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Bad choice for executioner? I quite enjoy the little quips from first captains about how the Night Hunters and World Eaters were unfit to be the executioner of the Emperor but I don't see how the Wolves are much better. The Wolves do fight wars that don't need to be fought. "Wolf at the Door" and Prospero show this pretty well, as well as their conduct post heresy. The problem with them is their barbarians serving Rome, and historically the Barbarians eventually sacked Rome. The main problem with the Wolves is that though their loyal to the Emperor their not loyal to the Imperium, they follow a man, not his ideals. They strike me as the opposite of the Night Lords who despite not following the Emperor and seeing him as a hypocrite follow his and the Imperium's ideals well into the 41st mill. Their problem might be the same problem as the Sons of Horus or the Word Bearers, they were to loyal, to true and that made the hypocrisy which always exist in any government be it a monarchy, democracy, or dictatorship sting far more. That ideal being that humanity must be dragged to water and forced to drink in order to survive.

I think what the Emperor really saw in them was lack of attachment. They didn't have much loyalty to the Imperium, only to the man in charge, and didn't care to much for their brothers in arms, because of that detachment they woud'nt have any guilt trips about killing other legions. In the long term it seems like an unwise choice.

Night Lords seem like the best choice

The Wolves were the best choice.

an executioner needs to be loyal...

Well, I'm pretty sure they didn't have a claim on that role exclusively. The Emperor is one to use whatever tool is most handy at the time.

For example, consider the following tidbits: Guilliman flat out states that the other two Primarchs were sanctioned, there are rumors that some of the survivors of the fallen Legions were incorporated into the Ultramarines, Guilliman argues with the Space Wolf delegation that both Legions serve as they are called upon, and the Ultramarines were chosen to discipline Monarchia. Granted, it could be that it fell to Russ to actually swing the headman's axe, which is why he is so emo and fatalistic about his role in the Imperium.

But yes, Space Wolves just do whatever the hell they want, damn the consequences, and feel no regrets. Admirable in one way... stupid in another.

Iirc, it's heavily implied in one of the BL books that the Wolves were responsible for destroying at least one of the missing legions.

The leader of ''the barbarians who sacked Rome'' was a Roman General.

I think the Wolves were the best choice for executioner as they were the legion called upon when the Emperor wanted an enemy dead.

The Night Lords were for when He wanted an enemy brought back into line but not wiped out.

The Night of the Wolf was on Russ's back sure, but it wasn't about wiping out the World Eaters, it was about trying to make Angron see where he is going wrong. If the Wolves had wanted to finish the World Eaters off, i'm pretty sure that they would have been capable of doing it.

Prospero on the other hand was a case of them executing their orders, the orders however had not come from the Emperor, but Horus, and they were unaware that he had turned traitor. They had no reason to suspect this at the time and as far as they were concerned were acting out the Emperors Command.

The Space Wolves were the best choice because they would follow orders and rein themselves in if required to, whereas the Night Lords and World Eaters could not be controlled in the same manner.

I think the Wolves were the best option. They are brutal and cunning, and they are utterly loyal, not to the Imperium (at all) but to the Emperor.

Only Rogal Dorn (and Horus, of course) would be as loyal in the eyes of the Emperor, and he specializes in defense.

As some have mentioned, they are more well trained hounds than wolves.

 Pilau Rice wrote:
The Night of the Wolf was on Russ's back sure, but it wasn't about wiping out the World Eaters, it was about trying to make Angron see where he is going wrong. If the Wolves had wanted to finish the World Eaters off, i'm pretty sure that they would have been capable of doing it.

I am pretty sure if that battle continued, the Wolves would have been slaughtered to a man actually.

"All right, so here's what you're gonna do guys: While Angron is busy beating the gak out of me, I want you all to surround him in the middle of this fight, thus allowing the World Eaters (A far more numerous Legion I am sure you know) to surround all of us. Then, we all kill Angron. Then, the World Eaters, outnumbering us several times over, will proceed to hold us in this position until they kill us all. My tactical acuity can not be denied."

As written, the Night of the Wolf was one of the single most idiotic battles I've ever read. In his hamfisted attempt to make Leman Russ look good, ADB just made him look like an idiot.

Anyway, the Space Wolves were probably not "chosen" to be the Emperor's executioners. More and more fluff indicates that the role is one they took upon themselves. The Night of the Wolf indicates that Russ reprimanded Angron without the Emperor's consent, for example, and apparently Unremembered Empire furthers the notion that the role is one they chose.

I think the Wolves were the best choice because:

- Loyalty to the man first meant if asked to bring another Legion to hell, they would without "Brotherly feelings" messing with the mission.

- Being executioners does not mean being butchers.

- If the Emperor yanks the chain and tells the Wolves to stop,tey stop period. The World Eaters are a tad more complicated to stop once they get started.

The key to being a great Executioner is to be capable of an incredible amount of violence combined with an uncompromising level of self control and unswerving loyalty. In other words your executioner should be willing to utterly destroy anyone or thing they are directed against without remorse but also be able to switch that violence off as soon as the command is given.

Neither the Night Lords nor the World Eaters have that level of self control. Whereas the Wolves obviously do.

Consider this: It's minutes before an attack is to be launched and the Emperor calls and says "Stop. I changed my mind." What would each Legion do? The Wolves would immediately stand down; even if it meant taking some losses. On the other hand, Angron would kill the Astropath and later claim he didn't receive the message. The Night Lords... well, it's kind off up in the air as to whether they would have been at the right planet to begin with. They might have simply ignored the first call to battle because they were busy elsewhere.

 Void__Dragon wrote:

 Pilau Rice wrote:
The Night of the Wolf was on Russ's back sure, but it wasn't about wiping out the World Eaters, it was about trying to make Angron see where he is going wrong. If the Wolves had wanted to finish the World Eaters off, i'm pretty sure that they would have been capable of doing it.

I am pretty sure if that battle continued, the Wolves would have been slaughtered to a man actually.

"All right, so here's what you're gonna do guys: While Angron is busy beating the gak out of me, I want you all to surround him in the middle of this fight, thus allowing the World Eaters (A far more numerous Legion I am sure you know) to surround all of us. Then, we all kill Angron. Then, the World Eaters, outnumbering us several times over, will proceed to hold us in this position until they kill us all. My tactical acuity can not be denied."

As written, the Night of the Wolf was one of the single most idiotic battles I've ever read. In his hamfisted attempt to make Leman Russ look good, ADB just made him look like an idiot.

But it is hard to make some one like Russ look good at all, so even him looking like an idiot is better than normal.

It is possible that the Space Wolves went in without the intention of a full out assault as Russ wanted to teach Angron some self help. It wouldn't have worked, even though it didn't anyway, if the Wolves had gone in guns blazing from the off. Even if Angron had been slain, I don't think the World Eaters would have noticed, it seems to a the theme of the book that the World Eaters don't really need or care about him.

 Void__Dragon wrote:
Anyway, the Space Wolves were probably not "chosen" to be the Emperor's executioners. More and more fluff indicates that the role is one they took upon themselves. The Night of the Wolf indicates that Russ reprimanded Angron without the Emperor's consent, for example, and apparently Unremembered Empire furthers the notion that the role is one they chose.

I wholeheartedly agree, but for the sake of this thread I was giving Russ a break for once, my own opinion is that the whole rank was imagined by Russ and it's his over inflated ego and bluster shining through.

Should've been Ultramarines, numerical superiority, high recruitment rate and willingness the follow orders makes them good for it.

I'm pretty sure the Vlka Fenryka were the best choice.

Kharn says it the best, IMO:



Lucarikx

well it appears that the job in the 41st millenium has been passed to the Minotaurs, a chapter loyal to the High Lords of Terra.

ADB wrote a great version of what Lucarikx posted from the Night Lords perspective (Sevatar in particular) on why they could never be the executioners either.

 Lucarikx wrote:
I'm pretty sure the Vlka Fenryka were the best choice.

Kharn says it the best, IMO:



Lucarikx

That's not correct, it's from the unreleased treaties on the 18 legions, why did you change the last bit?

I didn't change it, I just found it on ADB's blog

Lucarikx

 rohansoldier wrote:
I think the Wolves were the best choice for executioner as they were the legion called upon when the Emperor wanted an enemy dead.

The Night Lords were for when He wanted an enemy brought back into line but not wiped out.

That makes no sense. Night Lords are sadistic murderers. The whole argument for Wolves over Night Lords or World Eaters, is that the Wolves can be called back to heel like the loyal hounds they are. Russ did.overstep himself on Prospero, but he was goaded by that traitor Horus and that idiot Valdor.

The Wolves, being the second smallest Legion, aren't capable of destroying another Legion by themselves. Look at how much help they had against the only smaller Legion and they still almost got facerolled. They are chosen because they will follow any order, no matter how horrible, and they have no compulsions against attacking their brothers.

Yeah, they are sadistic murderers. They are sadists.

The Sons of Horus are famous for not finishing their campaigns. They often beat their enemies into submission, then let other legions clean up after them. They certainly did not wipe out populations when they were done "winning."

Every other Legion but the Space Wolves were the same way. The Word Bearers would pacify and convert the enemy to their ideology, the Iron Warriors would say that they had built a fort and the enemy would never take the fort, so it is a victory, and the Ultramarines would say that they have used combined arms and taken the favorable ground and have more bolt rounds than the enemy have shurikens, so mathematically they have won and it would be inefficient to cause more collateral damage than actually fighting. None of those things are an execution.

Even the Night Lords, your sadistic murderers, are way too busy doing other things to count as executioners. They win by sadism, they murder seven thousand enemy individuals in gruesome ways with complete impunity, and the rest of the the enemy are too worried about how it happened and how to cover themselves to do anything threatening like take Imperial worlds or build an army or develop weapons. That is how they win, and that is not an execution because the enemy still exist, they are just defeated.

The World Eaters too have nothing to do with execution. They are gladiators whose obsession is combat, and if they kill all of their enemy they cannot be in combat anymore. They were always Khornate, whether they called it that or not. If everyone is dead, the blood stops flowing. However, if the enemy are in a pitched battle, a meat grinder to see which side can kill more of the other, they have given up on any other goal. See "kill ratios" in real world conflicts, which are sometimes inversely related to which side actually wins in the end.

Only the Space Wolves, instead of worrying about what the enemy believe, or how many fortresses they hold, or how good their intelligence is, win wars by throwing blood claws at an enemy to punch them until the war is over because they are out of people to fight.

It is real easy and it is real dense to think it has anything to do with how powerful a legion is or how skilled its marines are.

You're not making any sense. How is Wolves throwing guys into the meat-grinder until the other side gives up any different from the methodology of the World Eaters or Iron Warriors or almost any other Legion?

They are "executioners" because they like to think they are special (we serve more and further than any other!), and because they like to pick fights with allies anyway (see Russ's track record, or the Space Wolves chapter in 40K). Russ is a dog, literally, according to the books he has dog DNA, so he's the loyal pitbull. He'll bite who you tell him to bite, and let go when you command it.

 Pilau Rice wrote:
But it is hard to make some one like Russ look good at all, so even him looking like an idiot is better than normal.

But it was a hamfisted attempt to make him look good. ADB outright stated in a blog or some gak that the Wolves "won" the battle, despite that clearly not being the case, as written.

It is possible that the Space Wolves went in without the intention of a full out assault as Russ wanted to teach Angron some self help. It wouldn't have worked, even though it didn't anyway, if the Wolves had gone in guns blazing from the off. Even if Angron had been slain, I don't think the World Eaters would have noticed, it seems to a the theme of the book that the World Eaters don't really need or care about him.

The World Eaters wouldn't have given a feth if Angron died. That is why Russ' "strategy" was idiotic. Angron would have died, World Eater morale would not have lessened, and the World Eaters surrounding his smaller army would have butchered them to a man. What ADB/Lorgar call "seizing an objective" I call "denying yourself any means of retreat". And no, the Space Wolves still having their Primarch would have meant nothing as ADB wrote it, because the passage established that, apparently, some Space Wolves firing their bolters at Angron would have been enough to kill him. Sure ADB, whatever you say, lol.

The problem with the scene is that it failed to adequately convey what ADB intended/thought was obvious.

I wholeheartedly agree, but for the sake of this thread I was giving Russ a break for once, my own opinion is that the whole rank was imagined by Russ and it's his over inflated ego and bluster shining through.

*Shrugs*

IMHO he probably is one of the better choices for the role, but that is neither here nor there.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Omegus wrote:

That makes no sense. Night Lords are sadistic murderers. The whole argument for Wolves over Night Lords or World Eaters, is that the Wolves can be called back to heel like the loyal hounds they are. Russ did.overstep himself on Prospero, but he was goaded by that traitor Horus and that idiot Valdor.

The Wolves, being the second smallest Legion, aren't capable of destroying another Legion by themselves. Look at how much help they had against the only smaller Legion and they still almost got facerolled. They are chosen because they will follow any order, no matter how horrible, and they have no compulsions against attacking their brothers.

To be fair, the Thousand Sons are pound for pound the strongest Legion. This point is not even debatable. Captains of their Legions were killing elite Custodians sent to accompany Valdor himself in numbers with single attacks, and were almost bored with how easy it was, thinking the reputation of the Custodians should have preceded a better challenge. Phosis T'kar's kine shields can withstand the salvo of an immense Eldar Titan. The Thousand Sons' sorcery made them far more powerful individually than any other Legion's Marines, with Ahriman likely being the single most powerful Legionary period, with the possible (Probable?) exception of Kor Phaeron.

 Void__Dragon wrote:

 Pilau Rice wrote:
But it is hard to make some one like Russ look good at all, so even him looking like an idiot is better than normal.

But it was a hamfisted attempt to make him look good. ADB outright stated in a blog or some gak that the Wolves "won" the battle, despite that clearly not being the case, as written.

It is possible that the Space Wolves went in without the intention of a full out assault as Russ wanted to teach Angron some self help. It wouldn't have worked, even though it didn't anyway, if the Wolves had gone in guns blazing from the off. Even if Angron had been slain, I don't think the World Eaters would have noticed, it seems to a the theme of the book that the World Eaters don't really need or care about him.

The World Eaters wouldn't have given a feth if Angron died. That is why Russ' "strategy" was idiotic. Angron would have died, World Eater morale would not have lessened, and the World Eaters surrounding his smaller army would have butchered them to a man. What ADB/Lorgar call "seizing an objective" I call "denying yourself any means of retreat". And no, the Space Wolves still having their Primarch would have meant nothing as ADB wrote it, because the passage established that, apparently, some Space Wolves firing their bolters at Angron would have been enough to kill him. Sure ADB, whatever you say, lol.

The problem with the scene is that it failed to adequately convey what ADB intended/thought was obvious.

Yep, we know that losing Angron wouldn't have made a difference as ADB kinda makes that clear throughout, why didn't he pick up on that when trying to write the scene. His intention failed to hit the mark, heck, why even bother writing the scene at all? Did it really need to be done, wasn't the fact that the World Eaters had been sanctioned by the Emperor enough?

 Void__Dragon wrote:
IMHO he probably is one of the better choices for the role, but that is neither here nor there.

Certainly, it's what Russ is, a loyal attack dog who is able to come to heel when required. He's not dumb, he has brains, he's just got an over inflated opinion of himself and where he sits within the Imperium. It's like his role isn't enough so he has formulated this notion of the Emperors Executioner. At the end of the day it probably was the Emperors decision to mark Russ as this, but until I have that from the horses mouth, it's Russ being a braggart. I don't dislike Russ's character, what I don't like about him is what I like about him. If that makes sense.

Executioners need to be loyal first and foremost. Wolves are loyal to a fault.

I've really never liked the "Executioner" aspect of the SW's put forth on the HH books. It feels hamfisted, at odds with many of their other aspects, and contributes greatly to the current negative perception of their fluff, largely because they try to be too many (and often contradictory) things at once and come off looking goofy because of it.

Kaesoron wrote:
The main problem with the Wolves is that though their loyal to the Emperor their not loyal to the Imperium, they follow a man, not his ideals.

Lets be honest the Imperium is very far from following the man's ideals.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Pilau Rice wrote:
ourself any means of retreat". And no, the Space Wolves still having their Primarch would have meant nothing as ADB wrote it, because the passage estab
Certainly, it's what Russ is, a loyal attack dog who is able to come to heel when required. He's not dumb, he has brains, he's just got an over inflated opinion of himself and where he sits within the Imperium. It's like his role isn't enough so he has formulated this notion of the Emperors Executioner. At the end of the day it probably was the Emperors decision to mark Russ as this, but until I have that from the horses mouth, it's Russ being a braggart. I don't dislike Russ's character, what I don't like about him is what I like about him. If that makes sense.

You like him as a character but not as a person?

 Vaktathi wrote:
I've really never liked the "Executioner" aspect of the SW's put forth on the HH books. It feels hamfisted, at odds with many of their other aspects, and contributes greatly to the current negative perception of their fluff, largely because they try to be too many (and often contradictory) things at once and come off looking goofy because of it.

That's because the Wolves are changing with the story. At first they are the "We do what needs to be no matter what" in Prospero Burns. Then in Scars Russ makes the declaration that he will only ever follow the Emperor, not a proxy like Horus. Then In Battle of the Fang we see them change again to losing some of their headlong charge at the enemy. And finally we see them take the role of "Self appointed protector of their allies, even against other allies if needs be. If it is the right thing to do". In the Emperor's Gift.

So you have to put into context what point in their changing idealogy you are looking at.

As far as saying that The Executioner title was self appointed. You have to remember that Malcador calls Russ that when talking to Dorn in Scars. Then in Unremembered Empire Guilliman says that the Wolves are well known as the "Sanction".

Guilliman then argues with the Wolves that they don't do anything particularly special to warrant fancy titles.