Editing Warsmith

[[Image:Warsmith.jpg|300px|thumb|right|A Warsmith of the [[Iron Warriors]].]]
'''Warsmith''' (not to be confused with [[Warpsmith]]) is a rank/title employed by the [[Iron Warriors]], given to the leaders of the legion's various Grand Companies. Typically wearing [[Mark III: Iron Armour]] due to their profession. The Warsmiths each have a number of captains who in turn command a regular Company, placing the Warsmiths in positions akin to that of [[Chapter Master]]s.
==Overview==
Warsmiths are highly skilled individuals, both in skill of arms and at siegecraft. They must also maintain a certain degree of paranoia toward their equals and direct subordinates: if a Warsmith is killed by a fellow Warsmith, the victor might absorb his opponent's Grand Company, and a good number of Warsmiths obtained their rank by killing its previous holder.

The Iron Warriors Legion of the late 41st Millennium is organised into a number of large warbands known as Grand Companies, each commanded by a Chaos Lord who bears the title of Warsmith. Originally, each Grand Company would have been similar in size and organisation, totalling approximately a thousand Space Marines, but now they vary in size enormously after ten millennia of battle and losses. It is uncertain how many Grand Companies there are at any given time. At the time of the Horus Heresy, the IVth Legion had an added layer of organisation known as a Grand Battalion, which contained several Grand Companies and was commanded by an officer with the rank of Warsmith. At the time of the Drop Site Massacre on Istvaan V there were at least twelve Grand Battalions in the IVth Legion, although with the widespread deployment of many garrison forces in that era, it is impossible to be sure.

One of the most famous Warsmiths is [[Honsou]], who has a great record in [[/tg/ gets shit done|getting shit done]], and being one messed up asshole.

It is interesting to note that the position of Warsmith can be held even when a marine would usually lose their rank, so long as they don't go bonkers even by CSM standards; Berossus from [[Graham McNeill]]'s ''Dead Sky, Black Sun'' retained the rank of Warsmith (albeit as a subordinate to another) despite being a bloodthirsty, half-crazed [[Chaos Dreadnought]], while Idriss Krendl from [[Rob Sanders]]' ''Adeptus Mechanicus'' duology kept his rank despite being an [[Obliterator]]. Another would have been Chengrel, a character from a novella, but he had to settle for [[Chaos Lord]] since he never officially made it to Warsmith.

Another interesting thing is their high mortality rate - [[Honsou]] is the only one we're 100% sure is still alive, with most of the others dying during or after one novel (Forrix, Berossus, Kroeger, Harkor, whoever that asshole in ''Siege of Castellax'' was; maybe Krendl, depending on how you interpret the ending of the AdMech books), vanishing into the ether despite having unresolved or unexplored plot threads connected to them (Kyr Valen, Toramino, Kalkator), or pulling an exit stage left after achieving their goals ([[Daemon Prince|The Warsmith]]).

==Known Warsmiths==

*'''[[Honsou]]:''' The [[Daemonculaba|sickest sonofabitch in the 41st Millennium]], best known for his record of [[/tg/ gets shit done|getting shit done]] and being [[Uriel Ventris]]' nemesis. More on him can be found on his own page, which is more than the rest of these poor fuckers managed to do.
*'''[[Dakka|Toramino]]:''' Back during the [[Great Crusade]] and [[Horus Heresy]], Toramino headed up the ''Stor-Bezashk'' - the Iron Warriors' elite artillery corps, tasked with breaking open the hardiest citadels and providing fire support during battles. He's also a huge backstabbing bastard, using his position to try and engineer an "unfortunate accident" for Kroeger (and Forrix, who was nearby) pretty much purely out of [[butthurt]] at not being given a position in [[Perturabo|Perty's]] Trident - and this was ''before'' he went full Chaos and became a [[Sorcerer (Warhammer 40,000)|Sorcerer]]. Eventually attacked [[Honsou]]'s citadel over a loot dispute involving [[gene-seed]]; he may or may not have been killed when a very pissed-off [[Bloodthirster]] was directed toward his very magic-heavy army by Honsou.
*'''[[Chaos Dreadnought|Berossus]]:''' During the [[Horus Heresy]], Berossus was the arrogant dickhead in charge of the 2nd Grand Company of the Iron Warriors. During the [[Battle of Phall|friendly reunion between the IW and the Imperial Fists at Phall]], he drew the short straw and had to inform Perturabo that the Iron Warriors were getting the shit kicked out of them by the Fists; even worse, First Captain [[Sigismund]] (who Perty really, ''really'' wanted to get his hands on) wasn't even there, so they couldn't capture him as they'd been ordered. Perturabo responded to this in his [[RAGE|usual calm and reasonable manner]], bitchslapping Berossus hard enough to wreck his armour, rupture most of his organs, and make his long-dead relatives on distant, gutted [[Olympia]] flinch before leaving him to slowly drown in his own blood on the bridge.
**Unfortunately for Berossus, Perturabo promptly had one of his patented mood swings and personally implanted the dying, half-mulched Warsmith into a [[Dreadnought]] as either further punishment or a gesture of remorse. Despite what you might expect, Berosuss actually remained pretty sane for a while, coming to enjoy the power of his new form and even keeping command of his Grand Company throughout the Horus Heresy. At some point, Toramino reduced him to a subordinate of his - probably because Berossus was both hidebound in terms of tactics and becoming [[Rip and Tear|increasingly psycho in combat]].
** Near the end of M41, Berossus and Toramino got into a throwdown with [[Honsou|everyone's favourite half-breed Warsmith]]; Berossus did the bulk of the heavy lifting, losing numerous troops in assaults to slowly wear down Honsou's forces while Toramino sat back and hurled spells at the walls. When his forces finally broke through, Berossus faced and very nearly killed Honsou in combat - only a Chekhov's Gun in the form of Honsou's regenerating [[necrodermis]] arm prevented his death by stalling his siege drill long enough for Honsou's [[Possessed]] bodyguard to knock him on his ass, followed by Honsou using his [[Daemon Weapon|daemonic axe]] to bust open his sarcophagus and go full [[rip and tear]] on the old warsmith.
*'''Kyodomor Forrix:''' One of the last remaining Terran-born Iron Warriors, Forrix served in Perturabo's Trident. He was a logistical genius and a master of siege warfare even by Iron Warrior standards, to the point of basically managing the entirety of Horus' muster at Ullanor prior to the Siege of Terra and pretty much running the whole 'siege' part of the Siege of Hydra Cordatus. Forrix gradually lost his passion for the Long War over time, coming to see the conflict as pointless, and was eventually reduced to a subordinate of The Warsmith. Cacked it during the Siege of Hydra Cordatus [[irony|right after getting his passion for the Long War back]], as a [[Warhound Scout Titan]] blasts him into shreds [[Awesome|after he takes down its comrade]].
** Forrix is actually given a deeper degree of characterization next to most Warsmiths - his Horus Heresy-era self is shown as secretly harbouring doubts as to Perturabo's effectiveness and the value of his orders, with his faith in the primarch slowly breaking over the course of the Heresy/Siege of Terra novels. This culminates in him realizing Perty sacrificed nearly a thousand of his Battle-Brothers (almost including him) in an infiltration mission that acted purely as a diversion, leading Forrix to despair that his legion have damned themselves purely to serve as pawns in the Chaos Gods' games and that their Primarch is no better than those they rebelled against; by the time of M41, he's so bitter and jaded by the Long War's sheer pointlessness that he serves Chaos purely because there is no other path available for him.
*'''Kroeger:''' A [[Khorne Berserker|Khornate Berserker]] in Iron Warrior colors, Kroeger became a Warsmith [[lulz|almost purely on accident]]: he was the only survivor of a misguided (and very costly) breaching action by Warsmith Harkor, which saw a pissed-off Perturabo strip Harkor of his rank and give it to Kroeger instead, even elevating him to the rank of Triarch despite his low-born origins. Kroeger was never all that comfortable with his rank, despising the constant scheming of those around him, and often took to the frontlines specifically to get away from it - a quality appreciated by Perturabo, who favored his blunt, straightforward approach and unconventional tactics after Phall. That said, while Kroeger looked the part of a blunt instrument he actually was reasonably smart and canny (at first). When introduced to the Warrior Lodges, he challenged [[Perturabo]] himself at a war-game, and while he eventually lost, he lasted longer than anyone else expected against his [[Primarch]]. His otherwise blunt, straightforward and goal-minding strategy of going for the objective and holding it actually got ''some'' results where any 4D-chess-400-IQ play got [[rape|hard-countered]] by Perty.
** By the time of M41, Kroeger had almost completely degenerated into a full-fledged berserker, complete with random bouts of maniacal rage; only his selfishness, willpower, and desire to survive prevented him from going completely bonkers. During the Siege of Hydra Cordatus, he took an [[Imperial Guard|Imperial guardswoman]] as a personal slave, who he frequently abused and tortured. This eventually led to Kroeger's death when she donned his possessed [[Power Armour]] in an act of [[Daemon]]-influenced desperation, with the newly-possessed guardswoman proceeding to [[rip and tear|gut and dismember him with his own chainsword then beat his skull into a red smear across the floor of his dugout]].
*'''The Warsmith:''' One of the oldest and most powerful known Warsmiths, The Warsmith led the Siege of Hydra Cordatus. He was the guy in charge of [[Honsou]], Forrix, and Kroeger after the latter two's falls from grace, and by far the most enthusiastic about the cause of Chaos among them - by the time of the Siege, he was so heavily corrupted that [[Luke|simply looking at him was enough to make Space Marines feel nauseous]], while regular humans were reduced to vomiting, bleeding, or catatonia at his passing. The Warsmith actually scored a rare win for the IW by butchering a full company of [[Imperial Fists]], killing their Captain in single combat ([[Rip and Tear|cutting him almost completely in half with his axe, then biting through his chest cavity to suck out and eat his progenoids]]), and ascending to [[Daemon Prince|Daemonhood]] by sacrificing a huge amount of geneseed to the Dark Gods.
** The Horus Heresy novel ''Angel Exterminatus'' finally gives him a name - '''Barban Falk''', Warsmith and former member of the Trident.
*'''Idriss Krendl:''' A rare case of an [[Obliterator]] Warsmith, Krendl was the boss of the 14th Grand Company - the Horus Heresy fans among you might recognize him as the guy who led the assault against [[Barabas Dantioch]]'s forces at the Schadenhold. He survived Dantioch's final "fuck you" at the cost of [[Ghazghkull Mag Uruk Thraka|needing his skull basically pieced and stitched back together like a broken eggshell]]. Somewhere along the line he was infected with the Obliterator Virus, which spread to the rest of his warband. Unusually for most Obliterators, Krendl and his warband largely retained their sanity ("largely" because of the aforementioned "head held together with wire mesh" thing).
** Krendl is actually a pretty smart bastard for a man whose head is held together with wire: he plants an uncorrupted STC template for a [[Warp]]-nullifying bomb on a backwater [[Feral Orks|xenos]]-infested world then leaks its location to the [[Adeptus Mechanicus]], causing them to find, construct, and use it on a Chaos-controlled [[Forge World]]. (Which had its fall to Chaos engineered by Krendl; turns out fucking about with the Warp was a bad idea - by [[Just As Planned|reinforcing realspace in one area]], they [[Not As Planned|weakened it in another, causing a Warp Storm to erupt around their homeworld.]]) The battles subsequently weaken the Chaos Forge World and the AdMech Explorator fleet to the point where Krendl's forces can simply mop them both up and take over ''both'' worlds. The only reason it fails is because of an AdMech Archmagos actually thinking out of the box for once and throwing a spanner in the works.
** Krendl may or may not also be dead; after that Archmagos' batshit insane gambit forces Krendl to let him and his fleet go, the Imperial Fists were quietly informed where the Warsmith and his warband would likely be, with the Archmagos predicating a high chance of the Fists destroying or crippling Krendl's fleet.
*'''Harkor:''' Harkor was a Warsmith and member of the Trident, existing almost purely to show why disobeying Perturabo's orders - even in his most sympathetic portrayal - is a Bad Idea. Having ordered a [[Chenkov|extremely costly breach action]] that deviated from Perty's battle plans ([[fail|one that also failed to achieve its objective until the primarch himself intervened]]), a very annoyed Perturabo stripped him of his rank and expelled him from the Trident, leaving him as a regular Battle-Brother. Harkor narrowly convinced Kroeger that he could serve him as an aide while secretly plotting to engineer an 'accident' for him with Toramino, only for his former subordinate to kill him in a Khorne-influenced rage during a battle on an [[Eldar]] Crone World.
*'''Kalkator:''' A bit of an oddball, this one. Appearing during the [[War of the Beast]] series, Kalkator led a Grand Company out of the Maelstrom, rather than the Eye of Terror, and notably shunned Chaos's more corrupting aspects (though he agreed with the view of the Emperor betraying them first). His Grand Company took heavy losses at Ork hands during the war, to the point of [[What|temporarily allying with the Black fucking Templars and Fists Exemplar]] to fight against the encroaching greenskins; this eventually resulted in a Mexican standoff between the three due to the Fists Exemplar present being divided on their views of the IWs (one side thought their methods had a point and they should be allowed to leave for their contribution to the war, the other wanted them dead no matter what). Kalkator promptly preyed on the doubts of the Fists Exemplar's acting Chapter Master, egging him on to the point where half the Chapter detachment fell to Chaos and joined the IW, while the other half was destroyed in the subsequent civil war.
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