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Hey guys! I just finished reading Prospero Burns today and had a couple questions about the Space Wolves. They are not a legion I am particularly drawn to, but I know a lot of people like them so maybe y'all can help me out. Firstly, I don't understand why the Thousand Sons were censured at Nikaea for dabbling in sorcery, when the Space Wolves have shamans of their own. In fact, I am reading the HH series in order and by the sounds of it, so much as owning a rabbits foot is heretical, so why are they allowed their totems and magical customs at all?

Secondly, it is common knowledge they are the Emperors executioners, who enforce "sanctions" on other legions. Why weren't the World Eaters used in this capacity? It seems like work that is right up their alley. Thanks everyone!

for the first comment: 'cause Russ is a hypocrite. Nothing more, nothing less. "hurr durr we don't use warp energy, we channel the power of Fenris" The Thousand Sons were censured (along side all legions) because the High lords, half the primarchs, and a little bit of the Emperor feared the warp, while half the primarchs and many others wanted to use the warp for the Imperium.

for the second question: Russ's title was self stylized, not official. Russ named himself the "emperor's executioner" and his arrogance caused himself many problems because his bloated sense of importance (Night of the wolf, Prospero, etc.) HOWEVER, the space wolves are much easier to control than the World eaters were. The only official times the space wolves were told to go after other legions were 1) when they took out one of the lost legions, and 2) when they were sent to arrest Magnus. Every other time, it was Russ giving the job to himself.

Really: Russ was an arrogant, hypocritical bum, and this sums up a large number of his stupid decisions.

Russ is a good lapdog and doesn't question what he is told. Someone like Angron, who hated the Emperor with a fiery passion wouldn't exactly be reliable to perform the Emperor's dirty work.

That, and the Vlka Fenryka think of themselves as the Emperor's Executioners, not necessarily that they are.

As for Nikea... Well, the Space Wolves have always been massive hypocrites...

As for the first question, it is because Russ and his Wolves were extremely ignorant and superstitious about the warp. They believe their own nonsense about the Rune Priests being "natural" when they clearly use the warp the same as all librarians as they appear in the warp realm when Ahriman fights alongside them in "A Thousand Sons." The White Scars also have different words for psykers and their powers, calling them Stormseers, but they were always aware that they too were using the warp, Russ is the only one backward enough to believe that his guys were different. This is even more egregious when you consider that it means that the Wolves never disbanded their librarius and should have been punished themselves.

To the second question, Captain Kharn says it better than anyone else could at the beginning of Betrayer:

" Because we couldn’t be trusted. The Emperor needed a weapon that would never obey its own desires before those of the Imperium. He needed a weapon that would never bite the hand that feeds. The World Eaters were not that weapon. We’ve all drawn blades purely for the sake of shedding blood, and we’ve all felt the exultation of winning a war that never even needed to happen. We are not the tame, reliable pets that the Emperor wanted. The Wolves obey, when we would not. The Wolves can be trusted, when we never could. They have a discipline we lack, because their passions are not aflame with the Butcher’s Nails buzzing in the back of their skulls. The Wolves will always come to heel when called. In that regard, it is a mystery why they name themselves wolves. They are tame, collared by the Emperor, obeying his every whim. But a wolf doesn’t behave that way. Only a dog does. That is why we are the Eaters of Worlds, and the War Hounds no longer"

It's not actually common knowledge that they are the sanctioners, it's still a self appointed title. There's no actual evidence, just hearsay, and they don't do well the other times they go up against legions, so it's quite probably false.

As to Rune Priests, hypocrites and arrogance.

Unlike the world eaters if you ordered them to take someone alive they would.
World eaters, nails activate and there a 7 foot superhuman rage monster, will not obey. Will not stop till everything in two or more chunks...

Plus it was known angron... He was broken from the day he was found. Unreliable as a sanction force. By the end, pretty much just a rage primarch, not a skilled general.

Russ was loyal and reliable from day one. Arrogant etc but not a devolving rage machine.

The Thousand Sons are the end result of a Tzeench plan, and are unreliable.

But the Council of Nikea was more about the Emperor trying to starve the warp by removing any and all knowledge about it. He had hoped a secular and ignorant populace would be immune to the temptations of the warp and starve it of the worship it craves.

Thus, the Thousand Sons, who actively study and investigate the warp, are censured. The Wolves, who's power is based on less formal education and more random superpower manifestation, it is less of an issue.

Or you could just be a hater like the others here. It's stated several times that Russ is playing a role, and is smarter then he lets on. Of course everyone gets to hold the idiot ball at some point in Prospero Burns, but for the most part it is in Magnus's hands.

Its also to do with Magnus breaching the webway when he tries to warn the emperor of Horus falling to chaos - this pledge to stop using the warp combined with the damage he does leads to the sanction.

Horus then corrupts the message to be a kill order rather than a capture order.

As for the hypocrisy - yes, Russ and his warriors believe they use other power sources - not the warp and are thus fine to ignore the Nikea edict.

Durandal wrote:
The Thousand Sons are the end result of a Tzeench plan, and are unreliable.

But the Council of Nikea was more about the Emperor trying to starve the warp by removing any and all knowledge about it. He had hoped a secular and ignorant populace would be immune to the temptations of the warp and starve it of the worship it craves.

Thus, the Thousand Sons, who actively study and investigate the warp, are censured. The Wolves, who's power is based on less formal education and more random superpower manifestation, it is less of an issue.

Or you could just be a hater like the others here. It's stated several times that Russ is playing a role, and is smarter then he lets on. Of course everyone gets to hold the idiot ball at some point in Prospero Burns, but for the most part it is in Magnus's hands.

The Thousand Sons weren't censured at Nikea, ALL Librarians in all legions were disbanded and all Astartes psykers were banned from using their powers. From the Emperor's mouth:

"I see now I have allowed my sons to delve too profoundly into matters I should never have permitted them to know even existed. Let it be known that no one shall suffer censure, for this conclave is to serve Unity, not discord. But no more shall the threat of sorcery be allowed to taint the warriors of the Astartes. Henceforth, it is my will that no Legion will maintain a Librarius department. All its warriors and instructors must be returned to the battle companies and never again employ any psychic powers."

The Space Wolves are hypocrites as they are simply playing RAW that because they never called their Psykers "Librarians" that they could continue to use them. To be honest, the Thousand Sons would have got away with ignoring the edict, just like the Wolves, the White Scars, The World Eaters and The Alpha Legion did, if not for Magnus using his powers to shatter the webway gate on Terra.

It's not like any of the Primarchs were really good at listening to the Emperor anyways. The ones who blatantly disregarded his orders generally sided with Horus, but none really followed his commands perfectly. That was a major problem after Horus was named Warmaster as a lot of them wouldn't follow Horus' orders even though the Emperor commanded it.

Russ believing Rune Priests weren't drawing their power from the Warp is doubtful. Maybe he, like many other Primarchs and Astartes, believed there was a difference between how a Librarian/Rune Priest/Storm Seer uses their abilities than how a "sorcerer" does. It's a distinction the Imperium in general holds in 40k so I imagine it exists in the 31st Millennium.

That and Magnus really screwed up the Emperor's plans with the Webway. Plus Horus changed the orders and Russ had no reason to doubt Horus at this time.

Alot of you clearly don't understand the wolves, they play at barbarians because that's what's expected but it's a front they are far more calculating than that.

If someone thinks your an ignorant savage they'll underestimate you and that gives you a major advantage.

Russ is a primarch he's no less intelligent or brilliant than the others, but also no less flawed in his own ways.

hobojebus wrote:
Alot of you clearly don't understand the wolves, they play at barbarians because that's what's expected but it's a front they are far more calculating than that.

If someone thinks your an ignorant savage they'll underestimate you and that gives you a major advantage.

Russ is a primarch he's no less intelligent or brilliant than the others, but also no less flawed in his own ways.

Hence why he is a hypocrite. Either A. He is aware of his Rune Priest's being psykers and he was therefore a total hypocrite to side against Magnus at Nikaea and is just as guilty of breaking the decree.
Or B. He does believe that they magically are the only psykers in the whole galaxy that don't use the warp (They do, it's been proved empirically that Ruin Priests manifest in the warp in the exact same way as any other psyker) in which case he is an ignorant reactionary just like Magnus accuses him of being.

If he was merely enforcing the Emperor's will then I would have slightly less contempt for him, but Russ actively pushed for a condemnation of psykers in the legions, all the while using them himself. Mortarion (pre-Heresy) was a close minded dick, but he wasn't a hypocrite. He banned all of his legion from using their powers, and chastised those that had used them in the past (Source, Angels of Caliban).

Whatever Russ thinks, there is good evidence that his idiotic Shamans actually do believe, with all the smug condescension in the world, that their powers aren't from the Warp, that they are from Fenris. Which makes them ignorant barbarians. As does their burning of libraries and torching of civilisations that don't comply with them. They are savages, no matter what they think of themselves.

So Russ is an ignorant barbarian for listening to his experts on a matter? Some people call that smart but alright.

You cannot whine about SW burning libraries = savage that's standard practice for the Imperium. The one to criticise for that is the Big E.

Space Wolves burning libraries wasn't exclusive to then. It was pretty much policy for most of the Crusade fleets. The Word Bearers had specific units meant to burn and cast down false beliefs. The Thousand Sons were probably one of the few forces that collected and studied material.

Magnus and the Thousand Sons were hardly innocent in their downfall. They knew they were looking into the warp and practicing things that should be left alone. In their arrogance they thought they could control it.

Magnus should have known his warning to the Emperor would get him censured at the very least. If he didn't expect the Emperor to react badly than he was a fool. The Thousand Sons stated into the abyss and it stared back.

Yes but Magnus was acting out of altruism in that instance. Virtually all of the loyalists broke the edict when it was considered the best route to them, Magnus is no exception. However the Thousand Sons guilt, or lack thereof, is irrelevant. The Wolves explicitly condemned the librarius program while maintaining their own. Out of the three who most vocally spoke out against the Librarius, there was Ferrus, who never had a librarius and never broke the edict, Mortarion who initially allowed one, then banned it declaring it a corruption of his Legion, then much much later, inadvertently slaved his whole legion to Nurgle. Ferrus is the only one who both always used his psykers and never stopped using them. Hence, he is a hypocrite and/or an ignorant fool.

Regardless of Magnus' intent, he used the very abilities the Emperor strictly forbid, and in doing so utterly destroyed the strongest psychic wards in the Imperium and destroyed the Emperor's biggest project. He had to have known there would be consequences and the Wolves were those consequences. Even then the orders were to bring Magnus in to answer for his actions. Horus twisted those orders to take two Legions out to further his own plans.

The quote above from the Emperor states that his sons delved too deeply into secrets he should not have let them know. Magnus was accused of Sorcery, not merely using Librarians. The distinction is there even from the Emperor. He knew psykers were vital to the Imperium. Magnus and his Legion were going too far, going beyond necessary and starting to use Sorcery. By the time of the ban on Librarians, the Thousand Sons were full of cults and many practitioners of different types of warp powered abilities. They were already on a dark path. If they had just followed other Legions and kept their use of psychic abilities limited they may have avoided their fate. But they didn't, and psychic abilities were central to their battle plans.

Most of the Primarchs were very flawed individuals which led to many problems during the Great Crusade and contributed greatly to the Heresy.

'Sorcery' as opposed to 'Psychic Powers' is - so far as a formal definition has ever been given - using Daemons (either bound or bargained with) to enhance or replace psychic powers of your own.


Hence a psyker reaches into the warp with his own strength, draws power, shapes it and flings a fireball.

A sorcerer summons the awareness of a patron/servant daemon and essentially says "get 'im, Kev." - which is why cultists can be sorcerors even if not necessarily psykers (see Enuncia from Ravenor for another example of this sort of thing).

The Thousand Sons were definitely drifting into sorcery - the Tutelaries (which, whatever benevolent aspects the Thousand Sons had perceived them to possess, were definitely daemons) are the most obvious case in point.

 Thanatos73 wrote:
Regardless of Magnus' intent, he used the very abilities the Emperor strictly forbid, and in doing so utterly destroyed the strongest psychic wards in the Imperium and destroyed the Emperor's biggest project. He had to have known there would be consequences and the Wolves were those consequences. Even then the orders were to bring Magnus in to answer for his actions. Horus twisted those orders to take two Legions out to further his own plans.

The quote above from the Emperor states that his sons delved too deeply into secrets he should not have let them know. Magnus was accused of Sorcery, not merely using Librarians. The distinction is there even from the Emperor. He knew psykers were vital to the Imperium. Magnus and his Legion were going too far, going beyond necessary and starting to use Sorcery. By the time of the ban on Librarians, the Thousand Sons were full of cults and many practitioners of different types of warp powered abilities. They were already on a dark path. If they had just followed other Legions and kept their use of psychic abilities limited they may have avoided their fate. But they didn't, and psychic abilities were central to their battle plans.

Most of the Primarchs were very flawed individuals which led to many problems during the Great Crusade and contributed greatly to the Heresy.

Nope, he very clearly says " Henceforth, it is my will that no Legion will maintain a Librarius department. All its warriors and instructors must be returned to the battle companies and never again employ any psychic powers."

There is zero distinction between Psykers and Sorcery. One is like the "scientific" term for an ability. The other is a word used by all who view pyskers negatively, yes including the Emperor. Mortarion refers to librarians as Sorcerers, Russ does it as do numerous characters that hate it. Not once does Yesugei or Sanguinius, or Magnus ever refer to it as Sorcery.

Now was Magnus a pawn to Tzeentch? Yes. Did his Sons delve too deep into the Warp? Yes. But the Emperor blanket bans ALL psykers, barring astropaths and Navigators. . But I digress, this is a strawman argument. Regardless of Magnus guilt, Russ was evangelical in his hatred of psykers, championed the anti Librarian movement, all the while using them himself and never ever once considering disbanding them. That's my only point. That he was a hypocrite. Any points you make against any other character don't change that point and I haven't read one shred of material that has suggested otherwise.

No reason to get all worked up. Russ used psykers of a different name and championed the anti Librarian campaign. He did act hypocritical in using psykers of a different name.

I just don't think he was this ignorant hypocritical jerk you see him as. I'm not going to dissuade you, and that's cool, everyone can see characters how they want. I'm not denying he acted like a jackass. I bring up other Primarchs because almost all of them are written as very flawed characters, so Russ is not alone in that club.

Also in a lot of the new fluff it has been greatly expanded on that most of the Primarchs didn't fully understand the warp. Magnus was probably one of the few who did, and he thought he could master it. So Russ not really getting where his psykers were getting their powers from can be understood in context of what was known at the time.

i can understand your feelings on Russ and seeing him as a hypocritical ass who destroyed the Thousand Sons despite his Legion also ignoring the ban on psykers.

I see him as a product of his times, a flawed character who, along with most of his brothers, was not told the whole truth by the Emperor. The Emperor could have spared the galaxy a whole lot of hurt by being a bit more open with the Primarchs in general.

I am eagerly waiting for Inferno as FW hinted at expanding the Wolves fluff and showing them not be simple barbarians but using that image to their advantage.

The 30k forum is usually so friendly. A whole lot of vitriol in here towards the wolves.

In answer to the OP: For the first question it more or less comes down to two things. Magnus smashing up the warp gate on terra, and scale. The TSons had a whole mess of psykers, and their legion more or less revolved around study of the warp. The Wolves had a librarius (pretty much) equivalent to any other legion and as we see quite a lot, the Emperor doesn't mind all that much if his Legions act against his wishes, as long is it's in small doses and they keep it quiet.

And the second question? Angron and his legion are great if you want a whole bunch of dudes murdered. Not so much if you want to murder a few to teach the rest a lesson.

The World Eater Pain Train has no brakes.

NickAtkins wrote:
The 30k forum is usually so friendly. A whole lot of vitriol in here towards the wolves.

There is some vitriol, admittedly.
Partially down to bad writing. The Wolves aren't that well written.
IRL we don't like hypocrites, even if it's just over small things. Russ and the Wolves are hugely hypocritical.
They're also arrogant. Appointing themselves the 'Emperors Executioners', and having that repeated on the internet when there's no proof for, and quite a bit against, can get a bit grating.
The whole 'we're barbarians but we're not' is also a little annoying, because, again, no evidence for, and some against.
Least, that's my take on it.

NickAtkins wrote:
The 30k forum is usually so friendly. A whole lot of vitriol in here towards the wolves.

That's not just 30k related. They've become very poorly written, to the point of Mary-Suedom in many cases. At least in 30k, they don't seem all WOLF WOLF WOLF.

No-one would mind the Wolves if they weren't so pretentious about themselves. They think they are the Emperor's chosen executioners? That's shared by many other Primarchs, who believed they were X/Y/Z - hence leading to the tension at Horus being chosen as Warmaster.
"We're barbarians, we don't need your culture - but we're also not, because it's just a trick to make you underestimate us." That isn't a good way of writing the wolves. No-one would mind if they were feral, but whoever wrote that tipped them into the Badly Written category.
Russ' hypocrisy is something many people just find absolutely irritating, and makes him one of the least popular Primarchs.

It's beard envy no one grows a luxurious beard like a wolf.

For the record, I like the Wolves, in a "I love to hate the ever loving feth out of them" Like Erebus, I hate him with every fibre of my bones but I like how much I hate the character.


However, I do genuinely hate the writing of the Emperor. I really hope ADB fixes this in Master of Mankind, because so far I can't see how one reader could think of the Emperor in a positive light, every decision he made seems to be the worst, my idiotic or unfair choice he could have made. Either I want compelling evidence that he is actually some insane Tyrant who didnt care one iota about the Primarchs aside from using them as tools to win the crusade, or that he is a misunderstood genius and we see why all of the things he did make real sense and even hurt him to do some of them.
So far he is so detached I often forget that he was even involved in the crusade except occasionally to show up and chastise one of his sons.

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

"We're barbarians, we don't need your culture - but we're also not, because it's just a trick to make you underestimate us." That isn't a good way of writing the wolves. No-one would mind if they were feral, but whoever wrote that tipped them into the Badly Written category.

That would be Dan Abnett and Prospero Burns, I can't stand that book. Try as I might I just cant like it. I hate the main character, I hate the leather fetishist masks, I hate how the wolves are portrayed, I hate that he clearly introduces a character to be one of the POVs and then forgets him for most of the book. Come to think of it, I think the only thing I liked was Russ trying to reach out to Magnus right before the attack. But even that was dumb, because "Hurr Ima talk through this dude because I think he's a spy for Magnus."

To give some perspective, I like Descent of Angels and Fallen Angels ALOT more than Prospero Burns, and both of those are not good.

 KorPhaeron77 wrote:

However, I do genuinely hate the writing of the Emperor. I really hope ADB fixes this in Master of Mankind, because so far I can't see how one reader could think of the Emperor in a positive light, every decision he made seems to be the worst, my idiotic or unfair choice he could have made. Either I want compelling evidence that he is actually some insane Tyrant who didnt care one iota about the Primarchs aside from using them as tools to win the crusade, or that he is a misunderstood genius and we see why all of the things he did make real sense and even hurt him to do some of them.
So far he is so detached I often forget that he was even involved in the crusade except occasionally to show up and chastise one of his sons.

I agree with you 100% on this. I really hate how the Emperor is written. Every one of his decisions is just so horrible I can't understand how he successfully led anything, let alone the resurgence of mankind. Not telling the Primarchs about the warp, putting Horus in charge of the Crusade despite knowing he would have a hell of a time and then going back to Terra. On top of that he didn't tell them what he was doing on Terra despite it being the future of humanity. Why not tell the Primarchs? Why keep that a secret? That probably would've smoothed things over with the Primarchs a lot.

"Hey, Horus is going to take over for a bit on the Crusade so I can go to Terra and set up the human Webway to protect our souls from the Warp. Oh yeah, bad things live in the Warp that are the biggest threat to mankind, did I forget to mention that?"

 VictorVonTzeentch wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

"We're barbarians, we don't need your culture - but we're also not, because it's just a trick to make you underestimate us." That isn't a good way of writing the wolves. No-one would mind if they were feral, but whoever wrote that tipped them into the Badly Written category.

That would be Dan Abnett and Prospero Burns, I can't stand that book. Try as I might I just cant like it. I hate the main character, I hate the leather fetishist masks, I hate how the wolves are portrayed, I hate that he clearly introduces a character to be one of the POVs and then forgets him for most of the book. Come to think of it, I think the only thing I liked was Russ trying to reach out to Magnus right before the attack. But even that was dumb, because "Hurr Ima talk through this dude because I think he's a spy for Magnus."

To give some perspective, I like Descent of Angels and Fallen Angels ALOT more than Prospero Burns, and both of those are not good.

Oh yeah I'm still angry over Prospero burns that was our only book and it was crap, the thousand sons did us more justice and actually featured the battle.

Dan abnett is severely overrated.

 Thanatos73 wrote:

 KorPhaeron77 wrote:

However, I do genuinely hate the writing of the Emperor. I really hope ADB fixes this in Master of Mankind, because so far I can't see how one reader could think of the Emperor in a positive light, every decision he made seems to be the worst, my idiotic or unfair choice he could have made. Either I want compelling evidence that he is actually some insane Tyrant who didnt care one iota about the Primarchs aside from using them as tools to win the crusade, or that he is a misunderstood genius and we see why all of the things he did make real sense and even hurt him to do some of them.
So far he is so detached I often forget that he was even involved in the crusade except occasionally to show up and chastise one of his sons.

I agree with you 100% on this. I really hate how the Emperor is written. Every one of his decisions is just so horrible I can't understand how he successfully led anything, let alone the resurgence of mankind. Not telling the Primarchs about the warp, putting Horus in charge of the Crusade despite knowing he would have a hell of a time and then going back to Terra. On top of that he didn't tell them what he was doing on Terra despite it being the future of humanity. Why not tell the Primarchs? Why keep that a secret? That probably would've smoothed things over with the Primarchs a lot.

"Hey, Horus is going to take over for a bit on the Crusade so I can go to Terra and set up the human Webway to protect our souls from the Warp. Oh yeah, bad things live in the Warp that are the biggest threat to mankind, did I forget to mention that?"

Oh man, his whole interaction with the Primarchs is ridiculous. I actually think that the bargain he struck with the pantheon was that he would gain the power to create the Primarchs, in return for most of his higher brain function. I mean so many problems could have been avoided with a single line of dialogue:

Hey Magnus, I know you love magic but don't go making bargains with Warp powers because they will screw you over. Also I plan on creating a Galaxy with no Psykers so don't encourage them, but also don't feel left out because I'll need you to help power the webway gate at some point in the near future.

Day one of Meeting Lorgar: Hey Son, uhm so I know you love religion but I want a galaxy with no religion because it's possible that you might end up worshipping Chaos gods that will enslave all of humanity. You can think of me as a God if you like but really please, I'm super serious, don't build churches or start a religion.

Curze. Hi Konrad, okay you are severely messed up by your upbringing. I do need a certain level of savagery but you are going too far. Please hang out with Vulkan for a little while so we can see if you are capable of empathy before we let you go off on your own.

Angron: Pfft that little army of High Riders? Sure I'll blow them up from Orbit and save your rebellion. Now come join with me, oh wait, I better remove those nails first. I could leave it to your legion to try but they probably won't be as skilled as the guy who literally invented your brain, so I better look at that myself.

Perurabo. Hey Perty! Good job, here's a cookie and a pat on the head.

Fulgrim "Don't pick up talking swords you jackass" (To be fair this is one of the only Primarchs who can't be blamed on the Emperor, Fulgrim brought his ruin on himself)

Horus (You covered in your post)

Russ: Bring Magnus back to Terra. Like seriously, we need to punish him but DO NOT kill him. I mean it. He did a bad bad thing. But he is literally the only other person in the Galaxy right now, who could come sit on the Golden Throne to keep his mess closed while I go deal with Horus. Literally anyone else will burn out in a matter of minutes. Do not deviate from this mission no matter who tells you otherwise. Especially not Horus because Magnus literally just told me that he's a traitor. I mean Magnus is totally probably a lying Witch, but just in case, don't talk to any other Primarchs.

Hit the nail on the head with those.

Just to add a point that everyone has overlooked to the discussion about the rune priest controversy.
The wolves never actually had a librarius, the rune priests existed long before the librarius was ever established amongst the legions, therefore the rune priests were never seen as librarians by anyone, they were seen as shamans as were the wolf and iron priests. The reason the wolves continued to use rune priests after nikea was simply because nikea was to censure the librarius within the legions, the space wolves had no librarius so were not censured ergo the rune priests were able to continue their practices.
As for the space wolves supposedly channeling from Fenris, it is possible that Fenris somehow acts as some sort of lodestone when channelling the warp thus giving the illusion that Fenris is where they channel their powers from. In the book the damnation of pythos there is an obelisk on the world of pythos that acts as a conduit for the warp (which is what draws the attention iron hands' ship's astropaths) it is possible that Fenris does something similar to this causing the illusion.