The wolves arze also the only chapter to know about the grey knight since the first battle of armagedon, but they have pay a heavy price for the knowledge.

Space Wolves are one off the most popular chapter and lots of events had been put in their background, and then are far more "knowledgeable" than the other Space Marine chapter.

It is unfair, but more canon than more.

The Dark Angels don't even suffer the Inquisition to know of the fallen. They have destroyed entire Inquisition void ships in order to keep their past a secret. They also have the closest relationships to their successor chapters, which are all also bent on keeping this secret.

I've always wondered if they might be overestimating the importance of the secret being kept, but because of their numbers, I doubt any force in the Imperium could prevent them from keeping it at this point.

They're only overestimating it's importance in light of the "new" fluff being thrown out about the Horus Heresy.

When Codex: Angels of Death was released in the 90s (the first time the Dark Angels got their own book, even if it was split with Blood Angels) then there was no mention, none, of any Legion "partially" going traitor. 100% of the World Eaters, Death Guard, Iron Warriors etc turned traitor. There was no concept of Marines like Loken or Garro - individuals from traitor legions who were still loyal. The idea was that either the entire legion turned, or none of them did.

That sounds really simplistic until you remember that the entire point of the Space Marines is that they are basically genetic clones (albeit watered down) of their Primarch, so "flawed" Primarchs who fell to Chaos would produce equally flawed Marines, and "pure" Primarchs would produce equally pure offspring. Combine that with all the brainwashing that Marines undergo, and it wasn't unreasonable to assume that an entire legion would fall with no individuals dissenting.

Therefore, at the time it was written, it was a *huge* thing that the Dark Angels lost almost half their legion to Chaos. As in, completely unheard of. Things like the Sons of Horus wiping out an entire company worth of "undesirable elements" hadn't even been conceived.

It'll be interesting to see how their fluff gets developed with their new codex - we'll get a lot more detail about the specifics that we've never seen before, I'm sure.

Switching back to the topic at hand…

How 'Friendly' the two chapters are is up to you, however since this is just a solitary one meeting a group of space wolves, its quite likely they wouldn't perform the ritual at all.

But since you want them to, assumably a first blood should be sufficient. Primitive weapons and no armor, or Chain weapons and armor. May want to restrain bonus damage from a rolled 10, no righteous wrap, zealous anger, or mild aggravation. The fight could end when one person goes down to Heavily wounded (Since we have no reason to think this is a fight to the death). You could include other cut offs if you want. The combatants WOULD likely strike at full power, with all talents. The GOAL may not be death, but given what we do know about marines (How grave matters of honor are, how resiliant they are, how silly they can get about tradition… ) it isn't hard to imagen them fighting with their full abilities. Not likely to use Psychic powers though, as neither Primarch had access to those.

As for the ritual itself, especially since it seems the wolves would be conducting most of it, a grand retelling of the tale of the first fight they are set to honor sounds right. The fight itself would likely have a generously sized ring, and the fight itself may start with a short prayer, and possibly be followed by drink and cheers if you want them to be amiable.

As a side note, if the character manages to defeat the Space Wolves Champion (Who may be an actual chapter champion, or simply the best fighter present) one would expect that would put him on good terms with them, at least in the short term (Possibly receiving bonuses to social checks, a gift, ect. What ever you feel is appropriate.)

As a side note, "Assumably" is evidently not a recognized word according to this board. Neither is "Primarch."

Narratively the Space Wolf/Dark Angels conflicts gives you an awesome platform to foster an odd couple bromance of epic proportions.

gradea said:

Leman Russ used a shout/growl/roar thing that had widespread psychic effects.

That's not psychic it is psychological.

First he is a primarch to be in his presence alone make people feel little, fragile, nothing…. 'even Astartes.

Second it's a primarch with a lot of nasty teeths sharp and a bit too big… Making him looking quite a predator aimal.

Third humans are animals even Astartes, Custodes and Primarch (even if their humanity is quite different) and as animal we instinctively react to some stimulus and physical domination had always work fine.

Fourth add all those point and imagine a Werewolf almost 3 meters high, thousand kilos, raging, in a full offence posture and growling at you little baby sheep… Now imagine the heird behind you, what do they feel like…

Pretty bad…

Thebigjul said:

In Thousand Sons it's presented as something the psychically aware members of the Thousand Sons can feel from beyond the range of hearing. I'm not convinced it isn't a psychic effect.

It's also important to note that most of the Primarchs show some psychic ability even if it's not fully trained. Fulgrim, Lorgar, Kurze, and Sanguinus are all examples, and it's fully possible that all of them have subconscious psychic ability. This is where I'd place the roar of Russ - as a subconscious psychic bolstering of the sounds his body can make.

So here's how it went:

I told the Dark Angel player that he can either pick who to challenge, or he could pick the manner of the trial. He picked his opponent…the biggest Space Wolf in the room. The Space Wolf accepted the challenge and chose "Holmgang" as the manner of trial.

I adopted much from Polaria's suggestion on how "Holmgang" works. I restricted them to standing on a large wolf skin, stripped down to the waist, and armed with a primitive shield and primitive hand weapon of their choice. I gave the shield 20 wounds each (usually took two hits to shatter). Each combatant had three shields to go through. The player picked a sword. The Space Wolf chose an axe. The challenged Space Marine was granted first strike. So each turn went like this:

1. Challenged space marine rolls to attack. If the attack hits, the target may either Dodge, or parry with a shield or weapon. If the target successfully parries with his shield, roll for damage (standard weapon damage plus strength and Talent/Trait bonuses).

2. Challenger attacks, defender parries or dodges.

3. Repeat until someone either gives up, passes out due to damage, or falls off the wolf skin. I had the players roll a Toughness test with a modifier based on the number of critical hits they had received to see if they pass out and fall off wolf skin.

It was possible to die, but I made it clear that deliberately killing your opponent would result in a loss of honor. However, if a marine died because they refused to give up, that was on them.

In addition, I allowed the Dark Angel player to pay 100xp to take Ritual Duel Fighter (RoB, pg77), but he had to agree to live with the actual result of the duel instead of rolling randomly.

For the record, the player lost, but because he was the first to issue the challenge, challenged the biggest Space Wolf in the room, both combatants lost all three shields, and he fought till he took his first critical damage, there was no honor lost. This meant Result #2. Therefore, he lost the use of his Chapter Trapping until he has an opportunity to duel again. However, his opponent was so impressed with his melee prowess that he gave him a wolf tail from his banner that acts as a Charm and grants +5 Fellowship when dealing with Space Wolves. The player was a Dark Angel Librarian fighting against a Wolf Guard. [Hey, I didn't tell him to pick the biggest mo-fo in the room!]

Bottom line: Everyone loved it. It wasn't over too quickly and no one died, but the possibility was there. There were ethical decisions as well as the player contemplated cheating, i.e. using his psychic powers.

My thanks to all of you for your awesome suggestions and debate. Respect!

Congratulations!

That should have been a great time in the game. Well done.

It might be easiest to simply read what is read in the Rites of War book under the "Ritual Duel Fighter" deed. As it stands, the two groups will usually send a champion to meet each other on the eve of battle and they'll fight unarmed but fully armored. With that in mind, I'd say a battle based on a point system (X number of hits, keeping an opponant grappled while maintaining the superior grappling position, or fighting until their fatigue forces unconciousness) would suffice quite well. However, as champions of the Astartes, I highly doubt either group would shirk away from a close quarters battle with sword or knife. A battle to first blood would still take time and effort and it's highly unlikely they'd die from the combat.

Plus, who wouldn't want to be in the middle of this: http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_lkvwveNPdi1qeeo82o1_500.png

Xeldrakka said:

That cool