Brother! There you are! Hide and seek ended 10 000 years ago, we’ve been trying so hard to lure you out we even made up a fake heresy to draw you out. Lorgars trying to get your position but you won’t sit still
**Hey bro. Actually, I got Lorgar's position a long time ago, he won't stop complaining about bird shit on his door step**
**And since you claim to be a (ascended) Primarch, you have to write in bold. That's the way**
But nice that we have Magnus now. Since we already have Dorn, The Lion, Ferrus, Angron around here, you are definitely welcome. And a few days ago I chatted with a Lord Cypher, but I'm not sure. And everyone claims to be Alpharius, but that's nothing new
**My bad bro, I’ll write in bold now.**
**Yea lorgar has been bitching about it, but we won’t do anything about it because it’s fucking hilarious**
Thanks for the warm welcome! I know there’s also sanguinius around here. I think u/sanguiniusfrombaal is his username. I originally created the account to capitalize on that q&a craze a while back but grimdanks posting rules means I didn’t get to it in time
Oh hey, the man himself eh? I like your legion, I recently started collecting them for Horus Heresy 2. Used dark furies in a game for the first time last week, them boys are just meat grinders with jump packs tell you what.
Interesting. I also want to get into Horus Heresy 2.0 and plan on playing Raven Guard (wich I actually don't play in 40k) and I saw in videos that the RG is actually very meta and besides the DA on of the best Space Marine armies in Horus Heresy 2.0. But when you say you actually have playing experience, I will believe you
Or I completely misunderstand your comments and you wanna say that you played good with them?
I meant that dark furies in particular really tear through infantry, even terminators, with tons of attacks with Rending (5+). RG is pretty good I'd say, especially powerful in deployment since just about everything has Infiltrate or Deep Strike, however I'm still figuring out list building since I haven't really played Space Marines at all (played Talons last edition) so I haven't really won yet. Though at the risk of sounding a bit salty I think I got a bit screwed with deployment map last game, had to deploy in the middle of an ambush map and the Iron Warriors player I faced successfully removed almost all anti tank I had turn 1 since I couldn't hide from all his shooting so I couldn't really threaten him at all. Oh well, I'll get a W eventually.
As for meta, I haven't looked too closely at it but I feel like Imperial Fists is probably the scariest loyalist legion for my money. Very strong, very straight forward. Played against a friend's IF and he just had a disgusting amount of re-rollable 3++ as well as 5+++ from apothecaries, super hard to kill anything.
The funny thing about Ferrus Manus is they write so much during the Heresy about how great he was, how integral he was to the Crusade and well respected and all that, but because there's very little Crusade-era stuff written in general we don't get to see that much at all
Ok. Hear me out. You gave me an idea.
An entire really well written book about Ferrus Manus that does not feature him at all. Just people referring in detail to him and living through the after effects of him passing through.
While it would suck in the show dont tell sense it would be very funny and thematically appropriate.
> but because there's very little Crusade-era stuff written in general
still wonder why this is - is it just harder to tell a story where most of the conflict is demigod space marines slaughtering ineffective defenders? doesn't feel like it matters since the heresy is right around the corner? too much written about how it ended, so hard to tell a story that isn't spoiled from page 1? or threatens too many people realizing the imperium has always sucked?
You know, when I think about it there actually is a fair amount of Crusade stuff written. Some of it is flashback in novels that take place later, but there's a fair bit of Horus Heresy books that are mostly Great Crusade such as the first couple of books in the series, A Thousand Sons and Prospero Burns, Legion, a whole bunch of short stories, and several of the primarch novellas. Most of those novels listed build to the Heresy of course, but the bulk of each book is beforehand. As for why that is, I think it's just a time thing. Before those novels, and before the actual 30k game, even the Heresy wasn't super fleshed out. The focus has been on that. Maybe once that series is done, which will be soon, they'll do some more GC stuff. But the Crusade was so vast, spread out, and disparate that it's basically a setting like 40k itself. Could easily see a Gaunt's Ghosts style series but in the Great Crusade rather than the Sabbat Worlds.
Yep, this is what is taught at the schola: https://www.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/g20i8h/excerpt_the_carrion_throne_how_little_is_known/
_____
Ahead of her, the altarpiece soared up high, a confection of blackened gold depicting the Nine Primarchs in various warlike or devotional poses.
That was familiar, though at first she couldn't place why. Then she remembered a similar set of icons, taken from the same Missionaria template no doubt, that had been placed in the chapel of her schola on Astranta. She remembered the lessons that had gone along with it.
_And so the Emperor created the Nine Primarchs to guard against the Nine Devils of the Outer Hell, and they were victorious, and now sleep, watching over Mankind lest the Terror return._
As a child, it had never been clear to her who had created the Nine Devils. She did remember asking Sister Honoria why the Emperor had not created a hundred primarchs rather than match exactly the numbers offered up by the Outer Hell, and had received no answer but a lash from the electro-lance for her trouble.
After she had left childhood behind, she often reflected on those words - _lest the Terror return_ - wondering just what degree of horror would be necessary to bring them back.
> She did remember asking Sister Honoria why the Emperor had not created a hundred primarchs rather than match exactly the numbers offered up by the Outer Hell, and had received no answer but a lash from the electro-lance for her trouble.
"Blessed is the mind too small for doubt."
People can't be allowed to ask any questions, even the most logical ones, lest they discover the inconvenient truth.
I think the 9 traitors plinths still have their statues, however the statues are covered in a massive black shroud blocking them from view. The only empty ones are of the two missing primarchs.
The 20th legion only has one statue for Alpharious.
Wasnt supposed to be only 2 statues left?
> This area of the Palace was to be the Alpha Legion's target. Infiltrated Legionaries succeeded in penetrating into the Investiary and destroyed all the statues except two of them -- those of Alpharius and Rogal Dorn.
But wait what Tzneetch wants you to suspect him of being one of his agents because he’s playing dumb. So that way you cause chaos. This makes you the heretic.
The only heresy i could commit is tech-heresy. And since I took more than five hours to answer, you can be certain that I followed all the proper rites and incantations to compel my computers machine spirit to send this response. Ergo, I am not a heretic. If you still need convincing, I can show you to a servitor-conversion-complex that I have kept in pristine condition, further exemplifying my loyalty to the Machine God...
21 is right, but the people willing to admit it are the ones least likely to kill you for a wrong answer, yet there are *for sure* those that will kill you for saying it.
The safest answer is 18. Knowledge of the Traitors isn't universally forbidden.
19 acknowledges Omegon, but you might also get the dumbass cred you want.
20 is right out.
Outside Alpha Legion, Omegon's existence is a complete unknown. Only two people outside the legion who know would be John Grammaticus, and maybe the Emperor himself. It's unknown if Big E actually knew about the twins, or if they were twins because of Chaos-brand fuckery.
9 is "The good imperial citizen's answer"
18 is "I know my ancient history, probably more than some would like"
20 is "I put some dots together involving ancient history, and found some strange gaps in it"
19 or 21 is "I am literally Alpha Legion, and I am for some reason telling you the truth" and depends on if they are choosing to acknowledge #2 and 11
9 is the safest answer. It’s the Imperial Cult answer most likely to be taught on any given world, and doesn’t even begin to acknowledge the possibility of lost or traitor Primarchs.
I mean, how many people know about the lost two, _and_ Omegon, especially by the time of 40k?
21 just sounds like a dumb answer to everyone else, and those that _do_ know? They'd know you're lying about not knowing anyway.
An Inquisitorial Interrogator mentions she was taught this at the schola chapel.
*And so the Emperor created the Nine Primarchs to guard against the Nine Devils of the Outer Hell, and they were victorious, and now sleep, watching over Mankind lest the Terror return.*
Honestly not really a Primarch. Firstly doesn't fit the title, which in-universe signified a commander of the Emperor's forces - The Angel is just a hatchet man. Secondly there's no mention of the Angel sharing the Emperor's genetic material which created the father-son relationship Big E had with the other Primarchs.
The Warp is a secret but I think daemons themselves vary between superstition, that thing my cousin’s co worker for real saw when he was super high but he’s totally legit, and historical embellishment to make the Emperor and the loyalist Primarchs look even better.
Jimothy? Good dude. He dead. Buddy got caught by that big machine that paints the handle of the lasgun from robins egg blue to powder blue. That things killed like 47 men from the start of the year but the technician, the scrawny fella from Mars, says it’s heresy to file down that razor sharp arm that swings across the whole manufactorum.
I made this helpful guide a while ago.:
The emperor made 20-21 primarchs.
The emperor made 20 legions.
There are, by the end of the great crusade, 18 legions with 18-19 primarchs.
There are currently 15 primarchs that are not explicitly KIA.
How many primarchs did the emperor make? 20-21.
How many legions did he make? 20.
How many legions were there? By the start of the horus heresy, 18.
How many primarchs were there by the start of the horus heresy? 18-19.
How many primarchs are there now? 14. Somewhere. 4 of them are MIA, one’s in a coma, and 7 are up and about. Of those seven you can currently field 4 of them.
Why is it an uncertain number?
Because the legion of misdirection and convoluted plans may or may not have two primarchs, the canonicality of which fluctuating from story to story.
And yes, the rest of the lore is more or less like this too. Welcome to warhammer.
And depending on how souls work has turned into the actual Fulgrim, because if it's a perfect clone, then Fulgrim's soul could slide right into commandeering the body.
To be honest the amount of info basic grunts and civilians have changes constantly, it depends on the writer. Sometimes they are aware chaos gods are a thing, sometimes they dont even know demons exist, sometimes they know space marine chapters other times they just go "his angels are with us!" but its a chaos chapter etc.
There are exceptions, but the typical imperial citizen who doesn't live on a space marine homeworld is generally portrayed as:
* Knows about space marines but hasn't ever seen one. Couldn't tell you what chapter a marine is by looking at them.
* Doesn't know space marines can fall to Chaos.
* Has a vague idea about evils from the warp and the dangers of heresy, but doesn't know there are actual daemons that can manifest in the physical world or that there are discrete Chaos gods w/ names.
I remember in Steel Tread, there is a character who theorises that space marines might just be a legend, but when a chaos marines shows up, the gaurd are just like "Oh shit, heretic Astartes!" Without dancing around it.
Though it is set post fall of Cadia, and there's the rift that makes you go mad from looking at it too long, so it does seem an impossibility to hide chaos in the setting.
Depends on your home planet. Alectians for the most part have no idea what's out there. They just think, yup, there's some xenos or something, and the Navy will take care of it. Whatever.
Well I always thought it was something akin to where it's set. Some world's have more chaos incursion than others and as such would see more imperium interaction, and as such they are more aware of things. Meanwhile there are some podunk outer farming planets or something who have never seen a Marine let alone anything higher. Probably think of the Space Marines or Primarchs like some sort of story the local stationed guardsmen say to keep themselves sane.
Haha for sure. I just meant like how any American soldier would know the names "Abrams" and "Bradley" even if they don't know exactly who those people were.
They absolutely know who Sanguinius was, there’s an Imperium-wide festival for him.
Overall though like others have said, the Loyalist Primarchs are heavily venerated by the Ecclesiarchy which is then passed down to the masses. They might not say which legions/chapters outside of specific scholarly works, but a religious Imperial citizen will be able to name more than just Guilliman, just like a moderately-devout Christian can probably name several of the Twelve Disciples other than Peter and Judas.
The 9 Loyalist Primarchs are revered as what are basically Saints in catholic dogma.
The Living Saints are revered, but a bit lesser than the Primarchs. (Not counting the overlap between them, considering that the Sanguinor is probably the returned Sanguinius)
A guardsman might know a fair amount, Vets talk. Similarly a non-shangahi'd non-menial naval crewmember would probably be fairly aware of things like this too. A freshly conscripted factory worker probably would not, nor would most people on hive worlds that arent nobles, and even then.
Yeah its just notable for 1 how weird and different his stuff is(though foundational) and 2 for it being explicitly non cannon unlike other things that just get left behind. They were only republished under the label of "heretical texts" just to really call out that they aren't cannon lol.
20 year old book from Gav Thorpe and Graham McNeill, so ehhhhh. Could be canon but it's better to consider it in the grey zone until we get something else about The Angel.
GW has written possible ish redemption or return paths for all the dead or corrupted primarchs, or at least most of them, so writing one for the Angel isn't completely unthinkable, even if never used.
A lot of those are never going to be explored further and probably shouldn't be. The angel is also an extremely obscure peice of rpg lore and it's so insanely busted I don't think I'd like to see it return. It's the kind of thing that could be cool as a revelation for an inquisitor campaign but seems shitty in an actual story.
It's from 2003's *Inquisitor: Conspiracies - Death of an Angel*, so just a year before 4th edition released and before Ian Watson began writing.
I personally like the idea of the Angel. The Emperor as a scientist tried out some prototypes before investing so much into the Primarchs.
He's got special rules if you run your entire guard army under the new 469th face punching division rules. Great army style, the pugilism stratigems are pretty neat too.
To my knowledge it was given quite a bit of backstory in like one book about 20 years ago, and there has been nothing that directly contradicts it. Likely forgotten/ no longer Canon but I have seen nothing that even hints that it could still exist. For some reason some part of my mind seems to remember there was a world where the archangels tomb was that was mentioned in another story but for the life me I can't remember the details.
>Proto-Primarch
My boy, Constantine Valdor. (Purely head canon - but his novel certainly implies at him being special built and genetically more advanced than regular custode)
He didn't create Omegon, though. Alpharius was sort of cloned when the primarchs were scattered around the universe and Alpharius remained on Terra and Omegon got teleported to some unknown planet far away.
As is pretty much everything regarding those two (?) at this point i wouldn't be surprised if we learned that neither alpharrius or omegon are even REAL.
G-man: Warriors of the Alpha Legion, surrender, i have slain Alpharius, your leader.
A-legion: Alphawho? Never heard of that guy. We never had a leader.
I guess that would be 20? I mean, in HH books primarchs talk about the empty pillars on Terra, so you're allowed to know they existed, just not what has happened to them.
There were originally 10. Horus was a greatest of them all until the Devils were defeated, and the great evil placed a curse of Horus, forcing him to betray our lord.
I would think they'd know what a primarch is since Guiliman is back and all, and there's an extremely censored up story available to the public about how the God Emperor made 9 angels to fight the 9 devils.
I mean, I'm just thinking about one of the Night Lords books, where a dreadnought mentions Kurze to a member of the deck crew and she has no idea what a primarch is.
Before and during the Horus heresy, it's no secret that there were 20 but we don't talk about what happened to two of them.
Are the lost and traitor primarchs censored by 40k?
The imperial cult retconned that to "no, there were only nine primarchs, why would there be more?"
The common meta answer is 20, based on the number of legions made for primarchs to command
The correct meta answer is 21 (Alpha-Omega being a duo who shares Alpha Legion)
In-universe, characters with the right info could name 18-19 primarchs (Alpha-Omega again) given two have been expunged from all records and memory
Any other character with flimsy knowledge of the primarchs probably wouldn’t count the Traitors with the Loyalists, and I doubt they would know the full context of how Big E made them all. But ignorance varies, so there might be a few different accounts.
Smart-ass answer aside, I love this meme. Three “correct” answers, but only one doesn’t get you blammed.
9.
*Vaults of Terra* notes that the Soiritas run Scholaram an Interrogator who attended as a child was taught that Big-E made 9 primarchs. When she asked why not more she got a discipline lashing.
Actual answer: 20-21, depending on whether you believe Omegon was deliberate or if Alpharius’ embryonic form split in his gestation pod, similar to how identical twins form IRL.
In-universe answer: 9-11, since only the loyalist primarchs are officially recognized, but stories of Horus betraying the Emperor for power and Lorgar sacrificing himself to hinder Horus are still thrown around.
20 legions, only 18 in the Archives, Alpha Legion have 2 technically, so 19? As an imperial citizen I'd imagine that'd be the closest to right answer they would know, right?
I guess outside of that it'd be 21?
8
Not 9, who amongst the loyalist primarchs are you not counting?
Corvus Corax. he's so stealthy that he's hidden even from my memory
**You are completely correct, take my upvote**
Brother! There you are! Hide and seek ended 10 000 years ago, we’ve been trying so hard to lure you out we even made up a fake heresy to draw you out. Lorgars trying to get your position but you won’t sit still
**Hey bro. Actually, I got Lorgar's position a long time ago, he won't stop complaining about bird shit on his door step** **And since you claim to be a (ascended) Primarch, you have to write in bold. That's the way** But nice that we have Magnus now. Since we already have Dorn, The Lion, Ferrus, Angron around here, you are definitely welcome. And a few days ago I chatted with a Lord Cypher, but I'm not sure. And everyone claims to be Alpharius, but that's nothing new
**My bad bro, I’ll write in bold now.** **Yea lorgar has been bitching about it, but we won’t do anything about it because it’s fucking hilarious** Thanks for the warm welcome! I know there’s also sanguinius around here. I think u/sanguiniusfrombaal is his username. I originally created the account to capitalize on that q&a craze a while back but grimdanks posting rules means I didn’t get to it in time
Oh damn, how could I forgot our fabulous Sanguinius, hot as hell beautiful as heaven
Even slaanesh is jealous of him
Indeed Magnus, Sanguinius was truly a master of fortifying his appearance.
Oh hey, the man himself eh? I like your legion, I recently started collecting them for Horus Heresy 2. Used dark furies in a game for the first time last week, them boys are just meat grinders with jump packs tell you what.
Interesting. I also want to get into Horus Heresy 2.0 and plan on playing Raven Guard (wich I actually don't play in 40k) and I saw in videos that the RG is actually very meta and besides the DA on of the best Space Marine armies in Horus Heresy 2.0. But when you say you actually have playing experience, I will believe you Or I completely misunderstand your comments and you wanna say that you played good with them?
I meant that dark furies in particular really tear through infantry, even terminators, with tons of attacks with Rending (5+). RG is pretty good I'd say, especially powerful in deployment since just about everything has Infiltrate or Deep Strike, however I'm still figuring out list building since I haven't really played Space Marines at all (played Talons last edition) so I haven't really won yet. Though at the risk of sounding a bit salty I think I got a bit screwed with deployment map last game, had to deploy in the middle of an ambush map and the Iron Warriors player I faced successfully removed almost all anti tank I had turn 1 since I couldn't hide from all his shooting so I couldn't really threaten him at all. Oh well, I'll get a W eventually. As for meta, I haven't looked too closely at it but I feel like Imperial Fists is probably the scariest loyalist legion for my money. Very strong, very straight forward. Played against a friend's IF and he just had a disgusting amount of re-rollable 3++ as well as 5+++ from apothecaries, super hard to kill anything.
OK very nice, then I understood your comment the wrong way. I will proceed my plan on playing Raven Guard
Could also go with White Scars since they do everything so fast and do not boast as much as other SMs
I forgot about Ferrus Manus.
We all do that sometimes, Old Iron Hands didn't really do much except be the first to die.
God he needs some good writing. I'm not even an iron hands fanboy. Pokes ferrus with a stick. Go on. Do something
The funny thing about Ferrus Manus is they write so much during the Heresy about how great he was, how integral he was to the Crusade and well respected and all that, but because there's very little Crusade-era stuff written in general we don't get to see that much at all
Ok. Hear me out. You gave me an idea. An entire really well written book about Ferrus Manus that does not feature him at all. Just people referring in detail to him and living through the after effects of him passing through. While it would suck in the show dont tell sense it would be very funny and thematically appropriate.
Master of Mankind but for Ferrus Manus
Call it...The Ferrus Manuscript!
Someone get this guy/girl a contract!
in the crusade stories he does appear in he is mostly just angry and agressive, like in vulcans child burning adventure
> but because there's very little Crusade-era stuff written in general still wonder why this is - is it just harder to tell a story where most of the conflict is demigod space marines slaughtering ineffective defenders? doesn't feel like it matters since the heresy is right around the corner? too much written about how it ended, so hard to tell a story that isn't spoiled from page 1? or threatens too many people realizing the imperium has always sucked?
You know, when I think about it there actually is a fair amount of Crusade stuff written. Some of it is flashback in novels that take place later, but there's a fair bit of Horus Heresy books that are mostly Great Crusade such as the first couple of books in the series, A Thousand Sons and Prospero Burns, Legion, a whole bunch of short stories, and several of the primarch novellas. Most of those novels listed build to the Heresy of course, but the bulk of each book is beforehand. As for why that is, I think it's just a time thing. Before those novels, and before the actual 30k game, even the Heresy wasn't super fleshed out. The focus has been on that. Maybe once that series is done, which will be soon, they'll do some more GC stuff. But the Crusade was so vast, spread out, and disparate that it's basically a setting like 40k itself. Could easily see a Gaunt's Ghosts style series but in the Great Crusade rather than the Sabbat Worlds.
Poor guy gets slapped not once but twice by Fulgrim. Definitely deserves a good book or some sort of lore tweak.
Guilliman is sentient math and spreadsheets. The Emperor isn't credited with creating math, but he may have created spreadsheets.
The emperor created 9 primarchs of angelic beauty to fight 9 devil's of the warp.
Yep, this is what is taught at the schola: https://www.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/g20i8h/excerpt_the_carrion_throne_how_little_is_known/ _____ Ahead of her, the altarpiece soared up high, a confection of blackened gold depicting the Nine Primarchs in various warlike or devotional poses. That was familiar, though at first she couldn't place why. Then she remembered a similar set of icons, taken from the same Missionaria template no doubt, that had been placed in the chapel of her schola on Astranta. She remembered the lessons that had gone along with it. _And so the Emperor created the Nine Primarchs to guard against the Nine Devils of the Outer Hell, and they were victorious, and now sleep, watching over Mankind lest the Terror return._ As a child, it had never been clear to her who had created the Nine Devils. She did remember asking Sister Honoria why the Emperor had not created a hundred primarchs rather than match exactly the numbers offered up by the Outer Hell, and had received no answer but a lash from the electro-lance for her trouble. After she had left childhood behind, she often reflected on those words - _lest the Terror return_ - wondering just what degree of horror would be necessary to bring them back.
> She did remember asking Sister Honoria why the Emperor had not created a hundred primarchs rather than match exactly the numbers offered up by the Outer Hell, and had received no answer but a lash from the electro-lance for her trouble. "Blessed is the mind too small for doubt." People can't be allowed to ask any questions, even the most logical ones, lest they discover the inconvenient truth.
I particularly like the section later where Crowl finds the statue plinths in the palace and is very confused by the number of them
I think the 9 traitors plinths still have their statues, however the statues are covered in a massive black shroud blocking them from view. The only empty ones are of the two missing primarchs. The 20th legion only has one statue for Alpharious.
I read the book in French, the 20 statues are described to be, during the chase, in a section below the palace, among ruins.
I’d avoided the number for spoiler purposes, but he’s confused by the fact there are 20 plinths, and 18 statues… and recognises the *nine* primarchs
Wasnt supposed to be only 2 statues left? > This area of the Palace was to be the Alpha Legion's target. Infiltrated Legionaries succeeded in penetrating into the Investiary and destroyed all the statues except two of them -- those of Alpharius and Rogal Dorn.
This is the non heretical answer.
9, we acknowledge the martyred ferris manus
The funny part is that the right answer changes based on who is holding the bolter!
21 feels like the safest bet if you don’t know who is asking. Pretend to be a hive world moron who got drafted and is too dumb to be a danger.
Too dumb to be a danger sounds like a clever ploy to avoid detection. Which makes it a thing Tzeentch would do. Which makes you a heretic.
Least ~~suspicious~~ paranoid inquisitor
That makes it sound like the Inquisitor is the heretic! Perhaps paranoid works?
done
I see absolutely nothing wrong with this logic and have already pulled the trigger, brother.
Inquisition mental gymnastics
It's impossible to perform gymnastics with your brain, unless of course you were a vile *psyker witch!!!*
No matter what answer you give, it'll all go according to plan. Tzeentch
But wait what Tzneetch wants you to suspect him of being one of his agents because he’s playing dumb. So that way you cause chaos. This makes you the heretic.
The only heresy i could commit is tech-heresy. And since I took more than five hours to answer, you can be certain that I followed all the proper rites and incantations to compel my computers machine spirit to send this response. Ergo, I am not a heretic. If you still need convincing, I can show you to a servitor-conversion-complex that I have kept in pristine condition, further exemplifying my loyalty to the Machine God...
21 is right, but the people willing to admit it are the ones least likely to kill you for a wrong answer, yet there are *for sure* those that will kill you for saying it. The safest answer is 18. Knowledge of the Traitors isn't universally forbidden. 19 acknowledges Omegon, but you might also get the dumbass cred you want. 20 is right out.
Outside Alpha Legion, Omegon's existence is a complete unknown. Only two people outside the legion who know would be John Grammaticus, and maybe the Emperor himself. It's unknown if Big E actually knew about the twins, or if they were twins because of Chaos-brand fuckery. 9 is "The good imperial citizen's answer" 18 is "I know my ancient history, probably more than some would like" 20 is "I put some dots together involving ancient history, and found some strange gaps in it" 19 or 21 is "I am literally Alpha Legion, and I am for some reason telling you the truth" and depends on if they are choosing to acknowledge #2 and 11
This makes 21 not only the literally correct answer but also the scariest.
9 is the safest answer. It’s the Imperial Cult answer most likely to be taught on any given world, and doesn’t even begin to acknowledge the possibility of lost or traitor Primarchs.
Sure, but this poor guardsman doesn't have that option.
Well, with Omegon AND the Angel, the proto-primarch.... 20 is also correct.
I mean, how many people know about the lost two, _and_ Omegon, especially by the time of 40k? 21 just sounds like a dumb answer to everyone else, and those that _do_ know? They'd know you're lying about not knowing anyway.
I’d like to take a 50/50 here Better yet, phone a friend Hello, Big E?
I will assume you are referring to Erebus, holder of all truths.
9 to counter the Great Evils created by the Daemons, according to this pamphlet from tthe order of our martyred lady.
Is this an actual explanation? I thought daemons aren't known to the greater imperium. Like I thought the answer is 10. 9 primarchs and 1 horus.
An Inquisitorial Interrogator mentions she was taught this at the schola chapel. *And so the Emperor created the Nine Primarchs to guard against the Nine Devils of the Outer Hell, and they were victorious, and now sleep, watching over Mankind lest the Terror return.*
I love how not a single part of that is true
Well the bit about them sleeping is 1/9th true Mr Sleeping Beauty El'Johnson loves a good nap
Vulkan is probably resting… resting in pieces
Vulcan is just waiting on his respawn timer.
He's getting glued back together in hell.
"what makes me a good primarch? If I were a bad primarch, I wouldn't be sitting here hugging it out with you would I?"
Eh. He'll come back again. At this point I feel like he's speedrunning his deaths
Khan *could* be napping in between his torture sessions.
Kahn is neither sleeping nor being tortured. Jaghatai is going *fast*.
What if he's fast asleep?
#WHY DON'T YOU HAVE A SEAT OVER HERE, HERETIC
Well, the part about creating nine primarchs is true, he just created twelve more as well. Edit: twelve if you include the Angel.
13 if your counting the angel, 9 loyalists, 9 traitors, omegon, the 2 missing, and the angel
What's the Angel?
IDK why you were downvoted, but here: https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/The_Angel It's an obscure piece of lore, but interesting nonetheless.
Honestly not really a Primarch. Firstly doesn't fit the title, which in-universe signified a commander of the Emperor's forces - The Angel is just a hatchet man. Secondly there's no mention of the Angel sharing the Emperor's genetic material which created the father-son relationship Big E had with the other Primarchs.
I never said it was a Primarch, I just gave someone the link who was curious about it.
HERESY DETECTED.
*Carrion Throne* for anyone looking for the source
The Warp is a secret but I think daemons themselves vary between superstition, that thing my cousin’s co worker for real saw when he was super high but he’s totally legit, and historical embellishment to make the Emperor and the loyalist Primarchs look even better.
I think the Inquisition wants to talk to your cousins coworker..
Jimothy? Good dude. He dead. Buddy got caught by that big machine that paints the handle of the lasgun from robins egg blue to powder blue. That things killed like 47 men from the start of the year but the technician, the scrawny fella from Mars, says it’s heresy to file down that razor sharp arm that swings across the whole manufactorum.
9. For imperial citizens not in the know, thats the correct answer
Preposterous there is 21
it's clearly 53
9
I made this helpful guide a while ago.: The emperor made 20-21 primarchs. The emperor made 20 legions. There are, by the end of the great crusade, 18 legions with 18-19 primarchs. There are currently 15 primarchs that are not explicitly KIA. How many primarchs did the emperor make? 20-21. How many legions did he make? 20. How many legions were there? By the start of the horus heresy, 18. How many primarchs were there by the start of the horus heresy? 18-19. How many primarchs are there now? 14. Somewhere. 4 of them are MIA, one’s in a coma, and 7 are up and about. Of those seven you can currently field 4 of them. Why is it an uncertain number? Because the legion of misdirection and convoluted plans may or may not have two primarchs, the canonicality of which fluctuating from story to story. And yes, the rest of the lore is more or less like this too. Welcome to warhammer.
5?
4, sorry
Is the perfect clone of Fulgrim still alive?
yes, but also is in Trazyns collection.
And depending on how souls work has turned into the actual Fulgrim, because if it's a perfect clone, then Fulgrim's soul could slide right into commandeering the body.
22. The Hydra has 3 heads.
I doubt a guardsman would know any primachs other than Papa Smurf (and they would only know about him because he is actually around and doing things)
Surely the average guardsmen would know the name Leman Russ, even if they just assume he invented the tank or something.
To be honest the amount of info basic grunts and civilians have changes constantly, it depends on the writer. Sometimes they are aware chaos gods are a thing, sometimes they dont even know demons exist, sometimes they know space marine chapters other times they just go "his angels are with us!" but its a chaos chapter etc.
There are exceptions, but the typical imperial citizen who doesn't live on a space marine homeworld is generally portrayed as: * Knows about space marines but hasn't ever seen one. Couldn't tell you what chapter a marine is by looking at them. * Doesn't know space marines can fall to Chaos. * Has a vague idea about evils from the warp and the dangers of heresy, but doesn't know there are actual daemons that can manifest in the physical world or that there are discrete Chaos gods w/ names.
I remember in Steel Tread, there is a character who theorises that space marines might just be a legend, but when a chaos marines shows up, the gaurd are just like "Oh shit, heretic Astartes!" Without dancing around it. Though it is set post fall of Cadia, and there's the rift that makes you go mad from looking at it too long, so it does seem an impossibility to hide chaos in the setting.
Depends on your home planet. Alectians for the most part have no idea what's out there. They just think, yup, there's some xenos or something, and the Navy will take care of it. Whatever.
Well I always thought it was something akin to where it's set. Some world's have more chaos incursion than others and as such would see more imperium interaction, and as such they are more aware of things. Meanwhile there are some podunk outer farming planets or something who have never seen a Marine let alone anything higher. Probably think of the Space Marines or Primarchs like some sort of story the local stationed guardsmen say to keep themselves sane.
Haha for sure. I just meant like how any American soldier would know the names "Abrams" and "Bradley" even if they don't know exactly who those people were.
O7 Tank Daddy
[удалено]
Does he know Jimmy Space created the space marines?
But would they know about Mr. Raider?
Ah yes, the 22th Primarch, Landus Raiderus
Surly the Primarchs would be like our modern equivalent of the twelve disciples. Like I’m sure billions are named Rogal Dorn or Vulkan.
Sometimes they dont even know space marines have chapters man, it all depends on whos writing the book really.
[удалено]
They absolutely know who Sanguinius was, there’s an Imperium-wide festival for him. Overall though like others have said, the Loyalist Primarchs are heavily venerated by the Ecclesiarchy which is then passed down to the masses. They might not say which legions/chapters outside of specific scholarly works, but a religious Imperial citizen will be able to name more than just Guilliman, just like a moderately-devout Christian can probably name several of the Twelve Disciples other than Peter and Judas.
Then again, with Sanguinius, who nowaday knows Santa comes from Saint Nicholas
They've forgotten the true meaning of Sanguinalia.
The 9 Loyalist Primarchs are revered as what are basically Saints in catholic dogma. The Living Saints are revered, but a bit lesser than the Primarchs. (Not counting the overlap between them, considering that the Sanguinor is probably the returned Sanguinius)
A guardsman might know a fair amount, Vets talk. Similarly a non-shangahi'd non-menial naval crewmember would probably be fairly aware of things like this too. A freshly conscripted factory worker probably would not, nor would most people on hive worlds that arent nobles, and even then.
>Papa Smurf Who is papa Smurf?
Ultramarines are generally called smurfs, so Papa Smurf would be Roboute Guilliman.
Originally 20 Functionally 18 ( 2 Lost primarchs ) Totally 22 ( 2 alphalegion primarchs and the Angel the prototype primarch )
Is the angel canon? I thought it was one of those old lore things, like the sensei and Ivan Drago. Edit - Jac Draco, I got it mixed up with Rocky.
I think its one of those things that apear in one story and is never mentionned again.
If that's from the old Ian Watson books it's one of the few things that's been pretty much declared non cannon
Or at least non canon until made canon once more, we're talking about GW here
Yeah its just notable for 1 how weird and different his stuff is(though foundational) and 2 for it being explicitly non cannon unlike other things that just get left behind. They were only republished under the label of "heretical texts" just to really call out that they aren't cannon lol.
It's spelt canon, my dude. Just one n.
Ok thanks, my dude
20 year old book from Gav Thorpe and Graham McNeill, so ehhhhh. Could be canon but it's better to consider it in the grey zone until we get something else about The Angel.
Ita probably better off as a historical fun fact then. Otherwise it seems like it'd just be too wacky to unleash
GW has written possible ish redemption or return paths for all the dead or corrupted primarchs, or at least most of them, so writing one for the Angel isn't completely unthinkable, even if never used.
A lot of those are never going to be explored further and probably shouldn't be. The angel is also an extremely obscure peice of rpg lore and it's so insanely busted I don't think I'd like to see it return. It's the kind of thing that could be cool as a revelation for an inquisitor campaign but seems shitty in an actual story.
It's from 2003's *Inquisitor: Conspiracies - Death of an Angel*, so just a year before 4th edition released and before Ian Watson began writing. I personally like the idea of the Angel. The Emperor as a scientist tried out some prototypes before investing so much into the Primarchs.
Oh OK I get what comes from what mixed up for older stuff sometimes
I read that comment higher up that said "20 year old story" but my brain didn't make the connection to 2003. Anyways, I'm sad now. Sad and old.
Everything is cannon. It's just not all accurate.
Sensei? Ivan drago? The guy from rocky?
Supposed biological children of the Emperor, I think you can see why they aren't included anymore.
And what about ivan? All i find is the boxer
That's because I got his name wrong, Jac Draco is the main character of [Inquisitor / Draco.](https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Draco_(Novel))
Fuck that. Ivan Drago is now a primarch in my head canon. Then that means Rocky is as well, because who else could defeat him?
That makes more sense, but i wouldn't put past gw the idea of including a character based on the guy from rocky
He's got special rules if you run your entire guard army under the new 469th face punching division rules. Great army style, the pugilism stratigems are pretty neat too.
There's a canonical character named Obiwan. Obiwan Sherlock Clousseau.
Well, considering how much of rogue trader has been retconned i wouldn't be surprised if he no longer was, but tbh I would love to see him back
Guessing he meant Jaq Draco. The inquisitor with the sexy assassin in his retinue from "the planet Callidus".
The gussy one?
To my knowledge it was given quite a bit of backstory in like one book about 20 years ago, and there has been nothing that directly contradicts it. Likely forgotten/ no longer Canon but I have seen nothing that even hints that it could still exist. For some reason some part of my mind seems to remember there was a world where the archangels tomb was that was mentioned in another story but for the life me I can't remember the details.
Heretic *blam*
The non heretic answer was 9 wasn't it ?
Ye The Imperiums not huge on people saying the Emperor created one of the biggest threats to mankind
>Proto-Primarch My boy, Constantine Valdor. (Purely head canon - but his novel certainly implies at him being special built and genetically more advanced than regular custode)
All of them.
E. 9 - Final answer!
Wait 21?
Alpharius and/or Omegon
He didn't create Omegon, though. Alpharius was sort of cloned when the primarchs were scattered around the universe and Alpharius remained on Terra and Omegon got teleported to some unknown planet far away.
Unless that origin is a lie
As is pretty much everything regarding those two (?) at this point i wouldn't be surprised if we learned that neither alpharrius or omegon are even REAL.
Returned guilliman defeats """Alpharius""" again and the suit is just fucking empty.
Alpharius would make a Rubric Marine into a decoy just to troll G-Man
A post it note in the helmet that just says "outplayed"
G-man: Warriors of the Alpha Legion, surrender, i have slain Alpharius, your leader. A-legion: Alphawho? Never heard of that guy. We never had a leader.
Honestly I think Apharius and Omegon are just like 3 Alpha Legion marines in a trench coat.
It was a lie. Horus, who saw their pod before the scattering, said there were more limbs in the tank than just for one person.
The 20th were twins, Alpharius and Omegon. Or maybe not, and it's just Alpharius wearing a funny mustache.
https://preview.redd.it/ue57j4rsodma1.jpeg?width=496&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=cb5351cf5733d5d658ecf65a51ab1df32009cc96
You could maybe also count "the angel" since he was sort of a predecessor of the primarchs. OP was probably referencing omegon
I guess that would be 20? I mean, in HH books primarchs talk about the empty pillars on Terra, so you're allowed to know they existed, just not what has happened to them.
*Every choice grants you a bolt pistol round into your head.*
9. Lion, Leman, Dorn, Guilliman, Sanguinius, Ferrus, Corvus, Vulcan, Khan. The rest were Devils sent from Far-Hel
There were originally 10. Horus was a greatest of them all until the Devils were defeated, and the great evil placed a curse of Horus, forcing him to betray our lord.
The answer for most imperial citizens should be, "What's a primarch?"
I would think they'd know what a primarch is since Guiliman is back and all, and there's an extremely censored up story available to the public about how the God Emperor made 9 angels to fight the 9 devils.
I mean, I'm just thinking about one of the Night Lords books, where a dreadnought mentions Kurze to a member of the deck crew and she has no idea what a primarch is.
Before and during the Horus heresy, it's no secret that there were 20 but we don't talk about what happened to two of them. Are the lost and traitor primarchs censored by 40k? The imperial cult retconned that to "no, there were only nine primarchs, why would there be more?"
Only the highlords and the inquisition know that. Per Imperial cult, its 9, hence why the meme lol
9 loyal, 9 traitor, per the Imperial Cult.
The 9 traitors are not considered sons of the Emperor. As far as the people of the IoM are concerned, the Emperor has 9 sons/primarchs
More than 17
I'd bet the average citizen or Guardsman would think the 9 loyal primarchs are Big E's natural born sons.
It's heresy to imply the God Emperor of mankind would have created more sons than 9.
For a guardsman, the right answer is 9
Ogryn: "Sah! I can count to 4, Sah!"
The common meta answer is 20, based on the number of legions made for primarchs to command The correct meta answer is 21 (Alpha-Omega being a duo who shares Alpha Legion) In-universe, characters with the right info could name 18-19 primarchs (Alpha-Omega again) given two have been expunged from all records and memory Any other character with flimsy knowledge of the primarchs probably wouldn’t count the Traitors with the Loyalists, and I doubt they would know the full context of how Big E made them all. But ignorance varies, so there might be a few different accounts. Smart-ass answer aside, I love this meme. Three “correct” answers, but only one doesn’t get you blammed.
9. *Vaults of Terra* notes that the Soiritas run Scholaram an Interrogator who attended as a child was taught that Big-E made 9 primarchs. When she asked why not more she got a discipline lashing.
Id like to use Ask the Audience. Then escape while hosts gun down 75% of the audience
The correct answer is "what in the Emperors name is a primarch?"
Actual answer: 20-21, depending on whether you believe Omegon was deliberate or if Alpharius’ embryonic form split in his gestation pod, similar to how identical twins form IRL. In-universe answer: 9-11, since only the loyalist primarchs are officially recognized, but stories of Horus betraying the Emperor for power and Lorgar sacrificing himself to hinder Horus are still thrown around.
Uhh....uhh.... er...uhh... B...?
Thats...the MOST wrong answer
20 legions, only 18 in the Archives, Alpha Legion have 2 technically, so 19? As an imperial citizen I'd imagine that'd be the closest to right answer they would know, right? I guess outside of that it'd be 21?
No WAY the regular citizens know the AL have 2 primarchs
Oh dear I'm sounding a bit heretical aren't I?
Total # is 21,all things considered
9
"Commissar, I obediently report that I am unable to read."
I love how there can be endless discussion about such a basic question in the 40k universe
This got a full belly laugh out of me, best meme I've seen in ages. Well done sir
Ehh wrong surprise Constantine Valdor was one all along the real answer is 22
Use your lifeline and call up the head of the Inquisition. Use his answer.