Editing Nobledark Imperium Primarchs (section)

== Dorn ==
Note:
 - Calbi born, early model astartes pattern. Desensitization problems.
 - Odd friendship with Perturabo
 - Died during 1st Black Crusades holding the battlements of Cadia


The story of Rogal Dorn starts in the garrison town of Onto Rontus, in the not-too-long-ago annexed land of Calbi. Born to a mother of the local tribes and an officer father of the Merikan army, his start was not as tragic as it could have been; often such half-breeds were not typically the result of consenting unions, but Donovan Dorn held genuine affection for Kosa and — unknown to his fellow officers — they had exchanged wedding vows.

Dorn was one of a large family and had many siblings, though he was ultimately the only one to follow in his father’s footsteps. Upon coming of age Dorn left his loving tribe and family and all he had known, traveling to the distant lands of Merika to begin his training as his father had before him.

He learned much in those years and was an excellent student, and would have been on the fast track to high station but for his circumstances of birth. No soldier of the "Greatest Nation on Old Earth" would gladly allow themselves to be given orders from a savage of the north. Despite all this, his tutors could not deny his talents.

It was not a thing he took undue joy, in but the ways of war came very easily to Dorn. Despite the unfortunate circumstances of his birth, he became the very model of a modern Merikan officer; he was well versed in military doctrine of all sorts and knew something of the history of his nation — at least enough to spot the histories with a more revisionist bent.

Although adept — or at minimum competent — at all aspects of war, his true talents were found in siege warfare. In the tactical simulations and competitive VR matches Dorn was unsurpassed.

Due to his knowledge of the locals and ability to speak at least one tribal language fluently, Dorn returned to Calbi wearing a conqueror's uniform. He thus served as a lieutenant under the rule of Praefectus Adran, himself new to the post after the ''forced retirement'' of old Praefectus Stavart.

Praefectus Stavart had been very old and was unquestionably loyal to Merika, but had always dealt with the natives with some degree of fairness — even kindness when he could afford to. He was not loved by the locals — for how could he be — but the elders were more than smart enough to know that his position as an intermediary between them and Merika was probably the best deal they could get in those circumstances.

For Stavart’s part he probably knew that as well. In his childhood Dorn had met him a few times with his father. He remembered him looking old then and, unless he somehow genuinely had six sixty-seventh birthdays, it was obvious that he had been lying about his age for a long time. In his own way, Stavart had cared about Calbi and its people as something other than a broken, subjugated state of Merika. Stavart held onto the job until he was nearly ninety, because he knew that Adran — or someone much like him — would succeed him. And he was right.

Praefectus Adran was not a nice man by any measure. His was a brutal reign of the law and the authority of an iron fist. He wouldn’t be seen attending local festivals or events, nor would he ever lift a finger to improve the lives of the Calbi citizenry; the people were there — from the greatest to the least — to be at his beck and call. They were savages and heathens, and he was a man of the Greatest Nation and a paragon among them. Needless to say, tensions between the conquered and conquerors increased.


At some point tribal unrest turned into genuine riots, and Praefectus Adran ordered mass executions in response.

At the time Dorn was well loved by both the locals, who saw him as their man on the other side and looked to him to for salvation, and by the Merikan occupation forces, both the rank-and-file and quite a few of the officers.

There were subsequently a few days of communications blackout between Calbi and Merika, reportedly due to "faulty equipment" and some "regrettable accidents", during which some of the Merikan officers were found dead and saw Praefectus Adran committing suicide after a long period of depression. When asked how he managed to shoot himself in the back of the head with a shotgun, acting Praefectus Dorn told the investigators that Adran had been "very depressed indeed".

Nobody believed it but, due to the difficulties in the still mysteriously faulty communications equipment, it does buy Dorn enough time to root out more Merikan loyalists and secure his alliances with the local tribes. When the order came from the capital to stand down and come back for questioning, he declared independence.

The next day Dorn was met by an uncannily nondescript man — possessing of average height and build, no distinguishing features, inestimable age, unremarkable clothing, and an oddly neutral and difficult-to-place accent. He claims his name to be Alpharius Omegon and he comes representing the Imperium. He tells Dorn that his timing is awful: had he been able to spin this out for a few more years, five at least, the Imperium would have been in a position to lend their considerable military might to his Rebellion. As it is, they will offer what lesser obvious help they can, but the Imperium can't get dragged into a direct and total war with Merika at the current time. Dorn and a few of his elites get what likely were some of the very last Mk1 Astartes upgrades, administered by local bio-druids for reasons of plausible deniability.

Merika had recently been supplying and training terrorist organizations in the lands conquered by the Imperium, and Oscar had found out who was behind the seemingly random attacks. The aim was to disassemble the Imperium back into little nations for Merika to "Manifest Destiny" all over — and the Warlord was most unhappy, most unhappy indeed. But his forces were all tied up dealing with Ursh and the Pan-Pacific Empire, so he couldn't act directly and was forced to use Dorn and his rebellion — and later Fulgrim — to fight by proxy.

Not that Dorn would know the specifics of this until quite a few years after Unification Day.

Dorn held out for long enough for Fulgrim — then Furis Doe — to raise his rebellion and make contact.

By this point, the Imperium was finishing off the last enclaves of Ursh, Lorgar was decapitating the Despot, and Merika was in deep shit because of the multiple rebellions, the pissed off Imperium, and the only neighbor it has left with whom it was not at war with was Hy Braseal — who hated both of them and were content to simply sit back and watch the fireworks.

Fulgrim "negotiated a deal of inclusion with very good terms" with the Imperium after he was appointed President of Merika and "abandoned the unprofitable campaign to uplift and civilize the northern provinces". Calbi became an independent nation and Dorn appointed an Assembly of Elders to govern the nation in his stead, stepping down from and decommissioning the title of "Praefectus of Calbi", but remained the head of the armed forces. The Elders of Calbi, or representatives of them in the case of the more elderly Elders, and Rogal Dorn are present at the swearing of allegiance to the Empty Throne of Earth.

When Oscar Steward looked to the other worlds of Sol and to the stars beyond, he named Dorn as one of his primarchs — to the surprise of Dorn, if not the people of his home nation who saw it as only right and proper.

And then Great Crusade, the War of The Beast, the reconquest and death on the walls of Cadia during the 1st Black Crusade, of which is WIP by Dornfag

During the Great Crusade, Dorn moved slower than most of the other Primarchs — bar Lorgar — but this came from his prioritization of diligence over speed. Though criticized at the time for this approach, Dorn's great care proved its worth in the War of The Beast when the worlds he had brought into the Imperium weathered the Orkish storm consistently better than others — when not compared to the works of Perturabo, at least.

At some point Dorn got it into his head to grow his trademark mustache, and some time later he had to have one of his eyes replaced — the resulting prosthetic bore an uncanny resemblance to a monocle. Due to some fault in the Mk I Astartes enhancements he received Dorn suffered from desensitization problems throughout his life, which gradually turned into a mild case of masochism.

Dorn did not take part in the Raid on Nurgle's Mansion; he did not excel as a personal combatant — instead tending to perform better at static defense than actually running around — thus the quick raid into the bowels of Chaos would not have played to his strengths. 

Dorn never married or had any children that he or history knew about, though he did have a large number of family members — nephews and nieces and cousins and more distant kin. Quite a few of his family survived the War of The Beast — he was quite lucky in that regard.