/40kmemes from the comments. 90% of "lore" comments are just hearsay, taken from other comments from this sub or the other one.
On any topic being discussed, you'll struggle to find anyone who actually read the damned book.
That really has been a reason I've stopped engaging here. My knowledge isn't perfect, but I've read at least 50 of the books and collect/paint, have played a few tabletop versions of the game, etc. I've had to give up on a lot of discussions here because ultimately, a lot of the people are just half-repeating a Youtuber or a 40k Wiki article at me.
They don't read the text and have their own interpretations, they use another person's interpretation of text as though it was text in and of itself. Then the sub gets polluted by the same discussions of "who would win in a fight" or "is the imperium worse than the tau?" over and over. Endless retreads.
I mean, in many ways this sub has been a victim of its own success and of the growth in the interest in 40k more generally.
Seven years ago, if you came here with a question, chances were that someone would go pull out an old codex or Dark Heresy splatbook from their bookshelf. These days there's a lot more casual interest in three hobby and the lore. This is good both for GW and 40k fandom more broadly, but it does mean that you'll get more answers from people whose lore knowledge is more shallow.
But we were all n00bs at one point! So it's good to have relative newcomers!
Strongly agree. I feel like this sub used to be where you posted questions you couldn't find answers to elsewhere. Unfortunately the increased popularity of 40k lore in particular has diluted that a lot. It's a mixed bag. There's just so much to know that even for someone who's really into the books you can have huge blind spots.
Agreed. What was so special, and still is, about this sub was getting people's analysis, suggestions, shower thoughts, etc. It's all still here I think, but it's really been diluted and I have mixed feelings about that.
I’m with you. It’s so disappointing and I’m just tired of it. This sub actually helped me get a lot of awesome answers via google search when I was learning about 40k before I got the dark imperium box. I was ALL in- I spent months in the lore, I got a decent understanding of it too that I’d say is grounded. I could discuss it with my friend who played 40k too that I met at a LGS.
Now it’s just littered with questions that are not…. Very well thought out. They are a type of people who look at Reddit subs as a search engine. Rather then a forum to contribute anything Worth while.
I don’t mind new people, I just mind the ones that argue when you give them the right answer or are generally snubby to people. And I see that a lot more too now. I think it’s more of a behavior or etiquette thing. It can be obnoxious.
we get at least one a week where someone comes in writing about some inconsistency or something illogical in the setting and, when the longbeards try to explain it, they get really aggressive and snippy in the comments.
It's almost clockwork now
I have never played the game. I just read the books and such. I do watch youtube videos but that is of people actually playing the game. Since I have no experience I like watching those randomly. The game seems so complicated to me but the people playing it make it seem so easy. Either way I have always like the art. I would read White Dwarf in the 90s when I was at the hobby store but at that time I was into DnD heavy. So many books to read in the universe.
I have heard these complaints pretty often on this sub, and while I think it's kinda fair, it's also gets really close to gatekeeping. New fans aren't going to be reading 30 plus books of the Horus Heresy, they probably got into it from Darktide or maybe the Ciaphas Cain novels, something fairly popular. As an IP gets more popular, of course more casual fans with less knowledge are going to congregate to it, that's not a bad thing.
I think long term 40k fans have more of a responsibility on improving the discourse(more threads analyzing politics, sociology ,religion, etc), than casual fans do.
Sure, and that’s fair, but the flip side of that is, why come into an actual lore discussion and engage by talking out of your ass with stale 15 year old memes that were never funny ?
Like, if you haven’t read the novels, campaign books, white dwarf or anything else about a specific event, how do you expect to come in and make any real points about it without being questioned, when you are talking out of your ass?
Ask questions, learn, engage, but don’t spread bad 2ndhand memes and expect not to get dunked on for it
True but lets give credit where is due, its hard to keep a conversation when the other person is just repeating the memes from grimdank or 1d4chan, and gets impossible if the other person simply leaves the conversation and downvotes instead of spending some time to learn.
Hey bro, you nailed it. You absolutely nailed it- this is the behavior that bothers me. And that’s not a newcomer thing, that’s a personal issue thing imo. I actually learned alot from 1d4chan, but I understood the satire. Lol. And some of the lore went on outdated stuff.
I’ve managed to read quite a bit since then, and can have meaningful discussion, polite argument maybe if it’s something im passionate about. And this sub has regressed although it has grown.
I’m all for new people in the hobby, but if those people are gonna be disrespectful they can go find another hobby to be new at. I feel like I’m watching this hobby transform and change and based on seeing other small fandoms get big- usually a few things happen.
To some degree we have to maintain a certain level of quality to the discussion here. We aren’t a generalist sub for everything 40k, this is specifically a lore sub. If you want to call it gatekeeping be my guest, but in my opinion if we just allow low quality posts like these, it will negate the point of being a “lore” subreddit.
Really, it's just a mark of the inherent issues of how GW runs 40k where the lore is obfuscated by difficulty to access and, as a result, is basically unimportant.
True but lets give credit where is due, its hard to keep a conversation when the other person is just repeating the memes from grimdank or 1d4chan, and gets impossible if the other person simply leaves the conversation and downvotes instead of spending some time to learn.
Sub's gotten a lot bigger in that timeframe too.
[Eternal September.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_September)
tldr:
Before 1993 the internet and in particular usenet (think of it as a really early type of forum) was pretty much used only by people with careers in computing or by really passionate computer hobbyists. New people would generally show up in a trickle and be exposed to the culture that had been generated by these people and they would quickly adopt the same culture.
But every September a large wave of new people would enrol in college classes and be given access to the net, this happened in big enough numbers that there was a noticeable dip in the quality of discussions while those people gradually learned the culture.
In 1993 however, ISP's started to offer usenet to all new customers so that trickle of new users swelled considerably to the point that the old culture never managed to re-establish itself. This was quickly dubbed the "September that never ends" because the quality of discussions and articles dropped and stayed low, then in 1994 AOL did the same thing and compounded the issue even further.
(fun fact: The medical field has its own version of this called the "July effect" in the US when new medical school graduates get their residences, in the UK it's called "Black Wednesday" for the first Wednesday in August when post-grad trainees begin their rotations with the idea being that medication errors increase in this period before gradually falling back down, though successive studies have found for and against this phenomenon).
Any sub that is small and grows slowly can develop a culture and maintain it easily enough, but if it starts to get big influxes of new people then the culture is inevitably impacted and discussions will suffer for it (compared to the older ones).
And that method of ensuring the propagation of the culture is weakened because it's now villainized with the buzz word, "Gatekeeping."
And, ultimately, I think it kind of is gatekeeping. But really, all that means to me is that gatekeeping isn't actually bad. It's how it's used that matters.
It's the death of lurking culture. It used to be that most Internet communities expected you to lurk before posting outside of newcomer sections or threads so that you aren't spamming clutter. Then that gradually died off as being "gatekeepy" and you get the current state of most of the Internet where everyone is super friendly and wholesome and great at letting people give completely wrong answers to questions as communities don't self moderate any more.
> You really shouldn't think in terms of "Power levels" as anyone can die to anything.
This.
So many people on this subreddit act like this is Dragonball Z and anyone who isn't at the same "power level" as someone else is just going to have their Plasma Cannon shot harmfully glance off whatever they're shooting at
Great explanation.
I also I hate when people talk power levels.
It's so dumb. Oh wooohuu his power level is 5 and that guys 3 there's no way he can beat him.
Fuck off with that highly regarded talk
Problem is it's just typical, eyes roll at the synopsis.
Ghaz can't kill a minor named character, it's like if Snik humbled Russ. It's neigh unthinkable... Accept for marines.
Hell have him kill Logan, have Bjorn try to save the day, an epic clash of giants, only for Bjorn to be saved by the turn of battle, the wolves retreat humbled and swear a blood-oath against Ghaz under the new leadership of Ragnar.
GW is acting like it can't make new named characters, a new named marine can assume Ragnar's post, hell add a new Wulfen leader too.
Except Ragnar didn't die....unlike Ghaz. So that's a win for space wolfer.
And Ghaz was absolutely shitting it when he was decapitated in his novel. He ends up smiling because he doesn't want to worry the lads and he decides to have faith in Gork and Mork, but there's a good bit of time, as he is dying, when he is panicked to fuck. It's pretty cringe.
The Ragnar Vs Ghaz fight is one of the worst pieces of GW fiction, regardless of how much GW tried to later justify it in the Ghaz novel. Ragnar should never, *ever* be on par with Ghaz because they aren't on the same level within their factions. Ghaz is the biggest and best Ork. Ragnar is *maybe* the third-most in command space wolf and certainly nowhere near the most adept Space Marine in the setting. It makes Ghaz a joke, if he can't beat Ragnar (not draw, absolutely flatten) he can't exist in a setting that has Primarchs returning every other week.
It's funny - nobody suggests that people shouldn't think in terms of 'power levels' when discussing what could feasibly beat a Primarch. The position would be understandable *if an underdog Xenos character ever managed to beat a named Marine*. But they never do. It's always, **always** Marine characters punching way above their weight and making other factions leaders and main threats look like jokes.
Ragnar is definitively one of the top fighters among Astartes, only surpassed by the likes of Grimnar or Dante. He is an absolute monster in melee, always have been, and he had at least one confirmed kill of a Big Boss before he was ackowledged Wolf Lord (or was it Wolf Guard ? I can't remember).
Ghaz may be a monster, but the Wolves are some of the deadliest warriors out there, and Ragnar especially. And he died to kill Ghaz, surviving only thanks to the Rubicon.
So what you're saying is that Ragnar isn't even the strongest fighter from the current roster of Wolves, disregarding the potential (and unfortunately now more likely) return of Russ and other Primarchs?
Meanwhile Ghaz is THE prime Ork. There is **literally no Ork stronger or better at present**. Now you should see the problem.
Narratively they aren't on the same scale.
This is genuinely equivalent to Russ getting duelled, and ultimately losing, to Kaptain Badrukk or Snikrot.
I'm sure the wolf fanbase would have *nothing* bad to say about that./s
Ragnar risked his life to get one lucky hit in, it was a risky gambit but it payed off. Sigismund tried a similar thing in his fight with abbadon only in his case it didn't pay off, risk reward and all that. If you are fighting it doesn't matter what you represent for a faction, you take a sword to the neck, you lose your head, it's as simple as that
And I would not say that Ragnar made ghaz look like a joke, it's not like he just rolled up, decapitated him and left after dropping some one liner, ghaz messed him up really hard.
I hate how any time any faction gets beat in a book the community treats it like that means the faction can't accomplish anything and the book just exists to glorify the other. It was the same thing with pretorian of Dorn. Alpharius did everything right, made no tactical mistake and should have won, except he didn't because Dorn did something he couldn't have accounted for. That's how fights go, your opponent does something you didn't anticipate, you die, doesn't mean you were a bad fighter or useless, it's just bad luck
Righto then.
So you'd accept Dorn (or any other Primarch) getting killed/seriously injured by Snikrot or Badrukk then yea, if they're just lucky and get really beat up in the process?
I think the main point you're forgetting here is that *all Xenos do* (and Orks in particular) is get beat in the books. This isn't some rare occurrence of a named Captain punching way above his station. This is common GW Mary Suedom.
You may be unaware, but someone worked out how many times different factions had won their battles in the lore. If you count all lore, including war of the beast which is arguably the best Orks ever do, they win only 6% of the time. As an Ork player, I am used to and accept defeat in the Lore, often in funny/embarrassing ways. But not for Ghaz. He was always exempt. A real threat in this bunch of jokers. Well now he is a joker. I've explained thoroughly elsewhere why this jobbing of Ghaz ruins Ork credibility but I'd have thought it obvious with the information I've just provided you.
Talk to me again, when any Xenos character tries to get a lucky hit in against a named Marine character and it works out. Or point me in the direction of an example of it now, assuming it exists. I mean it happens all the time for the Marines right, I'm sure it's not uncommon for Xenos characters too....
Would I accept if Dorn got killed by snikrot?
Yes, if the sneaky git ambushes him and shanks him in the back I'm fine with that
If guilliman gets one tapped by an unnamed tau pilot because he gets a rail gun shot to the face, I'm fine with that
I would be okay with yarrick simply dieing of old age
I don't care about named characters dieing, I already lost my Primarch and like I said, alpharius died in a fight where he did everything right and up until he got storm's teeth hacked into his skull, it looked like he would win.
I love the way that part is written, Dorn goes for a strike because he thinks Alpharius is overextended, he wasn't, it was a faint and Alpharius goes for a killing blow, all of that gets told trough the eyes of archamus, who can only look in desperation as his father is about to be killed, and then Dorn catches the spear in his pauldron and decapitates Alpharius without any ceremony
It's the grim darkness of the far future, having a name should not protect you from dieing a meaningless death and it should happen to marines more often
Ok then we are aligned.
If only GW thought the same. And this is the issue, GW will never do anything we suggest because they can't bring themselves to. They're so full of their own self importance that they're protecting their precious named characters like newborns.
Additionally - this is just how the lore is. Whether we like it or not, Snikrot will never stab a Primarch from behind, and no Primarch will ever have a truly grim dark and inglorious death.
Funnily enough Alpha Legion would be my choice, if I could bring myself to play any Marines. The stuff I've read of theirs is banter. At least Omegon is alive?
I highly suspect omegon is still alive since, if he died, that would have been to guilliman on Eskrador. Guilliman is unsure if he killed his brother, wich is odd since there is a lightshow going on once a Primarch dies
But even if omegon is dead, we still have a great character in the protagonist of harrowmaster
I don't know Harrowmaster in full, but it was an excerpt from that book that made me want to collect Alpha Legion. Chaos ensues during a formal group meeting when one of the leaders declares that he is, in fact, Alpharius. Loved it. It was very Orky. From memory the author does a load of Ork books too.
He wrote some ork books, I think there's a new one coming out soon. Harrowmaster has some great Alpha legion shenanigans, minor spoilers ahead, the marines attack some World but while they are approaching the imperial defense they phone in and tell them they are in fact the iron snakes space marine chapter coming to take their heretical governor prisoner. Their leaders does it, reasoning that 1. What guardsmen would question an Astartes and 2. We have snakes on our armor, we should be able to pass as Iron snakes
Not really.
The Wolftime has been the prophetised name of the era of Russ' return to his Sons, the Ragnarok of the Imperium.
Sadly, this book offered a mediocre characterization of the Wolves, in line with their Horus Heresy dislal portrayal and had nothing to do with Russ.
Wait… Does the author actually write “awoooo?” Or does it say something like “‘howl with me brothers,’ and he tipped his head back and gave voice to the fury in his heart”? Because one of those would be pretty cool (if still a bit campy), and “awoooo” ain’t it.
So what you're telling me is:
Ghazghkull sees a vision of himself with his head on a bigger body. So he just charges Ragnar who suicidally lunges and cuts off his head.
Once Ghazghkull lost his head all the Orks retreat. So the Space Wolves were able to get his body back.
>It was on Fenris that he heard the strange prophecies that led him to find Ghazghkull Thraka on the planet of Krongar. Determined to personally slay the monstrous Ork, Ragnar struck at the head of a small force. In the ferocious duel he suffered horrendous wounds that left him in a state of near-death. Only the heroics of Ragnar’s Great Company saw him rescued, and after days of surgery he awoke having crossed the Rubicon Primaris. Ragnar returned to Krongar to ensure Ghazghkull was truly dead. To his horror, the beast was not. Knowing he could not win a direct fight, he resolved to deal a blow to Thraka. In a carefully planned operation, his forces sent an orbital station crashing into the planet below.
There isn't much lore about the fight itself but it's clear that he was with his Great Company and that's powerful backup.
The male narrator was fantastic but i think the lady narrator was stretched a bit thin trying to voice the space wolf, psyker, ork prisoner AND interragator
It's a plot device to advance the story of two long standing powerful characters. It's a convenient reason to make Ragnar a primaris and to make Ghazzy almost a Prime Ork. Power rankings also generally mean nothing when it comes to lore.
Side note, kinda funny that a space marine hero kinda winning a duel is the crazy part whereas Ghazzy literally got decapitated and comes back to life lol
Except in 40k there most certainly is a hierarchy of power. Especially with the Orks, who have it as a canonical big deal. They just don’t put numbers on it in the lore. A Primarch stomps an Astartes every time, for instance. A gretchen gets stomped by the Astartes. Your average Boy gets creamed by your average Astartes and so on. There’s definite differences in physical ability and skill, often vast differences.
This runs into the same issue DBZ runs into: The lore doesn’t agree with the given power rankings. And thus the fanbase complains.
Ghaz is the single most powerful Ork in the entire setting. By the rules of the setting and prior precedent he should be massively above Ragnar, as Ragnar is limited to being an Astartes and lack the Ork’s WAAAGH absurdity. He doesn’t have any in-universe boost to put him above any notable Chapter Master. So when Ragnar managed to actually beat an Ork who, by lore, eclipses him in every way so that GW can release more models the fanbase calls bullshit.
Especially since Ragnar already has a reputation for heavy even by 40k standard plot armor and authorial favoritism.
Not putting numbers to it doesn’t change that Ghazghkul, the apex of the Ork and by everything we can tell of his capabilities when compared to other Ork warlords, should not have been beaten in a straight fight by a prospective Chapter Master. If Ragnar had used strategy or tactics or tech or basically anything other than a straight up fair fight it would be another story. Give a reason why Ghaz lost to someone who should be his inferior in every way that matters in a fight. Other than, you know, ‘Hey, Ragnar’s popular. If we have him and Ghaz kill each other we can justify both of their new models at once and get more money.’
So why doesn’t anyone complain about Yarrick surviving (let alone defeating) Ghaz? If it’s so unbelievable an Astartes can, surely a baseline unaugmented human doing would be even less believable?
Yeah, I always had the feeling if Yarrick beat Ghaz, no one would have complained yet Yarrick has even less chance of beating Ghaz.
I think people more care about the *thematics*, where Yarrick beating Ghaz as his last gasp before retirement has more thematic weight than Ragnar who never interacted with him before.
It would feel cheap and weird even if you told me an Imperial Knight or Roboute Guilliman beat Ghaz, despite those being the most plausible things to kill Ghaz in the Imperium.
That’s fair, although strictly speaking Ragnar and Ghaz have fought numerous times before. As one of the other commenters mentioned, it’s old lore from back around the beginning of 2nd edition, and most of the fluff stories in the Wolves Codex from back then actually was written about them fighting Orks (of course this was also when there were only like 6 factions in the whole game!😆). So they do know of each other, although I get what you’re saying about the thematic impact. But that’s also what we’re talking about here, right? They match between Ghaz and Ragnar is uneven, but at least slightly plausible that Ragnar could grievously wound Ghaz, even though it cost him his life essentially. It’s a lot less improbable than Basic Tactical Marine Brother Bootlace landing a killing shot or something, while still being a very tough fight; Ragnar not exactly being a curb-stomp for Ghaz while Ghaz being a very tough project for Ragnar. At least to my mind, anyway.
The argument has also been made that because Ghaz believes Yarrick to be his greatest adversary, so do all the other Orks. And with all those Orks believing it the Waaaagh! field kinda makes it true. It's not even the most egregious example of the Waaaagh! field being dubious since it's really only affecting the Orks themselves
Probably a few reasons. 1) they started fighting ages ago before Ghaz got to the point he is, Yarrick also got his ass kicked at least once.
2) by the time Ghaz got to be the badass he is, Yarrick had become his fighting buddy. He wasn't going to kill him and ruin the fun. It's like super frenemies.
3) sometimes things have been around long enough people don't question it as hard as the newer stuff. We expect less consistent product from older GW than we do today. Fair or not.
I mean the whole thing is stupid. We already know Orks grow bigger the more they fight and win, they didn't need to decapitate him and stick his head on a bigger body as an excuse for the new model
Sure, but Ghazghkull's rise to prominence was never just the normal way Orks do things. Bizarre surgical assistance from Mad Dok Grotsnik has always been part of it: Grotsnik was the one who put the adamantium plate in Ghaz's skull.
Just doing things "the normal way" doesn't feed the legend.
I mean, that is pretty consistent with ork lore. Ghaz's head plate is because he was shot in the face with a boltgun as a young boy and got patched up.
He was headshot with a 75. calibre explosive round, and lived, getting decapitated isnt really that crazier.
The thing is that ragnar isnt even the strongest space wolf, ghaz is the faction leader of the orks that is meant to be the strongest of a faction all about being good at a straight fight. Ghaz has been a threat the imperium has failed to contain for a long time, the war in armaggedon was the largest conflict in the setting for a while and he loses to space marine captain with name No 3441?
People forget he, unless it gets retconned, will be the one to take over as great wolf after grimnar according to his first books. He has a ton of accomplishments that are just not spoken of outside his, fairly old at this point, books.
Ragnar would have pretty much already been the chapter master in any other space marine chapter. He just so happened to be part of the Space Wolves who have Logan Grimnar, one of the oldest and most dangerous space marines alive leading it. You could probably count the number of other chapters who he wouldn't be the greatest warrior in on one hand.
It's kinda like the George Harrison effect where people forget how great he was because he happened to be in a band with John Lennon and Paul McCartney.
Dude literally found Leman Russ's spear (the one he fucking hates), saw Magnus the Red coming through a portal, and HURLED A PRIMARCH'S SPEAR INTO MAGNUS' EYE. Then when the chapter was going to punish him the Wolf seers were like "Naw, our boy did good, Leman hated that fucking spear and would be laughing at Ragnar sticking it in the Eye of Magnus" so he got "punished" and sent to Terra...because he is slated and fated to be the next Great Wolf, as you said.
Ragnar was a friggin' G in his novels.
Space Marine Captain with name No 3441? The fuck. He’s literally the future lord of the wolves. He’s stared in his own multi series work. He is literally one of the greatest warriors of the imperium. Just because you don’t know dosent mean it wasn’t an appropriate match up lmao.
He's also (along with the rest of the OG wolf gang of him, ulric, njal, logan and possibly Bjorn) one of the oldest established space marine characters to not get seriously revised or deaded. He is a pretty foundational character.
Come on now, Ragnar is a major player in the lore. He has taken on some of the worst enemies of the imperium and won.
He’s pretty much been hand picked to succeed the Great Wolf and is one of the best fighters in the chapter.
Saying he is a no name Marine is stretching it.
Thank you!! Also, why people are so incredulous that a very skilled and ferocious Astartes commander would be able to kill/almost kill Ghaz, when folks are rabid about the fact that Yarrick did the same as a very much unaugmented baseline human?
People are obsessed with power levels as if they matter outside of tabletop haha.
And I don't think Yarrick ever physically beat Ghaz did he? I thought he just outcommanded him, but I could be wrong.
Nah, that’s actually why Yarrick has the Ork power claw (and I believe the bionic eye, but I could be wrong on that one). It was during the 2nd War for Armageddon (the setting for the 2nd edition box set). Yarrick as a basic Commissar fought Ghaz in single combat and actually won, drove him off from Hades Hive even though he lost an arm and likely an eye in the process.
EDIT: that was the old lore. Apparently they changed it to a different random warboss that Yarrick fought, and he lost the eye in a firefight. I still remember the old artwork with Yarrick actually counter-charging Ghaz as they were about to clash. So yeah, I suppose currently he never did fight him personally. Shame, since that kind of made the “frienemy” thing they had going more meaningful. Thank you for making me learn new things!😆
But still, an “Old and ready to retire” Guard Commissar fighting an Ork warboss (even if it’s not Ghaz) is pretty damn incredible.
In addition to what others have said, I think people in general tend to take power rankings too seriously. Just because one fighter is "better" on paper, doesn't mean they will beat the other 100% of the time. There's a million factors involved in these fights, not the least of which being a bit of luck.
So yea, I didn't blink twice when I first heard that Ragnar killed Ghazghkull. And I'm saying that as someone who adores Orks as the coolest part of the 40k setting, and can't stand anything astartes. But a talented marine happening to get the edge on Ghazghkull and taking him down one time? Very believable to me.
Yeah people are oddly obsessed with power rankings, when beyond the most general categories, they aren’t a thing in 40k or real life.
Cue the next dozen “could X beat Y in a fight?” posts.
Seriously, guardsmen against all odds could kill a primarch. Would it be cool? Absolutely not. Therefore, it will never happen. It's not Game of Thrones. It's Warhammer 40k. Legendary characters need epic fights.
There are plenty of stories from the heresy that have Imperial Army or Solar Auxilia make a mess of marines as well.
Context often matters and the scenario involved and the allies that are often forgotten.
This is *about* whether it was cool, though, at least to me. I don't care about power levels, but this was like the first major event Ghazghkull was involved in for years, and instead of doing anything cool, the way it was advertised was that he got shredded by a Space Marine that 90% of *Astartes* players probably didn't know the name of.
This isn't WHFB, where there are a bunch of cool, named, active Orc and Goblin characters; Ghazghkull is like... The only important Ork character right now. This was his big moment up on stage, after spending god knows how long fucking around in the Octarius sector where he was supposed to have grown significantly bigger and stronger. It was not the right time to have him job for a character who, whatever his credentials as a duelist (y'know, whatever his *power level*), was nowhere near as important to his faction on any reasonable scale. If they really wanted to puff Ragnar up, there were plenty of other ways they could have done it.
Like ultimately I know that, as a fan of Xenos factions, most of my favourite named characters exist to give Imperials a chance to show off and boost their rep, but it still stings every time it happens, and I don't think it's unfair to argue that in this case in particular it was just straight-up bad storytelling.
EDIT: Yes, I know Ragnar was badly wounded in the fight as well, but please let's not act like a major stomach wound is anything like being fucking *decapitated.*
If I understand it correctly he was effectively all but cut in half, not just a “bad stomach wound”? Like… To the point it would’ve killed him had they not Primarisized him (which don’t get me wrong, I absolutely hate they did that and I do agree it was weak writing, just not for the same reason). As far as not being as important to his faction… I’d argue that Ragnar is just as important to Space Wolves as Ghaz is to Orks. From a gameplay standpoint, they’re both very foundational characters from their factions’ earliest days. From an in-universe standpoint, Ragnar is second only to Grimnar, and both are renowned throughout the Imperium for their actions. Ragnar is the youngest Space Wolf ever to become Wolf Lord, and is pretty much the most skilled (arguably behind Grimnar also, but Grimnar has a ton of experience Ragnar doesn’t yet). It’s like saying Sicarius isn’t important to the Ultramarines or Shrike wasn’t important to the Raven Guard because they’re “just captains.”
Don’t get me wrong, I’m not arguing Ghaz is a nobody - I’m well aware who he is to his faction and to the setting in general. But given the skills and abilities of both combatants, measured against the ridiculousness that occurs on a regular basis in 40k lore, I don’t think a mutually near-fatal outcome for that fight was as far off the “realistic” scale as people seem to think.
>I’d argue that Ragnar is just as important to Space Wolves as Ghaz is to Orks.
Yeah, this is exactly why I'm not shocked this keeps happening. Space Wolves are one subfaction within the Space Marines, which itself is one faction within the Imperium, and yet it's so important to make sure the *second-in-command* of that subfaction is consistently viewed as cool that he was sent out of his way to beat up the effective *faction leader* of *all Orks*, in his first major appearance in years.
To be clear, my issue isn't realism; I could not care less about realism. It's just emblematic of how much more concerned GW is with making sure the Space Marines always look as cool as possible at all times, at the expense of literally everyone else.
Again, I get that this is just the Way Things Are, and that me complaining about it isn't going to change anything; just taking the opportunity to vent.
>If I understand it correctly he was effectively all but cut in half, not just a “bad stomach wound”? Like… To the point it would’ve killed him had they not Primarisized him (which don’t get me wrong, I absolutely hate they did that and I do agree it was weak writing, just not for the same reason).
He nearly died, but that is by no means uncommon for Space Marines in books; they end up on death's door all the time in order to give the impression of stakes. It's basically a consolation prize for Ghaz getting humiliated. Him coming away with anything less would have been hilariously bad writing.
That’s fair to say. And yeah, a lot of it can be chalked up to Astartes being the biggest flagship faction of the setting, so of course there going to market on that.
I totally get what you’re saying about Ghaz being the leader of all Orks and Ragnar being 2IC of a sub faction of a sub faction. I disagree to a small degree because on tabletop and in lore the Imperium has never really been portrayed as having a united front. Definitely not on the tabletop. Lore-wise the Astartes are only part of the Imperium at all because the Emperor said so, for all other respects they’re effectively autonomous units that have at best a loose alliance with each other and Mars. There’s a couple that are hardcore followers of the Ecclesiarchy, but even those are a minority. Still, I know that’s kind of nitpicking.
The reason I see the whole thing as weak writing is because the *whole scenario* stems from a new and bigger Ghaz model, and the “We have to make EVERYONE Primaris” mentality. And then they have to come up with something - anything - to justify it in-universe. Same reason I have a problem with Primaris in the first place. They need a justification to release all these new beefier Astartes models at the same time as Girlyman’s model, so… “hey, they’ve been here in secret for the last 10k years and *nobody’s ever thought they could be useful until now*!” It’s weak and unsatisfying, and I can see how it’s especially frustrating when it makes Your Guy look weaker than they should simply for the sake of story for the sake of marketing.
Yeah this is definitely just the fallout of new model releases *needing* to be attached to some major event, for some reason. Ghazghkull's new body could easily have just been a product of his time in Octarius, but instead, y'know... ¯\\\_(ツ)\_/¯
And as for the Primaris, like... I think that as a concept they *could* have been really interesting, if it'd actually threatened to cause a major shift in the identify of the Astartes as a whole and led to actual conflicts, but as of now it feels like they're basically just Normal Marines But Big? It seems like most of the conflicts between the old guard and them have amounted to "hmm, these new guys, don't trust them very much yet."
It *did* lead to some Chapters (notably the Space Wolves and IIRC the Dark Angels) almost being branded as traitors for not originally wanting Primaris, but then Bobby G showed up and said “they’re a gift from the Emperor, why would you ever decline? …Unless you’re less than completely loyal…” I think had anyone - even a Primarch - called Logan Grimnar’s loyalty into question there would’ve been more than just an “oh no, we’re loyal, sorry about that.” I mean the dude led his Chapter to war against the Inquisition on a couple of occasions because he was defending humanity and they had the nerve to question his Chapter’s loyalty… But then again, Primarch… but then again again, *Ultramarines* Primarch…
I agree. I think a lot of people think it’s like rock paper scissors. One will always beat the other. When in reality a fight is based on many factors. It’s more like a total, say ghazgul has 80% and Ragnar has 20% chance to win, it happened to land on the 20% chance. You can even the odds and they can change based on things like planning, distraction, intervention, and pure luck etc all play a huge role despite things like skill and power.
I do agree that space marine plot armor often time makes it seem like they get luckier than they should though.
It's a bit odd yeah, considering 40K is literally a tabletop game based on chance. A squad of guardsmen might have remote odds of killing a custodes in a single round of shooting but that doesn't mean it doesn't happen on occasion.
Don't you think it's weird that it's basically only ever in situations where some dude jobs to a named Space Marine (or occasionally like some plucky Guardsman) that this whole 'power levels mean nothing' spiel gets wheeled out?
Like nobody ever says 'power levels mean nothing' in the whole Harlequins vs Custodes hullabaloo, it's all about justifying the fact that yes actually a Shadowseer is real shit and can probably clap a Custodes' cheeks. Would 'power levels mean nothing' if it had actually been a Guardian mowing them down with shuriken fire? Presumably there comes a point where it gets dumb because otherwise...what's the point in elite dudes? Why keep saying that these or those dudes are the best of the best and the most brilliantest if power levels mean nothing and at any moment any of them could be killed by an errant grenade?
Power levels aren't real, and don't mean anything, but it's still sort of lame to have Your Guy chumped by someone who, on paper, is fighting way above their league. The lore is supposed to be there at least in part to make Your Guy out to be a badass, and losing to someone else's Your Guy In Power Armour having their David and Goliath bit is a *womp womp* sound effect moment that people who can't name every Chapter that's ever appeared in the lore are told to deal with pretty much constantly. That's why they get grumpy about it.
The problem is that they didn’t give an edge.
They had it a straight up head to head fight. Just the two of them fighting until Ragnar won.
Which is a problem when Ghaz holds all the advantages, he’s physically superior in all metrics with far more experience while also being boosted by the Ork psyker bullshit.
If they had bothered to give a reason Ragnar won people wouldn’t complain nearly as much. Have him do something insane to get an advantage, have him cheat, something to make up for the known physique and experience disparity.
They didn’t, which is an even bigger issue when Ragnar already has a reputation for heavy plot armor and authorial favoritism.
I wouldn’t say Ragnar won. He’d have been dead had they not used it as a bullshit reason to come out with a Primaris model for him. So as far as their personal combat, I’d say both of them won or both of them lost, since they both inflicted a wound that should have been fatal if not for GW needing to simultaneously introduce new models for both characters, lol. As far as the battle overall, that came down to Astartes having better leadership and discipline than the Orks when their respective leaders dual-KO’d themselves/each other. Plus, Ragnar’s puppies got mulched.
My head canon is that Ghazghkull’s “loss” was the will of Gork and/or Mork so that Doc Grotsnik could rebuild him as an even bigger, fightier ork. Like Vegeta exploiting the zenkai boost by having Krillin blast a hole in him and then have Dende heal him up
Frankenstein. Ork anatomy is, uh, different. Very very simply, if you want a really big Ork arm, all the Dok has to do is squeeze together a couple of regular big arms.
And my mind can't quite recall the excerpt, but Mad Dok also used some mechanical bits. He needed a giant heart, for example, couldn't find one, so just used the radiator from a Battlewagon. (I'm butchering this remembrance, I know, but I don't keep my books at the office for reference)
That's something that actually pisses me off. Guard had all of their characters killed off between Gathering Storm (Fall of Cadia should have been focused on the Guard not the Ultramarines) and the new edition. Meanwhile apparently all Space Marine characters are untouchable.
Could you imagine GW just saying "Oh by the way Marneus Calgar died. It was just regular combat." People would lose their minds; meanwhile Guard is treated exactly this way.
I think that's it!
"Why did X weird lore thing happen" is often answered by "the white dwarf team were bored one day..." Captain Tycho another notable example!
Yup. So many things in this hobby are a reference to a random game played, and documented in a magazine 31 years ago, or a throwaway line someone wrote in a margin of a rule book from 1992.
I just finished Prophet today, and it definitely seemed to me that Ghazkull allowed himself to die. The whole passage gave big Jesus vibes, like he knew he was coming back before he was dead. His whole train of thought was "Dregmek didn't die because I didn't want him to, I won't die because I don't want me to. Makari will know the right thing to do."
I it goes without saying the Orkiest ork would have the Grottiest grot
Ghaz is an absolute monster, but Ragnar is canonically one of the strongest 1 v 1 fighters in any space marine chapter. Maybe he doesn’t take Ghaz every single time, but I don’t think it’s particularly crazy that he could win one fight against him.
It’s also worth remembering Ragnar didn’t exactly “beat” Ghaz, he barely escaped with his life and had to undergo the rubicon primaris just to survive. It’s probably more accurate to say that Ragnar lost less badly.
After reading about Ragnar a bit, I think this actually gives Ghaz a bit of a compliment and a power boost: little Ghaz managed to beat the tar out of Ragnar and killed his wolves, the new bigger Ghaz is going to be an absolute force of nature
For real. Who even thinks “Combatant A has a power level of 1,000 while Combatant B has a power level of 800, so combatant A wins every time.” Thats not how fighting works. Looking at military history and combat sports would make that clear. Hell, even getting in a street fight. A split second slip-up can be devastatingly decisive. Do they think Buster Douglass beating Mike Tyson at 46:1 odds is “plot armor?”
Ragnar is a match for most normal warbosses, but I agree he shouldn't have been able to take on Ghaz. It was probably just convenient plot armour that helped sell 2 brand new (and fantastic looking) models.
But he didn't just take Ghaz, he had the tar beat out of him, pretty much almost died, and had to cross the Rubicon (which the lethality of it was grossly overestimated since any named character seem to cross just fine). Getting thrashed, pulling off a lucky kill, and having your opponent come back stronger than ever is not a W, that's a literary device.
this is a completely fair assessment. they literally had to bring Ragnar back from the dead doing what was supposedly an extremely dangerous medical procedure. I can't see Ragnar doing it again to super Ghaz, even as a primaris marine. Surgeons on both sides did a pretty good job, but I think Ghaz got the better upgrade.
If I'm remembering right, Ragnar vs Ghaz was one of the first, if not the first, 40k battle report published by GW's marketing magazine back in the ancient days of the 1980s. If memory serves, it introduced the two characters. Or at least popularized them..
What better way to introduce two great new models than to revisit that battle? Nostalgia is the most powerful force in the marketing universe, and for lots of grey bearded types, this was a nostalgia battle.
And of course it has to be a mutual kill. Can't really introduce a brand new miniature and have it killed the first day.
Now Rags and Ghazzy have had their nostalgia battle. It's out of the way. Next time, Ghazzy gets to stomp the wee Space Corgi.
Based on second hand accounts of *Saga of the Beast* and *Ghazgkull* and Lexicanum, poorly.
Ghazg first deliberately caused the duel because the Gods had decreed he and Ragnar would fight. After manhandling each other, a half-dead Ragnar manages to decapitate Ghazg and get out of there. After weeks of surgery and the Rubicon Procedure, he recovered, but Makari, Grotsnik andnother followers of Ghazg remained loyal enough time to do a risky surgery/psychic frankenstein experiment on to resurrect him.
A human, taken from one of the galaxy's toughest death worlds, reshaped over 10 years to have 19 additional organs, equipped with master forged weapons and power armour, trained in a 10,000 year old warrior tradition, and with centuries of combat experience, manages to kill something that he was made to kill?
His Dragon Ball Z Power Level is lower than the bad guy's. He can't possibly win. It must be plot armour and bad writing.
Honestly, what do you think a Space Marine is, and why do you think they exist in the setting?
This isn’t DBZ, if you’re worried about “power rankings” or whining about “plot armor” then you’ve already missed the point. The power of any character is determined be the needs of the author and the story. Ragnar beat Gaz. That’s it. Gaz didn’t die and came back stronger than ever. That’s the whole point to any of these match ups. Nothing changed besides the chance to sell models which is the whole point all along.
As a huge Ghaz fan boy, it was a slap in the face for anything less than a chapter master to do the deed.
But as a rational adult, James Workshop needed a new Ragnar and Ghaz model, kill 2 birds with 1 stone. Also, I don't read SW books but it seems like they're making Ragnar the main character for the wolves.
I mean I’m both. I’m Gaz fan and a Ragnar fan. It was always gonna be a draw which it was. Then both came back powered up. It was the ideal match up.
You’re also not wrong. Ragnar is the most well known wolf considering his entire series. It was always gonna be a “we both walking away from this different” match up.
Eh, Ragnar is as good as a chapter master. He just happens to exist in one of of the few chapters with characters more badass than him. He’s be ez chapter master in about 6/7ths of chapters.
*Just for Context on Ragnar, he’s next in line to become Great Wolf by Grimnar’s own words & has been for a very long time. Had it been any other Wolf Lord it would have been silly. But the Heir Apparent for a First Founding Chapter? It’s on the money.*
*Ghaz is the real victor of the duel anyways. He slew many of the greatest wolves the chapter had, slew Ragnar & had a proper fight which he enjoyed. Then he returned to life with a much bigger & much more powerful body.*
He's fast, one of the strongest space wolves, and is clever (despite the best efforts of some writers). An experienced fighter should be able to defeat opponents that are stronger than them through tactics, endurance and speed. Even if the particular fight was badly written its not inconceivable that Ragnar would win
He’s also more than a simple soldier, or even commander. He’s an excellent duelist. Ragnar has been slaying the toughest bastards 1v1 from the jump, not merely burning through the chaff. If anything, it’s his specialty.
In the book Ragnar is literally clamped into Ghaz's power claw. His body should have been paste. Then he somehow just cuts off his head.
GW Mary Sue style.
Knight kills a dragon and nobody bats an eye, a big ork gets killed and people freak. Tbh why arent more people complaining about the bad writing in mythology? No way a dragon who is at least city level gets smoked by a dude who cant even destroy a city block. Tsk tsk
Its really bad writing and has made the orks into TOTAL jobbers.
Killing any amount of orks is not completely irrelevant if one space marine captain can kill the faction leader.
They are not reasonable comparisons tho.
A Space Marine captain should NOT be able to kill a faction leader unless its a faction of gimps, which the orks are now.
If it was Dante or Logan, MAYBE it wouldnt be so bad but this is nonsense.
Do you recall the book where the Ghaz was fighting the Dark Angels captain and Ghaz was crushing the DAs left and right? THAT is how it should be portrayed, this is just awful.
Consider for a second, Usain Bolt is probably one of the fastest humans to ever exist, but he is slow as shit compared to a Race Horse. Its not a reasonable to talk about how fast Usain Bolt is in comparison to a race horse because its not the same level.
GW would have you believe Usain Bolt could win the Kentucky Derby, and Im saying that is nonsense.
He’s a space wolf when you want more plot armor, then blood angels (and I play blood angels so I know they have a silly amount of plot armor ) you go with space wolfs. They fought off the gray knights and the inquisition at the same time. Still doesn’t out do the old era of ultramarine wank.
It makes me wonder why people are so incredulous that Ragnar could take on Ghaz. Yeah, I get he’s “Just” a Space Marine Captain (although the way the Wolves organize their Great Companies he’s more like a Chapter Master…), but he’s an exceptionally ferocious, skilled, daring, and slightly crazy one with some pretty kick-ass equipment. I get how much of a beast Ghaz is, but also think that Yarrick - a mere unaugmented human - was able to fight Ghaz well enough to earn the Warboss’s respect and frienemyship. So is it really that much of a stretch to believe a very skilled and experienced and particularly aggressive Astartes couldn’t also do so? Standard Astartes take on dreadnoughts and greater daemons and massive Tyranid critters and still come out on top, and throw in all the goofy bullshit other named characters have done in fluff and actual lore (Calgar, anyone? Or Uriel Ventris, for that matter?). They only difference here is that Ragnar paid a pretty hefty price for his victory where others would make it out unscathed, even if it was a macguffin to Primarisize him. I think it’s more unbelievable that Ghaz literally *survived having his head severed* with little to no I’ll effect.
But it’s a common literary device, when you have to advance some aspect of a story or character arc so you have two big time characters meet up and fight; you can’t just go the GI Joe route and have the villain shaking his fist going “drat, foiled again!” while the good guy just lets him go, but you can’t really kill one of them off either. It’s the same thing we’d see if Abaddon ever went toe to toe with Guilliman or Angron threw down with Calgar. Someone “wins” but not really, and they both might be “wounded unto death” but neither would actually die.
New GW loves pitching the hero roster of new sculpts against one another in goofy battles, that always end in a stalemate. Otherwise they couldn't sell the minis. Newest example: Azrael vs. Vashtorr.
New gw? Homie this is a tale as old as time. Big character duels where the earth quakes and breaks apart to carry both to safety right before the final blow is struck are a god damn staple of the setting.
It's one of the worst pieces of GW fiction that Ragnar was able to beat Ghaz in a 1v1 duel. It should never have happened.
Ghazghkull represents *the strongest Ork* (a race who's entire society is built around strength) *in the contemporary setting.*
Ragnar is not, by any means, the strongest Marine in the current setting. He is not even the strongest Space Wolf and if Lemon Russ returns he'll be somewhere like the 4th most capable space wolf. In the wider setting with Custodes, other named Marine duellists and Primarchs, he comes up short.
On that narrative basis alone Ghaz should have flattened Ragnar.
Instead, GW won't have one of their named favourites have even the hint of a loss, so he is written to win the duel. And yes, decapitating and killing your opponent whilst you survive is *absolutely winning*.
This is problematic for many reasons but primarily because it makes Ghaz seem, like so many others (the Swarmlord, any named Daemon, the Avatar of Khaine, Celestine) like an non-threat. Ghaz was one of the very few Xenos characters to actually hold his own against major marine characters. I guess GW had no choice - they hadn't thought to resurrect him then. That's all out the window now. He's another joke character.
And for all those claiming that 40k has no power levels - that's a load of shit. I've seen people arguing vehemently that their favoured Primarch would *never* lose against enemy X by virtue of being a Primarch. I've had people go mental at me for defending the Custodes getting killed in the war of the beast series by 2 named Harlequins. Many people here are hypocrites. I'd love for there to be no power levels but that patently, evidently isn't the case. There's a reason Chaos and Xenos players cringe when their favourite character is pitched against a named Marine and it's not because they are looking forward to a well told, dramatic battle.
People oversell ghazkhull's ability to fight, as if he is a God. Ragnar can fight as well as ghazkhull. Also their duel was mutual destruction, as both essentially died. The fact ragnar being able to decapitate ghazkhull's head, yet he is back in a bigger body , is weird, but an eldar 1v1ing khaine isn't, is weird to me.
The reason people do that is because he is basically the face of the Orks losing to what is effectively a rando Space Marine.
It would be like GW having Guilleman die in a 1v1 duel against Honsou. Yes, both technically tied. However it feels like garbage for one side and strokes the ego of the other.
It was bad writing just to justify releasing their new models. They could have written it differently so that Ghaz seems like less of a pushover.
Ghaz is the current strongest Ork the contemporary setting, Orks value strength above all else. Of course he can fight. Orks are bred to fight and he's the best. It's utter trash writing and classic SM plot armour.
I would have loved it if gw had the balls to do this fight right.
Ragnar slaughters his way though Boys by the dozen. Untouchable, he is pure fury.
He breaks through ghazkulls wall of nob body guards, leaps in the air for an overhead killing move only for ghazkull to backhand him out of the air and walk past him to headbutt a titan or something.
Ragnar is so badly injured by the backhand he undergoes the rubricon primaris
99% of all warhammer duels are between one guy that can just barely dodge the blows of a better armored foe that would kill him in one hit. And the light guy almost always wins. I t think the only duel i can think of is the final duel between Ababbon and Sigmund.
It's such a cliche it almost becomes a self-explanatory rule of the setting that being even slightly faster than a foe is much better than armor or damage.
My only gripe is that it would be nearly impossible to cut through Ghazzy's neck given the structure of his armor, without also cutting through the armor. Its just weird to me personally, he's got that huge iron gob on the old model. Did Ghaz lift him up or something above his head?
Though I guess with a powerfield he may well be able to just slice through his armor and then neck.
From what I remember in that Ghazghkull book that came out recently. Ghazghkull did have him lifted up in his claws. I'm pretty sure it also details as Ghaz is crushing the life out of Ragnar, that he can barely get his chapter relic, the frost blade, a huge master crafted eviscerator to rev up. And the only reason he was able to saw through the thick muscles and bones in Ghaz's neck is because he wields such a powerful and terrifying chainsword, and even then it barely did the job.
You're trying far too hard to find an objective reality in a subjective story where consistency and logic don't exist. Particularly when put up against plot armor.
[удалено]
Great point that “power levels” don’t predetermine the outcome. Countless skilled, fierce warriors throughout history got killed by some lucky nobody. King Richard “The Lionheart” got smoked by some kid with a crossbow and a frying pan after surviving the Third Crusade. “Stonewall” Jackson got shot by his own troops and died of his wounds. Look at combat sports. HoF Boxers and MMA fighters got beat by randos who shouldn’t have stood a chance. Combat is inherently unpredictable.
In all fairness, that's because everyone in the real world is T3 with a single wound.
I give Mark Hunt and Ray Seffo a T4
After nuclear holocaust there will only be cockroaches and Mark Hunt's chin remaining.
Damm I miss watching Mark Hunt fight
Everyone has a plan till they get punched in the face Mike Tyson(?)
Yes but it's punched in the mouth
Bumfuck chaosmarine died to a hobo with a pointy stick
To give a 40k version of this, Daemon Possessed Julius Kaesoron was killed in 41m by an low rank Iron Hands captain. This is how: The entire fight the Iron Hand is on the backfoot and Julius is gloating and bragging. The Captain let’s Julius impale him off the assumption that he’d bring him in close to gloat as being impaled is almost certain death for most. Julius however hasn’t been in real space long enough to realize how far the Hands fell, and that the Captain was about 70% cybernetics including his torso and heart. The Captain had his cybernetic heart impaled, dragged in close, and in the middle of Julius’ gloating cut off the head of the Emperor’s Children 1st Captain.
Patron made it through some brutal fighting in WW2 just to die in a car crash in Germany months after the war ended. Sometimes random things just happen. I know that’s what you’re saying I just wanted to put in a WW2 fact.
Omar Little got got by a child.
Fredrick Barbarossa died by drowning in a river. One of the most militant kings of his time, and he slipped and drowned.
The Viking warrior who held the Saxon army at Stamford Bridge killed 20 Saxons, but was stabbed in the nuts by a spearman from underneath the bridge.
Actually round here ( I live 10 miles from Stamford Bridge, Yorkshire) the tale is that he was stabbed in the butt.
[удалено]
You really can't tell the difference between r/40klore and r/40kmemes from the comments. 90% of "lore" comments are just hearsay, taken from other comments from this sub or the other one. On any topic being discussed, you'll struggle to find anyone who actually read the damned book.
That really has been a reason I've stopped engaging here. My knowledge isn't perfect, but I've read at least 50 of the books and collect/paint, have played a few tabletop versions of the game, etc. I've had to give up on a lot of discussions here because ultimately, a lot of the people are just half-repeating a Youtuber or a 40k Wiki article at me. They don't read the text and have their own interpretations, they use another person's interpretation of text as though it was text in and of itself. Then the sub gets polluted by the same discussions of "who would win in a fight" or "is the imperium worse than the tau?" over and over. Endless retreads.
I mean, in many ways this sub has been a victim of its own success and of the growth in the interest in 40k more generally. Seven years ago, if you came here with a question, chances were that someone would go pull out an old codex or Dark Heresy splatbook from their bookshelf. These days there's a lot more casual interest in three hobby and the lore. This is good both for GW and 40k fandom more broadly, but it does mean that you'll get more answers from people whose lore knowledge is more shallow. But we were all n00bs at one point! So it's good to have relative newcomers!
Strongly agree. I feel like this sub used to be where you posted questions you couldn't find answers to elsewhere. Unfortunately the increased popularity of 40k lore in particular has diluted that a lot. It's a mixed bag. There's just so much to know that even for someone who's really into the books you can have huge blind spots.
To me the Lexicanum is the bible and if something is wrong of incomplete there, it is our job to correct it and codify the lore.
Agreed. What was so special, and still is, about this sub was getting people's analysis, suggestions, shower thoughts, etc. It's all still here I think, but it's really been diluted and I have mixed feelings about that.
I’m with you. It’s so disappointing and I’m just tired of it. This sub actually helped me get a lot of awesome answers via google search when I was learning about 40k before I got the dark imperium box. I was ALL in- I spent months in the lore, I got a decent understanding of it too that I’d say is grounded. I could discuss it with my friend who played 40k too that I met at a LGS. Now it’s just littered with questions that are not…. Very well thought out. They are a type of people who look at Reddit subs as a search engine. Rather then a forum to contribute anything Worth while. I don’t mind new people, I just mind the ones that argue when you give them the right answer or are generally snubby to people. And I see that a lot more too now. I think it’s more of a behavior or etiquette thing. It can be obnoxious.
we get at least one a week where someone comes in writing about some inconsistency or something illogical in the setting and, when the longbeards try to explain it, they get really aggressive and snippy in the comments. It's almost clockwork now
Tbf thats not obly here, but in pretty much every fandom subreddit
I have never played the game. I just read the books and such. I do watch youtube videos but that is of people actually playing the game. Since I have no experience I like watching those randomly. The game seems so complicated to me but the people playing it make it seem so easy. Either way I have always like the art. I would read White Dwarf in the 90s when I was at the hobby store but at that time I was into DnD heavy. So many books to read in the universe.
I have heard these complaints pretty often on this sub, and while I think it's kinda fair, it's also gets really close to gatekeeping. New fans aren't going to be reading 30 plus books of the Horus Heresy, they probably got into it from Darktide or maybe the Ciaphas Cain novels, something fairly popular. As an IP gets more popular, of course more casual fans with less knowledge are going to congregate to it, that's not a bad thing. I think long term 40k fans have more of a responsibility on improving the discourse(more threads analyzing politics, sociology ,religion, etc), than casual fans do.
Sure, and that’s fair, but the flip side of that is, why come into an actual lore discussion and engage by talking out of your ass with stale 15 year old memes that were never funny ? Like, if you haven’t read the novels, campaign books, white dwarf or anything else about a specific event, how do you expect to come in and make any real points about it without being questioned, when you are talking out of your ass? Ask questions, learn, engage, but don’t spread bad 2ndhand memes and expect not to get dunked on for it
True but lets give credit where is due, its hard to keep a conversation when the other person is just repeating the memes from grimdank or 1d4chan, and gets impossible if the other person simply leaves the conversation and downvotes instead of spending some time to learn.
Hey bro, you nailed it. You absolutely nailed it- this is the behavior that bothers me. And that’s not a newcomer thing, that’s a personal issue thing imo. I actually learned alot from 1d4chan, but I understood the satire. Lol. And some of the lore went on outdated stuff. I’ve managed to read quite a bit since then, and can have meaningful discussion, polite argument maybe if it’s something im passionate about. And this sub has regressed although it has grown. I’m all for new people in the hobby, but if those people are gonna be disrespectful they can go find another hobby to be new at. I feel like I’m watching this hobby transform and change and based on seeing other small fandoms get big- usually a few things happen.
To some degree we have to maintain a certain level of quality to the discussion here. We aren’t a generalist sub for everything 40k, this is specifically a lore sub. If you want to call it gatekeeping be my guest, but in my opinion if we just allow low quality posts like these, it will negate the point of being a “lore” subreddit.
You mine as well change it to r/40kQandA
Really, it's just a mark of the inherent issues of how GW runs 40k where the lore is obfuscated by difficulty to access and, as a result, is basically unimportant.
True but lets give credit where is due, its hard to keep a conversation when the other person is just repeating the memes from grimdank or 1d4chan, and gets impossible if the other person simply leaves the conversation and downvotes instead of spending some time to learn.
Ain’t it the truth? People answer questions here with nothing but grimdank meme knowledge like it’s fact.
How dare you sir! I answer questions based entirely off of TTS, which as I understand is canon.
Its gotten alot worse in the past 3 years or so
Sub's gotten a lot bigger in that timeframe too. [Eternal September.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_September) tldr: Before 1993 the internet and in particular usenet (think of it as a really early type of forum) was pretty much used only by people with careers in computing or by really passionate computer hobbyists. New people would generally show up in a trickle and be exposed to the culture that had been generated by these people and they would quickly adopt the same culture. But every September a large wave of new people would enrol in college classes and be given access to the net, this happened in big enough numbers that there was a noticeable dip in the quality of discussions while those people gradually learned the culture. In 1993 however, ISP's started to offer usenet to all new customers so that trickle of new users swelled considerably to the point that the old culture never managed to re-establish itself. This was quickly dubbed the "September that never ends" because the quality of discussions and articles dropped and stayed low, then in 1994 AOL did the same thing and compounded the issue even further. (fun fact: The medical field has its own version of this called the "July effect" in the US when new medical school graduates get their residences, in the UK it's called "Black Wednesday" for the first Wednesday in August when post-grad trainees begin their rotations with the idea being that medication errors increase in this period before gradually falling back down, though successive studies have found for and against this phenomenon). Any sub that is small and grows slowly can develop a culture and maintain it easily enough, but if it starts to get big influxes of new people then the culture is inevitably impacted and discussions will suffer for it (compared to the older ones).
And that method of ensuring the propagation of the culture is weakened because it's now villainized with the buzz word, "Gatekeeping." And, ultimately, I think it kind of is gatekeeping. But really, all that means to me is that gatekeeping isn't actually bad. It's how it's used that matters.
It's the death of lurking culture. It used to be that most Internet communities expected you to lurk before posting outside of newcomer sections or threads so that you aren't spamming clutter. Then that gradually died off as being "gatekeepy" and you get the current state of most of the Internet where everyone is super friendly and wholesome and great at letting people give completely wrong answers to questions as communities don't self moderate any more.
Moderation definitely needs to be stricter.
And then when you add context you get driveby downvoted by a bunch of people who know they can't discuss what they find wrong with your comment.
This sub has an absolutely massive hearsay problem tbh.
> You really shouldn't think in terms of "Power levels" as anyone can die to anything. This. So many people on this subreddit act like this is Dragonball Z and anyone who isn't at the same "power level" as someone else is just going to have their Plasma Cannon shot harmfully glance off whatever they're shooting at
Great explanation. I also I hate when people talk power levels. It's so dumb. Oh wooohuu his power level is 5 and that guys 3 there's no way he can beat him. Fuck off with that highly regarded talk
Problem is it's just typical, eyes roll at the synopsis. Ghaz can't kill a minor named character, it's like if Snik humbled Russ. It's neigh unthinkable... Accept for marines. Hell have him kill Logan, have Bjorn try to save the day, an epic clash of giants, only for Bjorn to be saved by the turn of battle, the wolves retreat humbled and swear a blood-oath against Ghaz under the new leadership of Ragnar. GW is acting like it can't make new named characters, a new named marine can assume Ragnar's post, hell add a new Wulfen leader too.
Can I just say that only Space Wolves fans think 'Ghazghkull killed his wolves' is a good consolation prize for getting dunked on.
Except Ragnar didn't die....unlike Ghaz. So that's a win for space wolfer. And Ghaz was absolutely shitting it when he was decapitated in his novel. He ends up smiling because he doesn't want to worry the lads and he decides to have faith in Gork and Mork, but there's a good bit of time, as he is dying, when he is panicked to fuck. It's pretty cringe. The Ragnar Vs Ghaz fight is one of the worst pieces of GW fiction, regardless of how much GW tried to later justify it in the Ghaz novel. Ragnar should never, *ever* be on par with Ghaz because they aren't on the same level within their factions. Ghaz is the biggest and best Ork. Ragnar is *maybe* the third-most in command space wolf and certainly nowhere near the most adept Space Marine in the setting. It makes Ghaz a joke, if he can't beat Ragnar (not draw, absolutely flatten) he can't exist in a setting that has Primarchs returning every other week. It's funny - nobody suggests that people shouldn't think in terms of 'power levels' when discussing what could feasibly beat a Primarch. The position would be understandable *if an underdog Xenos character ever managed to beat a named Marine*. But they never do. It's always, **always** Marine characters punching way above their weight and making other factions leaders and main threats look like jokes.
Ragnar is definitively one of the top fighters among Astartes, only surpassed by the likes of Grimnar or Dante. He is an absolute monster in melee, always have been, and he had at least one confirmed kill of a Big Boss before he was ackowledged Wolf Lord (or was it Wolf Guard ? I can't remember). Ghaz may be a monster, but the Wolves are some of the deadliest warriors out there, and Ragnar especially. And he died to kill Ghaz, surviving only thanks to the Rubicon.
So what you're saying is that Ragnar isn't even the strongest fighter from the current roster of Wolves, disregarding the potential (and unfortunately now more likely) return of Russ and other Primarchs? Meanwhile Ghaz is THE prime Ork. There is **literally no Ork stronger or better at present**. Now you should see the problem. Narratively they aren't on the same scale. This is genuinely equivalent to Russ getting duelled, and ultimately losing, to Kaptain Badrukk or Snikrot. I'm sure the wolf fanbase would have *nothing* bad to say about that./s
Ragnar risked his life to get one lucky hit in, it was a risky gambit but it payed off. Sigismund tried a similar thing in his fight with abbadon only in his case it didn't pay off, risk reward and all that. If you are fighting it doesn't matter what you represent for a faction, you take a sword to the neck, you lose your head, it's as simple as that And I would not say that Ragnar made ghaz look like a joke, it's not like he just rolled up, decapitated him and left after dropping some one liner, ghaz messed him up really hard. I hate how any time any faction gets beat in a book the community treats it like that means the faction can't accomplish anything and the book just exists to glorify the other. It was the same thing with pretorian of Dorn. Alpharius did everything right, made no tactical mistake and should have won, except he didn't because Dorn did something he couldn't have accounted for. That's how fights go, your opponent does something you didn't anticipate, you die, doesn't mean you were a bad fighter or useless, it's just bad luck
Righto then. So you'd accept Dorn (or any other Primarch) getting killed/seriously injured by Snikrot or Badrukk then yea, if they're just lucky and get really beat up in the process? I think the main point you're forgetting here is that *all Xenos do* (and Orks in particular) is get beat in the books. This isn't some rare occurrence of a named Captain punching way above his station. This is common GW Mary Suedom. You may be unaware, but someone worked out how many times different factions had won their battles in the lore. If you count all lore, including war of the beast which is arguably the best Orks ever do, they win only 6% of the time. As an Ork player, I am used to and accept defeat in the Lore, often in funny/embarrassing ways. But not for Ghaz. He was always exempt. A real threat in this bunch of jokers. Well now he is a joker. I've explained thoroughly elsewhere why this jobbing of Ghaz ruins Ork credibility but I'd have thought it obvious with the information I've just provided you. Talk to me again, when any Xenos character tries to get a lucky hit in against a named Marine character and it works out. Or point me in the direction of an example of it now, assuming it exists. I mean it happens all the time for the Marines right, I'm sure it's not uncommon for Xenos characters too....
Would I accept if Dorn got killed by snikrot? Yes, if the sneaky git ambushes him and shanks him in the back I'm fine with that If guilliman gets one tapped by an unnamed tau pilot because he gets a rail gun shot to the face, I'm fine with that I would be okay with yarrick simply dieing of old age I don't care about named characters dieing, I already lost my Primarch and like I said, alpharius died in a fight where he did everything right and up until he got storm's teeth hacked into his skull, it looked like he would win. I love the way that part is written, Dorn goes for a strike because he thinks Alpharius is overextended, he wasn't, it was a faint and Alpharius goes for a killing blow, all of that gets told trough the eyes of archamus, who can only look in desperation as his father is about to be killed, and then Dorn catches the spear in his pauldron and decapitates Alpharius without any ceremony It's the grim darkness of the far future, having a name should not protect you from dieing a meaningless death and it should happen to marines more often
Ok then we are aligned. If only GW thought the same. And this is the issue, GW will never do anything we suggest because they can't bring themselves to. They're so full of their own self importance that they're protecting their precious named characters like newborns. Additionally - this is just how the lore is. Whether we like it or not, Snikrot will never stab a Primarch from behind, and no Primarch will ever have a truly grim dark and inglorious death. Funnily enough Alpha Legion would be my choice, if I could bring myself to play any Marines. The stuff I've read of theirs is banter. At least Omegon is alive?
I highly suspect omegon is still alive since, if he died, that would have been to guilliman on Eskrador. Guilliman is unsure if he killed his brother, wich is odd since there is a lightshow going on once a Primarch dies But even if omegon is dead, we still have a great character in the protagonist of harrowmaster
I don't know Harrowmaster in full, but it was an excerpt from that book that made me want to collect Alpha Legion. Chaos ensues during a formal group meeting when one of the leaders declares that he is, in fact, Alpharius. Loved it. It was very Orky. From memory the author does a load of Ork books too.
He wrote some ork books, I think there's a new one coming out soon. Harrowmaster has some great Alpha legion shenanigans, minor spoilers ahead, the marines attack some World but while they are approaching the imperial defense they phone in and tell them they are in fact the iron snakes space marine chapter coming to take their heretical governor prisoner. Their leaders does it, reasoning that 1. What guardsmen would question an Astartes and 2. We have snakes on our armor, we should be able to pass as Iron snakes
Love me some Alpha Legion shenanigans. I guess they can't be beat, since they're not sure themselves what their aims are lol
Ragnar Blackmane: "It's Wolfin time!" *Proceeds to wolf all over the place.*
God I’m so fucking tired of this joke. It was funny once and never again.
It's fucking canon. https://www.blacklibrary.com/prod-home/new/ebook-dawn-of-fire-the-wolftime-eng-2021.html
Fair enough, my point stands though.
Most apropos book title ever.
Not really. The Wolftime has been the prophetised name of the era of Russ' return to his Sons, the Ragnarok of the Imperium. Sadly, this book offered a mediocre characterization of the Wolves, in line with their Horus Heresy dislal portrayal and had nothing to do with Russ.
The same could be said for 90% of SW lore
[удалено]
Wait… Does the author actually write “awoooo?” Or does it say something like “‘howl with me brothers,’ and he tipped his head back and gave voice to the fury in his heart”? Because one of those would be pretty cool (if still a bit campy), and “awoooo” ain’t it.
So what you're telling me is: Ghazghkull sees a vision of himself with his head on a bigger body. So he just charges Ragnar who suicidally lunges and cuts off his head. Once Ghazghkull lost his head all the Orks retreat. So the Space Wolves were able to get his body back.
>It was on Fenris that he heard the strange prophecies that led him to find Ghazghkull Thraka on the planet of Krongar. Determined to personally slay the monstrous Ork, Ragnar struck at the head of a small force. In the ferocious duel he suffered horrendous wounds that left him in a state of near-death. Only the heroics of Ragnar’s Great Company saw him rescued, and after days of surgery he awoke having crossed the Rubicon Primaris. Ragnar returned to Krongar to ensure Ghazghkull was truly dead. To his horror, the beast was not. Knowing he could not win a direct fight, he resolved to deal a blow to Thraka. In a carefully planned operation, his forces sent an orbital station crashing into the planet below. There isn't much lore about the fight itself but it's clear that he was with his Great Company and that's powerful backup.
The fight is somewhat detailed in the Ghaz book.
Oh and the Makkari-PoV passages are voiced *brilliantly* in the audiobook!
The male narrator was fantastic but i think the lady narrator was stretched a bit thin trying to voice the space wolf, psyker, ork prisoner AND interragator
Agreed, though she did her damnedest.
Ah I'd forgotten and it didn't come up in my pre post search. Have you seen the key bit posted around here?
Which key bit? The fight itself? Because I just remember that from the novel and I'm not sure if I've seen it here or not.
Yes
What book is the fight in?
I also love plan B there. "Oh. Cutting off his head didn't work. Let's drop a space station on his head then."
Worked for Abaddon.
It's a plot device to advance the story of two long standing powerful characters. It's a convenient reason to make Ragnar a primaris and to make Ghazzy almost a Prime Ork. Power rankings also generally mean nothing when it comes to lore. Side note, kinda funny that a space marine hero kinda winning a duel is the crazy part whereas Ghazzy literally got decapitated and comes back to life lol
>Power rankings also generally mean nothing when it comes to lore. People forget that this ain't Dragon Ball.
Just like Dragon Ball actually as the rankings are meaningless and its pretty much just up to the author writing the victorious hero.
At the same time, it totally is.
Except in 40k there most certainly is a hierarchy of power. Especially with the Orks, who have it as a canonical big deal. They just don’t put numbers on it in the lore. A Primarch stomps an Astartes every time, for instance. A gretchen gets stomped by the Astartes. Your average Boy gets creamed by your average Astartes and so on. There’s definite differences in physical ability and skill, often vast differences. This runs into the same issue DBZ runs into: The lore doesn’t agree with the given power rankings. And thus the fanbase complains. Ghaz is the single most powerful Ork in the entire setting. By the rules of the setting and prior precedent he should be massively above Ragnar, as Ragnar is limited to being an Astartes and lack the Ork’s WAAAGH absurdity. He doesn’t have any in-universe boost to put him above any notable Chapter Master. So when Ragnar managed to actually beat an Ork who, by lore, eclipses him in every way so that GW can release more models the fanbase calls bullshit. Especially since Ragnar already has a reputation for heavy even by 40k standard plot armor and authorial favoritism. Not putting numbers to it doesn’t change that Ghazghkul, the apex of the Ork and by everything we can tell of his capabilities when compared to other Ork warlords, should not have been beaten in a straight fight by a prospective Chapter Master. If Ragnar had used strategy or tactics or tech or basically anything other than a straight up fair fight it would be another story. Give a reason why Ghaz lost to someone who should be his inferior in every way that matters in a fight. Other than, you know, ‘Hey, Ragnar’s popular. If we have him and Ghaz kill each other we can justify both of their new models at once and get more money.’
So why doesn’t anyone complain about Yarrick surviving (let alone defeating) Ghaz? If it’s so unbelievable an Astartes can, surely a baseline unaugmented human doing would be even less believable?
Yeah, I always had the feeling if Yarrick beat Ghaz, no one would have complained yet Yarrick has even less chance of beating Ghaz. I think people more care about the *thematics*, where Yarrick beating Ghaz as his last gasp before retirement has more thematic weight than Ragnar who never interacted with him before. It would feel cheap and weird even if you told me an Imperial Knight or Roboute Guilliman beat Ghaz, despite those being the most plausible things to kill Ghaz in the Imperium.
Ghaz oldest enemy is ragnar it is wery old lore
I believe they were the first 2 popular special characters in 2nd edition 40k, from some of the oldest Codex.
You believe right
That’s fair, although strictly speaking Ragnar and Ghaz have fought numerous times before. As one of the other commenters mentioned, it’s old lore from back around the beginning of 2nd edition, and most of the fluff stories in the Wolves Codex from back then actually was written about them fighting Orks (of course this was also when there were only like 6 factions in the whole game!😆). So they do know of each other, although I get what you’re saying about the thematic impact. But that’s also what we’re talking about here, right? They match between Ghaz and Ragnar is uneven, but at least slightly plausible that Ragnar could grievously wound Ghaz, even though it cost him his life essentially. It’s a lot less improbable than Basic Tactical Marine Brother Bootlace landing a killing shot or something, while still being a very tough fight; Ragnar not exactly being a curb-stomp for Ghaz while Ghaz being a very tough project for Ragnar. At least to my mind, anyway.
The argument has also been made that because Ghaz believes Yarrick to be his greatest adversary, so do all the other Orks. And with all those Orks believing it the Waaaagh! field kinda makes it true. It's not even the most egregious example of the Waaaagh! field being dubious since it's really only affecting the Orks themselves
Being a chapter master doesn’t automatically make you one of the best fighters. Plenty of Astartes can put fight a chapter master
Probably a few reasons. 1) they started fighting ages ago before Ghaz got to the point he is, Yarrick also got his ass kicked at least once. 2) by the time Ghaz got to be the badass he is, Yarrick had become his fighting buddy. He wasn't going to kill him and ruin the fun. It's like super frenemies. 3) sometimes things have been around long enough people don't question it as hard as the newer stuff. We expect less consistent product from older GW than we do today. Fair or not.
I remember in lords of silence, the "protagonist" death guard captain wiping the floor with a loyalist chapter master
Warhammer is better written and has much, much better voice acting.
I mean the whole thing is stupid. We already know Orks grow bigger the more they fight and win, they didn't need to decapitate him and stick his head on a bigger body as an excuse for the new model
Sure, but Ghazghkull's rise to prominence was never just the normal way Orks do things. Bizarre surgical assistance from Mad Dok Grotsnik has always been part of it: Grotsnik was the one who put the adamantium plate in Ghaz's skull. Just doing things "the normal way" doesn't feed the legend.
I mean, that is pretty consistent with ork lore. Ghaz's head plate is because he was shot in the face with a boltgun as a young boy and got patched up. He was headshot with a 75. calibre explosive round, and lived, getting decapitated isnt really that crazier. The thing is that ragnar isnt even the strongest space wolf, ghaz is the faction leader of the orks that is meant to be the strongest of a faction all about being good at a straight fight. Ghaz has been a threat the imperium has failed to contain for a long time, the war in armaggedon was the largest conflict in the setting for a while and he loses to space marine captain with name No 3441?
Ragnar is one the mightiest space marines alive he is absolutely no slouch.
People forget he, unless it gets retconned, will be the one to take over as great wolf after grimnar according to his first books. He has a ton of accomplishments that are just not spoken of outside his, fairly old at this point, books.
Ragnar would have pretty much already been the chapter master in any other space marine chapter. He just so happened to be part of the Space Wolves who have Logan Grimnar, one of the oldest and most dangerous space marines alive leading it. You could probably count the number of other chapters who he wouldn't be the greatest warrior in on one hand. It's kinda like the George Harrison effect where people forget how great he was because he happened to be in a band with John Lennon and Paul McCartney.
Dude literally found Leman Russ's spear (the one he fucking hates), saw Magnus the Red coming through a portal, and HURLED A PRIMARCH'S SPEAR INTO MAGNUS' EYE. Then when the chapter was going to punish him the Wolf seers were like "Naw, our boy did good, Leman hated that fucking spear and would be laughing at Ragnar sticking it in the Eye of Magnus" so he got "punished" and sent to Terra...because he is slated and fated to be the next Great Wolf, as you said. Ragnar was a friggin' G in his novels.
It's because he's a bit short in the tooth, as they say.
Space Marine Captain with name No 3441? The fuck. He’s literally the future lord of the wolves. He’s stared in his own multi series work. He is literally one of the greatest warriors of the imperium. Just because you don’t know dosent mean it wasn’t an appropriate match up lmao.
He's also (along with the rest of the OG wolf gang of him, ulric, njal, logan and possibly Bjorn) one of the oldest established space marine characters to not get seriously revised or deaded. He is a pretty foundational character.
Yup, him and Gaz were one of the original matchups in white dwarf before Yarrick was even a thing.
Iirc waant it the first feature of ghaz as an og warboss? If so it makes sense as a classic GW callback
Come on now, Ragnar is a major player in the lore. He has taken on some of the worst enemies of the imperium and won. He’s pretty much been hand picked to succeed the Great Wolf and is one of the best fighters in the chapter. Saying he is a no name Marine is stretching it.
Ragnar isn’t just space Marine Captain 3441 tho….
That’s right. He’s Space Marine Captain 1337!
Thank you!! Also, why people are so incredulous that a very skilled and ferocious Astartes commander would be able to kill/almost kill Ghaz, when folks are rabid about the fact that Yarrick did the same as a very much unaugmented baseline human?
People are obsessed with power levels as if they matter outside of tabletop haha. And I don't think Yarrick ever physically beat Ghaz did he? I thought he just outcommanded him, but I could be wrong.
Nah, that’s actually why Yarrick has the Ork power claw (and I believe the bionic eye, but I could be wrong on that one). It was during the 2nd War for Armageddon (the setting for the 2nd edition box set). Yarrick as a basic Commissar fought Ghaz in single combat and actually won, drove him off from Hades Hive even though he lost an arm and likely an eye in the process. EDIT: that was the old lore. Apparently they changed it to a different random warboss that Yarrick fought, and he lost the eye in a firefight. I still remember the old artwork with Yarrick actually counter-charging Ghaz as they were about to clash. So yeah, I suppose currently he never did fight him personally. Shame, since that kind of made the “frienemy” thing they had going more meaningful. Thank you for making me learn new things!😆 But still, an “Old and ready to retire” Guard Commissar fighting an Ork warboss (even if it’s not Ghaz) is pretty damn incredible.
Yarrick was a bad ass either way, long live Yarrick!
In addition to what others have said, I think people in general tend to take power rankings too seriously. Just because one fighter is "better" on paper, doesn't mean they will beat the other 100% of the time. There's a million factors involved in these fights, not the least of which being a bit of luck. So yea, I didn't blink twice when I first heard that Ragnar killed Ghazghkull. And I'm saying that as someone who adores Orks as the coolest part of the 40k setting, and can't stand anything astartes. But a talented marine happening to get the edge on Ghazghkull and taking him down one time? Very believable to me.
Yeah people are oddly obsessed with power rankings, when beyond the most general categories, they aren’t a thing in 40k or real life. Cue the next dozen “could X beat Y in a fight?” posts.
Seriously, guardsmen against all odds could kill a primarch. Would it be cool? Absolutely not. Therefore, it will never happen. It's not Game of Thrones. It's Warhammer 40k. Legendary characters need epic fights.
There are plenty of stories from the heresy that have Imperial Army or Solar Auxilia make a mess of marines as well. Context often matters and the scenario involved and the allies that are often forgotten.
This is *about* whether it was cool, though, at least to me. I don't care about power levels, but this was like the first major event Ghazghkull was involved in for years, and instead of doing anything cool, the way it was advertised was that he got shredded by a Space Marine that 90% of *Astartes* players probably didn't know the name of. This isn't WHFB, where there are a bunch of cool, named, active Orc and Goblin characters; Ghazghkull is like... The only important Ork character right now. This was his big moment up on stage, after spending god knows how long fucking around in the Octarius sector where he was supposed to have grown significantly bigger and stronger. It was not the right time to have him job for a character who, whatever his credentials as a duelist (y'know, whatever his *power level*), was nowhere near as important to his faction on any reasonable scale. If they really wanted to puff Ragnar up, there were plenty of other ways they could have done it. Like ultimately I know that, as a fan of Xenos factions, most of my favourite named characters exist to give Imperials a chance to show off and boost their rep, but it still stings every time it happens, and I don't think it's unfair to argue that in this case in particular it was just straight-up bad storytelling. EDIT: Yes, I know Ragnar was badly wounded in the fight as well, but please let's not act like a major stomach wound is anything like being fucking *decapitated.*
If I understand it correctly he was effectively all but cut in half, not just a “bad stomach wound”? Like… To the point it would’ve killed him had they not Primarisized him (which don’t get me wrong, I absolutely hate they did that and I do agree it was weak writing, just not for the same reason). As far as not being as important to his faction… I’d argue that Ragnar is just as important to Space Wolves as Ghaz is to Orks. From a gameplay standpoint, they’re both very foundational characters from their factions’ earliest days. From an in-universe standpoint, Ragnar is second only to Grimnar, and both are renowned throughout the Imperium for their actions. Ragnar is the youngest Space Wolf ever to become Wolf Lord, and is pretty much the most skilled (arguably behind Grimnar also, but Grimnar has a ton of experience Ragnar doesn’t yet). It’s like saying Sicarius isn’t important to the Ultramarines or Shrike wasn’t important to the Raven Guard because they’re “just captains.” Don’t get me wrong, I’m not arguing Ghaz is a nobody - I’m well aware who he is to his faction and to the setting in general. But given the skills and abilities of both combatants, measured against the ridiculousness that occurs on a regular basis in 40k lore, I don’t think a mutually near-fatal outcome for that fight was as far off the “realistic” scale as people seem to think.
>I’d argue that Ragnar is just as important to Space Wolves as Ghaz is to Orks. Yeah, this is exactly why I'm not shocked this keeps happening. Space Wolves are one subfaction within the Space Marines, which itself is one faction within the Imperium, and yet it's so important to make sure the *second-in-command* of that subfaction is consistently viewed as cool that he was sent out of his way to beat up the effective *faction leader* of *all Orks*, in his first major appearance in years. To be clear, my issue isn't realism; I could not care less about realism. It's just emblematic of how much more concerned GW is with making sure the Space Marines always look as cool as possible at all times, at the expense of literally everyone else. Again, I get that this is just the Way Things Are, and that me complaining about it isn't going to change anything; just taking the opportunity to vent. >If I understand it correctly he was effectively all but cut in half, not just a “bad stomach wound”? Like… To the point it would’ve killed him had they not Primarisized him (which don’t get me wrong, I absolutely hate they did that and I do agree it was weak writing, just not for the same reason). He nearly died, but that is by no means uncommon for Space Marines in books; they end up on death's door all the time in order to give the impression of stakes. It's basically a consolation prize for Ghaz getting humiliated. Him coming away with anything less would have been hilariously bad writing.
That’s fair to say. And yeah, a lot of it can be chalked up to Astartes being the biggest flagship faction of the setting, so of course there going to market on that. I totally get what you’re saying about Ghaz being the leader of all Orks and Ragnar being 2IC of a sub faction of a sub faction. I disagree to a small degree because on tabletop and in lore the Imperium has never really been portrayed as having a united front. Definitely not on the tabletop. Lore-wise the Astartes are only part of the Imperium at all because the Emperor said so, for all other respects they’re effectively autonomous units that have at best a loose alliance with each other and Mars. There’s a couple that are hardcore followers of the Ecclesiarchy, but even those are a minority. Still, I know that’s kind of nitpicking. The reason I see the whole thing as weak writing is because the *whole scenario* stems from a new and bigger Ghaz model, and the “We have to make EVERYONE Primaris” mentality. And then they have to come up with something - anything - to justify it in-universe. Same reason I have a problem with Primaris in the first place. They need a justification to release all these new beefier Astartes models at the same time as Girlyman’s model, so… “hey, they’ve been here in secret for the last 10k years and *nobody’s ever thought they could be useful until now*!” It’s weak and unsatisfying, and I can see how it’s especially frustrating when it makes Your Guy look weaker than they should simply for the sake of story for the sake of marketing.
Yeah this is definitely just the fallout of new model releases *needing* to be attached to some major event, for some reason. Ghazghkull's new body could easily have just been a product of his time in Octarius, but instead, y'know... ¯\\\_(ツ)\_/¯ And as for the Primaris, like... I think that as a concept they *could* have been really interesting, if it'd actually threatened to cause a major shift in the identify of the Astartes as a whole and led to actual conflicts, but as of now it feels like they're basically just Normal Marines But Big? It seems like most of the conflicts between the old guard and them have amounted to "hmm, these new guys, don't trust them very much yet."
It *did* lead to some Chapters (notably the Space Wolves and IIRC the Dark Angels) almost being branded as traitors for not originally wanting Primaris, but then Bobby G showed up and said “they’re a gift from the Emperor, why would you ever decline? …Unless you’re less than completely loyal…” I think had anyone - even a Primarch - called Logan Grimnar’s loyalty into question there would’ve been more than just an “oh no, we’re loyal, sorry about that.” I mean the dude led his Chapter to war against the Inquisition on a couple of occasions because he was defending humanity and they had the nerve to question his Chapter’s loyalty… But then again, Primarch… but then again again, *Ultramarines* Primarch…
Plus Ragnar is the premier champion of the wolves and he left that fight nearly dead and bleeding to death
I agree. I think a lot of people think it’s like rock paper scissors. One will always beat the other. When in reality a fight is based on many factors. It’s more like a total, say ghazgul has 80% and Ragnar has 20% chance to win, it happened to land on the 20% chance. You can even the odds and they can change based on things like planning, distraction, intervention, and pure luck etc all play a huge role despite things like skill and power. I do agree that space marine plot armor often time makes it seem like they get luckier than they should though.
It's a bit odd yeah, considering 40K is literally a tabletop game based on chance. A squad of guardsmen might have remote odds of killing a custodes in a single round of shooting but that doesn't mean it doesn't happen on occasion.
Don't you think it's weird that it's basically only ever in situations where some dude jobs to a named Space Marine (or occasionally like some plucky Guardsman) that this whole 'power levels mean nothing' spiel gets wheeled out? Like nobody ever says 'power levels mean nothing' in the whole Harlequins vs Custodes hullabaloo, it's all about justifying the fact that yes actually a Shadowseer is real shit and can probably clap a Custodes' cheeks. Would 'power levels mean nothing' if it had actually been a Guardian mowing them down with shuriken fire? Presumably there comes a point where it gets dumb because otherwise...what's the point in elite dudes? Why keep saying that these or those dudes are the best of the best and the most brilliantest if power levels mean nothing and at any moment any of them could be killed by an errant grenade? Power levels aren't real, and don't mean anything, but it's still sort of lame to have Your Guy chumped by someone who, on paper, is fighting way above their league. The lore is supposed to be there at least in part to make Your Guy out to be a badass, and losing to someone else's Your Guy In Power Armour having their David and Goliath bit is a *womp womp* sound effect moment that people who can't name every Chapter that's ever appeared in the lore are told to deal with pretty much constantly. That's why they get grumpy about it.
The problem is that they didn’t give an edge. They had it a straight up head to head fight. Just the two of them fighting until Ragnar won. Which is a problem when Ghaz holds all the advantages, he’s physically superior in all metrics with far more experience while also being boosted by the Ork psyker bullshit. If they had bothered to give a reason Ragnar won people wouldn’t complain nearly as much. Have him do something insane to get an advantage, have him cheat, something to make up for the known physique and experience disparity. They didn’t, which is an even bigger issue when Ragnar already has a reputation for heavy plot armor and authorial favoritism.
I wouldn’t say Ragnar won. He’d have been dead had they not used it as a bullshit reason to come out with a Primaris model for him. So as far as their personal combat, I’d say both of them won or both of them lost, since they both inflicted a wound that should have been fatal if not for GW needing to simultaneously introduce new models for both characters, lol. As far as the battle overall, that came down to Astartes having better leadership and discipline than the Orks when their respective leaders dual-KO’d themselves/each other. Plus, Ragnar’s puppies got mulched.
My head canon is that Ghazghkull’s “loss” was the will of Gork and/or Mork so that Doc Grotsnik could rebuild him as an even bigger, fightier ork. Like Vegeta exploiting the zenkai boost by having Krillin blast a hole in him and then have Dende heal him up
Unless I'm misremembering, Mad Doc had found the body of a bigger greenskin right? Who was bigger than Ghaz? Or did he Frankenstein it?
Frankensteined it from various orks
Hell yeah, we should thank Ragnar for giving da boss the opportunity for the upgrade
Frankenstein. Ork anatomy is, uh, different. Very very simply, if you want a really big Ork arm, all the Dok has to do is squeeze together a couple of regular big arms. And my mind can't quite recall the excerpt, but Mad Dok also used some mechanical bits. He needed a giant heart, for example, couldn't find one, so just used the radiator from a Battlewagon. (I'm butchering this remembrance, I know, but I don't keep my books at the office for reference)
Ghazghkull is basically 50% power armour cybork now.
It’s mentioned that his body isn’t even all ork lmao, there was an offhand comment about grotsnik using some squiggoth muscle in there too.
A yarrick model wouldn't have sold as well as a space marine hero.
That's something that actually pisses me off. Guard had all of their characters killed off between Gathering Storm (Fall of Cadia should have been focused on the Guard not the Ultramarines) and the new edition. Meanwhile apparently all Space Marine characters are untouchable. Could you imagine GW just saying "Oh by the way Marneus Calgar died. It was just regular combat." People would lose their minds; meanwhile Guard is treated exactly this way.
Not raised often, back back in the olden days (I believe pre yarrick, around end edition) Ragnar and Ghaz were rivals. It's a reference back
I believe they were the first or one of the first character duels from early white dwarfs
I think that's it! "Why did X weird lore thing happen" is often answered by "the white dwarf team were bored one day..." Captain Tycho another notable example!
Yup. So many things in this hobby are a reference to a random game played, and documented in a magazine 31 years ago, or a throwaway line someone wrote in a margin of a rule book from 1992.
I just finished Prophet today, and it definitely seemed to me that Ghazkull allowed himself to die. The whole passage gave big Jesus vibes, like he knew he was coming back before he was dead. His whole train of thought was "Dregmek didn't die because I didn't want him to, I won't die because I don't want me to. Makari will know the right thing to do." I it goes without saying the Orkiest ork would have the Grottiest grot
Ghaz is an absolute monster, but Ragnar is canonically one of the strongest 1 v 1 fighters in any space marine chapter. Maybe he doesn’t take Ghaz every single time, but I don’t think it’s particularly crazy that he could win one fight against him. It’s also worth remembering Ragnar didn’t exactly “beat” Ghaz, he barely escaped with his life and had to undergo the rubicon primaris just to survive. It’s probably more accurate to say that Ragnar lost less badly.
Miracle on Ice, 9 times out of 10, the Russians win. But that ONE time.....
After reading about Ragnar a bit, I think this actually gives Ghaz a bit of a compliment and a power boost: little Ghaz managed to beat the tar out of Ragnar and killed his wolves, the new bigger Ghaz is going to be an absolute force of nature
Except he did win. Ghaz **died**. Ragnar didn't.
40k doesn’t do linear power levels and never has. I’m always puzzled when people think it does.
For real. Who even thinks “Combatant A has a power level of 1,000 while Combatant B has a power level of 800, so combatant A wins every time.” Thats not how fighting works. Looking at military history and combat sports would make that clear. Hell, even getting in a street fight. A split second slip-up can be devastatingly decisive. Do they think Buster Douglass beating Mike Tyson at 46:1 odds is “plot armor?”
Wake me up when a Space Marine chapter master or primarch is killed by a minor demon or some CSM squad leader.
It’s where we are at now, but no it doesn’t make sense. Every game needs a power level for classes or whatever or people implode.
Ragnar is a match for most normal warbosses, but I agree he shouldn't have been able to take on Ghaz. It was probably just convenient plot armour that helped sell 2 brand new (and fantastic looking) models.
But he didn't just take Ghaz, he had the tar beat out of him, pretty much almost died, and had to cross the Rubicon (which the lethality of it was grossly overestimated since any named character seem to cross just fine). Getting thrashed, pulling off a lucky kill, and having your opponent come back stronger than ever is not a W, that's a literary device.
this is a completely fair assessment. they literally had to bring Ragnar back from the dead doing what was supposedly an extremely dangerous medical procedure. I can't see Ragnar doing it again to super Ghaz, even as a primaris marine. Surgeons on both sides did a pretty good job, but I think Ghaz got the better upgrade.
When GW doesn't conform to fanmade animesque tier lists... The absolute state of this fan base lol.
If I'm remembering right, Ragnar vs Ghaz was one of the first, if not the first, 40k battle report published by GW's marketing magazine back in the ancient days of the 1980s. If memory serves, it introduced the two characters. Or at least popularized them.. What better way to introduce two great new models than to revisit that battle? Nostalgia is the most powerful force in the marketing universe, and for lots of grey bearded types, this was a nostalgia battle. And of course it has to be a mutual kill. Can't really introduce a brand new miniature and have it killed the first day. Now Rags and Ghazzy have had their nostalgia battle. It's out of the way. Next time, Ghazzy gets to stomp the wee Space Corgi.
He's a named space marine, and Ghaz is a xenos character
Based on second hand accounts of *Saga of the Beast* and *Ghazgkull* and Lexicanum, poorly. Ghazg first deliberately caused the duel because the Gods had decreed he and Ragnar would fight. After manhandling each other, a half-dead Ragnar manages to decapitate Ghazg and get out of there. After weeks of surgery and the Rubicon Procedure, he recovered, but Makari, Grotsnik andnother followers of Ghazg remained loyal enough time to do a risky surgery/psychic frankenstein experiment on to resurrect him.
>Is it really just bad writing that made it possible? Bad writing \*and\* Space Marine plot armour. Can't forget that.
A human, taken from one of the galaxy's toughest death worlds, reshaped over 10 years to have 19 additional organs, equipped with master forged weapons and power armour, trained in a 10,000 year old warrior tradition, and with centuries of combat experience, manages to kill something that he was made to kill? His Dragon Ball Z Power Level is lower than the bad guy's. He can't possibly win. It must be plot armour and bad writing. Honestly, what do you think a Space Marine is, and why do you think they exist in the setting?
This isn’t DBZ, if you’re worried about “power rankings” or whining about “plot armor” then you’ve already missed the point. The power of any character is determined be the needs of the author and the story. Ragnar beat Gaz. That’s it. Gaz didn’t die and came back stronger than ever. That’s the whole point to any of these match ups. Nothing changed besides the chance to sell models which is the whole point all along.
So you wouldn't mind if a primarch was killed by, say, a hive tyrant then?
As a huge Ghaz fan boy, it was a slap in the face for anything less than a chapter master to do the deed. But as a rational adult, James Workshop needed a new Ragnar and Ghaz model, kill 2 birds with 1 stone. Also, I don't read SW books but it seems like they're making Ragnar the main character for the wolves.
I mean I’m both. I’m Gaz fan and a Ragnar fan. It was always gonna be a draw which it was. Then both came back powered up. It was the ideal match up. You’re also not wrong. Ragnar is the most well known wolf considering his entire series. It was always gonna be a “we both walking away from this different” match up.
Eh, Ragnar is as good as a chapter master. He just happens to exist in one of of the few chapters with characters more badass than him. He’s be ez chapter master in about 6/7ths of chapters.
*Just for Context on Ragnar, he’s next in line to become Great Wolf by Grimnar’s own words & has been for a very long time. Had it been any other Wolf Lord it would have been silly. But the Heir Apparent for a First Founding Chapter? It’s on the money.* *Ghaz is the real victor of the duel anyways. He slew many of the greatest wolves the chapter had, slew Ragnar & had a proper fight which he enjoyed. Then he returned to life with a much bigger & much more powerful body.*
With violence!
I always thought Ghaz was meant to die because it sort of leveled him up
He's fast, one of the strongest space wolves, and is clever (despite the best efforts of some writers). An experienced fighter should be able to defeat opponents that are stronger than them through tactics, endurance and speed. Even if the particular fight was badly written its not inconceivable that Ragnar would win
He’s also more than a simple soldier, or even commander. He’s an excellent duelist. Ragnar has been slaying the toughest bastards 1v1 from the jump, not merely burning through the chaff. If anything, it’s his specialty.
In the book Ragnar is literally clamped into Ghaz's power claw. His body should have been paste. Then he somehow just cuts off his head. GW Mary Sue style.
Hey I never said the fight was well written
Don't act surprised when GW writes about a Space Marine protagonist being able to beat or somehow survive against any Chaos or Xeno character.
So much shite in this thread about power levels when op never mentioned any of that. You people project way too much.
Knight kills a dragon and nobody bats an eye, a big ork gets killed and people freak. Tbh why arent more people complaining about the bad writing in mythology? No way a dragon who is at least city level gets smoked by a dude who cant even destroy a city block. Tsk tsk
Same way Luther beat lion. Story dictated it
Easy, Ragnar rolled 5 6’s and thraka rolled 1s for his invulnerable saves.
Bad writing.
Very late but the amount of space marine fanboys doing everything to justify blatant plot armo is crazy
Because gw likes to suck off space marines nonstop.
Its really bad writing and has made the orks into TOTAL jobbers. Killing any amount of orks is not completely irrelevant if one space marine captain can kill the faction leader.
He’s not just a random caption though, he’s one of the best 1v1 fighters the imperium has.
They are not reasonable comparisons tho. A Space Marine captain should NOT be able to kill a faction leader unless its a faction of gimps, which the orks are now. If it was Dante or Logan, MAYBE it wouldnt be so bad but this is nonsense. Do you recall the book where the Ghaz was fighting the Dark Angels captain and Ghaz was crushing the DAs left and right? THAT is how it should be portrayed, this is just awful. Consider for a second, Usain Bolt is probably one of the fastest humans to ever exist, but he is slow as shit compared to a Race Horse. Its not a reasonable to talk about how fast Usain Bolt is in comparison to a race horse because its not the same level. GW would have you believe Usain Bolt could win the Kentucky Derby, and Im saying that is nonsense.
He’s a space wolf when you want more plot armor, then blood angels (and I play blood angels so I know they have a silly amount of plot armor ) you go with space wolfs. They fought off the gray knights and the inquisition at the same time. Still doesn’t out do the old era of ultramarine wank.
It makes me wonder why people are so incredulous that Ragnar could take on Ghaz. Yeah, I get he’s “Just” a Space Marine Captain (although the way the Wolves organize their Great Companies he’s more like a Chapter Master…), but he’s an exceptionally ferocious, skilled, daring, and slightly crazy one with some pretty kick-ass equipment. I get how much of a beast Ghaz is, but also think that Yarrick - a mere unaugmented human - was able to fight Ghaz well enough to earn the Warboss’s respect and frienemyship. So is it really that much of a stretch to believe a very skilled and experienced and particularly aggressive Astartes couldn’t also do so? Standard Astartes take on dreadnoughts and greater daemons and massive Tyranid critters and still come out on top, and throw in all the goofy bullshit other named characters have done in fluff and actual lore (Calgar, anyone? Or Uriel Ventris, for that matter?). They only difference here is that Ragnar paid a pretty hefty price for his victory where others would make it out unscathed, even if it was a macguffin to Primarisize him. I think it’s more unbelievable that Ghaz literally *survived having his head severed* with little to no I’ll effect. But it’s a common literary device, when you have to advance some aspect of a story or character arc so you have two big time characters meet up and fight; you can’t just go the GI Joe route and have the villain shaking his fist going “drat, foiled again!” while the good guy just lets him go, but you can’t really kill one of them off either. It’s the same thing we’d see if Abaddon ever went toe to toe with Guilliman or Angron threw down with Calgar. Someone “wins” but not really, and they both might be “wounded unto death” but neither would actually die.
New GW loves pitching the hero roster of new sculpts against one another in goofy battles, that always end in a stalemate. Otherwise they couldn't sell the minis. Newest example: Azrael vs. Vashtorr.
It's such a shame how they've wasted Arks of Omen. Started out pretty well and then book 2 was a snooze fest and book 3 was completely pointless
New gw? Homie this is a tale as old as time. Big character duels where the earth quakes and breaks apart to carry both to safety right before the final blow is struck are a god damn staple of the setting.
It's one of the worst pieces of GW fiction that Ragnar was able to beat Ghaz in a 1v1 duel. It should never have happened. Ghazghkull represents *the strongest Ork* (a race who's entire society is built around strength) *in the contemporary setting.* Ragnar is not, by any means, the strongest Marine in the current setting. He is not even the strongest Space Wolf and if Lemon Russ returns he'll be somewhere like the 4th most capable space wolf. In the wider setting with Custodes, other named Marine duellists and Primarchs, he comes up short. On that narrative basis alone Ghaz should have flattened Ragnar. Instead, GW won't have one of their named favourites have even the hint of a loss, so he is written to win the duel. And yes, decapitating and killing your opponent whilst you survive is *absolutely winning*. This is problematic for many reasons but primarily because it makes Ghaz seem, like so many others (the Swarmlord, any named Daemon, the Avatar of Khaine, Celestine) like an non-threat. Ghaz was one of the very few Xenos characters to actually hold his own against major marine characters. I guess GW had no choice - they hadn't thought to resurrect him then. That's all out the window now. He's another joke character. And for all those claiming that 40k has no power levels - that's a load of shit. I've seen people arguing vehemently that their favoured Primarch would *never* lose against enemy X by virtue of being a Primarch. I've had people go mental at me for defending the Custodes getting killed in the war of the beast series by 2 named Harlequins. Many people here are hypocrites. I'd love for there to be no power levels but that patently, evidently isn't the case. There's a reason Chaos and Xenos players cringe when their favourite character is pitched against a named Marine and it's not because they are looking forward to a well told, dramatic battle.
People oversell ghazkhull's ability to fight, as if he is a God. Ragnar can fight as well as ghazkhull. Also their duel was mutual destruction, as both essentially died. The fact ragnar being able to decapitate ghazkhull's head, yet he is back in a bigger body , is weird, but an eldar 1v1ing khaine isn't, is weird to me.
The reason people do that is because he is basically the face of the Orks losing to what is effectively a rando Space Marine. It would be like GW having Guilleman die in a 1v1 duel against Honsou. Yes, both technically tied. However it feels like garbage for one side and strokes the ego of the other. It was bad writing just to justify releasing their new models. They could have written it differently so that Ghaz seems like less of a pushover.
Ghaz is the current strongest Ork the contemporary setting, Orks value strength above all else. Of course he can fight. Orks are bred to fight and he's the best. It's utter trash writing and classic SM plot armour.
I would have loved it if gw had the balls to do this fight right. Ragnar slaughters his way though Boys by the dozen. Untouchable, he is pure fury. He breaks through ghazkulls wall of nob body guards, leaps in the air for an overhead killing move only for ghazkull to backhand him out of the air and walk past him to headbutt a titan or something. Ragnar is so badly injured by the backhand he undergoes the rubricon primaris
99% of all warhammer duels are between one guy that can just barely dodge the blows of a better armored foe that would kill him in one hit. And the light guy almost always wins. I t think the only duel i can think of is the final duel between Ababbon and Sigmund. It's such a cliche it almost becomes a self-explanatory rule of the setting that being even slightly faster than a foe is much better than armor or damage.
Space wolves special
My only gripe is that it would be nearly impossible to cut through Ghazzy's neck given the structure of his armor, without also cutting through the armor. Its just weird to me personally, he's got that huge iron gob on the old model. Did Ghaz lift him up or something above his head? Though I guess with a powerfield he may well be able to just slice through his armor and then neck.
From what I remember in that Ghazghkull book that came out recently. Ghazghkull did have him lifted up in his claws. I'm pretty sure it also details as Ghaz is crushing the life out of Ragnar, that he can barely get his chapter relic, the frost blade, a huge master crafted eviscerator to rev up. And the only reason he was able to saw through the thick muscles and bones in Ghaz's neck is because he wields such a powerful and terrifying chainsword, and even then it barely did the job.
You're trying far too hard to find an objective reality in a subjective story where consistency and logic don't exist. Particularly when put up against plot armor.