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A lot of people seem irritated about the "murderfang" model for space wolves, complaining that calling it "murderfang" is silly, having "murderclaws" is silly, and any rule dealing with it using the word "murder" is also silly.

Really though....who cares? And what would YOU call it? It gets the point across. It murders. It doesn't hug and snuggle and prance. It murders. And those claws? They murder. Would you rather they just be called claws? Anyone have a problem with the ork saws being called Killsaws? Did you have a problem with Comedy Central's Robot Wars show calling its obstacles Killsaws? It's what they DO.

I mean what about a tank? It's covered in tank armor. It has a tank commander. It has a anti-tank cannon that fires anti-tank shells, and the tank commander wears a tank commander uniform, with tank commander epaulettes and a tank commander hat. What's wrong with naming something for what it does?

Leave GW alone. Coming up with like 200 different names for weapons that do different things, instead of having "anti-armor missile" and "anti-infantry missile" and "50mm gun" and "20 mm gun" and making everything incredibly boring, be glad there's so much variety.

I understand your general point that people give GW a hard time unnecessarily, but the murderfang situation is easy. If they pulled out a thesaurus all their issues would be solved. How about this: The Murder Fang- He suffers from bloodlust and is armed with slaying claws.

The magic alien ice claws are where I drew the line.

The rest of it I can deal with.

I'd call him Dandy Stan the Murder Man. His weapons would be called the Stabbing Fist of Slashing and the Slashing Fist of Stabbing. SFoS (L) would have an underslung belt fed orphan maker while the SFoS (R) would have an underslung promethium powered climate controller.

In all seriousness you can't compare it to the tank thing. Tank is a class of vehicle. Tank Commanders command a class of vehicle. Anti-tank weapons are made to handle a class of vehicle. It's not a name given to describe it colorful terms. Murderclaw is the proper noun for a specific weapon.

Removed by insaniak. Please do not spam the forum with image memes.

 Spellbound wrote:
Really though....who cares?

Uh... the people complaining about it, presumably...

Would you rather they just be called claws?

...because the only possible alternative to calling them 'murderclaws' is to just call them 'claws'...?

Anyone have a problem with the ork saws being called Killsaws?

Orks get a certain amount of leeway for silly naming conventions on account of being orks.

'Killsaws' isn't one of my favourites, though.

What's wrong with naming something for what it does?

There is nothing inherently wrong with naming something for what it does. Being what something does though doesn't inherently stop a name from sounding silly.

...be glad there's so much variety.

Slapping the same adjective on the front of a bunch of different things is not exactly what I would call 'variety'... but to each his own, I guess.

 Spellbound wrote:


A lot of people seem irritated about the "murderfang" model for space wolves, complaining that calling it "murderfang" is silly, having "murderclaws" is silly, and any rule dealing with it using the word "murder" is also silly.

Really though....who cares? And what would YOU call it? It gets the point across. It murders. It doesn't hug and snuggle and prance. It murders. And those claws? They murder. Would you rather they just be called claws? Anyone have a problem with the ork saws being called Killsaws? Did you have a problem with Comedy Central's Robot Wars show calling its obstacles Killsaws? It's what they DO.

Who cares? Everyone who is unceremoniously dumped out of their suspension of disbelief when such an appallingly lazy naming convention from a team of professional creatives comes up during a game?

I mean what about a tank? It's covered in tank armor. It has a tank commander. It has a anti-tank cannon that fires anti-tank shells, and the tank commander wears a tank commander uniform, with tank commander epaulettes and a tank commander hat. What's wrong with naming something for what it does?

Sherman, Abrahms, Challenger, Centurion, Leopard, Tiger.

These are all names of tanks, not what they are.

You will not find a Challenger Tank, firing upon the enemy with it's Challenger Gun, while repelling attacks with it's Challenger Armour, utilising it's revolutionary Challenger Radar to locate the next target.

Leave GW alone. Coming up with like 200 different names for weapons that do different things, instead of having "anti-armor missile" and "anti-infantry missile" and "50mm gun" and "20 mm gun" and making everything incredibly boring, be glad there's so much variety.

This is so blatantly ridiculous, this is as much comment as it needs.

it doesn't help that murderfang is in the space wolves codex, a codex particlarly notable for some of it's more.... simple nomeclature, of having wolf lords on thunderwolves with wolf claws.

In all seriousness, how is Muderfang supposed to be taken seriously. Those two words just don't go together. I know he's a psychotic and unstable shank happy killing machine (half is literally) but the name for a forgotten soldier just doesn't fit that they name him like a pet. I feel like this could have been a serious and inspiring unit that tells the tale of a soldier forced into an eternal struggle until he own body and mind warp to the point where he exists only to wage war. His fight has left him unrecognized by even his brothers in battle and all but forgotten. Instead we get a walking punch line.

There are plenty of things that could have been done with this. For example finding an inscription on his hull, finding some date or first sighting as his name, or even just something like "unknown" or "unspoken" would be fine with me.

For the murderlust change the name of the rule to something more toned down. He's a warrior encased in a weapon and knows only violence, call it "endless battle" or something to fit the tone.

Muderclaws are just silly. Wolves don't use claws as weapons. They don't even really need to be called out as named special weapons, but if they insist on giving them a name they need to pick something that fits without being bad comedy. Just call them the Hands of War or something. "Claw" just gets tossed around too much and "Murder" getting tossed around with the guy just makes it worse.

I can see the op's point in this specific instance, but I wouldnt go so far as to defend all of gw's naming practices. There's far too many Blood whatevers in the blood angel dex, it does get a little repetitive. It doesnt really bother me though, it does clearly bother some people.

It would be like saying a firewarrior has a firegun and firearmour, and is aided in its shooting by firelights. That sounds just as silly. No, actually, it sounds less silly.

I feel names like that push this game further and further into a more childish themed game. It seems to get worse and worse.

It simply lacks thought (common theme with GW eh? ) when there are thousands of name options out there to use. Instead they chose the most basic and straightforward name available.

I mean, its no different than Killing Claws, or attack Claws and so on. But I mean, they dont even murder... They can murder, but I doubt its their purpose.

I have a strong feeling that the removed meme was the "Leave Britney alone!" girl. Fitting.

Really, I can't take that character serious. 3x murder in one character? Come on. I smell Ward.

Mjölnir. There.

Mainly because "Murderfang" makes me think of this guy:



... and while I love Metalocalypse, and Dethklok...

They are silly. They are meant to be silly. They are a silly thing poking fun at a thing that the creator both loves and also thinks can be taken far too seriously sometimes.

Now, 40K *is*, at times, very silly. And, yes, people can take it far too serious sometimes. However, it is the role of the fans of 40K to create humor and satire of it, not the creators of the game. "Murderclaws" as an in-setting being is... vastly stupid.

Mörfangen.

Bastardised Scandinavian for Murder Fang.

 Azreal13 wrote:
Mörfangen.

Bastardised Scandinavian for Murder Fang.

Why not? GW already uses bastardized Latin.

That took literally two minutes thought and 30 seconds with Google translate. It isn't possible to overstate how lazy the whole Murderfang issue is.

The main problems with Murderfang (murdermurdermurder) is that not only are all the naming conventions stupidly derivitive, but the character itself is something that the Space Wolves I used to love would have completely destroyed for being an agent of Chaos, or put down as a fallen brother.

Even the Wolfen used to be a concession by a special-case of a force who did what they had to survive in the worst place in the Milky Way while they hunted an ancient enemy of Mankind who were the remnants of a force that nearly destroyed everything they were loyal to.

And even they would have seen Murderfang as an abomination, not a celebrated warrior who is kept in stasis between battles by shooting him with an ice-laser (c'mon, really...an ice gun??)

Suspension of disbelief. Thunder wolves. Big wolves, sounds like thunder when they ride. Shallow, but I get it.

Murderfang who satiates Murderlust with Murderclaws. Can someone passe a broom and pan to sweep up my shattered disbelief?

Its childish placating nonsense. Its not even clever or even told with an air of cheekiness. If it was a Khorne unit? Maybe. A loyalist unit? No.

The real problemis that basically the exact text cut and pasted into the Chaos codex for Murderfang would make a very cool and thematic Khorne Berzerker dread special character.

 AegisGrimm wrote:
The real problemis that basically the exact text cut and pasted into the Chaos codex for Murderfang would make a very cool and thematic Khorne Berzerker dread special character.

It'd be better than dinobots!

 AegisGrimm wrote:
The real problemis that basically the exact text cut and pasted into the Chaos codex for Murderfang would make a very cool and thematic Khorne Berzerker dread special character.

Chaos has precedence for silliness like this.

They have a Murder-class cruiser, for example.

Aww, people are just jealous.

CSM has the murder sword and SW have the murder fang. Everyone else is stuck with non-murder weapons.

Better hide that envy behind some other complaint.

I never understood the murdersword either. It's a sword. Swords have only ever had one purpose. Axes and Hammers have other purposes, hell even shovels have been used to murder. Murdershovel makes sense because it's not what it usually does.
(Note to self, model all power axes as power shovels)
But saying Murdersword just seems silly. Why couldn't they just call it the Ravenous Blade or something.

And who names these things. I just imagine the person that posts "first" on Youtube comments in the future as some marine that calls dibs on naming relics. I just imagine a bunch of disappointed marines in the back shaking their heads.

Marneus Calgar and his renamed wargear, the "Ultrafists".

Deathwing Masters should have access to "Darkblades".

Necrons already have a Necrodermis in their C'tan.

Black Templars can have a new unit called the Blackguard.

 AegisGrimm wrote:
Marneus Calgar and his renamed wargear, the "Ultrafists".

Deathwing Masters should have access to "Darkblades".

Necrons already have a Necrodermis in their C'tan.

Black Templars can have a new unit called the Blackguard.

All of those things actually sound better than murderfang.

It might be better if 'murder' wasn't such a wholly negative act. While there's plenty of killing in the 40k universe, the space marines should hold some standard of honour or nobility. They will kill in combat, but they don't generally murder people. Nobody ever got called a murderer as an honorific, there's nothing brave or noble about being labelled a murderer, so why would loyalist marines be so keen to do this to their own? Having 'murderlust' seems to imply that innocents aren't safe around him, which doesn't seem something many loyalist marine chapters would be openly proud of even if they did have a casual disregard for human life as some do.

It might be better if 'murder' wasn't such a wholly negative act. While there's plenty of killing in the 40k universe, the space marines should hold some standard of honour or nobility. They will kill in combat, but they don't generally murder people. Nobody ever got called a murderer as an honorific, there's nothing brave or noble about being labelled a murderer, so why would loyalist marines be so keen to do this to their own? Having 'murderlust' seems to imply that innocents aren't safe around him, which doesn't seem something many loyalist marine chapters would be openly proud of even if they did have a casual disregard for human life as some do.

What? You mean especially for a Chapter known for their closeness to the humans that fight alongside them and general regard for human life- so much so that they will risk Inquisitorial wrath??

Well they apparently use teleporters now. Makes sense that they'd have Santa Clause and the "last Dred you'd want around children" would be in the same army.