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So i was talking fluff with my friend the other day, a dark angels player. When talking about his army (which i am not entirely informed about) i mentioned (what i thought was accepted fluff) that Lion 'el was "in stasis" at the bottom of the rock. he said it was Luther, and claimed that Lion 'el is actually now playing the part of Cypher. It seemed far-fetched to me but not knowing the fluff all to well i left it at that. what is the case, are we both wrong, is he right or am I?

Well, your friend was half-right. IIRC Luther is being held prisoner at the heart of the Rock, while the Lion himself, according to Luther [who had gone insane after the fight], was carried away, and one day he will return to forgive the sins of the Fallen and Luther.

I've never heard of the Lion playing the part of cypher. I heard that Luther is being held prisoner in the rock and that even deeper in the rock, in an unaccessable chamber, Lion El'Johnson either sleeps or is in stasis.

The basis of the dark angels background is that Luther turned to chaos when Lion el Johnson rushed to help the emperor confront Horus. The Lion returned to the rock, and the chapter fleet fell under attack from Calibran's surface batteries. Lion el Johnson teleported down and fought his way to Luther. Luther mortally wounded Lion el Johnson, but went insane when he realised what he had done.

Lion el Johnson was carried away by the watchers in the rock - direct quote from the codex (from Luther). Luther is now in statis and each new dark angels chapter master attempts to make him repent. But he only repeats that one day the lion will return and forgive him...

but are the watchers in the dark an official part of the legion? do the MiD (marines in dresses) even know that their beloved primarch is down there?

According to Descent of Angels, the watchers in the dark are benevolent warp creatures.

Theres nothing in Descent of Angels that states the Watchers in the Dark are "benevolent warp creatures"!

If you do a wikipedia search for Dark Angels its states that the only person who knows (possibly) that the Lion is "sleeping" deep within the Rock is the Emperor!

How trusting Wikipedia is for such "arcane" knowledge, I don't know....

In the new book, it states that lion el took the troops he trusted and left the rest with luthor. Well luthor never got any replies from earth when it came under attack, and simply built up his defenses on caliban. A long time went by with no information given to luthor, so he was worried the emperor had lost. When lion el came back and dident answer his hails, he assumed lion el had joined chaos and opened fire on him. Lion el coming under fire assumed luthor joined chaos as he was attacking him. They fought, then fought on the battlefield. Once both learned of there mistake, it drove luthor insane (and this is the great shame dark angels hide, but none of the newer angels know, only the oldest, including the cypher) The great shame is they attacked each other mercilesly blaming their brothers of treachery to the emperor, basically they killed each other for no good reason. Luthor was locked up and lion el left on important missions, he was later severly wounded by a chaos primarch and put in suspension, as the emperor was the only one with knowledge on how to do surgery on the primarchs. Half of the fleeing dark angels that are hunted are still loyal to the emperor and fight his battles across the universe, the other half did get driven to chaos. Cypher is actually a title not the name of cypher, he is there chief records man. When the cypher dies the job is passed to another. The reason he is hunted is he wishes to expose the truth to exonorate the brothers held in prison, even though they are loyal. The dark angels are told to hunt there brothers that they went to chaos, which is a huge cover up to retain whats left of there honor. They arent killed if loyal, merely captured and kept in the rock with luthor until the lion and emperor come to exaunorate them. Which aint happening now. And that is acording to the book the big dark angels secret. Kinda a let down.

TLDR: neither side of dark angels were traitors, and when they found out they had been attacking loyal brothers, it brought them great shame that they hide to this day.

I like the new version better. To me it makes the whole unforgiven thing make a lot more sense. I mean thats real shame. Some of your legion turn traitor, thats embarrassing. You waged war on your brothers for no reason, thats a dark secret.

@Orock

WTF....is this an alternative you've cooked up? are you trying to pass this off as some kinda "fact"....cause if so, thats the biggest load of ........ I've ever read!!!

I suggest everyone who cares, get hold of a DA Codex and check out what the fluff really states!

Delephont wrote:@Orock

WTF....is this an alternative you've cooked up? are you trying to pass this off as some kinda "fact"....cause if so, thats the biggest load of ........ I've ever read!!!

I suggest everyone who cares, get hold of a DA Codex and check out what the fluff really states!

Actually, don't be too hasty before pointing fingers.

What Orock just said mimics exactly what I was told by a member of my gaming group who has read that novel cover-to-cover.
Have you read it?


Eric

Yes, I have read the book! Why don't you read the reviews above to find out that the book doesn't even touch on the DA return to Caliban, let alone the drivel about who is chaos tainted or not.....

Seriously, spend £10 and invest in the Codex! Why listen to some pointless hearsay, when the answer is staring you blatantly in the face....

If you're too tight to stretch to £10, then I suggest five minutes on Wikipedia, or even Gamesworkshops homepage....

...it'll save you looking like a plum, and completely trying to re-write/re-package a product thats been clearly packaged!

Delephont is correct. In fact in the codex, its suggested that the watchers in the dark are in fact the manifested guilt of the chapter! Imagine that, being so guilty it becomes corperal.

Have a look in the codex. Don't judge just according to books. The codex is in fact the official history of the chapter/race.

If I remember, according to the Black Library books, all a lone Tau warrior needs to have in order to defeat a cruiser full of marines is a supply of grenades to throw at them as he encounters them, destroying whole squads at a time. Do not trust fluff from the Library!

The lion is in the deepest chamber of the rock and only the emp knows this. Read the 2nd edition of DA.

As for the atchers they are mentioned in desent of angels. Dont take stuff of wiky and qoute it. Unless its in a GW codex or publication then its not cannon.

Theres nothing in Descent of Angels that states the Watchers in the Dark are "benevolent warp creatures"!

It actually does. If you'll remember when Zahariel went on his quest to hunt the lion the watchers talked to and reveal themselves to him. They talked about existence in another realm and their hatred of the evil powers of the warp.

I will admit that I assumed they were warp creatures because of the way they were described. It seemed to be implied that they were trans-dimensional, creatures that hated the evils of the warp. Since the only other dimension I've ever heard of in 40k is the Warp, it seemed to me that the Watchers were implied Benevolent Warp Creatures.

The only other explanation I can get from the book is that they are creatures that exist halfway between the warp and reality. If this is the case then perhaps they aren't benevolent warp creatures but are instead Benevolent Pseudo-Warp Creatures.

In fact in the codex, its suggested that the watchers in the dark are in fact the manifested guilt of the chapter! Imagine that, being so guilty it becomes corperal

Descent of Angels doesn't discredit this theory and in fact might actually support it. Time in the warp is different than time in reality. Because Caliban has a natural warp rift, it's not unreasonable that the guilt of the DA could have manifested itself as the watchers. If this is the case, because of how time is altered in the warp, perhaps these guilty manifestations were able to speak with Zahariel. This would also imply that when the watchers say that Zahariel has already been touched, they might be referring to a future roll he may have in Luther's Betrayal. All the talk of choosing the easy path they warn him against might be the watchers warning him about a roll he'll play in this future betrayal.

My first inclination was that they were referring to his psycher prowess. When they said he was touched, I thought they were referring to his psychic powers. And when they warned him not to choose the easy path, I thought they were warning him against using those powers.

The other possibilities this discussion has brought forward are very interesting and have actually increased the appeal of the future DA horus heresy book.

Hmmm...

If the Watchers are benevolent warp creatures watching over Caliban's natural rift, why are they still there following Caliban's "destruction"?

Did the rift survive?

ie Does the Rock have an open warp portal?


Also, Why do the watchers watch only that opening?

Is it possible that they caused it?

Also also, never believe a xenos. Just cause they say they hate chaos, doesn't mean they do....

Again brothers, disregard Descent of Angles all together as I forewarned everyone in my critique that it adds nothing of value to the DA's long and storied history.
Silly book has nothing substantial to add to the heresy and is quite pointless actually.

Actually, ORock did a fairly accurate and unbiased rendition of the events that I've gathered from many sources (from 2nd edition forward). The new DA codex is definitely "revisionist" in its retelling of the DA destruction of Caliban and what happened to the fallen.

Good Job Orock!!

That is a very interesting avatar, Dragonlady

Again brothers, disregard Descent of Angles all together as I forewarned everyone in my critique that it adds nothing of value to the DA's long and storied history.
Silly book has nothing substantial to add to the heresy and is quite pointless actually.

I'm going to admit that my knowledge of the Dark Angles is limited to Descent of Angels and Wikipedia, so the breadth of my knowledge of the Dark Angels does not span the same amount of lore of more venerable DA fans. However, I think that the Horus Heresy series is an honest attempt to fill in the details of the Horus Heresy. All the books in this series are more important to the fluff of the 40k universe than other 40k fiction because these books are fleshing out a history that been described in limited detail for the last 20 years. As bad as Descent of Angels is, and it is complete garbage from a literary sense, it is part of the Horus Heresy series and therefore has as much relevance to the extention of the fluff as any of the other books in this series. Descent of Angels is a first hand account of the history of the DA and as far as I can see it hasn't discredited any of the accepted history of the DA, simply added to it.

Descent of angels is possobly a First hand account by marine who may become a fallen or cyper himself, just like angels of darkness was a first hand account of a fallen . Just as the Da deny what the fallen say so will the DA fans deny these books as useless

REMEMBER the LION is in the deepest chamber in the rock