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So, frickin' everywhere in the first dozen Horus Heresy novels, you hear how unthinkable it is that Astartes would fight each other and how much so many characters are horrified by the idea or dismissive of the idea that it could happen (including Rogal Dorn, who nearly killed poor Nathaniel Garro even though that untrustworthy fink Fulgrim *TOLD* Dumbass Dorn about Curze's visions).

If the Space Wolves had killed off a Legion already, how was this so unthinkable? Did the deceased Legion refuse to fight?

Many different writers with a very similar but totally un-coordinated brief.

"drag this heresy thing out as long as you can"

It all varies legion to legion.

I imagine the more extreme posterboy legions like the Ultras or Imp Fists find the idea unspeakable, but some other loyal legions like Iron Hands and White Scars held honor duels (to the death) within their legions all the time.

Because early on in the series they didnt have some of the present things fleshed out as a concept, so when you go back things seem out of place.

There has been some back and forth on what that means, but the way I took that is that what the Wolves did was always an unpleasant rumor, not a hard fact. it wasn't until them burning the THousand sons that no one could deny they had murdered several legions.

 Nightlord1987 wrote:
It all varies legion to legion.

I imagine the more extreme posterboy legions like the Ultras or Imp Fists find the idea unspeakable, but some other loyal legions like Iron Hands and White Scars held honor duels (to the death) within their legions all the time.

Luna Wolves? Death Guard? Thousand Sons?


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 VictorVonTzeentch wrote:
Because early on in the series they didnt have some of the present things fleshed out as a concept, so when you go back things seem out of place.

The problem being you still hear that from Arhiman in the same book the Wolves first talk about doing this gak before, right?


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HoundsofDemos wrote:
There has been some back and forth on what that means, but the way I took that is that what the Wolves did was always an unpleasant rumor, not a hard fact. it wasn't until them burning the THousand sons that no one could deny they had murdered several legions.

It wouldn't have been a rumor to Dorn, who *knew* what happened to 2 and 11. That being said, Dorn is pretty stupid, so he might not have figured out that because it has already happened once or twice means that it could happen a third time.

2 and 11 weren't 'real' astartes, which is why it didn't count.

If the Space Wolves had killed off a Legion already, how was this so unthinkable? Did the deceased Legion refuse to fight?

Because this is not a fact. Not even close. There's more evidence against this viewpoint then for.

Honor duels are regarded as individual differences-very different to all-out war between the Legions.

Because all-out war between the Astartes is a very different thing from individual honour duels or a legion being destroyed as punishment.

Rumours of what happened place to the 2nd and 11th legions are numerous.

Haven't read the books but didn't the ultramarines experience a spike in their overall legion population at roughly the same time one of them went missing. Which hinted they and something to do with it. Albeit the most popular theory is the Space Wolves were responsible. Also the primarchs know at least something about their lost brothers and their legions, but it's never built upon.

 Baldeagle91 wrote:
Rumours of what happened place to the 2nd and 11th legions are numerous.

Haven't read the books but didn't the ultramarines experience a spike in their overall legion population at roughly the same time one of them went missing. Which hinted they and something to do with it. Albeit the most popular theory is the Space Wolves were responsible. Also the primarchs know at least something about their lost brothers and their legions, but it's never built upon.

The main theory I remember is that the 2 legions were killed by the Wolves but there were some survivors who got sent into the Ultramarines.

 Baldeagle91 wrote:

Haven't read the books but didn't the ultramarines experience a spike in their overall legion population at roughly the same time one of them went missing.

The author (Aaron Dembski-Bowden) confirmed that that was a baseless in-universe rumour thrown out by a bitter Word Bearer. The Ultramarines did not assimilate the missing Legions.

The idea that the Space Wolves singlehandedly took out one or two other Legions is bizarre as well. Sent to apprehend (not destroy) Magnus they brought Custodes and Sisters of Silence along with them. Why do people think the Space Wolves could destroy another Legion by themselves unless it was a significant smaller Legion?

The first rule of Space Marine club is you don't talk about II and XI...

The Space Wolves decided they were the executioners. Whether they did a lot to eliminate the two legions is anyone's guess.

SomeRandomEvilGuy wrote:

 Baldeagle91 wrote:

Haven't read the books but didn't the ultramarines experience a spike in their overall legion population at roughly the same time one of them went missing.

The author (Aaron Dembski-Bowden) confirmed that that was a baseless in-universe rumour thrown out by a bitter Word Bearer. The Ultramarines did not assimilate the missing Legions.

The idea that the Space Wolves singlehandedly took out one or two other Legions is bizarre as well. Sent to apprehend (not destroy) Magnus they brought Custodes and Sisters of Silence along with them. Why do people think the Space Wolves could destroy another Legion by themselves unless it was a significant smaller Legion?

I thought the Ultramarine assimilating the missing legions was a rumour that went back far earlier than the Horus Heresy being written into it's own book series? Plus the whole 'nothing is entirely false in terms of fluff' when it comes to GW thing? It is also hinted that the Emperor took part in the destruction of the two missing legions and I wouldn't be surprised if he used one of the others, aka Space Wolves. There's also a theory the entire legions didn't rebel at all, just the upper echelons + Primarch and with Magnus it's heavily hinted space wolves committed similar actions before. You also have hints of legionnaires being spread among other legions/chapters previously in the 40k fluff.

But then you have alternative theories such as gene seed failures being suggested seeing a possible reason Sanguinius never told the emperor about the red thirst was because he didn't want an empty plyth akin to the missing legions primarchs, due to gene seed instability. But even that would require some force to apprehend them.

Even then, whatever happened to the two missing legions, I bet it involved Astartes killing Astartes.

 EmpNortonII wrote:
So, frickin' everywhere in the first dozen Horus Heresy novels, you hear how unthinkable it is that Astartes would fight each other and how much so many characters are horrified by the idea or dismissive of the idea that it could happen (including Rogal Dorn, who nearly killed poor Nathaniel Garro even though that untrustworthy fink Fulgrim *TOLD* Dumbass Dorn about Curze's visions).

If the Space Wolves had killed off a Legion already, how was this so unthinkable? Did the deceased Legion refuse to fight?

Well here's the simple truth of it:

Nothing has come close to being confirmed as true when it comes to the reasons for and the circumstances surrounding the loss of the Two Missing Legions and their Primarchs. Ergo we have no concrete proof as to whether or not there was actually dull-on Astartes vs Astartes combat outside of things like Honour Duels and whatnot.

The numbers of the Ultramarines swelling the the wake of the "Loss" of one of these Legions, the destruction of at least one of the Missing Legions, and any other theory can be classified as one of two things:

(1) Propaganda within the Warhammer 40,000 Universe.

(2) Speculation made by us fans.


Therefore, the premise upon which you ask the question 'How is the though of Astartes fighting other Astartes so unthinkable?' is ultimately flawed because it's simply not fact.

I'm not saying it's necessarily false, but it has not been confirmed and thus still leaves the idea of Astartes fighting Astartes on a War-Scale as an abhorrent one.

SomeRandomEvilGuy wrote:
The idea that the Space Wolves singlehandedly took out one or two other Legions is bizarre as well. Sent to apprehend (not destroy) Magnus they brought Custodes and Sisters of Silence along with them. Why do people think the Space Wolves could destroy another Legion by themselves unless it was a significant smaller Legion?

Custodes were in part there also to give more authority. "This IS will of the Emperor". And SoS are blanks. Considerable advantage against such a psychic based legion as Thousand Sons. Unlikely other 2 were nearly as powerful in that area as TS so SoS wouldn't be needed.

Also never hurts to have more oomph with you anyway. Less own casualties.

tneva82 wrote:

SomeRandomEvilGuy wrote:
The idea that the Space Wolves singlehandedly took out one or two other Legions is bizarre as well. Sent to apprehend (not destroy) Magnus they brought Custodes and Sisters of Silence along with them. Why do people think the Space Wolves could destroy another Legion by themselves unless it was a significant smaller Legion?

Custodes were in part there also to give more authority. "This IS will of the Emperor". And SoS are blanks. Considerable advantage against such a psychic based legion as Thousand Sons. Unlikely other 2 were nearly as powerful in that area as TS so SoS wouldn't be needed.

Also never hurts to have more oomph with you anyway. Less own casualties.

If Magnus hadn't sent the fleet away, alerted the planet's defenses, and fought with his troops, the Wolves likely would have lost, despite the SoS and Custodes.

 Baldeagle91 wrote:

Haven't read the books but didn't the ultramarines experience a spike in their overall legion population at roughly the same time one of them went missing. Which hinted they and something to do with it. Albeit the most popular theory is the Space Wolves were responsible. Also the primarchs know at least something about their lost brothers and their legions, but it's never built upon.

That's just an unsubstantiated rumour. Praetorian of Dorn offers a different hint (minor spoilers for the books):

The UM were the largest legion because they had the largest pool of potential candidates, the most-efficient recruitment and training programs (because the UM are the "Efficiency Legion"... it is totally their thing) and the most-stable of geneseed.

That is all there is to it. The UM are good at what they do, and what they do is be masters of logistics, planning, and civil engineering.

Anything could have happened to 2 and 11. Hell could've happened the same as one of the chapters that the Crimson Fists wiped. A full chapter all depressed and without the will to fight. Ah good old Tzeench.

It was just unthinkable a thing like the heresy would even happen.

If the Wolves did execute the other two legions, it could have been done while the other two were understrength from conflicts, or were still building their numbers.

My favourite idea regarding one of the lost legions fits quite well with the general shock at astartes fighting actually.

One of the lost legions could have been a legion of biomancers (big part of the Emprah's psyche, but no legion representation). They experimented wildly on their marines, seeking to make the most efficient killer through genetic and biological engineering.

Near their end, their legionnaires were unrecognisable as human, let alone as an astartes.

When the Wolves were set loose upon them, it was only their leaders that knew the reality of who they were fighting. For the rest of the Wolves, and the Imperium at large, it was simply filed as a routine cleansing of a violent xeno race.

Those few neophytes captured that were not yet irrevocably changed were disseminated among the other legions (has anyone else wondered why Fabulous Bill is so completely different from the rest of the Emperor's Children?).

If the other legion disappeared (was lost), that would explain why it's such a shock to find astartes fighting astartes. As far as anyone apart from Russ and the Wolf Lords were concerned, it was the first time that ever happened.

Sorted!

Because they didn't! Legion II devolved into halflings and legion XI into Ogryn. The greatest cover up of all time...

Because the Emperor literally banned talking about it. Plus, its pne thing to clean outna legion by the Emperor's decree, but half the people you knew suddenly becoming your opponent in the largest civil war in human history?

 EmpNortonII wrote:
So, frickin' everywhere in the first dozen Horus Heresy novels, you hear how unthinkable it is that Astartes would fight each other and how much so many characters are horrified by the idea or dismissive of the idea that it could happen (including Rogal Dorn, who nearly killed poor Nathaniel Garro even though that untrustworthy fink Fulgrim *TOLD* Dumbass Dorn about Curze's visions).

If the Space Wolves had killed off a Legion already, how was this so unthinkable? Did the deceased Legion refuse to fight?

I think the idea of SM's killing each other, for any circumstance other than a direct order from the emperor, is unthinkable.