Kharn, Lucius, Typhus, Ahriman, Huron and others would all gather together on a neutral world to decide who among them would lead the forces of Chaos next as their mortal champion. Many insults are traded, accusations of past failures are made over Abbadons armless body. Kharn challenges any of them to a duel, Lucius suggests they all audition for the film adaptation of the popular Heresy era erotic novel "Fifty shades of 'Oh my fucking god what the actual fuck is happening!?'" With the champion winning the lead role also becoming Warmaster. But as Typhus steps forward, they all suddenly realise it isn't Typhus at all, but actually the Planet Killer, already under control of somebody else along with the rest of Abbadons forces.

Furiously they all look at each other with confusion and suspicion, before it dawns on them. With a rare singular and shared thought, they all look to the sky and scream out...

CREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEED!!!!!!!!!!

 

If Abbaddon fails again? Mind you he has 13 Black Crusades on his belt. 13 bad losses.

 

Fall not fail

Kharn, Lucius, Typhus, Ahriman, Huron and others would all gather together on a neutral world to decide who among them would lead the forces of Chaos next as their mortal champion.

I really can't see the old guard traitors submitting to Huron

Huron would probably try and make alliances with the legions if abaddon dies

Huron is a big fish in a small pond. There are arguable hundreds if not thousands of Chaos lords of similar power. I mean, how much clout does he have right now really? His little empire was broken. He just has a sizeable Chaos fleet at his disposal.

He's a minor Chaos lord who gets mentioned a lot in the fluff

 

Huron would probably try and make alliances with the legions if abaddon dies

 

Of course, Abbaddon must be the best logistical mind of all times, I mean half his time he is using to settle arguments between four sides that really doesn't like eachother. It's like getting fanatical Muslims, Nazis, fanatical Jews and fanatical other people to cooperate. Of course this is just an example, but it shows how hard the job of Abbaddon is. I also never take it too seriously when a person says Abaaddon is Failabbaddon the Armless. That's just humor not a serious opinion, as the IOM sic everything they have at him once he rears his ugly head.

 

Stuff

So..would that be a 'no I cannot elaborate on how all of Abbadon's black crusades were failures' or are you just trying to avoid the question?

 

They were all failures, though not all can be lopped at him.

 

WHAT???

How were they all failures?

13th aim was to get a foothold on cadia, which they did
1st one killed a loyalist primarch
One secured his magical sword etc etc
The Eye has expanded hugely

Don't think of chaos as a linear black white idea of all we want is to invade terra. That is not their goal. If any thing I imagine Abbadon will want to create a second imperium rather than rushing to terra. He knows he can't just rush to terra, he needs to get out of the eye and start the grind and thats what he is doing

 

Which Primarch was killed? Getting trinkets counts as victory? Gaining a foothold only to be blasted away by the Imperial Navy, and I don't think Abbaddon can do anything about the Eye of Terror expanding as last I checked he had negligible psychic prowess.

 

1st crusade killed Dorn, gained sword
2nd Failed
3rd Abaddon wasn't involved in
4th bit meh captured a planet
5th Abaddon not involved with
6th ???
7th lots of fighting and death - no notable gain
8th ??
9th Destroyed naval fortresses defending system
10th not really a crusade just several battles
11th ??
12th crusade abbadon acquired 2 blackstone fortresses - mixed victory he wanted 4
13th crusade foothold is still intact - The imperial navy never blasted him away. He lost a lot of ships but they likely float back to they eye as all debris does. The ships can be repaired re-crewed and sent out again in the future

The expanding eye is due to the fluctuations of chaos powers which occurs during the crusades, chaos is at a peak and once a planet is swallowed its never returned. This is due to the huge gathering of chaos power generally orchestrated by abbaddon.

Abbadon is not 13 times the loser. He has a near impossible task, but he is making gains. Wait is time for a near immortal?

 

The expanding eye is due to the fluctuations of chaos powers which occurs during the crusades, chaos is at a peak and once a planet is swallowed its never returned.

Haven't the zombie art collectors (Necrons) whacked a couple of anti-psychic phallic towers on there that stop the eye getting too lary?

 

He has launched 13 Black Crusades Barnster. Hehe, though it sounds fun that he manages to be in absentia in some.

I mean Abbaddon ain't the only person going on Black Crusades and he haven't copyrighted them like Disney have copyrighted Disney. I now envision Abbaddon hiring an army and suing Doombreed for taking it's name. Hehe quite a vision that Abbaddon and Doombreed in suit and tie in a courtroom.

Also Rogal Dorn stopped a Black Crusade by sacrifising himself, but it wasn't Abbaddon's Black Crusade.

 

He has launched 13 Black Crusades Barnster.

Hehe, though it sounds fun that he manages to be in absentia in some.

Actually no, while there have been black crusades led by others, the numbered ones have all been led by Abbadon (even though there are some with no information on them at this time.)

Also Rogal Dorn stopped a Black Crusade by sacrifising himself, but it wasn't Abbaddon's Black Crusade.

Thats debatable as we do not know which black crusade he died in, and whether or not he even died in one (because of the canon conflict regarding when he was lost to the Imperium.)

Getting trinkets counts as victory?

When those 'trinkets' include his daemon sword, the eye of night, hand of darkness, and blackstone fortresses, I'd say yes. And while his aim in the 12th crusade was to acquire all six fortresses, two was plenty and three would have been more than enough.

Why? Because three blackstone fortresses had the power to make a sun supernova and destroy an entire system; two had the power to destroy a planet.

Gaining a foothold only to be blasted away by the Imperial Navy,

Gaining a foothold on one of the most heavily defended worlds, bar terra, and ensuring that the Imperium has to spend an ungodly amount of resources (even for them) to completely remove a now entrenched chaos hold.

You seem to like to believe the matter is so cut and dry but its not. Every time the Imperium would have lost ground on Cadia (and lets face it, they did) thats a strong-point or heavily defended locale now in the hands of the enemy. Its locations designed to be nigh impossible to take, and in the case of the Imperium retake.


Once again, and getting to be rather unsurprising, your opinion-as-fact mentality is quite wrong/misinformed.

 

I thought the Eye of Terror varied in size. Doesn't it?

 

Wow Darkreaver, just wow. Well that's your opinion, I refuse to voice mine about you.

I was poking fun at the idea that Abbaddon manages to lead in absentia, it's a wild theory not reality though it's a fun thought which I cracked a joke about with the lawsuit of Abbaddon suing Doombreed. I'm not blind for fluff, as I already mentioned, every time Abbaddon rears his ugly head they sic everything they have at him.

I was maybe a bit informal about calling the nice things Abbaddon got trinkets, but it almost seems like a really longwinded computer-game with him picking up gear like I could do in Baldur's Gate and still he never gets any closer to getting to Terra despite winning symbolic victories.

And I'm pretty much convinced Cadia is the second-best defended planet in the entire Galaxy. And I also uses knowledge about what fighting in ruins does to an army, that will just bring it down, just look at Stalingrad, that's my view of Cadia.

If anything was speculation on my part it was Dorn sacrificing himself to stop a Black Crusade, but that to my surprise you didn't protest too much about.

 

Wow Darkreaver, just wow. Well that's your opinion, I refuse to voice mine about you.

Whats my opinion? That you have previously attempted to use your opinion as fact, and that your posts here are reminiscent of that? Or would it be the meat of my post, about things like the blackstone fortresses and gaining a foothold on Cadia and that the numbered crusades are the ones led by Abbadon?

If anything was speculation on my part it was Dorn sacrificing himself to stop a Black Crusade, but that to my surprise you didn't protest too much about.

To my knowledge, and I honestly haven't read my copy of index astartes in some time, I think it is actually mentioned that Dorn's actions aboard the Sword of Sacrilege was the lynchpin in stop that black crusade. Meaning that what you said is correct, so why would I protest about you being right?

 

I don't deny that Abbaddon has had successes and hell I called him the greatest logistical mind ever, mind you he has an assortment of haters siding which eachother (the things I wrote about the guys of differencing religions comes to mind as when I joke Abbaddon is an Armless fuckwit, while I'm painfully aware of him being the greatest threat to the IOM since Horus, there is a difference), and if I come off that way, then I should try to be more clear that it's my opinion and interpretation despite me writing in a very direct way.

Foothold on Cadia means foothold in Stalingrad in my vocabulary. Yes Abbaddon won the ground-war there but he lost the air-war which is what counts. Again this is my opinion nothing else, but it's kind of backed by fluff.

Maybe you are right Darkreaver, but I remember it being fairly weakly written and rather an anti-climax, I mean this is the greatest story never told as I would actually buy that book.

 

I can't find the original campaign report.

The Lex' says that Chaos pretty much owns the entire planet with Imperial forces stuck in their fortresses. Though the Imperium has control of the space around Cadia.

 

Back to the original question. Who could take over?

I mean Peturbo and Lorgar are there both blessed by Chaos Undivided, but I can't come up with anyone else that would be a good idea placing there at the head instead of Abbaddon as just a normal Astartes would mean no cooperation from the legions of the Daemon Primarches as I have seen other Space Marines pop up.

 

The main issue would be if they are actually interested in taking over.

I could see Lorgar taking over but current fluff dictates that he's been on Sicarus meditating in a temple for a thousand years with no indication that he'll be finished anytime soon.

And Perturabo, well, IRC he isn't the most charismatic chap and (to me) he doesn't seem too interested with the material realm (A byproduct of Daemonhood I am guessing).

And even if both of them were interested, would the other legions follow them? I understand why they follow Abbadon seeing as he is the natural successor to Horus, has built up the Black Legion into a powerful military entity and has lead Black Crusades and has basically actually been doing things.

What has Lorgar or Perturabo done recently of note?

 

Been meditating and drank beer and be unemployed. I mean so little is known about Peturbo that I'm almost tempted to write about him myself.

 

Nothing better than ADB stepping in again to tell it how it is. Cheers again!

 

It's clear that only Angron can take over.

He's the only daemon primarch that can get shit done.

 

He's the only daemon primarch that can get shit done.

Unless the shit that needs to be done extends only as far as "There are people with skulls and blood over there, let's kill them!", I don't think Angron is the best choice.

As to the original question...I don't think anyone, as DarkReever has said, is ready to or capable of leading the forces of Chaos. Power is like money: You need to have money ,or at least convince enough people that you do have enough money, in order to get more.

No one wants to back a loser. The next Warmaster will have to have the influence, power, and drive to engage the Imperium.

I personally think Huron is the best bet. Give him another couple thousands of years to turn his 5000 astartes into 50,000 and we'll see what he can do.

 

I earlier wrote I'm considering just writing about Perturbo just for someone to write about him. That's how much a Scrappy he feels to me, and you should look at the wording, that was straight from 1d4chan. And I haven't read anything about him doing much, but if I was GW I would have him leading the aforementioned Black Crusade and haven Dorn banish him from the warp for the sacrifice of Dorn being mortally wounded, though that's just me. But I don't doubt for a minute it would be an awesome read and give a powerful reason to Dorn being dead.

 

I assumed the wording was not your own, thats why I limited my question to just why you think Perturabo has done nothing.

 

In my area we curb stomped chaos. My Blood Angels rampaged across the entire sector inflicting loses on the wrong side of hilarious for Chaos. I thought the national result was rather more in the favour of Disorder though.

 

Ahriman or Erebus.

 

Huron or Honsou.

Seriously, probably Huron. He's done some pretty awesome stuff (destroying a Space Marine Chapter with minimal losses to his own forces and reaping a huge reward in gene seed, despite losing a pretty powerful battleship - that was to his own allies, admittedly). He's got a large pirate empire with docks such as Hell's Iris at his command. Huron's the rising star for CSM.

Midnight

 

destroying a Space Marine Chapter with minimal losses to his own forces

Which chapter was this?

 

Yeah it's that way when you tries to let the TT decide things. I mean had GW let the TT dictate fluff then we would have been absent the Ultramarines since the late 90's. In a WD. Retconned on the spot. Even I thought it was insane to publish. Then they did the same with Armageddon. Hehe hilarious. Medusa was fun as well and a better alternative as unlike Ultramar, Armageddon and Cadia Medusa doesn't carry a large profit. If I recall correctly the IOM lost badly at the ground at Cadia so then they fluffed out the IOM won the air-war.

 

OK I found it. I read this on another forum (there was quite an argument going on):

A GW authors opinon is exactly that, he is NOT a canon voice in any way outside of what he officaly writes for GW. So no, he is clearly wrong when he can be SHOWN to be wrong, unless he writes soemthing that GW say 'This is canon'.

Please; EVERY one of those Crusades was ultimatly focused on the strategic objective to break open the Gate and allow unimpeeded access to the rest of the Galaxy, even if there were immediate objectives to that fact. The Gothic War was not at the Gate, but ultimatly it was about getting the bigass eldar guns to LET him break open the gate, it was a glorified hit, hold and run BACK to the eye, to then break open the front door to the eye. And he only managed a partial success there, and lost almost all of the Blackstones anyway when he tried to use them in the 13th Crusade to smash open the door.

Which is nothing but GW sulking over the fact that they wanted a Chaos win, the Imperial players (of course) overwhelmingly won, and they tried to come up with a half assed GW style approach to say 'Well yes, BUT...'.

The Imperium have SPACE SUPERORITY in the Cadian Gate. They CONTROL Cadian orbit meaning the Chaos forces on the ground are cut off and the Imperium WILL retake the planet. Those unprecedented numbers of Chaos forces pouring out of the Gate have already mostly been turned back and eliminated by the Imperial response forces rushed in from all over the Imperium. The Chaos fleet has been DRIVEN BACK inside the EOT from the Cadian gate. The Imperium has ultimatly WON the battle here because the Chaos offensive has been broken, their mobile strategic forces have been pushed back or eliminated and Imperial reinforcements are charging in who have/are/will retake the worlds outside the Cadian gateway that are now cut off from support.

If you read a little further DOWN said newsletter;

The Imperial Navy commands the space lanes in the Cadian Gate. Ergo, THEY control the Gate, not Chaos. Cadia is an importaint staging ground inside the Gate by all means, but its not the gateway itself.

 

OK I found it. I read this on another forum (there was quite an argument going on):

Jesus. People get so agonisingly worked up when they're that deep in denial.

Stuff like: "Please; EVERY one of those Crusades was ultimatly focused on the strategic objective to break open the Gate and allow unimpeeded access to the rest of the Galaxy, even if there were immediate objectives to that fact" always sort of horrifies me, because it's the worst kind of fan reaction. It's stating a perception (against all evidence to the contrary) with such ferocity, that you know when more detail emerges based on actual lore and IP discussion, they'll just hiss and spit and insist it's wrong or a change to the previous lore. In that particular instance, it's categorically incorrect, and I know that (as do most 40K fans) from the lore itself, let alone the fact that I'm lucky enough to be able to ask these things directly to the IP department and the IP manager. Yet you've got some very serious forum froth going on, insisting any disagreement with his wildly incorrect interpretations is somehow the domain of fools and hacks.

The 13th Black Crusade is one of the worst offenders about this, because so much of the (barely existent) lore is based on a 15-year-old campaign newsletter that GW itself has ignored and not cared about for... well, for over a decade. I can tell you, straight up, that the newsletter is essentially worthless in terms of lore, and utterly ignored. That's not even a scandalous or controversial point: it's a newsletter from a store campaign over ten years ago. I mean... I mean, seriously. I can't just pretend that matters, and base a novel series around it.

And that's not even counting how all the talk of how the 13th Black Crusade ended is meaningless to anyone outside that old campaign, because the new edition(s) is/are set at two minutes to midnight, just before the 13th Black Crusade starts. Y'know, the crusade that's prophetically destined to end the Imperium, and herald in the "midnight" of the IP.

Also, one of the main problems with getting quoted out of context on other forums is that it can make it look like I just blithely rock up and announce stuff, when 99.9% of the time I'm answering something someone has directly asked about for clarity on a matter related to something I'm writing about.

Take a project like dealing with the Black Legion. That'll involve having access to every single word ever written about them, their characters, their origins, and so on. Every written word. It'll also involve discussions with various IP folks, and synopses going back and forth, and just generally getting immersed in it all. Part of that, thankfully, is getting to ask things like "So... how does the IP work?" and "So what's the deal with the Black Crusades, because sometimes it looks like X, and sometimes it looks like Y..."

And when you get the answers, they don't always match the rabid, vocal forum perception, which is often based on old memes and inaccurate lore, anyway.

So what do you do?

 

As of late, I've begun to seriously think about the whole Failbaddon meme situation. Are memes such as Failbaddon, the Alpha Legion's nonexistence, Eldrad's dickery, etc. based more on a disregard or outright contempt for GW's fluff?

I don't mean to say so in a condescending, "shame on you!" fashion. I stick to the Failbaddon meme because I find it funny, and for little else. I also do not think that the presence of these memes detract from my immersion into 40k as a whole, in the same way that Deus Ex's "What a Shame" and "A bomb!" do not detract from its enjoyability.

What I mean to say, however is that perhaps fans simply don't care. About two years back, a fellow on /tg/ posted this - and before I get slammed for bringing /tg/ into the equation, I will say that this could be indicative of theirs and others' attitudes towards ultra-powerful or ultra-influential beings like Abaddon. In Abaddon's case, the 13 Black Crusades were just what they needed to take him down a notch, as it were. It wouldn't be the first time players have been contemptuous of ultra-powerful characters; Marneus Calgar comes to mind, and before you-know-who got his hands on him, no less.

This is all to say, perhaps adherents of the Failbaddon meme and others like it don't want to consider Abaddon at all in the context GW has given him, and this meme and the armless meme offer a sort of escape from it. I don't know why that is; maybe it's because a lot of players are more concerned with their own plastic soldiers and their grimdark adventures, as the 1d4chan article suggests, or maybe there's another reason. I sure as hell could not speak for the majority of players because I myself can't wrap my head around this phenomenon.

In any case, it's just a thought; I certainly can't endorse it until I've made up my mind about the whole business. I'll continue thinking about it.

Who would rise to take his place?

ME! MUAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!

 

As of late, I've begun to seriously think about the whole Failbaddon meme situation. Are memes such as Failbaddon, the Alpha Legion's nonexistence, Eldrad's dickery, etc. based more on a disregard or outright contempt for GW's fluff?

I don't mean to say so in a condescending, "shame on you!" fashion. I stick to the Failbaddon meme because I find it funny, and for little else. I also do not think that the presence of these memes detract from my immersion into 40k as a whole, in the same way that Deus Ex's "What a Shame" and "A bomb!" do not detract from its enjoyability.

What I mean to say, however is that perhaps fans simply don't care. About two years back, a fellow on /tg/ posted this - and before I get slammed for bringing /tg/ into the equation, I will say that this could be indicative of theirs and others' attitudes towards ultra-powerful or ultra-influential beings like Abaddon. In Abaddon's case, the 13 Black Crusades were just what they needed to take him down a notch, as it were. It wouldn't be the first time players have been contemptuous of ultra-powerful characters; Marneus Calgar comes to mind, and before you-know-who got his hands on him, no less.

This is all to say, perhaps adherents of the Failbaddon meme and others like it don't want to consider Abaddon at all in the context GW has given him, and this meme and the armless meme offer a sort of escape from it. I don't know why that is; maybe it's because a lot of players are more concerned with their own plastic soldiers and their grimdark adventures, as the 1d4chan article suggests, or maybe there's another reason. I sure as hell could not speak for the majority of players because I myself can't wrap my head around this phenomenon.

In any case, it's just a thought; I certainly can't endorse it until I've made up my mind about the whole business. I'll continue thinking about it.

That feels unarguably true for a lot of gamers, fans, and readers - and, I'll note, I reckon it's a good and healthy dose of perspective. I also think it's fair to say that even those folks who don't adopt that attitude wholesale will still carry aspects of it around with them. I certainly do, not just for 40K but for a lot of licenses/IPs that I like.

But I find discussion and exchange only breaks down when you've got opinions that directly counter everything about that stance you mention, Prot. In the text Monty quoted, you've got several pages of vitriolic argument insisting this, that, and everything else, with such righteous vehemence, that they're clearly not just getting involved with the memes/ using them for kicks / taking aspects of them / etc. They're insisting the memes are ironclad truth as GW intended, and anyone cites other evidence is either wrong or seeking to distort some objective truth. They don't just care about about this stuff; they practically demand everyone else bows to their vision of it, even if it's wrong - and most importantly, they demand that their interpretation is what 40K is, that the way they see it is exactly what GW is actually saying.

I think that's when stuff breaks down. Even the license's contributors (me included) don't say "This is how it is" in our work. I spend a great deal of time and effort on forums and in my writing presenting my perspective of the setting, in a license where there famously "is no canon". But I base all of that on extensive research and the perspectives of many other contributors, too. I also point out that it doesn't make my interpretation any more valid than anyone else's preferences for 40K, but it puts me in pretty good stead to explain stuff that doesn't always come over in the background very clearly.

I say all that as a pretty big fan of the Failbaddon meme, because it's funny - especially when considering almost none of his life or career has ever had any light shone on it. So on one hand, I love that stuff. I put a reference in Betrayer to a pretty famous Kharn meme, too. But on the other hand, it's my job to shine that light and show a lot of the truths between infrequent mentions of vague directives in Black Crusades. Because that's another key difference in topics like this: people who take every written line and cite them as All There Is are still missing the point. There's a great deal of inference in this setting, which is part of why it's so open to interpretation. Abaddon has lived for thousands and thousands of years in a literal Hell, seeing more war and treachery than any living being in the galaxy. If his entire life was distilled down into a few paragraphs and vague talk of a few Black Crusades (or, worse, an ancient store campaign)... I mean, that can't be it. That would make no sense at all. If that was really all there was, then I'd find it easier to commit wholesale to the memes as objective reality.

I got wildly sidetracked by sidepoints there, but TL;DR: I dig your point a lot, and reckon it holds true, to some degree, for a lot of folks.

 

One thing though...I don't think you can fault the participants in that Spacebattles thread for citing old newsletters released by GW. I mean, at least they're trying to base their arguments on relevant sources. Whether or not they're misinterpreting said newsletter for their own agendas is another matter. I'm not really qualified to comment as I've never read said newsletter.

OK...so what is the status of the 13th Black Crusade? The Imperial Nava controls the Cadian space lanes but Chaos controls the planet itself? What's going on? Is the older fluff (newsletters and such) pretty much ignored at GW/BL (i.e. writers essentially enjoy a blank slate to rework the fluff)?

For the record, I don't mind if Mr. DB disregards older fluff or only uses part of it. I'm fine with that. I'm all for it when BL writers improve previously rather mediocre GW fluff.

Oh oh, could someone explain the "armless" meme to me?