Dreadwing

[DarkChaplain]

Maybe we should just wait and see what The Buried Dagger and The Solar War bring to the table? There are multiple explanations available as for why the Astronomican isn't broadcasting anymore. Chances are that the partly daemonic assault on Terra has blacked it out. It seems pretty obvious that communications to and from Terra weren't the greatest during the Siege, and while the defenders knew the Ultramarines specifically were doing their damndest to reach the Throneworld, none knew exactly when they'd arrive. Having the Astronomican offline would give us another reason as to why the Emperor, Sanguinius and Dorn would venture aboard the Vengeful Spirit, too.

 

I'm highly disinclined to believe that the Lion is simply lying about the Astronomican, at any rate. It'd be a stupidly huge lie, and I doubt he'd be using Tuchulcha as liberally as he is shown here. He decided to use the daemon engine again after the light went out, which makes sense. Why he wouldn't just tell his "little brothers"? Because he and his Legion are already secretive to a fault, nobody learns what they don't strictly need to know. This is evident throughout the entirety of the novella, too - to the point of alienating his closest sons. It's been a theme that has led the Dark Angels and Lion El Jonson for decades.

To jump from the Lion only telling those that he needed to know, or knew anyway (the navigator, and Stenius as captain in charge of Tuchulcha), to making it all up, is simply unnecessary when we knew all along that the Order and the Dark Angels' hexagrammaton operate this way.

 

Needless to say, the Legion is *already* riven by internal strife. They're already pointing weapons at one another, scheming behind each others' backs is par for the course, and even close brothers don't clear the air between them. We already know there's a schism on Caliban, where multiple factions existed and were suppressed by Luther, Astelan and co. We see here that the Legion is divided on their course of action, too. Telling them "hey, Terra is probably already gone and what we're doing is an expression of my own grief, depression and willful ignorance to my own failings" isn't going to help keep things together.

 

The Lion has always doubled down on mistakes. He is exceptionally unapologetic and cannot for the life of him bow down and admit he has erred, even to his foster father, or his brothers. He did once on Macragge, and that's about it. He compounds his errors by making more, tangling himself up further while being too proud to even just take a step back. That much is evident in his battlefield strategies as well - he is arrogantly moving into reach of a ship that could cripple the Invincible Reason, understaffed, low on fuel and armaments as it was already, with big chunks of it under lockdown. When disaster strikes, he takes it from there, as if nothing had gone wrong to begin with. He makes bad calls that his Legionaries are suspicious of, in this instance Stenius, and it costs crew lives, yet in the end, they dare not speak up and pull him back down to earth.

 

I think this is interesting in so far as it differentiates Horus Lupercal from Lion El Jonson, up to a point. Horus, for all his grandeur and playacting, at least made it a point to surround himself with his Mournival. Even while Warmaster and thus the ultimate authority next to the Emperor and, potentially, Malcador, he at least tried to keep a spark of humility in his leadership position. The Lion had none of that - he actively banished Luther, his closest second, for a moment of doubt. He smashed Nemiel's face in, which still colors the attitudes of his sons, so many years after Perditus. At this point, Holguin is the only one who dares talk back to him at all - and he does so at high risk and more out of frustration than actual, wise council.

I'd say that this alone is already reason enough for the Lion being unfit, utterly and absolutely unsuitable, for the Warmaster position, no matter how much he coveted it. He never learned how to keep his own house in order, how to properly communicate or how to retain people's confidence in him as a leader, rather than his abilities as a Primarch.

 

Lion El Jonson doesn't simply commit mistakes or makes (to us) stupid decisions. His very nature is flawed, and always has been. He's traditionally been most adored by those furthest away from the person. It's been stated before on multiple occasions that Primarchs aren't just superhuman fighters and strategists on a logical level, but they're also subject to extremes in other aspects, most notably their passions. I think the Lion exemplifies that, albeit in a rather negative light for himself and his Legion.

[TheRealMcCagh]

I think that the Lion has bought into what Curze foresaw and genuinely believes that Hourus has/will inevitably win and lies about the beacon being extinguished to Holguin and Redloss; it would look bad to them if he didn’t at least *try* to get to Terra, but he “knows” it will be futile so needs a reason not to go.

 

That doesn't seem to reconcile with the Lion we see at Terra blaming Russ. It seems strange that he gives up on Terra then at some point does an about face and races back to Terra with Russ, arriving late, and nearly killing Russ for delaying him. Unless he is just lashing out at Russ to cover for his own inability to arrive in time to save the Emperor. Which I guess would be in character. Hopefully they find some way to tie those two different depictions together

[Kelborn]

I thought it to be pretty clear that the Lion was frustrated for not arriving in time just like his "savage" brother Leman. Maybe he was told of the events of Wolfsbane, frustrating him even more.

 

Furthermore, the Dulan campaign stained his honor in a way which demanded resolution. Imho, Leman Russ as a novel has some really great views on Johnson, which still fit the current setting.

[TheRealMcCagh]

Doesn't he blame Russ for delaying them though? So why does he lash out at Russ when it seems like he was in no hurry to get to Terra anyways, having resigned himself to Terra falling?

[DarkChaplain]

I mean, we haven't seen Russ since Corax: Weregeld. There's a story left to be told about the Lion and Russ reuniting on their way to Terra. Even if Russ delayed him in some fashion, there's ample opportunity for that to be shown down the road. Chances are the veil on the Astronomican will lift at some point, showing Jonson that he has erred, and he'll curse himself (internally) for a fool, ready to unload his grief and self-loathing on Leman.

[Indefragable]

<snip>

 

Great points and well said. I don't agree with it all, but you point out some excellent patterns. Your last bit...

 

Lion El Jonson doesn't simply commit mistakes or makes (to us) stupid decisions. His very nature is flawed, and always has been. He's traditionally been most adored by those furthest away from the person. It's been stated before on multiple occasions that Primarchs aren't just superhuman fighters and strategists on a logical level, but they're also subject to extremes in other aspects, most notably their passions. I think the Lion exemplifies that, albeit in a rather negative light for himself and his Legion

 

...especially stands out to me.

 

I agree with it, but I think it's a failing on BL's part to not emphasize the positive affects of this a bit more. The Lion defeated another Primarch 1:1 (Curze), and--as far as I can tell from what's been told so far--the Dark Angels are the only Legion to outright defeat another Legion (Night Lords) in a straight-up, 1:1, near-Legion-strength fight. Also, the I Legion is pretty much the most intact Legion of them all around the Siege of Terra, right? They took casualties at Thramas and in the Ruinstorm, but otherwise are ok. They have not had their Prospero, or Calth, or Istvaan, or Signus, etc...

 

So, for better and worse, it works for the Lion. The scoreboard speaks for itself and that is all the motivation the Lion needs (from his perspective).

 

 

I think that the Lion has bought into what Curze foresaw and genuinely believes that Hourus has/will inevitably win and lies about the beacon being extinguished to Holguin and Redloss; it would look bad to them if he didn’t at least *try* to get to Terra, but he “knows” it will be futile so needs a reason not to go.

 

That doesn't seem to reconcile with the Lion we see at Terra blaming Russ. It seems strange that he gives up on Terra then at some point does an about face and races back to Terra with Russ, arriving late, and nearly killing Russ for delaying him. Unless he is just lashing out at Russ to cover for his own inability to arrive in time to save the Emperor. Which I guess would be in character. Hopefully they find some way to tie those two different depictions together

 

 

This is me attempting to psycho-analyze Lion El'Jonson and think as he may be thinking:

 

In El'Jonson's mind, there could be a correlation between Russ's brawl on Dulan and Russ's assault on Horus, thus why he is so mad at Russ for "being late." Perhaps to the Lion, Russ is a brash brute who charges in without considering the negative consequences of actions motivated by egotistical needs. On Dulan, the Lion waited patiently for Russ to claim the king's head for himself, but when it became tactically and strategically untenable to wait any longer, the Lion went in and did it himself. With Terra, the Lion might see Russ's "need" to launch a futile decapitation strike against Horus as another act of petty vainglory. When the VI Legion is consequently mauled and kept out of the Siege of Terra, the Lion sees this as a "well, that's what you get for doing something so stupid!" kind of result and blames Russ for initiating the action of which the consequence was not being present to save their Father.

 

...in many ways, it's a compliment of sorts to Russ. "You idiot, if only you had been there, we would have had a smashing victory!" Yet also, it's very telling of the Lion himself. It seems in some ways as if the Lion has a lot more in common with Russ then he would ever care to admit...both want glory and to be the favored sons above all else and it makes them seethe when they bungle opportunities to actually do that. And they bungle those opportunities precisely by trying to achieve that masterstroke. 

 

And I think part of the "secret" to El'Jonson is that--despite his cold logic and talk of efficiency--he wanted the head of the King of Dulan for himself. He relished the chance to show up a brother, albeit in a humble brag "well, I waited for you, brother" sort of way. And I think he sees Russ's strike in Wolfsbane with through a lens of envy: that's precisely what he would have done, but of course he would have done it better and would have succeeded. Just like on Dulan.

 

Therefore, I think the extermination of traitor homeworlds is a consolation prize. No more dealing with brothers, no more compromises. Do what he does best on his own unfettered. If he can't stab directly at Horus then he will stab at Horus' homeworld and secretly hope that maybe that draws Horus out.

 

"Hell, I know I'm a prima donna — I admit it! What I can't stand about Monty is he won't admit it!"

-General George S. Patton, Patton

 

In this case, I imagine Patton to be Russ and Montgomery to be the Lion.

 

The Lion was a boy lost in the wilderness on Caliban, left to rely on himself. What has changed?

 

***********************

 

The fact that he is tricky to figure out, so conflicted, and takes so much effort to understand is precicely what makes Lion El'Jonson one of the most interesting Primarchs to me. One of the reasons I am dying for ForgeWorld's depiction of him.

[DarkChaplain]

I'm not sure I'd agree on the First being in such great shape that late in the game. Thramas bled them, though they triumphed. According to Tymell's compiled timeline (which is awesome, as always!), the Thramas Crusade took them around two and a half years before they even ended up with Tuchulcha on Perditus, after which they had many run-ins with the Death Guard under Typhon, and he sent Corswain with a good chunk back to Caliban to replenish their ranks for the first time in probably over a decade. Remember, Luther and co were recruiting thousands of Dark Angels initiates, which were never picked up by anyone.

 

They were still in reasonably good shape, comparatively, when they arrived at Macragge, but they also just had Curze rampaging through the Invincible Reason, and when he escaped, things weren't pretty either. By that point, the Shadow Crusade was still running, and the Lion contributed his Legion as lord protector for years, and lost another good part of his ships and sons during the attempt to reach Terra in Ruinstorm.

 

By the time of Dreadwing, we know that the Invincible Reason is barely functional, with the entire remaining fleet (which isn't too impressive compared to Great Crusade standards, either) being undermanned, with holes in the chain of command of the wings, a lack of fuel and ordnance. They were restocking what they could at various forgeworlds, but they never replenished Legionaries throughout the entire Heresy. They weren't as broken as the Wolves or Raven Guard, I'd say, but they certainly suffered. Where Guilliman was able to recruit rapidly all across Ultramar, the First Legion's recruitment from Caliban basically crept to a halt when Luther was banished. The one attempt he made, sending Corswain, didn't go so well, both due to the reception the emissary got in Aldurukh and due to Calas Typhon.

 

Overall, though, I agree that a bunch of Legions didn't get their proper dues throughout the series, most notably the Loyalists. The Thramas Crusade was basically handled in short stories and novellas only, Ferrus Manus and the Iron Tenth had their supposed final novel canceled / merged into Old Earth, and Ferrus never had his own stand-alone novel before losing his head. But in many ways, the Heresy is a grand tragedy, and I think the Lion fits into it pretty well. It's not all that difficult to follow the trajectory of his Legion and the civil war within it.

 

I'm definitely looking forward to the Lion's Primarchs novel. I honestly wouldn't mind Guymer getting a shot at it. I think he nailed the tension inherent within the Legion this late into the Heresy.

[Phoebus]

I'm highly disinclined to believe that the Lion is simply lying about the Astronomican, at any rate.

I would be, as well. I didn’t get that impression from Dreadwing at all. I simply think his jumping to conclusions as to what the Astronomican going out means makes for poor writing.

 

... I doubt he'd be using Tuchulcha as liberally as he is shown here. He decided to use the daemon engine again after the light went out, which makes sense. Why he wouldn't just tell his "little brothers"?

I don’t think there’s any need for the Lion to say anything about Tuchulcha to anyone he doesn’t trust sufficiently. On the other hand, let’s not set the bar for Tuchulcha’s usage too high. The Lion wasn’t worried about using it to secure victory in the Thramas Sector, or to pierce the Ruinstorm to get to Ultramar. Using Tuchulcha to reunite his legion and deal Horus’s actual forces even more significant losses than Guilliman was able to would have been strategically far more meaningful than merely extricating himself from Thramas. Ascertaining the Emperor’s fate (and, at the same time, that of more than one legion) at such a crucial juncture would likewise have been far more important than determining Guilliman’s disposition.

 

I don’t want to come off as too blunt, but as things stand Tuchulcha has been nothing more than a Deux Ex Machina to get the Lion from one plot line to another. Thorpe, Haley, and Guymer shouldn’t be singled out for that, but they should be criticized for the warp engine not merely being an arbitrary plot device, but not even bothering to provide an explanation for its use and non-use.

 

The Lion has always doubled down on mistakes. He is exceptionally unapologetic and cannot for the life of him bow down and admit he has erred, even to his foster father, or his brothers. He did once on Macragge, and that's about it. He compounds his errors by making more, tangling himself up further while being too proud to even just take a step back. That much is evident in his battlefield strategies as well - he is arrogantly moving into reach of a ship that could cripple the Invincible Reason, understaffed, low on fuel and armaments as it was already, with big chunks of it under lockdown. When disaster strikes, he takes it from there, as if nothing had gone wrong to begin with. He makes bad calls that his Legionaries are suspicious of, in this instance Stenius, and it costs crew lives, yet in the end, they dare not speak up and pull him back down to earth.

I wholeheartedly agree. Forget “is he suitable for the office of Warmaster” for a second, though. My issue with the Lion’s depiction isn’t that he makes mistakes or doubles down on them; it’s the types of mistakes that he makes that strike me a poorly-considered writing.

 

I'm not sure I'd agree on the First being in such great shape that late in the game. Thramas bled them, though they triumphed. According to Tymell's compiled timeline (which is awesome, as always!), the Thramas Crusade took them around two and a half years before they even ended up with Tuchulcha on Perditus, after which they had many run-ins with the Death Guard under Typhon, and he sent Corswain with a good chunk back to Caliban to replenish their ranks for the first time in probably over a decade. Remember, Luther and co were recruiting thousands of Dark Angels initiates, which were never picked up by anyone.

This is another instance where the absence of data doesn’t exactly help the reader or the story.

 

Here’s what we do know about the Dark Angels. As of “Savage Weapons”, shortly before the end of the Thramas Crusade, the Dark Angels were “one of the last loyal Legions left at full strength in the Imperium.” The Night Lords had not bled them; point of fact, it is qualified that they actively avoided the Dark Angels. As seen in Prince of Crows, Tuchulcha enabled the Lion to trap the Night Lords and destroy between a fourth and a fifth of that legion before the survivors fled. The Dark Angels suffered minimal losses in that battle.

 

Subsequently, the Lion took a token force to Ultramar — just around 20,000 warriors. Corswain appears to have been left in command of the rest of the Legion, but, prior to the events of “By the Lion’s Command,” he scattered them throughout the galaxy to engage the enemy and try to locate Leman Russ. From that point on, very little is known about the Dark Angels’ strategic disposition. Belath’s force, which Corswain sent to Caliban to requisition Luther’s Dark Angels, is the only one that we have any direct knowledge of. In “Exocytosis”, Typhon reveals that Corswain’s force came close to ending his Death Guard fleet, but no real details are given.

 

So really, while we know that the Lion’s own command has been depleted by the events of Dreadwing, we don’t really have any idea of what his Legion’s state is anymore.

[b1soul]

BL has a tendency to, IMO, needlessly complicate the flow of events

 

Wolfsbane and Dreadwing feel equally pointless to me

[TheRealMcCagh]

Which novel or short covers the Lion sending Corswain away? I remember him being there in Savage Weapons, then gone by Unremembered Empire (or maybe just unmentioned). Was he in the short where the Lion captures the Tuchulcha engine?

[DarkChaplain]

Corswain was in The Lion, where the Lion meets Typhon and Tuchulcha. His absence was explained in By the Lion's Command, found in War Without End nowadays

[N1SB]

What a great discussion for so short a book. And on that note, I love this new novella format, a fellow player at my Warhammer Store described it as "Goosebumps for Warhammer", and I lol'd.

 

Great analysis of the Lion, by the book and you guys. Great comparison with Montgomery. I love it.

 

You know, like a lot of comics/films these days, it deconstructs stuff that we grew up with. In this case, it's the Dark Angels. However, I really found them more interesting now than before.

 

The Lion and Redloss seem to be going with this "if we can't have it, YOU CAN'T have it" attitude towards Horus and the Imperium. I really want to do a Dark Angels successor or something descended from Dreadwing now. I think the Star Phantoms are hinted to be what they became.

[Robbienw]

Its possible the angels of vengeance are descended from the dreadwing, their 1st company is called the dreadwing

[LordOfIron]

I think the Dreadwing either become the Angels of Vengeance or the Star Phantoms. Potentially via a schism and the Star Phantoms go into hiding. 

[deepsix81]

Anybody know if/when the Corswain and/or Caliban storylines will be resolved? Are they scheduled for mention in the Death Guard novel?

[Tymell]

Anybody know if/when the Corswain and/or Caliban storylines will be resolved? Are they scheduled for mention in the Death Guard novel?

 

As far as I know, there's no mention of them coming up on The Buried Dagger. It's possible Corswain may be mentioned/seen, since he was seen on the hunt for Typhus, but I believe Caliban's end doesn't occur until post-Heresy, so we're unlikely to see that resolved within the series anyway.

[b1soul]

I'd rather leave the DA out of Swallow's hands...

[Nashnir]

I have yet to utterly dislike any Dark Angel novel, but I have decided to stop reading any future releases till I feel like their characterization is improved.

The title Buried Dagger unfortunately perfectly describes the characterization of the Dark Angels at this point.

Once the tip broke through the skin, the following conspirators just drove it in deeper.

 

At this point I want CW, ABD or GH to take charge of the dark angels simply due to the fact that I like their characters and ability to completely redo the image of the subject matter they handle.

We know the Dark Angels as a whole have a large part to play post Siege with Chaos making a desperate attempt to gain foothold using Caliban.

Question is; will we have a good, complex and fleshed out Dark Angels and Lion by then or will they just keep driving the dagger in deeper.

Edited December 7, 2018 by Nashnir

[Rob P]

I've literally only read the first part of the first chapter of this book and the word usage is already peeing me off in the space of 200 or less word.

 

Words I don't have a clue about the meaning of:

Bocage

Bowering

Casemate

Portieres

 

This leaves two options - learn the meaning words and make reading a chore - or - just keep reading and accept that I don't exactly get it. Well, you might say that you have this choice anytime you read a book with a word in you don't understand and that is true. But a smattering of them is just annoying.

 

What a frustrating start to a book that has a great blurb. It removes the pleasure.

[Manchu warlord]

I've literally only read the first part of the first chapter of this book and the word usage is already peeing me off in the space of 200 or less word.

 

Words I don't have a clue about the meaning of:

Bocage

Bowering

Casemate

Portieres

 

This leaves two options - learn the meaning words and make reading a chore - or - just keep reading and accept that I don't exactly get it. Well, you might say that you have this choice anytime you read a book with a word in you don't understand and that is true. But a smattering of them is just annoying.

 

What a frustrating start to a book that has a great blurb. It removes the pleasure.

Guymer must have recently discovered the Thesaurus website, and decided to be pretentious and use exactly words us mere mortals wouldn't understand.

[Manchu warlord]

At the very end where the Watchers were speaking to one another, saying: ‘The Angels will have a part to play yet, come the end of it all.’ ‘Perhaps, but I fear that the destruction of Caliban is our last hope for the future now. It will be the final blow that sunders them. Is even the Lion willing to commit such an act?’ The Watchers pondered the ineffable as the first war of the Fallen played out, a tessellation in the repeating pattern of the mosaic. One alone amongst them turned his hooded gaze upward, looking for the spread of stars known colloquially as the Iron Corridor. ‘I do not think that will be a problem'

To me, I interpret this to mean that the Lion knows, and he - though it will break his heart - has allowed (or is arranging) the fall Caliban, in order to deliver the "final blow that sunders them".

Edited April 6, 2019 by Manchu warlord

[rendingon1+]

Finished it some time ago, but couldn't find this thread. This novel had such a potential but from the second half is standard DA bull:cuss written by author who has no no idea what to do with DA. Further characterization of Holguin and Redloss, their respective Wings, inter legion politics and doubts about current course of action - that was great. I really enjoyed it.

Everything goes to hell with appearance of the Lion - here we go back to a string of nonsenscial reasoning and decision making on the part of the primarch a'la Gav the Defilier Thorpe fiction.

From now on I will download BL books I suspect are rubbish and if I like them will pay for them.

[DarkChaplain]

That's the impression I got way back when during The Primarchs, or specifically, The Lion. The entire last paragraph is him "talking" to the Watchers, although we only read his words, not theirs. He responds to information he could not have on his own, during the Thramas Crusade, to the point of commenting on Guilliman's plans for Imperium Secundus, long before he even gets close to Ultramar, with the Ruinstorm still up and running.

 

The last lines in particular are:

 

 

‘No, it is too important,’ said the primarch. ‘Even if what you say is true, I cannot return to Caliban yet. Come what may, I have to stop Horus and Guilliman.’

The small figure bowed its head, and the Lion did the same, his whisper full of sorrow.

‘Yes, even if it costs me my Legion.’

 

So we know for certain that Lion El'Jonson knows that Caliban is at risk, as is his Legion at home, and that he considers it the lesser evil. During the hunt for the Lion aboard the Invincible Reason in Dreadwing, we also see that the Watchers are very much around and most assuredly still communicating with El'Jonson, seeing how they're close to his sanctum...

 

And while he dispatched Corswain to deal with Calas Typhon (another thing that The Buried Dagger completely ignored, despite getting the reader into Typhon's head, and the sparring lasting years....), he did not send his own delegation to Caliban. Corswain himself later sent Belath and co there, which is the only contact we know of between the Lion's Dark Angels and those under Luther.

 

Extrapolating from these points, we may assume that the Lion also knows that in Angels of Caliban, the returning DAs got to blows with Luther, in addition to Astelan's previous purges as per Master of the First. When he refuses to return home to resupply, we can be reasonably certain that he doesn't just do this out of sheer stubborness, but also because he is well aware that there's little to come home to - or rather, that he'd be walking into a conflict that may further fracture his Legion, one where he may well be outnumbered, seeing how long Luther has been recruiting, and that he'd be tied up for long enough to be entirely irrelevant to the Heresy's remaining blows. Where his subordinates are lost and confused about his decision, to the Lion, it may be a mix of shame at having let it come that far, with an acceptance that he has to write Caliban off as lost for now, with the option of taking it back under control once the galactic civil war is over. It's not a priority to fix, but also not something he can admit to his underlings (or "little brothers") as a personal failing, and even one he invited through his own choices early into the war, and his fixation on Curze.

[Manchu warlord]

 

 

And while he dispatched Corswain to deal with Calas Typhon (another thing that The Buried Dagger completely ignored, despite getting the reader into Typhon's head, and the sparring lasting years....), he did not send his own delegation to Caliban. Corswain himself later sent Belath and co there, which is the only contact we know of between the Lion's Dark Angels and those under Luther.

 

 

I think it is because in the short story, Exocytosis (which can be found in the Heralds of the Siege anthology), Swallow mentions how Typhon - with the aid of Luther and his men - is recovering and repairing his force at Zaramund after being chased by the Hound, Corswain.  This short story takes place right after Angels of Caliban, from Typhon's part, that is, and before The Buried Dagger.  Thus, perhaps, it is not required to re-mention Typhon's chase by Corswain.

 

Also, in The Buried Dagger, it was nice to see the re-mentioning of the DA's being the ones responsible for Barbarus' death.

 

One thing I didn't appreciate and didn't quite understand, was why the Lion had to betray the (loyal?) Mechanicus forces and imprison their leader.

[Fedor]

I wonder how they are going to finish the Caliban arc. I'm guessing it will get its own book rather than show up at the end of the siege series, but under what series heading?.