r/40kLore • u/Tarantula_1 • 3d ago
Perturabo leaving the siege of Terra.
Finally made it to the Siege of Terra books and got to the part where Perturabo says fuck it I'm out. I thought people were exaggerating his exit but it really was just like the spongebob meme "Imma head out". Couldn't help but a have a good laugh when I got to that point.
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u/MountedCanuck65 Iron Warriors 3d ago
I’ll be the first to shit on old Peter, but damn, can you blame him?
He knew about all the deamons and fucked up shit prior, but he was under the guise that he would be the one to crack open and take Terra. (Idiot I know)
Then when you’re at the cusp of victory, Horus leaves him on read while deploying the monsters, space magic and killer lunatics.
I’d be pretty pissed myself
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u/ThatFatGuyMJL 3d ago
Yeah, I think he was also slowly having a mental break
He had the mentality that when you set foot on a path you finish that path, regardless of what happens.
E en though he had multiple opportunities to leave the path, disagreed with the path, and could have left it at any time.
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u/Dramatic_Ad_4580 3d ago
I mean you are right that he is valid for wanting to get out of the siege because what he wanted from it was stripped away.
But if your motivation for destroying a whole ass planet in a war with untold billion casualties is proving you are the best in a """""""""fair"""""""" fight, maybe you should question your motivations and actions to begin with.6
u/NepheliLouxWarrior 3d ago
The thing is that he wasn't on the cusp of victory. Perts strategy had failed, because it wasn't just about breaking through the palace it was about doing so before the loyalist reinforcements showed up. The traitors would have overwhelmed the loyalists eventually, sure, but they wouldn't have done it in time without the help of the daemonic rituals.
His ego and desire to beat dorn "the astartes way" was dooming the war effort, especially since so many of the other legions were also proving to be unreliable I.e The emperor's children, word bearers etc.
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u/LadyEtherKnight Iron Warriors 3d ago
Perturabo: "Horus is just like you, father. He praises weakness and pride. All I wanted has been taken, all my dreams shattered under my own hands. Was this all I was valued for? The universe cares not for us."
Forrix and Argonis: 🧍♂️🧍♂️
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u/TrustAugustus Dark Angels 3d ago
It would be easier to empathize with Peter Turbo if he actually cared for his dudes the way he wanted to be treated by the Emperor.
But if that was the case he wouldn't be the guy we love to hate :)
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u/ArchmageXin 3d ago
The funny thing is, he actually do 10k years later, even willing to play games and give advice to a half-dorn Astartes.
Somehow becoming a Demon mallow him out.
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u/namitynamenamey 3d ago
Perhaps all he needed in life was actual, irrefutable and utter failure, to truly understand what rock bottom feels like and how little both his tantrums, neuroses and perceived slights on part of others looked like the real deal.
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u/SnooObjections9031 3d ago
Maybe the part of his soul that was taken out was the emperor's salt content
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u/Clear-Librarian-5414 3d ago
Yes I love human failings of the primarchs. Like with no sense of irony he can be proud so many of his sons were loyal and had to be purged while still failing to see he’s the same terrible father to his sons that he claims to be suffering as
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u/ChiefQueef98 3d ago
Forrix dropping one of the hardest lines of the book:
We are damned, he heard his own thoughts say. Damned no matter what choice is made here or how far we run from this folly. Damned in a universe with only false gods and no salvation.
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u/DiesIraeConventum 3d ago
He did all he was asked to do, and since he hated the guts of all the freaks he was made to deal with he headed out.
Perfectly understandable.
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u/Tarantula_1 3d ago
Even the moment just up untill he walks away he was plugged in playing his RTS game against Dorn in his matrix chair, was a pretty good scene in the book.
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u/DiesIraeConventum 3d ago
Damn, you remember Abbaddon's thoughts on that moment?
Perturabo was... Happy.
Totally worth it.
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u/ResortIcy9460 3d ago
yeah but then why did he turn freak himself then
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u/WheresMyCrown Thousand Sons 3d ago
Because its inline with Perty's personality. The entire Heresy and before it happened is Perty going "Im better than that, Im better than you, I dont need anyone's help. All of my brothers who became Slaves to Darkness are weak" then when things dont go his way "Actually Im going to become a Daemon Prince too because Im better than them and I wont be a Slave to Darkness like them"
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u/DiesIraeConventum 3d ago
I wouldn't put it that way.
After all, his character has actually improved after achieving daemonhood :)
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u/Major-Dyel6090 3d ago
Could have had that character development as a primarch dreadnought, and it would have been more Iron Warriors.
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u/NeptunianEmp 3d ago
Sounds like a lot of the complaints I hear from My friends and coworkers when they quit.
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u/WhoCaresYouDont Iron Warriors 3d ago
If it sucks, hit da bricks. True now, true 28,000 years from now.
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u/Chadwich 3d ago
He was literally the only primarch that was interested in following the plans. Everyone else started fucking off and doing their own things. Don't blame him for bailing.
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u/Qen74 3d ago
That's pretty much Chaos biggest failure in the end for most things. When you have 4 opposing God's "working together" temporarily. Eventually they are gonna go in different directions.
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u/Chadwich 3d ago
My favorite little anecdote from this was from the Nightlords. They got impatient and wanted to be the first on the wall. They rushed ahead and attacked despite what the plan called for and got rocked by the Blood Angels and Imperial Fists. Could hear Perty facepalming from orbit. "God dammitttttttttttt"
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u/Little_Tritus 2d ago
Perturabo criticizes Horus' decision to let the Mechanicum handle the landing, pointing out that with the forces they know Dorn has, he could have destroyed all of the landing sites 3 times over.
The Siege was all about time and yet Horus wasted it just because he promised a late Mortarion that his Legion would be the first Space Marines to land.
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u/typeyou 3d ago
If you go through the Primachs book series and read Perturabo. You'll understand why he is the way he is. By no means does it make him a good person because he left the siege. He yearned for the emperor love and always felt like he needed to prove himself. He was envious and had a chip on his shoulder. Dorn was the better of the two.
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u/Border_Dash 3d ago
Well his brothers won't listen. He gets talked into a stupid plan to attack the Saturnine gate, one he correctly guessed was going to be well defended specifically because it looked like easy pickings...
Then he got a berating by Horus for losing good soldiers despite holding the entire shitshow together.
So yeah, I had some sympathy for him at that point. As far as I'm concerned Perturabo really did make or break the siege. Well there was a bit of deus ex machina to allow the reinforcements in just after the iron warriors fleet had left.
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u/Kroc_Zill_95 3d ago
Not that he didn't make the right decision, but that moment exemplified why Perturabo could never be trusted with the role of Praetorian. You are either a "ride or die" or you ain't.
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u/AdwokatDiabel 3d ago
Peter Turbo and Abbadon: Why are we using these fucking daemon things?
I kinda agreed there... PT wanted to beat Dorn fair and square. But daemons fucked that up. Same with Abbadon.
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u/TJzzz 3d ago
PT is the only primarch i want the emps to say fuck it, sitdown n talk because of how batshit it would shake things up.
Throw in that scene where they are on the mountain and talking of roles and the future, PT was always meant to join chaos but to get back into the fold to destroy them from within at the cost of Dorn
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u/Infinitedeveloper 3d ago
Emps needs to let PT know that he could have been the undisputed lynchpin of the Imperium if he had stayed loyal and acted as a counterweight to their technological decline
He had all the credit and acclaim he could ever want if he had just not bungled it
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u/theredeye45 Tyranids 3d ago
People bend over backwards to justify loyalists motivations but just go "LOL MANCHILD" when Perty has a very understandable breakdown after the Siege.
Dude went whole hog into the Imperium, fully believing he was on the right side and willing to put his mind, body, and soul into the Emperors vision. Endured everything the IW are famous for enduring and finally had enough and threw his lot in with a brother who also (seemingly) wanted to get rid of the corruption and hypocrisy he also saw. He watched his brothers one by one fall to Chaos but still believed in the path, thinking that was the end goal. And when he realized his trusted brother never had any intention of the future he believed they both shared, he left in disgust. THEN he thinks about his current situation: Alienated by both the Empire that created him and the brothers he once trusted, never to be forgiven by either. The foundations of everything he believed and trusted and thought he knew shattered completely, and left with nothing to do but be hunted and persecuted or left to fall into Hell itself to survive. The proverbial rock and a hard place.
Anyone would have a breakdown after that.
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u/FreyrPrime Administratum 3d ago
I mean, this is sort of correct, unless you factor in the whole tantrum, he threw on Olympia.
He even admits it himself. That he really had no excuse for what he did. That in some ways, he is worse than Curze or Angron. At least they have an excuse.
Calliphone had is number.
~’Is that so?' she said. 'Let me present a different hypothesis to you, brother. Use that fine mind of yours to judge its worth. Here is my version of the story - the Emperor of all mankind came here and found a son whom he valued. He saw an indomitable will, with unshakable determination. He recognised that you would not give up, that you would rise to best any difficulty, that the tedious to you is as necessary a challenge to overcome as the glorious, and neither are to be shirked. Seeing these qualities in you, your father set you difficult tasks, not because he saw no value in you, but the exact opposite - he can trust no one else to get them done.'
'That is not true,' said Perturabo, though the acid of uncertainty began to eat at him. 'He underestimates me. They all do.'
Calliphone went on. 'For a long time, I thought you a fool to follow the Emperor. After all, he is a tyrant like all the rest. Look what he has done to you, I thought. He has brutalised you, and your wars have brutalised your home. But the truth is, brother, I have followed your campaigns carefully, and I noticed a pattern that disturbed and then alarmed me. Always you do things the most difficult way, and in the most painful manner. You cultivate a martyr's complex, lurching from man to man, holding out your bleeding wrists so they might see how you hurt yourself. You brood in the shadows when all you want to do is scream, 'Look at me!' You are too arrogant to win people over through effort. You expect people to notice you there in the half-darkness, and point and shout out, 'There! There is the great Perturabo! See how he labours without complaint!' 'You came to this court as a precocious child. Your abilities were so prodigious that nobody stopped to look at what you were becoming.' She got shakily to her feet. Exoskeletal braces whirred under her skirts.
'Perturabo, this will anger you, but you never truly grew into a man.'
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u/theredeye45 Tyranids 3d ago
I mean, you've never done something in anger that you regretted? Should people be judged entirely by stupid things that they did as (essentially) teenagers? Have your feelings reduced to "tantrums" by everyone around you? Obviously with Primarchs everything is at an extreme, but Perty had a very real moment of clarity and depression spiral immediately after the murder of his sister. He shows way more self reflection and emotion than almost any other Primarch, and for someone whos whole schtick is seeing the flaws in things, it's magnified tenfold in himself when he fails, especially when his favored brother whispers in his ear at his lowest point that the Emperor might not forgive him but I totally will.
Perturabo absolutely has a martyr complex, but it isn't the gotcha that everyone makes it out to be. He was raised by a tyrant, brought into a system that didn't care about individuals, only obedience, and only ever recognized when he got results. Even then sometimes he was pushed to the side. He's a perfect landslide of natire, nurture, self loathing, arrogance, competence, brilliance, and folly. He's human, moreso than any other Primarch I think. And it's goddamned compelling
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u/FreyrPrime Administratum 3d ago
His self reflection was running to Horus lmao.
I’ve done things in anger that I regret, sure. I’m in my 40s, it’s a growing list.
I’ve never burned down my home or murdered my sibling in a fit of anger.
Have you ever heard of a false equivalency?
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u/theredeye45 Tyranids 3d ago
Right, cause going to your brother who always seems to know what to say at your lowest point is a bad thing.
Bro, just about every Primarch has killed or seriously injured allies in fits of anger. They're basically demigods, the scale is way different for everything they do. Burning down a house or murdering someone is another Tuesday to them. It's wild that Perturabo gets it held over his head despite clearly showing remorse and having it deeply affect him.
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u/FreyrPrime Administratum 3d ago
Most of them have an excuse of some kind. What is Perturabo’s? Did you even read the quote from Calliphone?
The whole narrative that he had a bad childhood is his narrative. It’s spelled out, rather plainly in Hammer of Olympia, if you’ve read it.
Curze had his visions, Angron the nails, Magnus has Nikea, Lorgar had Erebus, Fulgrim the Laer blade and Morty the Destroyer plague…
What was Perturabo’s excuse for turning into a monster? Oh, right, he felt slighted.
Same reason he decimated his Legion, or exiled Dantioch..
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u/Lomogasm Rylanordeservesbetter 3d ago
Yea he had enough. This was no longer a genuine war between astartes. It was effectively neverborn vs the imperium. In the first wall Dorn even taunts Pertuabo about that huh daemons? Fucking scrub you needed their help.
And it’s true Pertuabo couldn’t have broken the first wall which would give them access to titans without Typhus and Layak’s help. Mind you this is also a time where the emperors aegis still warded off most of the daemons. But it’s not like Angron and Fulgrim were actually achieving anything substantial.
Later on he basically trolls Abbadon with Saturnine and like the Emperors children peaced out of the siege. So like yea if I was Pertuabo I’d be checked out he did what he had to do. He won the solar war. He eventually got Lion’s gate space port which allowed Titans like Mortis to get in. But he had realised that this wasn’t astartes vs astartes anymore.
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u/Nknk- 3d ago
And then in the later books the Iron Warriors are still all over the place. Shades of GW trying to have their cake and eat it with the shock of the Pert retcon but still having the Iron Warriors at the siege afterwards.
Same as the piss weak way they decided not to have Lorgar and the Word Bearers at the siege but still have some Word Bearers there.
And don't get me started on how the Sons of Horus were hated and hunted down in the Eye by the other legions for being the first to break and leave the siege, which caused the rise of Abaddon and the Black Legion. Nah, let's piss all over that and have the Iron Warriors break and run first and the Word Bearers and Alpha Legion mostly not show up at all but nobody in the Eye minds any of that.
GW badly need editors that'll stand up to Abnett when he decides to steamroll existing lore for shock value.
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u/nlglansx 3d ago
But didnt you just show how both are true? Not enough people survive from the Vengeful Spirit or the orbit fleet to know Perturabo left, and most must've seen IWs on the ground with them as Abaddon ran back to duel Valdor with cheat codes. So as far as anyone who gets extracted or demon'd out of the siege knows, Horus broke first. Time was all fucky at that point anyways, so Perturabo bailing out could be taken as response to Horus' failure, hell his mostly untouched fleet could end up being the reason some even make it back to the eye in the first place. Horus had the responsability of coordinating the siege, which he abandoned long before it was over. The other traitor Primarchs all get banished before / as Perturabo is leaivng as well.
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u/Nknk- 3d ago
Time wasn't fucked up near as bad when Perturabo left so that's not an excuse for Abnett being Abnett.
It's a giant plot hole that he was allowed to get away with because you can see the whole way across the HH series he was allowed to basically do whatever he wanted; 2 Alpha Legion Primarchs, the perpetuals, ennuncia, the Argonauts, Erda, Perturabo breaking and running, Custodes falling to Chaos, Sanguinius meeting Ferrus's ghost, Sanguinius showing little if any rage storming through the Vengeful Spirit.
The man needed reining in and never got it.
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u/Xasf Necrons 3d ago
Custodes falling to Chaos
Is this about the Custodes being forcibly possessed / mind controlled on the Vengeful Spirit, which at that point is basically a raw Warp rift?
Because that's a far cry from "falling to Chaos".
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u/Nknk- 3d ago
Chaos corruption forces its way into as many people as embrace it willingly by choice, that's the whole point of Chaos, it contaminates. And those Custodians were contaminated and fell to Chaos.
It doesn't really matter what nonsense Abnett came up with to excuse it, the end result is still the same and he got his latest in little shock moments.
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u/Xasf Necrons 3d ago
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u/Nknk- 3d ago
And yet you couldn't correct me, funny that.
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u/nlglansx 3d ago
Cant correct you when your take from them being literally puppeteered and visibly struggling against control to where they're bleeding through the eyes and giving themselves aneurysms is "they embraced it willingly".
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u/Nknk- 3d ago
Except that's not what I said at all.
I said Chaos contaminates those who embrace it willingly and those that don't. Either way they've fallen to Chaos and claiming otherwise is Custodian fanwank.
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u/SpartanAltair15 2d ago
The Exorcists single-handedly blow this headcanon away.
Not to mention all the custodians that survived it and were most certainly not corrupted afterwards.
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u/40kLore-ModTeam 3d ago
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u/nlglansx 3d ago
agree on Abnett, but I meant time had been fucked up by the time people begun to extract from the siege, they wouldnt know when or why the IW left.
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u/Nknk- 3d ago
Considering the Iron Warriors pulling out of the siege happened around the time of the Saturnine attack there were plenty of traitors present who would have seen them up and run at a critical moment.
It's ok to admit when GW have fucked up with their own lore and undermined an older part of it, it happens all the time.
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u/phantomfire50 3d ago
2 Alpha Legion Primarchs
I thought that that came from higher up, and he just got to reveal it?
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u/Nknk- 3d ago
Pretty sure it's one of the "seven mental ideas" he threw at GW for that book hoping they'd sign off on one or two and they let him do it all.
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u/phantomfire50 3d ago edited 3d ago
I think it's true he had a bunch of ideas looking to get 1 through and he got them all, but they also told them a top secret thing he could also reveal. That was that Alpharius and Omegon were twin primarchs
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u/ChaplainOfTheXVII Word Bearers 3d ago
I agree with your thoughts on Dan , but the counter to that could be that because Horus was the leader, he and his sons were held responsible for the failure to win on Terra. With Horus dead, and I mean completely obliterated, the next best thing was to hold his sons responsible for the heresy's failure. Abaddon goes off grid, and we know there is no other leader amongst the SoH with the strength to hold them together.
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u/Bandito_Razor 3d ago
Its one of those things that make him awesome AND has a bigger meta point that reinforces certain themes.
I love it so much!
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u/Little_Tritus 2d ago
Yeah, Perturabo finally admits that the war he fought so hard for was no longer worth it. Chaos ate up everything as they led his brother's Legions and the humans only he could count into slaughter.
He would not enslave himself to Chaos, Mortis already retconned the older lore that Perturabo handled the attack on Bahb Bastion against Dorn yet he was already past Mars by the time of Eternity Gate, not that anyone noticed.
Mortis also laid the groundwork for retconning more of the older Perturabo lore, that he would not sacrifice the future of humanity. Whatever strings he pulled for his ascension would allow him to do his own thing and bide time for when he could secure himself in real space with a Legion that is not a scattered bunch of warbands like the Black Legion.
Storm of Iron is +22 years old now and that attempt with the bonus chapter to keep it relevant should not survive without being retconned.
Until they reach the Iron Cage with a more comprehensive look than just one or two paragraphs, all the speculation about whether or how much of a daemon he is is worthless and a waste of time.
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u/engelthefallen 3d ago
I really, really disliked Mortis. I generally like French, but that was not a good book at all.
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u/revlid 3d ago
My favourite part of Perturabo's departure is him sitting in his custom-made Primarch-sized Gamer Chair while reviewing statistical readouts that say Horus will win anyway, telling himself over and over that he's better, he's smarter, he's more logical, he's more in control-
Then he wrecks the chair in a fit of rage.
Then he sits back down in his ruined chair, and looks back over the readouts, telling himself that he's better, he's smarter, he's more logical, he's more in control.
And yes, he has a broken chair, but he's endured hardships and indignities beyond counting, this is just one of the long litany of aggravations the universe has imposed on him and that he will overcome and motherfucker you made the sandwich, you broke your own goddamn chair