How tough is a Primarch (Betrayer Spolier)

[Samos]

Ok, so the Primarchs are getting a lot of attention in the Heresy books as they should and depending on the author the Primarchs come across with various levels of toughness. For the most part they come across as incredibly tough but not to the point of stupidity. However, we then come to the book betrayer, where we see the first signs of sillyness.

 

Sanguinius fighting a Bloodthirster was fine, Guilliman surviving in the vacuum of space was explained away by not actually having him in a complete vacuum,  put Lorgar pulling gunships out of the sky with his hands, topling titans by throwing rocks at them, surviving two plasma blasts from a titan, and angron stopping a 410 tonne titan stomping on him, just seems a step too far for me.

 

We know primarchs are incredibly tough but there has to be a limit... where is that limit ?

[A D-B]

Psychically-speaking, you'll find kine shields in a wealth of sources doing a great deal more than allowing someone to survive two plasma blastgun hits (a few hundred Thousand Sons use it to shield an entire city from orbital bombardment for several hours), and as for telekinetically pulling a gunship from the sky, pretty much any major psyker worth his salt would be able to give that a shot. He doesn't topple a Titan by throwing rocks at it. He smashes a Warhound's cockpit with a hurled boulder when its shields are down. There's a vast difference. Warhounds are pretty damn small, all said. That cockpit is smaller than the room I'm sitting in, and I'm in a pretty damn small room.

 

I advise not reading any of the Index Astartes articles and their primarch lore if those incidents in Betrayer strain your credulity. Especially not Leman Russ's one. And no, I'm not being sarcastic. 

 

The notions of primarch "power" varying from author to author is a good topic, and one we discuss in HH meetings, too. I think we all see it in slightly different ways, the same way every fan and/or reader does. One of the cool things about the license is that you can "believe" whatever presentation you prefer. The mythic one of the older lore. The way Author X describes it. The stats for the game. Whatever you like. A lot of it will never match up (and if it was supposed to, they'd ask us to make it match up) but I don't see any real divergences in the Heresy series so far. Everything seems pretty even. Nothing in Betrayer is anathema to Prospero Burns or A Thousand Sons, which I reckon are probably the leaders with Betrayer in Primarchs Doing Rad Things stakes.

[Mantras]

My thoughts are generall that we rarely see what a Primarch is truly capable of. Even basic humans are capable of extraordinary feats of strength, endurance and resilience in extreme circumstances, ones that looked at in the cold light of day look impossible. Scale that up for Astartes, and then again for Primarchs, and I think there is very little they cannot do, if the circumstances are extreme enough, of which all the cases the OP mentioned, are

[dragon950]

In Angel Exterminatus Perturabo sends a certain marine flying with just a little push from his finger and rips terminator armor off another without any effort.  And he isn't blessed by the dark gods the way others are.  Magnus takes down a titan by himself.  So yes, Angron stopping/surviving a titan putting its foot on him is silly.  But so is saying that in the vacuum of space, the outsides of ships somehow have a limited atmosphere.

[Aegnor]

Nothing Lorgar did bothered me. Through his sorcery, the guy is probably the 3rd strongest psyker in history after the Emperor and Magnus. And he's a primarch with the matching physical strength.

 

Angron holding up a Warhound, especially when exhausted from his tunnelling trip was a little eyebrow raising but not stupid in my view. Very close to the line but staying on the right side of it.

[DarKnight]

The only feat a Primarch has performed thus far in the Heresy that has given me pause was the kine shield that the Lion manifested aboard the Invincible Reason in Gav's short story, only for the reason that I personally don't want the more mundane Primarch's (Dorn, the Lion, Vulkan etc.) psychic abilities to shine through, though I'm sure they do possess them. Other than that, Lorgar's performance was awesome, and so was Angron's, though the fact that a mob of Astartes, no matter how many, or how fatigued/injured Dorn was, could overcome him and murder him aboard the Sword of Sacrilege though I guess that's a debate for another day.

[Aegnor]

Vulkan had a psyker side to him - his prophecies in the Tome of Fire show that.

[Kol Saresk]

Well the more the series goes on, going forward and back through the timeline as well as going left and right to parallel events, it is becoming obvious that virtually all of the Primarchs are psychic to one degree or another and it just seems that Magnus was the only one who explored it to its full potential with Lorgar drawing a close second, maybe even equal at this point since he is using things like "enuncia", or at least something similar.

 

On the bit of Angron, it's not exactly like he walked away without a scratch either. He was pretty bloodied from digging his way out and I seem to recall mention of some muscles and bones popping while he was holding up the leg of a Warhound Titan. Considering this was the same Primarch who was buried under so much rubble that everyone who saw it, including the Luna Wolves, believed he was dead and then shrugged it off like it was nothing, a Warhound Titan seems pretty manageable. And even Lorgar didn't get away unscathed from those plasma burns. Even Angron thought he looked bad.

 

I think the "reality" is that the Primarchs are made from materials and energy well beyond our imagination. It might not be too crazy to think of them as daemon princes bound to human form with the Daemon Primarchs not ascending, but merely rediscovering what they truly are. Granted, that has no basis, it is just pure speculation.

[Sevatar]

The Titan bit was a bit too far, but it does create questions on how Dorn died. It must have been hundreds of Legionaries. I really do hope, however, that Abaddon didn't kill him - its much cooler if its just hundreds of nameless marines.

[Aegnor]

I have no basis for this beyond a vague memory, but didn't they kill Dorn by destroying his ship and presumably sending him into the void. Doesn't matter how tough he is, he can't survive in the void for too long.

[Badaboom]

   In Prince of Crows, Sevatar mentions how many marines he has to sacrifice just to drive the Lion back and rescue Curze, and it´s about a company or so. Can´t imagine how many Dorn took with him to hell before he fell (Damn, I SO would love him to stay alive, somewhere...).

[Kol Saresk]

And with the Night Lords, a company could be of any size since at least the First Company is divided into sub-Companies.

[Wade Garrett]

In Reflection Crack'd Fulgrim takes down a Titan with one shot from his pistol and a wave of his hand.

 

Also, going by the Soul Hunter books one need not be a psyker to be a prophet.

[DarKnight]

I have no basis for this beyond a vague memory, but didn't they kill Dorn by destroying his ship and presumably sending him into the void. Doesn't matter how tough he is, he can't survive in the void for too long.

No, he's charging the bridge of a Chaos ship during the first Black Crusade, and gets overwhelmed by Traitor Marines. Maybe they all had athames.

[Kol Saresk]

Why would athames matter?

[Wade Garrett]

Given that Betrayer also had Angron about to be killed by a bunch of "ordinary" Space Wolves, I still don't see why the Imperial Fist folks have their drawers in knots.

 

Of course, my two favorite Legions are the VIII and the XVII, and my first exposure to them was in Lord of the Night, which I will summarize thusly:

 

Acerbus:

"Hey Sahaal. What are you getting our Primarch for..."

 

Zho Sahaal:

"OUR PRIMARCH IS DEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAD!"

 

And The First Heretic:

 

Magnus, Guilliman, and the Emperor:

"Lorgar, why do you keep failing the Emperor? Is that like, your thing? Failing the Emperor?"

 

Lorgar:

Fine. HERESY!

 

Corax:

Heresy? CORAX SMASH!

 

And then he does.

 

 

So I never had the chance to grow a "My Primarch is the super special toughtest of the tough Primarch who can beat up all the other Primarchs." On account of my first favorite Primarch being DEEEEEED and the second favorite getting smashed by the Raven.

[A D-B]

Given that Betrayer also had Angron about to be killed by a bunch of "ordinary" Space Wolves, I still don't see why the Imperial Fist folks have their drawers in knots.

 

Of course, my two favorite Legions are the VIII and the XVII, and my first exposure to them was in Lord of the Night, which I will summarize thusly:

 

Acerbus:

"Hey Sahaal. What are you getting our Primarch for..."

 

Zho Sahaal:

"OUR PRIMARCH IS DEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAD!"

 

And The First Heretic:

 

Magnus, Guilliman, and the Emperor:

"Lorgar, why do you keep failing the Emperor? Is that like, your thing? Failing the Emperor?"

 

Lorgar:

Fine. HERESY!

 

Corax:

Heresy? CORAX SMASH!

 

And then he does.

 

 

So I never had the chance to grow a "My Primarch is the super special toughtest of the tough Primarch who can beat up all the other Primarchs." On account of my first favorite Primarch being DEEEEEED and the second favorite getting smashed by the Raven.

 

And on account of you not being a frothing twelve-year-old with lethal spelling.

 

A key factor.

[Prot]

I was coincidentally thinking about this.

 

In Angel Exterminatus I thought it went too far.... SPOILER ALERT:

 

 

Especially when Fulgrim 'plans' to have himself shot in the head by an expert loyalist marine sniper.... through the temple, around the brain. All this to win Perturabo over. I mean Perturabo is a cool guy and we all love the siege stuff and cool techno virus toys, but a bullet in the brain? Seriously? What ever happened to offering to help a friend move as the ultimate act of brotherhood?

 

 

^That just went a little too far to me at least.

[Wade Garrett]

Re: The Spoiler

 

"This is your brain. This is your brain on Slaanesh."

(sizzling sound)

"Any questions?"

 

What I'm saying is, good ideas and the Emperor's Children are not always close acquaintances.

[DarKnight]

Why would athames matter?

because they can kill anything with a minimal effort. but brother Wade was correct, the Wolves did have Angron cold & were supposed to have been able to kill him by massed bolter fire. Pretty mundane way to kill a Primarch, but well within the realm of possibility.

[Kol Saresk]

Then how come the only things I've seen killed by athames are the Newborn, M'Kar, Samus and Hol Beloth, all of which were essentially warp-fueled creatures at the time of their death while Guilliman had his throat slit by one and still lived?

 

The athame is nothing more than a ritual knife and the ones involved in the deaths mentioned above were Shards of Erebus, not regular athames. So in reality, an athame is nothing more than a knife so unless it was lodged inside a Primarch's brain, it probably wouldn't do that much.

[Wade Garrett]

Don't forget an athame does not mean the same thing as Anathame. (aka magic sword of kill everything)

[Kol Saresk]

Well, in the case of the Shards of Erebus, it sort of does but two of those have alrady been destroyed and we know where three of them are.

[Conn Eremon]

The Anathames are the super destructive ones, taking out two Primarchs. One had to be saved by Chaos and the other was put into stasis before he croaked. And the first one was just nicked in the shoulder.

 

Athames are small blades used for ritualistic purposes. An Anathame is a play on the words athame and anathema. It can be confusing, as both are used and they are described as being quite similar.

 

Angel Exterminatus also showed us that anathames can be used to injure or inflict pain beyond the scope of the actual wound, not just kill.

[Kol Saresk]

Athames are small blades used for ritualistic purposes. An Anathame is a play on the words athame and anathema. It can be confusing, as both are used and they are described as being quite similar.

Yes and no. For those who do not have Mark of Calth, I will put spoilers on for. It doesn't destroy the story if you read them but at the same time, one of the stories focus on them.

 

 

You are right, they are two different types of weapons. However Erebus took eight shards of the anathame and by mixing daemon blood into the smelting process, made eight athames known as the "Shards of Erebus." Thanks to KNF, Chapter's Due and Calth that was(MoC anthology), the only things they kill outright are warp entities as Guilliman survived having his throat slashed by the one that was given to Kor Phaeron. Of course, one could argue that Kor Phaeron just didn't know how to properly use it, which is a possibility.

 

 

So the regular athames are indeed just regular knives. The anathame is the special weapon it is. And then there are the Shards of Erebus. But almost every Shard can be accounted for to some degree so it's highly unlikely one was involved in Dorn's death.