Ghazghkull Mag Uruk Thraka
"Theys are a weak buncha gitz in yurop. Pansie, feeble..."
- – Mag Uruk Thraka
Ghazghull Mag Uruk Thraka, the Beast of Armageddon, is the Warlord of one of the largest Ork WAAAGH's in existence. AND 'E IS DA BIGGEST AND DA BEST BOSS OOO SMASHES ALL DA UMIES, AND ANYFING ELSE WOT WANTZ TA 'AVE A GO!
Being from the political days of Rogue Trader (when the setting was a straight up parody of 80's British politics), he's also supposedly named after then-prime minister Margaret "Fuck Yo Unions" Thatcher; similarly to Thatcher's "Iron Lady" moniker, Ghazghull has been referred to as the "Iron Ork". Take this as you will. Andy Chambers created Ghazghkull's Goff warband from an assortment of figures that the painting team had put together. The actual name came from the Orc-ish language that he and those he LARP'd with made up based on the Black Speech language from Lord of the Rings. Ghazghkull Mag Uruk Thraka's name is a combination of Ghazgh = Metal, Kull = Skull(Head), Mag = Big(Great), Uruk = warrior(Orc), Thraka = Leader. So put it all together Ghaz's name means "Metal head big ork leader". Its likely that a lot of people think its Margret Thatcher because a few people thought the names sounded similar.
Overview
Ghazy started out as an Ork of very little standing or prestige in the Goff's Klan on the planet of Uruk, where he also got his name 'Uruk', Yeah, we thought it was a LoTR reference too (why can't it be both?). Anyway, this meant that he was at least slightly tougher than the regular git, but hey, who's counting?
Anyway, an unknown group of Spess Mehreens were forced to attack the Orks in Uruk. Oh, poor Ghazghkull fought, but a bolter round tore into his skull, destroying over 30% of his skull and pulping most of his brain. Rough, considering that like most Orks, he had little there to begin with. After the Spess Mehreens systematically left Uruk, Ghazghkull was found by a particularly... creative Painboy known as Mad Dok Grotsnik, who rebuilt the small Ork's head with adamantium for shits and giggles. (They don't call him Mad Dok for nothing.)
Apparently metal plates unleash psyker potential within Orks, because Ghazghkull had some visions from Gork and Mork, convincing him he was blessed. So yeah, Orks can be religious too. So, after this, he became delusional - sorry, I meant DESTINED FER GRAET FINGZZZ and rose to become Warboss of his tribe after a short period of 6 years. Guess he needed to check in with his Ork Minister. Anyway, here's where the lulzy shit starts going down. A year or two later, Uruk's sun began to die, killing boyz with radiation from severe solar flares. However, conveniently enough, a massive Space Hulk appeared and provided Ol' Ghazzy a chance to be someone for a change. (Apparently the dick had something to do with this, as otherwise the WAAAAGH!! would have headed straight for Craftworld Idharae instead and we all know how much the Eldar would prefer not to die and, by then, Eldrad already knew that the Imperium could always beat any amount of Orks.) He decided to get all them boyz on Uruk together and made for that Space Hulk. It failed to start up several times. In the warp of all places. Which also meant they got to whack some daemons while they waited. The daemons may not have found these incidents as amusing as the Orks did.
"Travellin' through space is boring. Well, boring unless da hulk yer on is full of dem gene-sneakers, or a base fer da chaos lads wiv da spikes, or already has Boyz on it. Or if humie lootas come callin', that's always good fer a bit a sport. Or unless yer have a mutiny or two to pass da time, or unless strange fings start happenin', which dey usually do when yer out in da warp. One time we had some bloody great ugly fing come straight out of Weird Lugwort's 'ed! It butchered half da lads, that was pretty entertainin'. Come ter fink of it, space is a pretty good larf. And that's before yer find yerself a nice world ta crush!"
- – Bigmaw, Orks on Space Flight
Anyway, they finally managed to reach Armageddon, kicking off those massive wars we all know and love. They were all great failures, especially considering how consistently Ghazghkull would get fucked over by Yarrick during the Second Armageddon War. Then the SPESS MEHREEENS arrived and it all went about as well as you would expect things to go for the Orks when the Badass Catholic Space Nazi Warriors of the Imperium decide to get their act together.
After a spectacular defeat Ghazghkull fled, tail between his legs, and abanonded Armageddon in defeat. Almost immediately he began plotting and planning his return. As part of these preparations he, along with Bad Moons Warboss Nazdreg, invaded the world of Piscina IV where they got their asses hand to them by the Dark Angels and ran away. Such is the power of Space Marine plot armor.
To his credit Ghazghkull did defeat Yarrick on Golgotha, although Yarrick had not a single Space Marine in his army for some reason, and let the old man live to prepare Armageddon for him. This ended up being a very stupid idea.
Then the Third War for Armageddon started and he ends up fighting to a standstill with the Imperium, and withdraws simply because he recieved messages from Gork and Mork that his destiny lay elsewhere. Sometime between all of this, Yarrick swore to avenge the dead of Armageddon and kill Ghazgkhull. A rather strange thing to hear from a Commissar, but ol' Yarrick is hardly a conventional specimen.
Ghazgkhull developed an... equally unhealthy relationship with Yarrick, regarding him as 'the bestest 'umie evar'
And that's all there was to him for about twenty years, till 7th edition. It just seemed falling on his ass twice wasn't enough for da big boss no mores, so the Games Workshop team *gasp* advanced the storyline.
Well, just Ghazghkull's storyline.
See, Ghaz left Armageddon to go find something he wasn't quite sure of. Then, he had this revelation from Gork and Mork, telling him he was to create a galaxy-wide Waaagh! Ghaz had a space battle with Yarrick and Helbrecht, but got away after Gork and Mork themselves spoke through his Weirdboyz to announce to all the Orks present that Ghazgkhull was indeed the Prophet of the Waaagh, leaving his humie boyfriend in the dust. Ghazghkull, now determined to unite the orks under the Great Waaagh, went around the galaxy, thumping heads and getting orks in line. Then he went to Octarius and intervened, killing all the tyranids on Octarius and, essentially, driving over Hive Fleet Leviathan's testicles in a battlewagon. He let the empire of Octarius and its overfiend know he was the prophet of the ork gods and would bring an eternal Waaagh to the galaxy. Now endless orks flock to Octarius to join the fight against the remaining tyranids, turning the whole area into an endless war of attrition against the tyranids just as Armageddon is against the Imperials. Get that? With pretty much every major ork concentration between Armageddon and Octarius is united under Ghazghkull, he is on his way to uniting the ork race. Oh yeah, and he can psychically sense big concentrations of orks so he knows where to go.
Nowadays, unfortunately, he doesn't get ta have a proppa scrap like he used to. Oh, sure, it'd be nice, but organizing all the orks together into one titanic WAAAAGH! isn't going to happen on its own. There's authority to delegate, multiple fronts to manage, the occasional orky bit of improvisation... It's a good thing he's actually turning out to be a genuinely genius strategist and tactician or it'd all fall apart on him. But when he does take to the field, he's still the most dangerous ork around.
Stuck in the perpetual mire of the Octarius War, Ghazghkull's only prominent achievement since 8th Edition began is working with the Swarmlord to fight the Khornate Crusade to a stalemate.
Some consider Ghazghkhull to be the Warhammer 40K to Warhammer Fantasy's Grimgor Ironhide, but really there's not a lot of common in between. Ghazghkull is much more of a general and statesman rather than Grimgor's epic super-champion that spends his days kicking major ass and taking names but falls flat on his face in strategy, diplomacy, logistics or generally anything that does not involve driving his choppa into some other git's head. Grimgor kicks more ass in a personal combat, but Ghazghkull kicks way more ass with an army and is able to keep it all together long past the point where it should have fragmented into rival warbands, so if anything his FB equivalent should be Skarsnik.
It is worth noting that Yarrick, Ghazghkull, and Old One-Eye are all essentially takes on the same old fishing story about the one that got away. It's also worth noting that Mag Uruk Thraka means "I am Slaughter" heavily implying Ole' Ghaz is on the way to becoming like The Beast.
Tabletop
Ghazghkull used to be the Ork HQ. He was the only Ork character with Eternal Warrior, and he had 2+ armor and a 5++ in the form of Cybork body. With Fleet and Fearless in 5th edition, this guy was bad fucking news. In addition to that, if you called a WAAAGH using him it would last TWO TURNS and he would have a 2++ for the duration of that. And anything in his unit that had Slow and Purposeful, including him, could run during the WAAAGH. Though it was admittedly cheesy, especially for Orks, it fit the fluff and it was so awesome no one really cared since he costed as much as a Land Raider.
Then 7th Edition happened.
Among the list of gut punches and groin kicks include:
- Cybork body became a pathetic 6+ FNP. And he lost an extra attack.
- His WAAAGH only lasts one turn now. And is changed from auto-running 6" for the whole damn army to just allowing him and the squad to run and charge (which can still find some use but not nearly as good as it used to be).
- Moved to Lord of War slot.
- Expensive price kept the same despite the nerfs.
- Actually with his supplement, he can call a WAAAGH!!! every turn granting him a 2++ save EVERY TURN. Still not really worth it though.
This is practically the equivalent of taking This Guy and punching him in the face, clipping off one of his testicles, and throwing him in jail for something he didn't do and didn't deserve.
Don't get me wrong, he's still no slouch. He can tank and kill most HQs in the game and is still the most powerful Ork character. Sadly, enough focused fire can take him out, and even Abbadon or a well-equipped Hive Tyrant can take him out one-on-one. The sad part is despite the nerfs to his WAAAGH, he'd still be good if he were just an HQ. Now as a Lord of War, he's thrown into the unfair category of Titans, Super-Heavy tanks, and Gargantuan Daemons. As flattering as that sounds, he is horribly underpowered as a Lord of War. He can't be redeemed as long as a generic warboss with da lucky stick is better and 2 times cheaper. And that very lucky stikk is taken from the cold, dead grasp of legendary Makari who used to hang out with Ghaz...
Changed again as of 8th. He's back as an HQ now, and got himself a 4++ along with some other nice bits and bobs. On the other hand his special WAAAGH!!! while decent is not nowhere near as amazing as SM stock characters and he looks very week in presence of mostrocieties like Papa Smurf or Mortarion who are not that much more expensive... Powercreep continues I guess.
8th edition ork codex rumors suggest he might get full Primork status and a new model with stats rivaling those of the most powerful models on tabletop currently available. This is not confirmed in any way.
Awesome Quotes
"I'm da hand of Gork and Mork, dey sent me to rouse up da boyz to crush and kill ‘cos da boyz forgot what dere ‘ere for.
I woz one of da boyz till da godz smashed me in da ‘ead an’ I ‘membered dat Orks is meant to conquer and make slaves of everyfing they don’t kill.
I’m da profit of da Waaagh an’ whole worlds burn in my boot prints. On Armour-Geddem, I led da boyz through da fire deserts and smashed da humies’ metal cities to scrap. I fought Yarik, old one-eye at Tarturus, an’ he fought good but we smashed iz city too.
I’m death to anyfing dat walks or crawls, where I go nothin’ stands in my way. We crushed da stunties on Golgotha, an’ we caught old one-eye when da speed freeks blew da humies’ big tanks ta bits. I let ‘im go ‘cause good enemies iz ‘ard to find, an Orks need enemies ta fight like they need meat ta eat an’ grog ta drink.
I iz more cunnin’ than a grot an’ more killy than a dread, da boyz dat follow me can’t be beat. On Pissenah we jumped da marine-boyz an’ our bosspoles was covered in da helmets we took from da dead ‘uns. We burned dere port an’ killed dere bosses an’ left nothin’ but ruins behind. I’m Warlord Ghazghkull Mag Uruk Thraka an’ I speak wiv da word of da gods. We iz gonna stomp da ‘ooniverse flat an’ kill anyfing that fights back. We iz gonna do this coz’ we’re Orks an’ we was made ta fight an’ win!"
All were found scrawled on the side of an Imperial Titan in legible Gothic. We suspected his good buddy "Clever" Nazdreg helped him with that. However the next quote comes from the memories of Yarrick himself as Ghazghkull (Chains of Golgotha book) releases him... HE SPEAKS IN FUCKING HIGH GOTHIC!
"A great fight! My best enemy. Go to Armageddon, make ready for the greatest fight!"
See Also
- Orks
- Makari, Ghazghkull's late banna-wava.
- Yarrick, Ghazzy's favorite humie
- Octarius War, shitstorm Ghazzy is on his way towards
| Ork Gitz and Bosses | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| From da canon: | The Beast - Boss Snikrot - Boss Zagstruk - Ghazghkull Mag Uruk Thraka Grukk Face-Rippa - Mad Dok Grotsnik - Makari - Mek Boss Buzgob Mozgrod Skragbad - Nazdreg Ug Urdgrub - Old Zogwort - Orkimedes Tuska Daemon-Killa - Wazdakka Gutsmek - Zhadsnark da Rippa - Zodgrod Wortsnagga Kaptin Badrukk - Herman von Strab - Ufthak Blackhawk | |||||||
| From da gamez: | Brikkfist - Gorgutz 'Ead 'Unter - Kaptin Bluddflagg - Grimskull Mister Nailbrain - Orkamungus - Spookums - Stupid | |||||||