Editing Nobledark Imperium Forces of Chaos (section)

== Crone Eldar Notable Groups ==

=== Scions of the Old Helm ===

Khorne's elite military cult of pre-fall Eldar warriors and guardians that turned to him in the violent wake of Slaanesh's birth. They earned their place in his favor when in the fall he watched them turn their ships inward to the great debauchery and slaughter their kin as they writhed together in the filth of Slaanesh, cut down mad sorcerous seers as they exalted the ever changing Tzeentchian glory of the expanding eye, and harried the clinging sycophants all about Isha as Nurgle dragged her down into the garden. They warred gloriously through the Shaa-Dome's upper surfaces, brought continent shattering climax to the mounting hells on the empire's scattered worlds as they washed in immaterial miasma, and shredded the webway within the Eye, spilling pocket universal redoubs into the eye's cloying nebula. He granted them his mark and blessing, and in time since they have proven their worthiness of his esteem as terrors among even the heavies of Chaos. The forces of this ancient military cult have made particular efforts to drag the remains of Khaine into Khorne's domain, and their legacy of horrific, bloody war has been felt in every corner of the Galaxy. The Scions of the Old Helm are led by [[Nobledark_Imperium_Forces_of_Chaos#Arrotyr.2C_Marshall_of_the_Scions_of_the_Old_Helm|Arrotyr]], once a hero of the Old Eldar Empire turned into a madman and fanatic even by Crone standards in the chaos of the Fall and his veneration of the Blood God.

=== The Puppets ===

The 'puppets' or 'dolls', as they are known to Imperial soldiers, are one of the stranger factions of the Croneworld Eldar. Totally abandoning the normal unlanded warrior/noble officer structure of most Croneworld raiding bands, they advance to war 'wearing' a dizzying array of vat-grown and ghastbone bodies, transferring their minds into new bodies by sorcery and surgery, or piloting them from afar via MIU-analogues. Although the politics of Shaa-Dome are opaque to the Imperium, it seems that the puppet clades are distant from the normal courts, almost never fighting in the same theaters as the more 'normal' Croneworld forces, even in the middle of the Black Crusade. There is evidently some ideological animosity between the dolls and the great lords of Shaa-Dome, and they make their homes far from the center of power. Many of them seem to come from [[Nobledark_Imperium_Notable_Planets#Altansar|Craftworld Altansar]]

In combat, the puppets are more variable than even the normal run of Chaos warbands. Their war-bodies vary in mind as much as body, each one possessing its own unique patterns of thought. The mind is a plaything of the body; a fluid takes the shape of its container. Most of the older puppets are no longer recognizable, in both body and mind, as having ever been Eldar. 

These are custom murder-bodies of the nobility, bizarre post-Eldar hive minds and mind hives, priests seeking extremes of experience impossible in an unmodified brain and solitary killers so radically modified they can no longer meaningfully communicate. All radically different, and yet essentially identical from the perspective of the Guardsman on the ground.

=== The Bleeding Star ===

The story of the Bleeding Star begins with Archon Darumache Zharr, and his Kabal of the Venomed Breath. After a plot to destroy a more powerful rival backfired on him, Archon Zharr and his Kabal chose to flee into the Webway rather than stick around for the inevitable overwhelming retaliation. After wandering the Webway for decades, raiding Imperial worlds and rival raiders for supplies, they found something incredible- a proto-craftworld in orbit around a warp rift, crew slaughtered in the Fall but otherwise untouched. Archon Zharr instantly declared this their new base, and named it 'Port Razor'.

The millennium that followed was good for the Venomed Breath. Port Razor gradually attracted other outcast Kabals and lone Dark Eldar, mercenary bands, Ork Freebootas, xenos pirates and Chaos marauders, until it had become a city in its own right. Commorragh in miniature. Constantly on the move and equipped with the finest cloaking fields, it provided all the scum of the galaxy with an inviolate base to strike at civilization from. Until the Imperium finally tracked Port Razor down, and assembled a Crusade to destroy it.

Unwilling to abandon his domain twice, Lord Zharr committed to a vicious defence. However, deprived of their usual advantage of mobility with the need to defend a mostly-static position, his fleets were slowly destroyed or simply deserted. Port Razor itself was forced deeper and deeper into the warp storm, fleeing into the depths where Gellar fields failed, beyond the reach of the Imperium. It was assumed to be destroyed, and centuries passed without further sign of Port Razor and the Venomed Breath.

Then the Bleeding Star emerged. Outer hull encrusted with the hulks of thousands of ships, the outline of what was once Port Razor was still visible, having been transformed into a Space Hulk in the terrible depths of the warp storm. The old inhabitants had been likewise transformed. Archon Zharr and the Venomed Breath had sold their souls to Chaos in exchange for survival- and power. The Bleeding Star ripped its way through an entire sector before it was finally damaged enough to drive it away. Before, Port Razor had been a base, a port; now the Venomed Breath operated it as a warship, a super-dreadnought of horrendous power. They had fallen primarily to Khorne and Nurgle (and Slaanesh not at all- they take particular pleasure in killing Croneworlders who follow She Who Thirsts), and their behavior reflected that; much more willing to assault the enemy head on, much more willing to stand and fight- and much more capable of doing both. Now capable of true warp travel thanks to the thousands of daemons bound into its hull, the Bleeding Star blazes bloody paths through the Imperium, only stopping when grievous injury forces it to withdraw and recover. It licks its wounds for decades, or centuries, loitering beyond the reach of any foe in the Warp- then it comes in again, without mercy, without warning.

Over the millennia of its operation, Port Razor and the Bleeding Star are estimated to have killed trillions of Imperial citizens. Its every appearance is met with furious force- but each time, it manages to slip away, leaving burning ships and worlds in its wake.