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I have been thinking if a case can be made for every one of the original 9 Traitor legions to represent a twisted version of a specific Loyalist Legion, in an "evil twin" sort of way. Here's what I've come up with:

Imperial Fists - Iron Warriors
This one is pretty obvious and probably the most relevant in-universe, as their one-sided rivalry with the IF was one of the key reasons why Perts sided with Horus.

Ultramarines - Black Legion
In both cases, the "generic" posterboy faction, whose legion/chapter leader is also the clostest to the supreme leader of their overall faction.

Salamanders - Death Guard
Endurant, (relatively) slow foot-sloggers and mid-range experts.with spread weaponry. Also the most friendly and jovial towards their serfs and allies outside of combat.

Blood Angels - World Eaters or Emperor's Children
While the World Eaters seem the more obvious choice at first, with them representing embracing your inner blood lust whereas the BA represent trying to tame it, a similar argument could be made for the EC in regards to the BA asthetic/artistic streak.

Iron Hands - Thousand Sons
Extra emphasis on having moved beyond flesh and bone, either through bionics or being a dust-filled tin bucket respectively. Both factions also put additional emphasis on a "mind over matter" philosophy - the IH by embracing cold, calculated logic, the TS by embracing arcane lore.

Raven Guard - Night Lords
Stealth Tactics, subterfuge, outflanking maneuvers, Jump Troops. In-universe, Corax was explicitedly afraid of becoming like Kurze if he didn't remain vigilant about his methods.

Dark Angels - Alpha Legion
While the aforementioned two are all about deception on the battle field, DA and AL arguably are the most secretive SM factions outside of battle, with a thousand in-universe question marks about their true motives/allegiances. Both their primarchs were hailed as Tactical Geniuses (tm) and the were leaders of the First and Last Legions respectively. Also, both armies are ranged-combat experts.

Undertermined:

Word Bearers
While their in-universe arch-enemy are the Ultramarines, the "crazy religious zealot" counterpart among the loyalists would be the Black Templars

Space Wolves
Perhaps due to being one of the most obviously Real Life historic culture-based chapters, the SW don't have a direct counterpart.There really isn't an "evil Viking" Legion among the Chaos Space Marines.
Their canonical arch-enemy are the Thousand Sons, but thematically they are virtually nothing alike.

White Scars
Same as with SW, Chaos doesn't have an "evil Mongol" or even "evil biker" CSM faction.

Thoughts?

Because the Word Bearers actions resemble the bloody Christian zeal of the Teutonic Order, I think you could say they are the Space Wolves' nemesis. And you could also say the White Scars are the Emperor's Children's nemesis, because both of them are in some way expression of the nobility of their respective homeworld.
But I think those comparison are always a little bit forced.

IF/IW are obvious, and I can see where you're going with RG/NL, and UM/BL, but its more game mechanics and 'stealth jump troops' for those pairs. The rest... complete stretch.

This just doesn't lend itself to mirror match (and it would be really boring if it did).

Voss wrote:
IF/IW are obvious, and I can see where you're going with RG/NL, and UM/BL, but its more game mechanics and 'stealth jump troops' for those pairs. The rest... complete stretch.

This just doesn't lend itself to mirror match (and it would be really boring if it did).

Agreed. I think you're picking up on a combination of explicit and intentional narrative things (IF vs IW, AL and DA are both deceptive, etc.) and the limited number of mechanical gimmicks in the game. It's actually probably a point in GW's favor that most of the legions don't have 1 for 1 comparisons. Like, AL and RG are both sneaky, but they're sneaky in different ways. RG and NL both use jump packers, but they feel very unique.

Iron fists vs emperors children as both legion sought perfection through any means including augmenting their bodies.

World eaters are only psycho cos the butchers nails and not by emperors design so shouldn’t be compared in that way. Unless the whole mirror theory is more about lazy writing than a subtle theme

Just to be clear: I am not suggesting that all 18 original legions are intentionally supposed to be mirrors of each other. Rather, I was thinking about wether or not a loose case could be made for them to be interpreted that way. You know, in a thought experiment sort of way.
Naturally, a stronger case can be made for some (I think we are all in universal agreement on IF vs IW, for example) than for others. I would also argue that RG and NL is backed-up by Corax explicitedly having in-universe worries about ending up like Kurze.
The question is, which legions could theoretically be paired without it becoming a complete stretch (like, Word Bearers are the Blood Angels counterpart because they both wear red armor or whatever), which is, of course, subjective.

 Esmer wrote:
Just to be clear: I am not suggesting that all 18 original legions are intentionally supposed to be mirrors of each other. Rather, I was thinking about wether or not a loose case could be made for them to be interpreted that way. You know, in a thought experiment sort of way.
Naturally, a stronger case can be made for some (I think we are all in universal agreement on IF vs IW, for example) than for others. I would also argue that RG and NL is backed-up by Corax explicitedly having in-universe worries about ending up like Kurze.
The question is, which legions could theoretically be paired without it becoming a complete stretch (like, Word Bearers are the Blood Angels counterpart because they both wear red armor or whatever), which is, of course, subjective.

Ah. Gotcha. In that case...
IW = IF because rivalry and siege tacics. Also plenty of paralells with IH.

WE = SW and BA. Both SW and BA have a "the beast within" theme, so the WE make natural foils to that. WE embrace the blood lust to the extreme where SW and BA have to channel/make peace with it.

AL = UM and DA. DA because they're easy to mess with. UM because Roboute strongly disapproves of Alpharius's methods, and because tweaking the nose of the straight-man is what tricksters do. Although tactically, they're a bit more Raven Guard-esque.

TS = SW for obvious reasons. Honorable mention to WS for opposing TS for similar reasons to those of the SW while also generally being more open-minded (and imho more interesting as a result).

BL = UM because poster boys, but you could also make a strong case for BA because of the whole killing Sanguinius thing.

EC = BA probably. Both are artistic, perfectionistic, and had very pretty primarchs. (Which drove/drives Fulgrim nuts.) The 30k novels make a kind of compelling case for WS here too though. WS are dedicated to their craft and seek constant improvement, but they're also okay with letting material things go and acknowledging their failings. Perfection vs perfection, but one side is willing to admit their imperfections.

DG = Eh... Maybe DA? DA had (has?) some pretty gnarly Wings that specialized in DG-esque tactics and weaponry. Barring that, the recent Roboute vs Mortarion stuff gives them a bit of a rivalry for now.

WB = UM just because of Calth and their history leading up to it. Maybe there's some room for Salamanders too? Salamanders are all about self-sufficiency where WB are big on accepting help from daemons?

NL = RG because jump packs. Maybe SW because "scary"?

I do think it's interesting in terms of the foils for Guilliman- Horus is a goks foil for him because he was so well-rounded, like Guilliman. Lorgar was a good foil to him because of the religiosity vs pragmatism angle. And Alpharius was a good foil for him because of the "we wrote the rule book" vs. "there are no rules" factor.

Personally I think that the Lion nakes a good thematic foil for Alpharius too.

Russ is a weird case because he was known for his extreme loyalty, even fighting his brothers on his father's orders, but in the present timeline of 40k the Space Wolves are the iconoclastic chapter who is constantly being dicked over by the Inquisition for not bending the knee. I wouldn't be surprised if they went into outright rebellion due to the natives of Fenris being genocided by the GKs, and that would be an interesting dilemma for Russ to return to.

Night Lords are the evil counterpart of the Blood Angels. Both have psychic primarchs with the gift/curse of prescience (and both foresaw their own deaths as a result of the Emperor's actions). Both favour fast, brutal assaults led by jump-pack troops. Both have heavy 'vampire' themes, though BA are more on the Anne Rice end of the fictional vampire spectrum, while NL are more on the Bram Stoker end. NL were originally (in the Rogue Trader era) a Khorne-worshipping legion with an even more obvious vampire aesthetic, but it's been toned down considerably since then - they're still pale, gaunt, cynical murderers who hate the divine, hunt in the dark and impale people. Konrad Kurze's philosophy of 'order and justice through uncompromising terror and brutality' is basically how the real Vlad the Impaler operated (he's still a national hero in Romania).

World Eaters were noted for assaults before the Nails. Angron had empathy abilities too- matched the Blood Angels better thst way.

Curze and Corax were mirrors, they made that explicit in the Horus Heresy.

I'd say it's SW and 1K Sons, as being antipsyker and propsyker, Ultramarines and Alpha Legion, innivation vs tradition and Dark Angels vs Sons of Horus, strategy/human insight vs tactics/human confusion. The black/green moves, the traitor elements being tracked down, special terminators, special bikers, etc.

Hecaton wrote:

Russ is a weird case because he was known for his extreme loyalty, even fighting his brothers on his father's orders, but in the present timeline of 40k the Space Wolves are the iconoclastic chapter who is constantly being dicked over by the Inquisition for not bending the knee. I wouldn't be surprised if they went into outright rebellion due to the natives of Fenris being genocided by the GKs, and that would be an interesting dilemma for Russ to return to.

Side tangent:
What even is the current state of Fenris? I thought Magnus's guys drained the seas into the warp and left the Space Wolves all but wiped out. At the time, it seemed like they were maybe building up to the return of the Russ, but I haven't heard anything about them in a while. Are they just... fine now? Seas restored, human Fenrisians carrying on as before, chapter maybe signfiicantly primarisifed now?

 Duskweaver wrote:
Night Lords are the evil counterpart of the Blood Angels. Both have psychic primarchs with the gift/curse of prescience (and both foresaw their own deaths as a result of the Emperor's actions). Both favour fast, brutal assaults led by jump-pack troops. Both have heavy 'vampire' themes, though BA are more on the Anne Rice end of the fictional vampire spectrum, while NL are more on the Bram Stoker end. NL were originally (in the Rogue Trader era) a Khorne-worshipping legion with an even more obvious vampire aesthetic, but it's been toned down considerably since then - they're still pale, gaunt, cynical murderers who hate the divine, hunt in the dark and impale people. Konrad Kurze's philosophy of 'order and justice through uncompromising terror and brutality' is basically how the real Vlad the Impaler operated (he's still a national hero in Romania).

This is how I've always seen it. Blood Angels are the romantic version: blonde, art, poetry, ashamed of their bloody tendencies. While Night Lords are the darker, more Vlad Tepes inspired side of the coin: Vicious, violent, nihilistic, godless. And loving, every, minute of it. No hiding their tendencies for them.

Ave Dominus Nox.

It's more correctly:

Ultramarines vs Word Bearers (remember Monarchia!)
Iron Hands vs Emperor's Children (strength vs perfection)
Salamanders vs Thousand Sons (different approaches to mysticism)
Imperial Fists vs Iron Warriors (seige! fortify!)
Blood Angels vs Night Lords (both raised in hell, one a demon, the other an angel)
Space Wolfs vs Word Eaters (controlled vs uncontrolled ferocity)
Dark Angels vs Sons of Horus (first vs favourite)
White Scars vs Death Guard (speed and precision vs creeping omnicide)
Raven Guard vs Alpha Legion (sneakiness type A vs sneakiness type B)

Nurglitch wrote:
It's more correctly:

Ultramarines vs Word Bearers (remember Monarchia!)
Iron Hands vs Emperor's Children (strength vs perfection)
Salamanders vs Thousand Sons (different approaches to mysticism)
Imperial Fists vs Iron Warriors (seige! fortify!)
Blood Angels vs Night Lords (both raised in hell, one a demon, the other an angel)
Space Wolfs vs Word Eaters (controlled vs uncontrolled ferocity)
Dark Angels vs Sons of Horus (first vs favourite)
White Scars vs Death Guard (speed and precision vs creeping omnicide)
Raven Guard vs Alpha Legion (sneakiness type A vs sneakiness type B)

I think this is closer to my view, the only one I'd really disagree with is Space Wolves, who must be vs 1KS.

I also applaud your use of the Sons of Horus, because as everyone knows the Black Legion are not an 'original traitor legion'.

The Iron Hands are the perfect antithesis to the Emperor's children since they worship emotionless strength and cold mechanization while the Emperor's Children revel in every possible sensation and the possibilities of the flesh.

I find Death Guard - Salamanders mirroring to be quite good.

Mortarion started liberating people on Barbarus from evil sorcerers and liberated them of all but one. Then when reunited with his legion, he at first sought to liberate oppressed humans from xenos, etc...

Vulkan on the other hand fought off Dark Eldar threatening his kin and upon being reunited with his legion, he fought to protect all of humanity at any cost with his legion.

Also the fact that both legions had a slow moving heavy infantry style doctrine with use of more exotic weaponry makes the comparison more apt.

Iron Hands and Thousand Sons seek perfection in their respective "schools of thought" One is completley about magic and the other machines.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
OP already said that, nvm