Ho Ho Ho, Heretic!

Hello!

Praise the Allfather, the Great Wolf has arrived!

As usual, the majority of the Grimdark WIPs are not on Patreon anymore.  But community members can still access the latest WIPs as mentioned in previous posts.  Just to be thorough, community members will receive an email with the access information as well.

So I'm sure Logan Grimnar needs no introduction to Grimdark fans. He is the current Great Wolf (Chapter Master) of the Rout (Space Wolves) and one of the Big Three Space Marines, the others being Marneus Calgar and Dante. Beyond being an absolute monster in combat and racking up a bunch of legendary victories, Logan Grimnar also holds several historical achievements.

Before becoming Chapter Master, he actually campaigned with Macharius, the second Alexander the Great in the Grimdark universe. Big E is canonically the actual Alexander the Great in our history. 😲

But I'd say Logan Grimnar is most famous for spanking the Inquisition after all the fallout that came from First War of Armageddon. Here's real time footage of said event. Now the Months of Shame is a huge mess but I will say that the Inquisition had a legitimate concern that Chaos could contaminate neighboring star systems. The problem was how they went about solving this situation which really rubbed Wolves the wrong way. Could diplomacy have solved this problem? Maybe, but in this story no such characters exist, most of them just seemed more interested in pouring promethium over the situation.

Honestly, I'm not really sure how I feel about the Emperor's Gift as I question a lot of decisions made in that storyline. But that horrible inquisitor getting curb stomped? Yes, very satisfying.

Now normally when people get on the Inquisition's naughty list, they get a fatal case of Ork Snipers. But hilariously, the Inquisition actually got more buggered the harder they tried to punish the Space Wolves. There's some funny excerpts I remember from Blood of Asaheim where a bunch of characters from the Inquisition are hard coping with how badly they screwed up with the Wolves.

Some basically tried to wash their hands of the whole affair and mutter how insane it was to try and fight a First Founding Chapter. Others double downed, became raving lunatics and ended up killing themselves in their futile quest to bring down the Wolves. 😅 So yeah, if your a Grimdark fan who thinks the Inquisition gets too drunk on their frequent power trips then you'll love that Logan Grimnar gave them PTSD.

And the final Logan Grimnar achievement that I think is worth mentioning is the fact that he managed to get the Rout Successor Chapters. This is actually a pretty big deal since the Wolves tried this in the past to disastrous results. So when Big Papa Smurf shows up with Primaris Marines from Russ' lineage and they don't immediately turn into Wulfen, it opens possibilities previous Great Wolfs never had.

Whether you think Primaris Space Marines are a good thing or not, that's up to the individual fan. But the point is Logan Grimnar did give the final okay for them to join the Rout and sanctioned new Successor Chapters, so I'd say that's a feather in the Great Wolf's cap. So in a roundabout way, the Inquisition failed so hard to screw over Space Wolves they ended up giving them Successor Chapters. 😅

Anyways, here's my version of the Great Wolf. I tried to adhere to his general style and I'll probably end up giving him different melee weapon option in the final release. And as promised, he'll also come in his Grimdark Santa version because it's the season and I think fans can do a lot with this meme. 😄

Regarding Stormrider as an actual piece of lore, I can sum up my feelings on it and (Space Wolf helmets) with this.

Now to be clear, I don't think it's ridiculous for a Chapter Master to have their own personal transport. The image of the Khan surfing a Vindicator during the Siege of Terra is awesome. But I'd say too much of the Stormrider lore jumps the shark. Like a hovercraft that has no propulsion and actually needs to be tugged by Thunderwolves? What if they get distracted by a juicy looking Ork? 🤔

Anyways I've designed my version with what I'd like to believe are more sensible options like actual engines and options for an actual pilot. The Great Wolf can still stand on the mag locked platform like a badass but at least now, he doesn't have to rely on two animals who might steer him off course. I will include the wolves for the meme version but only for the meme. 😄

Next up is the Void Dragon! Now this C'tan's proper name is Mag'ladroth and it has a pretty interesting backstory. Like all existing C'tan in current lore, they are basically shards of Star Gods that Necron use like Pokémon when they need to flex on their enemies. Mag'ladroth is also said to have complete mastery of technology and all knowledge/control of machinery.

But the really juicy piece of lore is that many believe Mag'ladroth to be the actual Machine God venerated by the Cult of the Machine of the Adeptus Mechanicus. This goes back to a mythological story referred to in Mechanicum where Big E fought and imprisoned a dragon in medieval times. The story is shrouded in a lot of metaphors but this gist is Big E defeated but couldn't kill the dragon. Instead, Big E announced to a crowd that He would take it away to be imprisoned.

Through lots of oblique sources, it's strongly implied that Big E eventually dragged this entity to Mars as part of His many, many plans to kickstart the Cult Mechanicus. Without getting into too many conspiracies, the Void Dragon might be the Dragon on Mars which has directly influenced the Cult Mechanicus' evolution and their understanding of technology. 😲

There's a lot of evidence supporting this theory like the fact that the vaults on Mars are sealed and even the Fabricator General isn't allowed access, a character in Mechanicus eventually taking up the role of guardian and the fact the Necrons once tried to a futile attack on Mars in the hopes of doing...something, possibly freeing the Dragon of Mars.

Which brings me to how I designed my version of this awesome mysterious being. Like many fans, I expected the Void Dragon to look to have an appearance that vaguely resembled a Dracolich with Necron and mechanical style vitals. To my complete bafflement, we got Dr. Manhattan clone wearing a Daft Punk helmet complete with emoji symbols.

I find this depiction especially egregious due to the story in Mechanicum I just referred to. The lore of Big E fighting the Void Dragon sounds badass on paper and unless the entire medieval crowd was tripping balls, I seriously doubt they saw a badass knight fighting...this. Wow, I'm making myself more angry just thinking about it but the moral of the rant is this. A dragon should look like a dragon, especially if it's described as such in the lore.

So that's what I did, I took the name Void Dragon and brought it to it's logical conclusion in style and appearance. Sometimes that's all that's needed.

Fantasy voting is coming up later this week. Please have you suggestions submitted in the next few days. Thanks!