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Khaine

2021-01-29T09:01:26Z

2406:3400:20F:FFC0:97C:9E80:BC00:599B: /* Trivia */

[[File:Khaine End Times.png|350px|thumb|right|The only Eldar god that has the [[Awesome|testosterone]] and [[RAEG]] to rival [[Khorne|Khorne.]]]]
<div style="font-size:1.10em;font-weight:bold;font-style:bold;font-family:serif;margin-top:1em;margin-bottom:1em"><span style='color:orange;font-size:120%'> ALL WHO OPPOSE ME SHALL BURN TO CINDERS AND ASH! - Khaine, being anal and wrong as fuck</span></div>'''

{{Topquote|Do not go gentle into that good night. Rage, rage against the dying of the light.|Dylan Thomas}}

'''Khaela Mensha Khaine''' (also known as the '''Bloody-Handed God''', '''A Consistent [[Fail]]''', or '''Big Daddy Calgar's personal pleasure object''') is the [[Dark Elf]], [[High Elf]]/Aelf, and [[Eldar]] God of War and Fire. He is also GW's Worf-equivalent, being the chosen punchbag-by-proxy for whenever they want to prove just how powerful their new character of the week is [[#The Avatar of Khaine|(more on that below)]].

==In Warhammer 40,000==
Mr. K.M. Khaine is one of the three Eldar gods that survived the [[Fall of the Eldar]] (the other two being [[Cegorach]] and [[Isha]]), although he was trampled and pushed out of the [[Warp]] and into realspace while [[Khorne]] was busy piledriving baby [[Slaanesh]] all over Eldar heaven. Because of this, he's no longer "alive" in a spiritual sense and is now shattered into a bajillion physical pieces. These pieces made their way into the [[Craftworld]]s, where they can be used to summon a manifestation of Khaine when the need arises. He's also the angriest god of the Eldar pantheon, although he can't really contest with the [[RAGE]] of [[Angron]] and [[Doombreed]].

It has been [[Xenology|hinted]] at that Khaine (as well as the rest of the Eldar pantheon) is one of the [[Old Ones]], and so strictly speaking is not exclusively an Eldar deity. He was also the Bloody-Handed God of War for the [[Hrud]].

===The story of the single angriest Eldar entity ever===
Long ago, when the Eldar were the most powerful race in the universe and they hadn't raped themselves yet, Khaine heard from [[Lileath]], the prophecy-giver of the Eldar pantheon, that the Eldar would one day kill him. Khaine, never one for subtlety, decided to [[Exterminatus|murder every last one of the pansies]] to ensure that never happened. However, [[Isha]], the mother-goddess of the Eldar, wept for them because no sane mother would want her own children butchered to death by a maniacal god of war. Khaine's rage gets pretty visible at this point because he had the hots for Isha and still completely ignored her, even after she immediately used her common sense and said she was not getting with a genocidal manifestation of pure wrath (per the book ''Path of the Eldar''. Speaking of which, this book basically says that Eldar [[Exarch|Exarchs]] and Khaine have severe psychological problems. Too bad the only gods who come close to being psychologists are [[God-Emperor of Mankind|this warmongering atheist]] and [[Tzeentch|this squawking politician patron]] of [[Sorcerer (Dungeons & Dragons)|spontaneous casters]]. The last one would be [[Malal|this god]] who doesn't believe that you (or he) exists.

Anyway, that's where [[Asuryan]], the Phoenix King of the Eldar gods, intervened and decided to spare the Eldar from their would-be fate at the bloody hands of Khaine and Isha from having to witness it, by creating a barrier to separate mortals from gods for all eternity. This ensured that the mortal Eldar would never have the chance to kill Khaine and that Khaine would never be able to enter the mortal realm and kill all of the Eldar. This solution worked for Khaine, but not so well for Isha.

Isha missed talking to her children and so cheated through the whole barrier deal by having [[Vaul|Vaul the Artificer]] (the best craftsman of the Eldar gods) make spirit stones to communicate with them. Khaine however, discovered this, and cried foul on Isha and her husband [[Kurnous]]. Asuryan, not wanting to look like a biased dick, told Khaine that he could do whatever he wanted with the two, so naturally Khaine chose eternal torment. Vaul got pissed at this and bargained with Khaine that he would make a hundred of his finest swords in a year in exchange for Isha and Kurnous' release, which Khaine agreed to.

However, because Vaul decided to jerk off on the last day rather than work, he couldn't make the last sword in time and instead tried to trick Khaine by putting one normal sword among the bunch of ninety-nine epic swords he made, thinking that Khaine, with his short attention span and inability to count beyond 10, wouldn't notice and would just accept the fuckheug pile of swords as is. Which is exactly what seemingly happened at first, and Khaine released Isha and Kurnous. [[Just as planned|Situation over]]. [[Not as planned|However, Vaul didn't count on Khaine being a total mathfag/detailfag whenever he's weaponwhoring]], and so Khaine got almighty pissed when he discovered that he got tricked. Yeah, a lot of people reeeaaallly love to screw with Khaine. Too bad the guy has a terrible sense of humor.

This trickery had unfortunate consequences for the whole Eldar pantheon, who after Asuryan shrugged the matter off started to take sides: some agreed with Khaine, others told him to calm the fuck down and grow up; and things snowballed from there and boiled over into the mortal realm (simply having Vaul fashion a replacement sword [[derp|apparently never occurred to anyone]]). Exactly what the hell happened then is unclear but a couple of things are set in stone. At one point, Khaine got his hands on Vaul and beat the shit out of him before chaining him to his anvil. Another certainty is that he eventually murdered Eldanesh, an Eldar champion, although why he did it is unclear since multiple reasons have been put forward (there's lore on this in multiple sources and they are contradictory as fuck):

*Eldanesh challenged Khaine to an honorable duel for the freedom of Vaul, armed with the last blade the Artisan-God should have finished in time (and did before his capture). (Original lore from 2ed. Codex: Eldar.)
*Eldanesh, as nominal leader of the mortal Eldars, was just tired of his shit and told Khaine to calm the fuck down because he and the [[War in Heaven]] were fucking things up for the Eldar royally. (More recent lore.)
*Eldanesh and Khaine actually collaborated during the war against the [[Necrons]], but at the end he gave Khaine the middle finger when he tried to convince him to keep killing for the sake of killing and generally having violent fun. And Eldanesh did it in vain because his murder triggered the internecine [[War in Heaven]] anyway. (See also the novel ''Path of the Eldar'' by [[Gav Thorpe]].)

Anyway, whatever the exact reason, what is certain is Khaine got [[rage|a little angry]] at Eldanesh and slapped a bitch, and since said bitch wasn't a god it really didn't end well. That's the point where Asuryan got '''really''' tired of everyone's shit so he told everyone to shut the fuck up and condemned Khaine to have blood eternally drip from his hands to remind him of his crime, earning him the title "Khaela Mensha" (or Bloody-Handed).

When the [[Chaos Gods|Chaos god]] [[Slaanesh]] was birthed from the accumulated Warp energy of the Eldar's galactic empire of excess and decadence, Khaine tried to battle the newborn god and managed to put up a pretty good fight, despite the fact The Great Hermaphrodite had already consumed the other Eldar gods and was backed by the Ruinous Powers themselves (well, [[khorne| two of them at least]]). Despite Slaanesh overpowering him she/he/it did not have power enough to consume Khaine, but then [[Khorne]] appeared and challenged Slaanesh to a battle, as he claimed that Khaine was his property and that Slaanesh had no right to eat him. Needless to say, Slaanesh lost. While Khorne was busy piledriving and backbreaking Slaanesh into oblivion, Khaine was in the middle of it and got shattered into a million pieces, presumably because Khorne had left his axe back at the Brass Citadel and [https://1d4chan.org/images/8/8f/AngryMarine9.jpg Khaine was the only available melee weapon at the time]. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnlfyWWeD5k Or maybe he made a fine object on which to drop Slaanesh over and over again]. Whatever it was, he doesn't say and the rest is history.

So in the end, Lileath's prophecy did come true in a sense. The Eldar were responsible for the birth of Slaanesh, who sort of got Khaine killed, but not totally because technically he is still "alive". It's just that he's not up and about anymore, like [[Cegorach]] and [[Isha]], and now has to live with the fact that he, the Eldar god of war and destruction, was himself destroyed. Either way, it was either [[Just As Planned]] by [[Tzeentch]], who was the only Chaos God who didn't directly intervene during the fall of the Eldar, or Cegorach, because that hilarious son of a bitch just HAD to do it to put Khaine in his place before he slipped back into the [[Webway]]. Hell, for all we know, the two could have orchestrated the entire Fall of the Eldar just to be the only two entities who managed to successfully screw with Khaine and get away with it.

===The Avatar of Khaine===
[[File:Avatar vs Lorgar.jpg|thumb|350px|right|The Avatar of Khaine in its natural state of existence: dying horribly to make whatever character or faction GW is currently trying to sell look awesome. (In this instance, [[Lorgar]] mercy killed it.)]]

The '''Avatar of Khaine''' is a unique Eldar [[daemon]] unit. The Avatar is basically a small fragment of Khaine's power given form through one of his fragments present in a Craftworld.

The Eldar will only summon the Avatar into battle under the most dire of circumstances when there is no other choice. This is because in order to summon the Avatar, the Eldar must sacrifice one of their [[Exarch]]s, known as the "Young King", in order to bring him into existence, and this only lasts for a limited amount of time. Like any daemon, after some time, the Avatar will eventually degenerate and disappear, taking the sacrificed Exarch with it. For the Exarch in question this is the ultimate honour, as this and becoming a Phoenix Lord are the only ways an Exarch can find release in death.

There is an alternative method of awakening the Avatar, but it requires no less than six [[Phoenix Lord]]s to show up on a craftworld simultaneously and place their weapons at the Avatar's feet. The concentration of psychic energy is enough to not only awaken the Avatar without needing a sacrifice, but [[Apocalypse|supercharge him]].

He <s>used to be</s> '''IS''' really strong, but [[Games Workshop]]'s authors have taken a liking to murdering Avatars every chance they get depending on marketing needs. Because of this, the Avatar has been:

*Killed hilariously by [[Marneus Calgar]] in hand-to-hand combat in the 5th edition [[Space Marine]] codex. This can mainly be chalked up to the ridiculous levels of [[Matt Ward|Wardian Wankery]] in the 5th Ed codex, and can be unofficially retconned/explained as an exaggerated in-universe tale to reinforce the 'unstoppable angel of death' image of Astartes that the average Imperial will know about.
*Possessed by Heartslayer, a [[Keeper of Secrets]] (oh, the [[Irony|irony]]), during the invasion of the Eldar Craftworld Kher-Ys.
*Trampled to death by twelve stampeding [[Carnifex|Carnifexes]] during the battle between [[Craftworld Iyanden]] and the [[Hive Fleet Kraken]]. What happened was that the Avatar goaded the swarm's [[Hive Tyrant]] into a duel. What the Avatar failed to realize was that this wasn't tabletop and that the [[Tyranids]] are a pragmatic instead of an idealistic lot who have no concept of honourable or dirty fighting, so the Hive Tyrant just raised his brow at this and sent twelve Carnifexes to run the Avatar over. (Weirdly, [[Matt Ward]] gave him a more dignified death than this bullshit.)
*Strangled (WTF?)/neck crushed by [[Fulgrim]]. Let us remind you that Avatars are living metal statues, and they neither breathe nor have bones. Unless Fulgrim full-on [[Rip and Tear|crushed its neck until the head popped off]], which would've pretty thoroughly killed it.
*Killed by the [[Sanguinor]].
*Doused in a great flood by the water people of Astrominus IV after his raw power and heat defrosted them from their icy imprisonment by the Space Wolves.
*"Put out of his misery" by [[Lorgar Aurelian|Lorgar]] (who was, at the time, considered to be the worst fighter out of all the [[Primarchs]]). Though the Avatar was heavily damaged even before the fight, unable to even stand and driven mad by centuries spent in the Warp, and this was just a few pages before Lorgar proved to be a top level badass as he battled and bested Anggrath, the uber-[[Bloodthirster]] of Khorne who can eat Avatars and [[Titans]] like cookies.
*Stabbed in the heart by [[Maugan Ra]] to temper his Maugetar. See? Even in its own faction, the thing gets killed anticlimactically.
*Abandoned on a [[Maiden World]], where its connection to the Eldar was severed, reducing it to a mindless state of rage. The now-unbound Avatar consequently called out to the [[Orks]] of the nearby Octarius system, which were [[Looted|happy to answer it]]. It's kind of sad that the only time the Avatar isn't being a jobber is when he's being used by someone else entirely.
*Killed by the [[Legion of the Damned]] when assisting the [[Invaders]] in their assault on Craftworld Idharae. When the Legion realized their flaming bolters did squat against the Avatar, they instead brought the roof down on it. This one's slightly less [[fail]]-worthy than the others, since destroying the dome ''literally blasted the Avatar out into the void of space'' and the Invaders were seriously mauled by the Avatar before this.
*Slain by a Battlewagon whilst leading Ulthwe's forces in a near suicidal attempt to defeat a powerful Ork Warboss.
*Somehow able to achieve a mutual kill against [[Skarbrand]], most likely the closest thing to a victory any Avatar has ever achieved; it should be noted that, as the Avatar of the Craftworld with the greatest devotion to Khaine, it may have been stronger than normal. Sadly, with the death of the Craftworld and Infinity Circuit, this Avatar is most likely no more.
*Somehow fused and corrupted by a Genestealer Patriarch who took over it on the Craftworld Zaisuthra. Once again, the Avatar is a living '''metal statue''', raising the question of how the hell a biological creature fused with it unanswered beyond GW fiat.
*A purer shard of the Avatar of Khaine, called the Warshard, was killed rather quickly by the Yncarne possessing Yvraine which, considering the Yncarne itself was easily defeated by Ahriman, [[Fail|does not say good things about Khaine]].

He's also used by a boss fight whenever Eldar show up in [[Dawn of War]]. These are among his more dignified deaths because he's actually got the high-level stats he ''should'' have, on par with greater daemons, yet encountered much earlier:
*Killed by [[Gabriel Angelos]]' 3rd company without the aid of anything heavier than a [[Dreadnought]] during the [[Dawn of War|Tartarus Campaign]]. The presence of [[Isador Akios]], though he was already descending towards [[heresy]], probably helped too.
*Killed in a break-dancing competition by a Khornate [[Bloodthirster]] during the Eldar's incursion on Lorn V (this one's non-canon).
*In Dark Crusade, destroying the Eldar Stronghold during the Kronus Campaign shows you a loving rendition of the Avatar getting punk'd in ''single combat'' by the tallest unit your army has to offer. This includes:
**A Chaos Bloodthirster.
**A Necron [[C'tan|Nightbringer shard]].
**A Tau [[Great Knarloc]].
**If the [[Imperial Guard]] under [[Governor-Militant Lukas Alexander|Lukas Alexander]] defeat the eldar on Kronus, then the avatar gets killed by a MOTHER FUCKING [[sentinel|SENTINEL]].
**And last but not least, the tallest unit [[Blood Ravens|the canonical winners]] have to kill the Avatar is Epistolary Anteas. Yep, Papa Smurf himself just got outdone by a [[Librarian]]. In the after-action report Anteas is credited with stealing the pieces of the Avatar's armor, showing early-onset signs of the Blood Ravens' kleptomania.
*Possibly defended [[Caerys|Farseer Caerys']] last base on Kaurava III only to be blown away by <strike>[[Vance Stubbs|VANCE MOTHERFUCKING STUBBS]] and his 100 [[Baneblade|Baneblades]] after they refused to fuck off.</strike> <span style='color:green;font-size:115%'> KRUMPED BY GORGUTZ! QWIT WHININ' DIS IZ KANNON YA 'UMIE GROT!</span>
*Killed ''twice'' by [[Blood Ravens Force Commander|Force Commander Hair Gel's]] squad during the fighting to pacify the Eldar in subsector Aurelia. Though to be honest, both of these battles are really fucking hard if you don't have a well-managed squad, and nothing short of [[Ulkair|greater daemons]] is more than a speedbump for [[Tarkus]] or [[Cyrus]].

One rare example of an Avatar of Khaine not being used as a punching bag is in the Fracture of Biel Tan, where one ties with an injured Skarbrand. It has gotten to the point that the question isn't who could beat an Avatar, but who ''hasn't'' beaten an Avatar.

===On the Tabletop===
[[File:LatestKhaine.jpg|thumb|right|300px|FOOL! YOU DARE QUESTION THE SIZE OF MY LOINCLOTH?! ([[Mark Gibbons|MG]])]]
The Avatar of Khaine took a bit of a beating with 8th edition. For starters, the Avatar now costs 220 points while not improving too much. What you get for that cost is a whopping WS2+ A5 monster that hits at S8 AP-4 D6 damage, with an ability that lets you roll two dice and take the highest to determine damage. This means that the Avatar of Khaine can punch holes in tanks and monsters like it's nobody's business. Do note that it has only 5 attacks and it deals no Mortal Wounds, so it can kill a maximum of 5 models per turn. If you really want all your attacks to hit, give him an Autarch buddy for rerolls for your To Hit rolls. On top of that it can also shoot with that profile as an 12" Assault 1 weapon, and thanks to Battle Focus does not get -1 to hit if it advanced the same turn. Paired with its 7" movement and a re-roll on failed charge rolls one of the Avatar's largest problems in earlier editions, its low speed, has been kind of addressed. As for saves it gets a 3+, a 5++ due to being a Daemon and its Molten Body ability has been reworked into granting yet another 5++ save instead of immunity to flamers and melta weapons. With the advent of multi-wound weapons this is quite useful and it would be one hell of a job to write down exactly which guns count as flamers or melta now that the keywords regarding them are gone, it is still sad to see such a flavorful ability disappear. With T6, W8 and no degrading of its abilities as it gets hurt the Avatar can stay in the fight long enough, but two lucky Lascannon shots can put it down for the count with frightening ease (although if you lose a character to shooting in 8th edition you probably don't know what you're doing). Don't forget that it's a Character, so as long as it remains screened by other units it should be able to get close enough to the enemy to deal damage. Be wary of flyers with powerful weapons, for they can easily assassinate your Avatar because of the high speed of the rest of the Eldar army compared to it.

If you're not running a Saim-Hann list the Avatar's '''12"''' aura (which allows units to re-roll failed charges and makes them immune to morale) can be pure rape. Use him to propel Howling Banshees up the table, or to lead a horde of Guardian blobs.

When using Power Ratings instead the Avatar clocks in at 13 points, the second-most expensive unit behind the [[Wraithknight]]. Nothing much changes about it, so stick it in combat as soon as you can to get the most out of it.

==Warhammer Fantasy==
Similar to his 40k part only not in pieces. He is given a LOT more respect in this version of him, shown to be a powerful, mighty god that is renowned and feared (as he should be, you pussies).

There was no prophecy that the Elves would harm him, so that 40k story about him trying to wipe the mortal elves out didn't happen in the Fantasy universe because he had no reason to dislike the mortal elves. The Swords of [[Vaul]] story DID happen however, and that final Sword was the [[Widowmaker]] which somehow ended up in the mortal world (a lot of Khaine's shit does actually, probably at a 1:1 ratio with [[Lileath|Lileath's]]). He's not outright evil (other than the fact he likes war just like the Fantasy players), rather he's pretty neutral and the High Elves love to acknowledge the dualities of "evil has to be killed by good, there can be no joy without sorrow, etc" with him.

Overall, Khaine is a huge asshole and High Elves acknowledge him as part of the pantheon but do not actually worship him (barring a small minority amongst the [[Ulthuan|Nagarythe]] who are a bit more fucked up than the rest of the lot, which is saying something). [[Dark Elves]] on the other hand praise him in [[Asuryan|Asuryan's]] place (when they aren't worshiping [[Slaanesh]] anyway).
High Elves do not insult him however, and still include a depiction of him amongst the High Elf Pantheon who view him as a necessary evil. High Elf warriors pray to Khaine before battle, but are careful to insure that his influence does not drive them batshit crazy. The Shrine of Khaine is a hotly fought over place between the High and Dark Elves, the former trying to prevent his worship and the latter trying to, well, worship at it. It's the location of the [[Widowmaker]] (see below).

He's not overly fond of ANY of the elf races in the mortal world, but since the Dark Elves revere him instead of big boss Asuryan he grants them boons then sits back with some popcorn and watches the Elves slaughter each other.

His love of war combined with his elfness and that his most ardent worshipers are scantily-clad women means he's probably the secret love-child of Khorne and Slaanesh (tsundere confirmed).

===The Sword of Khaine===
Long ago, when the Old Ones left and Daemons were overrunning the world, [[Aenarion]], the first Phoenix King of the High Elves (as well as the father of the king of the Dark Elves) took up the Sword to help fight off the Daemons. He used it to kick so much ass he eventually drove the Daemons back. During the final battle against the Daemons, while his [[Caledor the Dragontamer|best bud]] created a Vortex to syphon off the extra magic and keep the Daemons from manifesting properly, he used the sword to fight and kill all four avatars of the [[Chaos Gods]], killing a Lord of Change, Bloodthirster and Keeper of Secrets single-handedly (there was a Great Unclean One, but his HUEG dragon helped him kill that). Suck it Marneus.

Aenarion, mortally wounded, took his dragon (also mortally wounded, having been ambushed by the Bloodthirster Aenarion subsequently killed) and flew across half a continent (which, thanks to the size of the Warhammer world, means a full sized continent) back to the island then stuck it in the ground at the Shrine, where it remains to this day.

Some editions imply the Widowmaker being grabbed by Aenarion and thus causing the Dark Elves to happen is Khaine's plan come to fruition so there'd always be elves fighting and thus his portfolio would mean something. Other times, he's with the other gods in facepalming when he nabbed it and cursed himself. It's open to interpretation.

===Khaine Lives In Death===
Kane.. er, I mean Khaine... was the main focus of [[The End Times]]' third book, which focused on the conclusion of the Elven wars.

So Malekith, king of the Druchii and all-around bad person, manages to repeat the ritual of becoming the Phoenix King once again and succeeds this time, reclaiming the title that was rightfully his. [[Tyrion]], the closest thing to a guardian as Ulthuan has had the entire event, finds this to be a breaking point in a series of upsets (Including being utterly unaware that his own brother caused Tyrion's illegitimate daughter to be sacrificed to summon [[Nagash|the king of the spooky scary skeletons]] and helped cause the death of the last Phoenix King) and decides that enough is enough. At the Shrine of Khaine, Tyrion takes up the Widowmaker, and thus becomes possessed by the big guy himself as his Avatar.

This possession does a 180 on his personality; where once Tyrion was a noble prince who was dedicated to defending his land, Khaine's possession turned him into a murderous asshole. Well, that and Morathi's attempts at wooing him. This too affected the Elves as well, as they also surrendered to their murderous impulses and Witches joined with his host. Together, they rampaged through Wood Elves and murdered Orion (and Kurnous), they executed Kohril when he stole the Widowmaker in hopes of ending the war early, and generally just stopped caring about protecting their land.

This all comes to a head at the Isle of the Dead, where all Elves had a massive battle, with Malekith's side being bolstered by the ghosts of Phoenix Kings past who sought to repay a debt to their creator. Eventually Malekith, now bearing Asuryan's power, and Tyrion the Avatar of Khaine battled. It was long, bloody, and terrible, but eventually it ended when Alith Anar managed to snipe out Tyrion's heart. Tyrion's death also spelled the death of Khaine, and thus his madness faded from the world and the Old Gods faded from the world. When Tyrion was resurrected in the last book, it was free of the Bloody Handed one's influence.

===Age of Sigmar===

In Age of Sigmar Khaine (like all the Aelven gods) is dead, killed in the End Times. But the Aelven Gods are cyclical and will reincarnate if there's any bits of them left and they're worshiped enough. Most of Khaine's parts ended up in Khorne's control...somehow and were reforged into weapons for his greatest generals, except for Khaine's iron heart. Despite the greatest efforts of Khorne's forges, the heart would not break or even crack, and even the mightiest efforts of Khorne himself only succeeded in squeezing eight drops of blood from it. Finally Khorne got frustrated and hurled it away where, after a lot of shit, it came into the clutches of Morathi, who declared herself the High Oracle of Khaine and started uniting Khaine's worshipers to bring Khaine back to life.

Except not. Holding onto the Iron Heart of Khaine has allowed [[Morathi]] to steal its power and she's using it as part of her plan to ascend to Godhood. After centuries of plotting, Morathi gathered the resources and tools to undertake a ritual - enter Slaanesh's belly and consume the souls of the Phoenix Kings from the World-That-Was. But Morathi hesitated when she reached Aenarion's soul, which cut hers in half, leaving Morathi one soul in two bodies. She then took all the power she'd accumulated, fused her essence with that of Khaine's heart and became the goddess Morathi-Khaine. Khaine as he was is gone in AoS, and Morathi-Khaine is all that remains... maybe. Given that Khaine's will is a strange thing, perhaps he just wanted to be a banging hot crazy snake goddess for a bit. Gods are weird like that.

===On the Tabletop===

As implied by the name, the Daughters of Khaine faction is entirely devoted to Khaine and as such they get their own Avatar of Khaine model. This can be taken either on foot or as part of a Cauldron of Blood, but unlike the 40k version, it's not the heart of a Craftworld or Temple but simply an iron statue, animated by magic. As such it requires continual prayers from Daughters of Khaine Priests to stay awake and moving, at least until you hit turn 3 in an all-Daughters army, at which point it wakes up permanently as part of their escalating table allegiance ability (there are a lot of bonuses to playing all Daughters of Khaine, the girls do not play well with others).

Once he's awake however, he's an incredibly brutal close combat unit. Clocking in at 180 points (or included as part of the 300/330 for a Cauldron) he moves 9 inches a turn, has a short ranged shooting attack that can hit hard (6 shots, 3s to hit, 3s to wound, -1 rend, 1 damage, just don't ask how it hurts Magmadroths) and in close combat he's got 4, 3 to hit, 3 to wound, -3 rend, 3 Damage hits. Yes, flat 3 damage. Alone he can very easily wreck entire units or annihilate monsters (especially since the turn he wakes up automatically, he gets rerolls of 1 to hit) and on top of a Cauldron he can help the Cauldron eat squads. The only downside is he's basically only a beatstick, only having a small +1LD aura (which is active whether he's awake or not). Still, as the monster at the front of a brutal charge, he certainly does the job.

== Trivia ==

* Khaine was inspired by and named after Cain from the Abrahamic Scriptures; the first human born outside the Garden of Eden and the first murderer. Interestingly, Cain's victim was his younger brother Abel and some of the Eldar/Elf gods are considered siblings. Also, while Cain was marked by God to prevent others from killing him, Khaine the elf god was marked by the top elf god Asuryan for his murder of Eldandesh.
* The Wailing Doom (known as the ''Suin Daellae'' by the Eldar) wielded by the Avatar also bears close similarities with the mythical weapon of the Irish god Lugh, a [[Awesome|howling burning spear so bloodthirsty it was able to throw itself at the enemy like a fucking missile and was never tired of slaying shit.]]

==Gallery==
<gallery>
Image:M3470223a 99120212009 2013CauldronOfBlood01 873x627.jpg|Dark Elf Cauldron of Blood, a mobile shrine to Khaine administered to by his fangirls.
Image:AvatarofKhaine.png|Here we can see Khaine being a little bit mad at Isha lying about that ”time of the month”
Image:1236357978434.jpg|The Avatar of Biel-tan, soon to get its shit kicked in.
Img4acfaf8c4d2c9.jpg|An Avatar of Khaine has arrived and he would like a word or two with Khorne.
99590104004 AVATARWITHWAILINGDOOMSPEAR4.webp| An Avatar of Khaine about to bring down its mighty spear on some foes.
</gallery>

== Navigation ==

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[[Category: Dark Elves]]

Khaine

2021-01-29T08:59:06Z

2406:3400:20F:FFC0:97C:9E80:BC00:599B: /* Age of Sigmar */

[[File:Khaine End Times.png|350px|thumb|right|The only Eldar god that has the [[Awesome|testosterone]] and [[RAEG]] to rival [[Khorne|Khorne.]]]]
<div style="font-size:1.10em;font-weight:bold;font-style:bold;font-family:serif;margin-top:1em;margin-bottom:1em"><span style='color:orange;font-size:120%'> ALL WHO OPPOSE ME SHALL BURN TO CINDERS AND ASH! - Khaine, being anal and wrong as fuck</span></div>'''

{{Topquote|Do not go gentle into that good night. Rage, rage against the dying of the light.|Dylan Thomas}}

'''Khaela Mensha Khaine''' (also known as the '''Bloody-Handed God''', '''A Consistent [[Fail]]''', or '''Big Daddy Calgar's personal pleasure object''') is the [[Dark Elf]], [[High Elf]]/Aelf, and [[Eldar]] God of War and Fire. He is also GW's Worf-equivalent, being the chosen punchbag-by-proxy for whenever they want to prove just how powerful their new character of the week is [[#The Avatar of Khaine|(more on that below)]].

==In Warhammer 40,000==
Mr. K.M. Khaine is one of the three Eldar gods that survived the [[Fall of the Eldar]] (the other two being [[Cegorach]] and [[Isha]]), although he was trampled and pushed out of the [[Warp]] and into realspace while [[Khorne]] was busy piledriving baby [[Slaanesh]] all over Eldar heaven. Because of this, he's no longer "alive" in a spiritual sense and is now shattered into a bajillion physical pieces. These pieces made their way into the [[Craftworld]]s, where they can be used to summon a manifestation of Khaine when the need arises. He's also the angriest god of the Eldar pantheon, although he can't really contest with the [[RAGE]] of [[Angron]] and [[Doombreed]].

It has been [[Xenology|hinted]] at that Khaine (as well as the rest of the Eldar pantheon) is one of the [[Old Ones]], and so strictly speaking is not exclusively an Eldar deity. He was also the Bloody-Handed God of War for the [[Hrud]].

===The story of the single angriest Eldar entity ever===
Long ago, when the Eldar were the most powerful race in the universe and they hadn't raped themselves yet, Khaine heard from [[Lileath]], the prophecy-giver of the Eldar pantheon, that the Eldar would one day kill him. Khaine, never one for subtlety, decided to [[Exterminatus|murder every last one of the pansies]] to ensure that never happened. However, [[Isha]], the mother-goddess of the Eldar, wept for them because no sane mother would want her own children butchered to death by a maniacal god of war. Khaine's rage gets pretty visible at this point because he had the hots for Isha and still completely ignored her, even after she immediately used her common sense and said she was not getting with a genocidal manifestation of pure wrath (per the book ''Path of the Eldar''. Speaking of which, this book basically says that Eldar [[Exarch|Exarchs]] and Khaine have severe psychological problems. Too bad the only gods who come close to being psychologists are [[God-Emperor of Mankind|this warmongering atheist]] and [[Tzeentch|this squawking politician patron]] of [[Sorcerer (Dungeons & Dragons)|spontaneous casters]]. The last one would be [[Malal|this god]] who doesn't believe that you (or he) exists.

Anyway, that's where [[Asuryan]], the Phoenix King of the Eldar gods, intervened and decided to spare the Eldar from their would-be fate at the bloody hands of Khaine and Isha from having to witness it, by creating a barrier to separate mortals from gods for all eternity. This ensured that the mortal Eldar would never have the chance to kill Khaine and that Khaine would never be able to enter the mortal realm and kill all of the Eldar. This solution worked for Khaine, but not so well for Isha.

Isha missed talking to her children and so cheated through the whole barrier deal by having [[Vaul|Vaul the Artificer]] (the best craftsman of the Eldar gods) make spirit stones to communicate with them. Khaine however, discovered this, and cried foul on Isha and her husband [[Kurnous]]. Asuryan, not wanting to look like a biased dick, told Khaine that he could do whatever he wanted with the two, so naturally Khaine chose eternal torment. Vaul got pissed at this and bargained with Khaine that he would make a hundred of his finest swords in a year in exchange for Isha and Kurnous' release, which Khaine agreed to.

However, because Vaul decided to jerk off on the last day rather than work, he couldn't make the last sword in time and instead tried to trick Khaine by putting one normal sword among the bunch of ninety-nine epic swords he made, thinking that Khaine, with his short attention span and inability to count beyond 10, wouldn't notice and would just accept the fuckheug pile of swords as is. Which is exactly what seemingly happened at first, and Khaine released Isha and Kurnous. [[Just as planned|Situation over]]. [[Not as planned|However, Vaul didn't count on Khaine being a total mathfag/detailfag whenever he's weaponwhoring]], and so Khaine got almighty pissed when he discovered that he got tricked. Yeah, a lot of people reeeaaallly love to screw with Khaine. Too bad the guy has a terrible sense of humor.

This trickery had unfortunate consequences for the whole Eldar pantheon, who after Asuryan shrugged the matter off started to take sides: some agreed with Khaine, others told him to calm the fuck down and grow up; and things snowballed from there and boiled over into the mortal realm (simply having Vaul fashion a replacement sword [[derp|apparently never occurred to anyone]]). Exactly what the hell happened then is unclear but a couple of things are set in stone. At one point, Khaine got his hands on Vaul and beat the shit out of him before chaining him to his anvil. Another certainty is that he eventually murdered Eldanesh, an Eldar champion, although why he did it is unclear since multiple reasons have been put forward (there's lore on this in multiple sources and they are contradictory as fuck):

*Eldanesh challenged Khaine to an honorable duel for the freedom of Vaul, armed with the last blade the Artisan-God should have finished in time (and did before his capture). (Original lore from 2ed. Codex: Eldar.)
*Eldanesh, as nominal leader of the mortal Eldars, was just tired of his shit and told Khaine to calm the fuck down because he and the [[War in Heaven]] were fucking things up for the Eldar royally. (More recent lore.)
*Eldanesh and Khaine actually collaborated during the war against the [[Necrons]], but at the end he gave Khaine the middle finger when he tried to convince him to keep killing for the sake of killing and generally having violent fun. And Eldanesh did it in vain because his murder triggered the internecine [[War in Heaven]] anyway. (See also the novel ''Path of the Eldar'' by [[Gav Thorpe]].)

Anyway, whatever the exact reason, what is certain is Khaine got [[rage|a little angry]] at Eldanesh and slapped a bitch, and since said bitch wasn't a god it really didn't end well. That's the point where Asuryan got '''really''' tired of everyone's shit so he told everyone to shut the fuck up and condemned Khaine to have blood eternally drip from his hands to remind him of his crime, earning him the title "Khaela Mensha" (or Bloody-Handed).

When the [[Chaos Gods|Chaos god]] [[Slaanesh]] was birthed from the accumulated Warp energy of the Eldar's galactic empire of excess and decadence, Khaine tried to battle the newborn god and managed to put up a pretty good fight, despite the fact The Great Hermaphrodite had already consumed the other Eldar gods and was backed by the Ruinous Powers themselves (well, [[khorne| two of them at least]]). Despite Slaanesh overpowering him she/he/it did not have power enough to consume Khaine, but then [[Khorne]] appeared and challenged Slaanesh to a battle, as he claimed that Khaine was his property and that Slaanesh had no right to eat him. Needless to say, Slaanesh lost. While Khorne was busy piledriving and backbreaking Slaanesh into oblivion, Khaine was in the middle of it and got shattered into a million pieces, presumably because Khorne had left his axe back at the Brass Citadel and [https://1d4chan.org/images/8/8f/AngryMarine9.jpg Khaine was the only available melee weapon at the time]. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnlfyWWeD5k Or maybe he made a fine object on which to drop Slaanesh over and over again]. Whatever it was, he doesn't say and the rest is history.

So in the end, Lileath's prophecy did come true in a sense. The Eldar were responsible for the birth of Slaanesh, who sort of got Khaine killed, but not totally because technically he is still "alive". It's just that he's not up and about anymore, like [[Cegorach]] and [[Isha]], and now has to live with the fact that he, the Eldar god of war and destruction, was himself destroyed. Either way, it was either [[Just As Planned]] by [[Tzeentch]], who was the only Chaos God who didn't directly intervene during the fall of the Eldar, or Cegorach, because that hilarious son of a bitch just HAD to do it to put Khaine in his place before he slipped back into the [[Webway]]. Hell, for all we know, the two could have orchestrated the entire Fall of the Eldar just to be the only two entities who managed to successfully screw with Khaine and get away with it.

===The Avatar of Khaine===
[[File:Avatar vs Lorgar.jpg|thumb|350px|right|The Avatar of Khaine in its natural state of existence: dying horribly to make whatever character or faction GW is currently trying to sell look awesome. (In this instance, [[Lorgar]] mercy killed it.)]]

The '''Avatar of Khaine''' is a unique Eldar [[daemon]] unit. The Avatar is basically a small fragment of Khaine's power given form through one of his fragments present in a Craftworld.

The Eldar will only summon the Avatar into battle under the most dire of circumstances when there is no other choice. This is because in order to summon the Avatar, the Eldar must sacrifice one of their [[Exarch]]s, known as the "Young King", in order to bring him into existence, and this only lasts for a limited amount of time. Like any daemon, after some time, the Avatar will eventually degenerate and disappear, taking the sacrificed Exarch with it. For the Exarch in question this is the ultimate honour, as this and becoming a Phoenix Lord are the only ways an Exarch can find release in death.

There is an alternative method of awakening the Avatar, but it requires no less than six [[Phoenix Lord]]s to show up on a craftworld simultaneously and place their weapons at the Avatar's feet. The concentration of psychic energy is enough to not only awaken the Avatar without needing a sacrifice, but [[Apocalypse|supercharge him]].

He <s>used to be</s> '''IS''' really strong, but [[Games Workshop]]'s authors have taken a liking to murdering Avatars every chance they get depending on marketing needs. Because of this, the Avatar has been:

*Killed hilariously by [[Marneus Calgar]] in hand-to-hand combat in the 5th edition [[Space Marine]] codex. This can mainly be chalked up to the ridiculous levels of [[Matt Ward|Wardian Wankery]] in the 5th Ed codex, and can be unofficially retconned/explained as an exaggerated in-universe tale to reinforce the 'unstoppable angel of death' image of Astartes that the average Imperial will know about.
*Possessed by Heartslayer, a [[Keeper of Secrets]] (oh, the [[Irony|irony]]), during the invasion of the Eldar Craftworld Kher-Ys.
*Trampled to death by twelve stampeding [[Carnifex|Carnifexes]] during the battle between [[Craftworld Iyanden]] and the [[Hive Fleet Kraken]]. What happened was that the Avatar goaded the swarm's [[Hive Tyrant]] into a duel. What the Avatar failed to realize was that this wasn't tabletop and that the [[Tyranids]] are a pragmatic instead of an idealistic lot who have no concept of honourable or dirty fighting, so the Hive Tyrant just raised his brow at this and sent twelve Carnifexes to run the Avatar over. (Weirdly, [[Matt Ward]] gave him a more dignified death than this bullshit.)
*Strangled (WTF?)/neck crushed by [[Fulgrim]]. Let us remind you that Avatars are living metal statues, and they neither breathe nor have bones. Unless Fulgrim full-on [[Rip and Tear|crushed its neck until the head popped off]], which would've pretty thoroughly killed it.
*Killed by the [[Sanguinor]].
*Doused in a great flood by the water people of Astrominus IV after his raw power and heat defrosted them from their icy imprisonment by the Space Wolves.
*"Put out of his misery" by [[Lorgar Aurelian|Lorgar]] (who was, at the time, considered to be the worst fighter out of all the [[Primarchs]]). Though the Avatar was heavily damaged even before the fight, unable to even stand and driven mad by centuries spent in the Warp, and this was just a few pages before Lorgar proved to be a top level badass as he battled and bested Anggrath, the uber-[[Bloodthirster]] of Khorne who can eat Avatars and [[Titans]] like cookies.
*Stabbed in the heart by [[Maugan Ra]] to temper his Maugetar. See? Even in its own faction, the thing gets killed anticlimactically.
*Abandoned on a [[Maiden World]], where its connection to the Eldar was severed, reducing it to a mindless state of rage. The now-unbound Avatar consequently called out to the [[Orks]] of the nearby Octarius system, which were [[Looted|happy to answer it]]. It's kind of sad that the only time the Avatar isn't being a jobber is when he's being used by someone else entirely.
*Killed by the [[Legion of the Damned]] when assisting the [[Invaders]] in their assault on Craftworld Idharae. When the Legion realized their flaming bolters did squat against the Avatar, they instead brought the roof down on it. This one's slightly less [[fail]]-worthy than the others, since destroying the dome ''literally blasted the Avatar out into the void of space'' and the Invaders were seriously mauled by the Avatar before this.
*Slain by a Battlewagon whilst leading Ulthwe's forces in a near suicidal attempt to defeat a powerful Ork Warboss.
*Somehow able to achieve a mutual kill against [[Skarbrand]], most likely the closest thing to a victory any Avatar has ever achieved; it should be noted that, as the Avatar of the Craftworld with the greatest devotion to Khaine, it may have been stronger than normal. Sadly, with the death of the Craftworld and Infinity Circuit, this Avatar is most likely no more.
*Somehow fused and corrupted by a Genestealer Patriarch who took over it on the Craftworld Zaisuthra. Once again, the Avatar is a living '''metal statue''', raising the question of how the hell a biological creature fused with it unanswered beyond GW fiat.
*A purer shard of the Avatar of Khaine, called the Warshard, was killed rather quickly by the Yncarne possessing Yvraine which, considering the Yncarne itself was easily defeated by Ahriman, [[Fail|does not say good things about Khaine]].

He's also used by a boss fight whenever Eldar show up in [[Dawn of War]]. These are among his more dignified deaths because he's actually got the high-level stats he ''should'' have, on par with greater daemons, yet encountered much earlier:
*Killed by [[Gabriel Angelos]]' 3rd company without the aid of anything heavier than a [[Dreadnought]] during the [[Dawn of War|Tartarus Campaign]]. The presence of [[Isador Akios]], though he was already descending towards [[heresy]], probably helped too.
*Killed in a break-dancing competition by a Khornate [[Bloodthirster]] during the Eldar's incursion on Lorn V (this one's non-canon).
*In Dark Crusade, destroying the Eldar Stronghold during the Kronus Campaign shows you a loving rendition of the Avatar getting punk'd in ''single combat'' by the tallest unit your army has to offer. This includes:
**A Chaos Bloodthirster.
**A Necron [[C'tan|Nightbringer shard]].
**A Tau [[Great Knarloc]].
**If the [[Imperial Guard]] under [[Governor-Militant Lukas Alexander|Lukas Alexander]] defeat the eldar on Kronus, then the avatar gets killed by a MOTHER FUCKING [[sentinel|SENTINEL]].
**And last but not least, the tallest unit [[Blood Ravens|the canonical winners]] have to kill the Avatar is Epistolary Anteas. Yep, Papa Smurf himself just got outdone by a [[Librarian]]. In the after-action report Anteas is credited with stealing the pieces of the Avatar's armor, showing early-onset signs of the Blood Ravens' kleptomania.
*Possibly defended [[Caerys|Farseer Caerys']] last base on Kaurava III only to be blown away by <strike>[[Vance Stubbs|VANCE MOTHERFUCKING STUBBS]] and his 100 [[Baneblade|Baneblades]] after they refused to fuck off.</strike> <span style='color:green;font-size:115%'> KRUMPED BY GORGUTZ! QWIT WHININ' DIS IZ KANNON YA 'UMIE GROT!</span>
*Killed ''twice'' by [[Blood Ravens Force Commander|Force Commander Hair Gel's]] squad during the fighting to pacify the Eldar in subsector Aurelia. Though to be honest, both of these battles are really fucking hard if you don't have a well-managed squad, and nothing short of [[Ulkair|greater daemons]] is more than a speedbump for [[Tarkus]] or [[Cyrus]].

One rare example of an Avatar of Khaine not being used as a punching bag is in the Fracture of Biel Tan, where one ties with an injured Skarbrand. It has gotten to the point that the question isn't who could beat an Avatar, but who ''hasn't'' beaten an Avatar.

===On the Tabletop===
[[File:LatestKhaine.jpg|thumb|right|300px|FOOL! YOU DARE QUESTION THE SIZE OF MY LOINCLOTH?! ([[Mark Gibbons|MG]])]]
The Avatar of Khaine took a bit of a beating with 8th edition. For starters, the Avatar now costs 220 points while not improving too much. What you get for that cost is a whopping WS2+ A5 monster that hits at S8 AP-4 D6 damage, with an ability that lets you roll two dice and take the highest to determine damage. This means that the Avatar of Khaine can punch holes in tanks and monsters like it's nobody's business. Do note that it has only 5 attacks and it deals no Mortal Wounds, so it can kill a maximum of 5 models per turn. If you really want all your attacks to hit, give him an Autarch buddy for rerolls for your To Hit rolls. On top of that it can also shoot with that profile as an 12" Assault 1 weapon, and thanks to Battle Focus does not get -1 to hit if it advanced the same turn. Paired with its 7" movement and a re-roll on failed charge rolls one of the Avatar's largest problems in earlier editions, its low speed, has been kind of addressed. As for saves it gets a 3+, a 5++ due to being a Daemon and its Molten Body ability has been reworked into granting yet another 5++ save instead of immunity to flamers and melta weapons. With the advent of multi-wound weapons this is quite useful and it would be one hell of a job to write down exactly which guns count as flamers or melta now that the keywords regarding them are gone, it is still sad to see such a flavorful ability disappear. With T6, W8 and no degrading of its abilities as it gets hurt the Avatar can stay in the fight long enough, but two lucky Lascannon shots can put it down for the count with frightening ease (although if you lose a character to shooting in 8th edition you probably don't know what you're doing). Don't forget that it's a Character, so as long as it remains screened by other units it should be able to get close enough to the enemy to deal damage. Be wary of flyers with powerful weapons, for they can easily assassinate your Avatar because of the high speed of the rest of the Eldar army compared to it.

If you're not running a Saim-Hann list the Avatar's '''12"''' aura (which allows units to re-roll failed charges and makes them immune to morale) can be pure rape. Use him to propel Howling Banshees up the table, or to lead a horde of Guardian blobs.

When using Power Ratings instead the Avatar clocks in at 13 points, the second-most expensive unit behind the [[Wraithknight]]. Nothing much changes about it, so stick it in combat as soon as you can to get the most out of it.

==Warhammer Fantasy==
Similar to his 40k part only not in pieces. He is given a LOT more respect in this version of him, shown to be a powerful, mighty god that is renowned and feared (as he should be, you pussies).

There was no prophecy that the Elves would harm him, so that 40k story about him trying to wipe the mortal elves out didn't happen in the Fantasy universe because he had no reason to dislike the mortal elves. The Swords of [[Vaul]] story DID happen however, and that final Sword was the [[Widowmaker]] which somehow ended up in the mortal world (a lot of Khaine's shit does actually, probably at a 1:1 ratio with [[Lileath|Lileath's]]). He's not outright evil (other than the fact he likes war just like the Fantasy players), rather he's pretty neutral and the High Elves love to acknowledge the dualities of "evil has to be killed by good, there can be no joy without sorrow, etc" with him.

Overall, Khaine is a huge asshole and High Elves acknowledge him as part of the pantheon but do not actually worship him (barring a small minority amongst the [[Ulthuan|Nagarythe]] who are a bit more fucked up than the rest of the lot, which is saying something). [[Dark Elves]] on the other hand praise him in [[Asuryan|Asuryan's]] place (when they aren't worshiping [[Slaanesh]] anyway).
High Elves do not insult him however, and still include a depiction of him amongst the High Elf Pantheon who view him as a necessary evil. High Elf warriors pray to Khaine before battle, but are careful to insure that his influence does not drive them batshit crazy. The Shrine of Khaine is a hotly fought over place between the High and Dark Elves, the former trying to prevent his worship and the latter trying to, well, worship at it. It's the location of the [[Widowmaker]] (see below).

He's not overly fond of ANY of the elf races in the mortal world, but since the Dark Elves revere him instead of big boss Asuryan he grants them boons then sits back with some popcorn and watches the Elves slaughter each other.

His love of war combined with his elfness and that his most ardent worshipers are scantily-clad women means he's probably the secret love-child of Khorne and Slaanesh (tsundere confirmed).

===The Sword of Khaine===
Long ago, when the Old Ones left and Daemons were overrunning the world, [[Aenarion]], the first Phoenix King of the High Elves (as well as the father of the king of the Dark Elves) took up the Sword to help fight off the Daemons. He used it to kick so much ass he eventually drove the Daemons back. During the final battle against the Daemons, while his [[Caledor the Dragontamer|best bud]] created a Vortex to syphon off the extra magic and keep the Daemons from manifesting properly, he used the sword to fight and kill all four avatars of the [[Chaos Gods]], killing a Lord of Change, Bloodthirster and Keeper of Secrets single-handedly (there was a Great Unclean One, but his HUEG dragon helped him kill that). Suck it Marneus.

Aenarion, mortally wounded, took his dragon (also mortally wounded, having been ambushed by the Bloodthirster Aenarion subsequently killed) and flew across half a continent (which, thanks to the size of the Warhammer world, means a full sized continent) back to the island then stuck it in the ground at the Shrine, where it remains to this day.

Some editions imply the Widowmaker being grabbed by Aenarion and thus causing the Dark Elves to happen is Khaine's plan come to fruition so there'd always be elves fighting and thus his portfolio would mean something. Other times, he's with the other gods in facepalming when he nabbed it and cursed himself. It's open to interpretation.

===Khaine Lives In Death===
Kane.. er, I mean Khaine... was the main focus of [[The End Times]]' third book, which focused on the conclusion of the Elven wars.

So Malekith, king of the Druchii and all-around bad person, manages to repeat the ritual of becoming the Phoenix King once again and succeeds this time, reclaiming the title that was rightfully his. [[Tyrion]], the closest thing to a guardian as Ulthuan has had the entire event, finds this to be a breaking point in a series of upsets (Including being utterly unaware that his own brother caused Tyrion's illegitimate daughter to be sacrificed to summon [[Nagash|the king of the spooky scary skeletons]] and helped cause the death of the last Phoenix King) and decides that enough is enough. At the Shrine of Khaine, Tyrion takes up the Widowmaker, and thus becomes possessed by the big guy himself as his Avatar.

This possession does a 180 on his personality; where once Tyrion was a noble prince who was dedicated to defending his land, Khaine's possession turned him into a murderous asshole. Well, that and Morathi's attempts at wooing him. This too affected the Elves as well, as they also surrendered to their murderous impulses and Witches joined with his host. Together, they rampaged through Wood Elves and murdered Orion (and Kurnous), they executed Kohril when he stole the Widowmaker in hopes of ending the war early, and generally just stopped caring about protecting their land.

This all comes to a head at the Isle of the Dead, where all Elves had a massive battle, with Malekith's side being bolstered by the ghosts of Phoenix Kings past who sought to repay a debt to their creator. Eventually Malekith, now bearing Asuryan's power, and Tyrion the Avatar of Khaine battled. It was long, bloody, and terrible, but eventually it ended when Alith Anar managed to snipe out Tyrion's heart. Tyrion's death also spelled the death of Khaine, and thus his madness faded from the world and the Old Gods faded from the world. When Tyrion was resurrected in the last book, it was free of the Bloody Handed one's influence.

===Age of Sigmar===

In Age of Sigmar Khaine (like all the Aelven gods) is dead, killed in the End Times. But the Aelven Gods are cyclical and will reincarnate if there's any bits of them left and they're worshiped enough. Most of Khaine's parts ended up in Khorne's control...somehow and were reforged into weapons for his greatest generals, except for Khaine's iron heart. Despite the greatest efforts of Khorne's forges, the heart would not break or even crack, and even the mightiest efforts of Khorne himself only succeeded in squeezing eight drops of blood from it. Finally Khorne got frustrated and hurled it away where, after a lot of shit, it came into the clutches of Morathi, who declared herself the High Oracle of Khaine and started uniting Khaine's worshipers to bring Khaine back to life.

Except not. Holding onto the Iron Heart of Khaine has allowed [[Morathi]] to steal its power and she's using it as part of her plan to ascend to Godhood. After centuries of plotting, Morathi gathered the resources and tools to undertake a ritual - enter Slaanesh's belly and consume the souls of the Phoenix Kings from the World-That-Was. But Morathi hesitated when she reached Aenarion's soul, which cut hers in half, leaving Morathi one soul in two bodies. She then took all the power she'd accumulated, fused her essence with that of Khaine's heart and became the goddess Morathi-Khaine. Khaine as he was is gone in AoS, and Morathi-Khaine is all that remains... maybe. Given that Khaine's will is a strange thing, perhaps he just wanted to be a banging hot crazy snake goddess for a bit. Gods are weird like that.

===On the Tabletop===

As implied by the name, the Daughters of Khaine faction is entirely devoted to Khaine and as such they get their own Avatar of Khaine model. This can be taken either on foot or as part of a Cauldron of Blood, but unlike the 40k version, it's not the heart of a Craftworld or Temple but simply an iron statue, animated by magic. As such it requires continual prayers from Daughters of Khaine Priests to stay awake and moving, at least until you hit turn 3 in an all-Daughters army, at which point it wakes up permanently as part of their escalating table allegiance ability (there are a lot of bonuses to playing all Daughters of Khaine, the girls do not play well with others).

Once he's awake however, he's an incredibly brutal close combat unit. Clocking in at 180 points (or included as part of the 300/330 for a Cauldron) he moves 9 inches a turn, has a short ranged shooting attack that can hit hard (6 shots, 3s to hit, 3s to wound, -1 rend, 1 damage, just don't ask how it hurts Magmadroths) and in close combat he's got 4, 3 to hit, 3 to wound, -3 rend, 3 Damage hits. Yes, flat 3 damage. Alone he can very easily wreck entire units or annihilate monsters (especially since the turn he wakes up automatically, he gets rerolls of 1 to hit) and on top of a Cauldron he can help the Cauldron eat squads. The only downside is he's basically only a beatstick, only having a small +1LD aura (which is active whether he's awake or not). Still, as the monster at the front of a brutal charge, he certainly does the job.

== Trivia ==

* Khaine was inspired by and named after Cain from the Abrahamic Scriptures; the first human born outside the Garden of Eden and the first murderer (the victim was his younger brother Abel). Interestingly, some of the Eldar/Elf gods are considered siblings. Also, while Cain was marked by God to prevent others from killing him, Khaine the elf god was marked by the god Asuryan for his murder of Eldandesh.
* The Wailing Doom (known as the ''Suin Daellae'' by the Eldar) wielded by the Avatar also bears close similarities with the mythical weapon of the Irish god Lugh, a [[Awesome|howling burning spear so bloodthirsty it was able to throw itself at the enemy like a fucking missile and was never tired of slaying shit.]]

==Gallery==
<gallery>
Image:M3470223a 99120212009 2013CauldronOfBlood01 873x627.jpg|Dark Elf Cauldron of Blood, a mobile shrine to Khaine administered to by his fangirls.
Image:AvatarofKhaine.png|Here we can see Khaine being a little bit mad at Isha lying about that ”time of the month”
Image:1236357978434.jpg|The Avatar of Biel-tan, soon to get its shit kicked in.
Img4acfaf8c4d2c9.jpg|An Avatar of Khaine has arrived and he would like a word or two with Khorne.
99590104004 AVATARWITHWAILINGDOOMSPEAR4.webp| An Avatar of Khaine about to bring down its mighty spear on some foes.
</gallery>

== Navigation ==

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[[Category: Dark Elves]]

Khaine

2021-01-29T08:55:18Z

2406:3400:20F:FFC0:97C:9E80:BC00:599B: /* Age of Sigmar */

[[File:Khaine End Times.png|350px|thumb|right|The only Eldar god that has the [[Awesome|testosterone]] and [[RAEG]] to rival [[Khorne|Khorne.]]]]
<div style="font-size:1.10em;font-weight:bold;font-style:bold;font-family:serif;margin-top:1em;margin-bottom:1em"><span style='color:orange;font-size:120%'> ALL WHO OPPOSE ME SHALL BURN TO CINDERS AND ASH! - Khaine, being anal and wrong as fuck</span></div>'''

{{Topquote|Do not go gentle into that good night. Rage, rage against the dying of the light.|Dylan Thomas}}

'''Khaela Mensha Khaine''' (also known as the '''Bloody-Handed God''', '''A Consistent [[Fail]]''', or '''Big Daddy Calgar's personal pleasure object''') is the [[Dark Elf]], [[High Elf]]/Aelf, and [[Eldar]] God of War and Fire. He is also GW's Worf-equivalent, being the chosen punchbag-by-proxy for whenever they want to prove just how powerful their new character of the week is [[#The Avatar of Khaine|(more on that below)]].

==In Warhammer 40,000==
Mr. K.M. Khaine is one of the three Eldar gods that survived the [[Fall of the Eldar]] (the other two being [[Cegorach]] and [[Isha]]), although he was trampled and pushed out of the [[Warp]] and into realspace while [[Khorne]] was busy piledriving baby [[Slaanesh]] all over Eldar heaven. Because of this, he's no longer "alive" in a spiritual sense and is now shattered into a bajillion physical pieces. These pieces made their way into the [[Craftworld]]s, where they can be used to summon a manifestation of Khaine when the need arises. He's also the angriest god of the Eldar pantheon, although he can't really contest with the [[RAGE]] of [[Angron]] and [[Doombreed]].

It has been [[Xenology|hinted]] at that Khaine (as well as the rest of the Eldar pantheon) is one of the [[Old Ones]], and so strictly speaking is not exclusively an Eldar deity. He was also the Bloody-Handed God of War for the [[Hrud]].

===The story of the single angriest Eldar entity ever===
Long ago, when the Eldar were the most powerful race in the universe and they hadn't raped themselves yet, Khaine heard from [[Lileath]], the prophecy-giver of the Eldar pantheon, that the Eldar would one day kill him. Khaine, never one for subtlety, decided to [[Exterminatus|murder every last one of the pansies]] to ensure that never happened. However, [[Isha]], the mother-goddess of the Eldar, wept for them because no sane mother would want her own children butchered to death by a maniacal god of war. Khaine's rage gets pretty visible at this point because he had the hots for Isha and still completely ignored her, even after she immediately used her common sense and said she was not getting with a genocidal manifestation of pure wrath (per the book ''Path of the Eldar''. Speaking of which, this book basically says that Eldar [[Exarch|Exarchs]] and Khaine have severe psychological problems. Too bad the only gods who come close to being psychologists are [[God-Emperor of Mankind|this warmongering atheist]] and [[Tzeentch|this squawking politician patron]] of [[Sorcerer (Dungeons & Dragons)|spontaneous casters]]. The last one would be [[Malal|this god]] who doesn't believe that you (or he) exists.

Anyway, that's where [[Asuryan]], the Phoenix King of the Eldar gods, intervened and decided to spare the Eldar from their would-be fate at the bloody hands of Khaine and Isha from having to witness it, by creating a barrier to separate mortals from gods for all eternity. This ensured that the mortal Eldar would never have the chance to kill Khaine and that Khaine would never be able to enter the mortal realm and kill all of the Eldar. This solution worked for Khaine, but not so well for Isha.

Isha missed talking to her children and so cheated through the whole barrier deal by having [[Vaul|Vaul the Artificer]] (the best craftsman of the Eldar gods) make spirit stones to communicate with them. Khaine however, discovered this, and cried foul on Isha and her husband [[Kurnous]]. Asuryan, not wanting to look like a biased dick, told Khaine that he could do whatever he wanted with the two, so naturally Khaine chose eternal torment. Vaul got pissed at this and bargained with Khaine that he would make a hundred of his finest swords in a year in exchange for Isha and Kurnous' release, which Khaine agreed to.

However, because Vaul decided to jerk off on the last day rather than work, he couldn't make the last sword in time and instead tried to trick Khaine by putting one normal sword among the bunch of ninety-nine epic swords he made, thinking that Khaine, with his short attention span and inability to count beyond 10, wouldn't notice and would just accept the fuckheug pile of swords as is. Which is exactly what seemingly happened at first, and Khaine released Isha and Kurnous. [[Just as planned|Situation over]]. [[Not as planned|However, Vaul didn't count on Khaine being a total mathfag/detailfag whenever he's weaponwhoring]], and so Khaine got almighty pissed when he discovered that he got tricked. Yeah, a lot of people reeeaaallly love to screw with Khaine. Too bad the guy has a terrible sense of humor.

This trickery had unfortunate consequences for the whole Eldar pantheon, who after Asuryan shrugged the matter off started to take sides: some agreed with Khaine, others told him to calm the fuck down and grow up; and things snowballed from there and boiled over into the mortal realm (simply having Vaul fashion a replacement sword [[derp|apparently never occurred to anyone]]). Exactly what the hell happened then is unclear but a couple of things are set in stone. At one point, Khaine got his hands on Vaul and beat the shit out of him before chaining him to his anvil. Another certainty is that he eventually murdered Eldanesh, an Eldar champion, although why he did it is unclear since multiple reasons have been put forward (there's lore on this in multiple sources and they are contradictory as fuck):

*Eldanesh challenged Khaine to an honorable duel for the freedom of Vaul, armed with the last blade the Artisan-God should have finished in time (and did before his capture). (Original lore from 2ed. Codex: Eldar.)
*Eldanesh, as nominal leader of the mortal Eldars, was just tired of his shit and told Khaine to calm the fuck down because he and the [[War in Heaven]] were fucking things up for the Eldar royally. (More recent lore.)
*Eldanesh and Khaine actually collaborated during the war against the [[Necrons]], but at the end he gave Khaine the middle finger when he tried to convince him to keep killing for the sake of killing and generally having violent fun. And Eldanesh did it in vain because his murder triggered the internecine [[War in Heaven]] anyway. (See also the novel ''Path of the Eldar'' by [[Gav Thorpe]].)

Anyway, whatever the exact reason, what is certain is Khaine got [[rage|a little angry]] at Eldanesh and slapped a bitch, and since said bitch wasn't a god it really didn't end well. That's the point where Asuryan got '''really''' tired of everyone's shit so he told everyone to shut the fuck up and condemned Khaine to have blood eternally drip from his hands to remind him of his crime, earning him the title "Khaela Mensha" (or Bloody-Handed).

When the [[Chaos Gods|Chaos god]] [[Slaanesh]] was birthed from the accumulated Warp energy of the Eldar's galactic empire of excess and decadence, Khaine tried to battle the newborn god and managed to put up a pretty good fight, despite the fact The Great Hermaphrodite had already consumed the other Eldar gods and was backed by the Ruinous Powers themselves (well, [[khorne| two of them at least]]). Despite Slaanesh overpowering him she/he/it did not have power enough to consume Khaine, but then [[Khorne]] appeared and challenged Slaanesh to a battle, as he claimed that Khaine was his property and that Slaanesh had no right to eat him. Needless to say, Slaanesh lost. While Khorne was busy piledriving and backbreaking Slaanesh into oblivion, Khaine was in the middle of it and got shattered into a million pieces, presumably because Khorne had left his axe back at the Brass Citadel and [https://1d4chan.org/images/8/8f/AngryMarine9.jpg Khaine was the only available melee weapon at the time]. [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qnlfyWWeD5k Or maybe he made a fine object on which to drop Slaanesh over and over again]. Whatever it was, he doesn't say and the rest is history.

So in the end, Lileath's prophecy did come true in a sense. The Eldar were responsible for the birth of Slaanesh, who sort of got Khaine killed, but not totally because technically he is still "alive". It's just that he's not up and about anymore, like [[Cegorach]] and [[Isha]], and now has to live with the fact that he, the Eldar god of war and destruction, was himself destroyed. Either way, it was either [[Just As Planned]] by [[Tzeentch]], who was the only Chaos God who didn't directly intervene during the fall of the Eldar, or Cegorach, because that hilarious son of a bitch just HAD to do it to put Khaine in his place before he slipped back into the [[Webway]]. Hell, for all we know, the two could have orchestrated the entire Fall of the Eldar just to be the only two entities who managed to successfully screw with Khaine and get away with it.

===The Avatar of Khaine===
[[File:Avatar vs Lorgar.jpg|thumb|350px|right|The Avatar of Khaine in its natural state of existence: dying horribly to make whatever character or faction GW is currently trying to sell look awesome. (In this instance, [[Lorgar]] mercy killed it.)]]

The '''Avatar of Khaine''' is a unique Eldar [[daemon]] unit. The Avatar is basically a small fragment of Khaine's power given form through one of his fragments present in a Craftworld.

The Eldar will only summon the Avatar into battle under the most dire of circumstances when there is no other choice. This is because in order to summon the Avatar, the Eldar must sacrifice one of their [[Exarch]]s, known as the "Young King", in order to bring him into existence, and this only lasts for a limited amount of time. Like any daemon, after some time, the Avatar will eventually degenerate and disappear, taking the sacrificed Exarch with it. For the Exarch in question this is the ultimate honour, as this and becoming a Phoenix Lord are the only ways an Exarch can find release in death.

There is an alternative method of awakening the Avatar, but it requires no less than six [[Phoenix Lord]]s to show up on a craftworld simultaneously and place their weapons at the Avatar's feet. The concentration of psychic energy is enough to not only awaken the Avatar without needing a sacrifice, but [[Apocalypse|supercharge him]].

He <s>used to be</s> '''IS''' really strong, but [[Games Workshop]]'s authors have taken a liking to murdering Avatars every chance they get depending on marketing needs. Because of this, the Avatar has been:

*Killed hilariously by [[Marneus Calgar]] in hand-to-hand combat in the 5th edition [[Space Marine]] codex. This can mainly be chalked up to the ridiculous levels of [[Matt Ward|Wardian Wankery]] in the 5th Ed codex, and can be unofficially retconned/explained as an exaggerated in-universe tale to reinforce the 'unstoppable angel of death' image of Astartes that the average Imperial will know about.
*Possessed by Heartslayer, a [[Keeper of Secrets]] (oh, the [[Irony|irony]]), during the invasion of the Eldar Craftworld Kher-Ys.
*Trampled to death by twelve stampeding [[Carnifex|Carnifexes]] during the battle between [[Craftworld Iyanden]] and the [[Hive Fleet Kraken]]. What happened was that the Avatar goaded the swarm's [[Hive Tyrant]] into a duel. What the Avatar failed to realize was that this wasn't tabletop and that the [[Tyranids]] are a pragmatic instead of an idealistic lot who have no concept of honourable or dirty fighting, so the Hive Tyrant just raised his brow at this and sent twelve Carnifexes to run the Avatar over. (Weirdly, [[Matt Ward]] gave him a more dignified death than this bullshit.)
*Strangled (WTF?)/neck crushed by [[Fulgrim]]. Let us remind you that Avatars are living metal statues, and they neither breathe nor have bones. Unless Fulgrim full-on [[Rip and Tear|crushed its neck until the head popped off]], which would've pretty thoroughly killed it.
*Killed by the [[Sanguinor]].
*Doused in a great flood by the water people of Astrominus IV after his raw power and heat defrosted them from their icy imprisonment by the Space Wolves.
*"Put out of his misery" by [[Lorgar Aurelian|Lorgar]] (who was, at the time, considered to be the worst fighter out of all the [[Primarchs]]). Though the Avatar was heavily damaged even before the fight, unable to even stand and driven mad by centuries spent in the Warp, and this was just a few pages before Lorgar proved to be a top level badass as he battled and bested Anggrath, the uber-[[Bloodthirster]] of Khorne who can eat Avatars and [[Titans]] like cookies.
*Stabbed in the heart by [[Maugan Ra]] to temper his Maugetar. See? Even in its own faction, the thing gets killed anticlimactically.
*Abandoned on a [[Maiden World]], where its connection to the Eldar was severed, reducing it to a mindless state of rage. The now-unbound Avatar consequently called out to the [[Orks]] of the nearby Octarius system, which were [[Looted|happy to answer it]]. It's kind of sad that the only time the Avatar isn't being a jobber is when he's being used by someone else entirely.
*Killed by the [[Legion of the Damned]] when assisting the [[Invaders]] in their assault on Craftworld Idharae. When the Legion realized their flaming bolters did squat against the Avatar, they instead brought the roof down on it. This one's slightly less [[fail]]-worthy than the others, since destroying the dome ''literally blasted the Avatar out into the void of space'' and the Invaders were seriously mauled by the Avatar before this.
*Slain by a Battlewagon whilst leading Ulthwe's forces in a near suicidal attempt to defeat a powerful Ork Warboss.
*Somehow able to achieve a mutual kill against [[Skarbrand]], most likely the closest thing to a victory any Avatar has ever achieved; it should be noted that, as the Avatar of the Craftworld with the greatest devotion to Khaine, it may have been stronger than normal. Sadly, with the death of the Craftworld and Infinity Circuit, this Avatar is most likely no more.
*Somehow fused and corrupted by a Genestealer Patriarch who took over it on the Craftworld Zaisuthra. Once again, the Avatar is a living '''metal statue''', raising the question of how the hell a biological creature fused with it unanswered beyond GW fiat.
*A purer shard of the Avatar of Khaine, called the Warshard, was killed rather quickly by the Yncarne possessing Yvraine which, considering the Yncarne itself was easily defeated by Ahriman, [[Fail|does not say good things about Khaine]].

He's also used by a boss fight whenever Eldar show up in [[Dawn of War]]. These are among his more dignified deaths because he's actually got the high-level stats he ''should'' have, on par with greater daemons, yet encountered much earlier:
*Killed by [[Gabriel Angelos]]' 3rd company without the aid of anything heavier than a [[Dreadnought]] during the [[Dawn of War|Tartarus Campaign]]. The presence of [[Isador Akios]], though he was already descending towards [[heresy]], probably helped too.
*Killed in a break-dancing competition by a Khornate [[Bloodthirster]] during the Eldar's incursion on Lorn V (this one's non-canon).
*In Dark Crusade, destroying the Eldar Stronghold during the Kronus Campaign shows you a loving rendition of the Avatar getting punk'd in ''single combat'' by the tallest unit your army has to offer. This includes:
**A Chaos Bloodthirster.
**A Necron [[C'tan|Nightbringer shard]].
**A Tau [[Great Knarloc]].
**If the [[Imperial Guard]] under [[Governor-Militant Lukas Alexander|Lukas Alexander]] defeat the eldar on Kronus, then the avatar gets killed by a MOTHER FUCKING [[sentinel|SENTINEL]].
**And last but not least, the tallest unit [[Blood Ravens|the canonical winners]] have to kill the Avatar is Epistolary Anteas. Yep, Papa Smurf himself just got outdone by a [[Librarian]]. In the after-action report Anteas is credited with stealing the pieces of the Avatar's armor, showing early-onset signs of the Blood Ravens' kleptomania.
*Possibly defended [[Caerys|Farseer Caerys']] last base on Kaurava III only to be blown away by <strike>[[Vance Stubbs|VANCE MOTHERFUCKING STUBBS]] and his 100 [[Baneblade|Baneblades]] after they refused to fuck off.</strike> <span style='color:green;font-size:115%'> KRUMPED BY GORGUTZ! QWIT WHININ' DIS IZ KANNON YA 'UMIE GROT!</span>
*Killed ''twice'' by [[Blood Ravens Force Commander|Force Commander Hair Gel's]] squad during the fighting to pacify the Eldar in subsector Aurelia. Though to be honest, both of these battles are really fucking hard if you don't have a well-managed squad, and nothing short of [[Ulkair|greater daemons]] is more than a speedbump for [[Tarkus]] or [[Cyrus]].

One rare example of an Avatar of Khaine not being used as a punching bag is in the Fracture of Biel Tan, where one ties with an injured Skarbrand. It has gotten to the point that the question isn't who could beat an Avatar, but who ''hasn't'' beaten an Avatar.

===On the Tabletop===
[[File:LatestKhaine.jpg|thumb|right|300px|FOOL! YOU DARE QUESTION THE SIZE OF MY LOINCLOTH?! ([[Mark Gibbons|MG]])]]
The Avatar of Khaine took a bit of a beating with 8th edition. For starters, the Avatar now costs 220 points while not improving too much. What you get for that cost is a whopping WS2+ A5 monster that hits at S8 AP-4 D6 damage, with an ability that lets you roll two dice and take the highest to determine damage. This means that the Avatar of Khaine can punch holes in tanks and monsters like it's nobody's business. Do note that it has only 5 attacks and it deals no Mortal Wounds, so it can kill a maximum of 5 models per turn. If you really want all your attacks to hit, give him an Autarch buddy for rerolls for your To Hit rolls. On top of that it can also shoot with that profile as an 12" Assault 1 weapon, and thanks to Battle Focus does not get -1 to hit if it advanced the same turn. Paired with its 7" movement and a re-roll on failed charge rolls one of the Avatar's largest problems in earlier editions, its low speed, has been kind of addressed. As for saves it gets a 3+, a 5++ due to being a Daemon and its Molten Body ability has been reworked into granting yet another 5++ save instead of immunity to flamers and melta weapons. With the advent of multi-wound weapons this is quite useful and it would be one hell of a job to write down exactly which guns count as flamers or melta now that the keywords regarding them are gone, it is still sad to see such a flavorful ability disappear. With T6, W8 and no degrading of its abilities as it gets hurt the Avatar can stay in the fight long enough, but two lucky Lascannon shots can put it down for the count with frightening ease (although if you lose a character to shooting in 8th edition you probably don't know what you're doing). Don't forget that it's a Character, so as long as it remains screened by other units it should be able to get close enough to the enemy to deal damage. Be wary of flyers with powerful weapons, for they can easily assassinate your Avatar because of the high speed of the rest of the Eldar army compared to it.

If you're not running a Saim-Hann list the Avatar's '''12"''' aura (which allows units to re-roll failed charges and makes them immune to morale) can be pure rape. Use him to propel Howling Banshees up the table, or to lead a horde of Guardian blobs.

When using Power Ratings instead the Avatar clocks in at 13 points, the second-most expensive unit behind the [[Wraithknight]]. Nothing much changes about it, so stick it in combat as soon as you can to get the most out of it.

==Warhammer Fantasy==
Similar to his 40k part only not in pieces. He is given a LOT more respect in this version of him, shown to be a powerful, mighty god that is renowned and feared (as he should be, you pussies).

There was no prophecy that the Elves would harm him, so that 40k story about him trying to wipe the mortal elves out didn't happen in the Fantasy universe because he had no reason to dislike the mortal elves. The Swords of [[Vaul]] story DID happen however, and that final Sword was the [[Widowmaker]] which somehow ended up in the mortal world (a lot of Khaine's shit does actually, probably at a 1:1 ratio with [[Lileath|Lileath's]]). He's not outright evil (other than the fact he likes war just like the Fantasy players), rather he's pretty neutral and the High Elves love to acknowledge the dualities of "evil has to be killed by good, there can be no joy without sorrow, etc" with him.

Overall, Khaine is a huge asshole and High Elves acknowledge him as part of the pantheon but do not actually worship him (barring a small minority amongst the [[Ulthuan|Nagarythe]] who are a bit more fucked up than the rest of the lot, which is saying something). [[Dark Elves]] on the other hand praise him in [[Asuryan|Asuryan's]] place (when they aren't worshiping [[Slaanesh]] anyway).
High Elves do not insult him however, and still include a depiction of him amongst the High Elf Pantheon who view him as a necessary evil. High Elf warriors pray to Khaine before battle, but are careful to insure that his influence does not drive them batshit crazy. The Shrine of Khaine is a hotly fought over place between the High and Dark Elves, the former trying to prevent his worship and the latter trying to, well, worship at it. It's the location of the [[Widowmaker]] (see below).

He's not overly fond of ANY of the elf races in the mortal world, but since the Dark Elves revere him instead of big boss Asuryan he grants them boons then sits back with some popcorn and watches the Elves slaughter each other.

His love of war combined with his elfness and that his most ardent worshipers are scantily-clad women means he's probably the secret love-child of Khorne and Slaanesh (tsundere confirmed).

===The Sword of Khaine===
Long ago, when the Old Ones left and Daemons were overrunning the world, [[Aenarion]], the first Phoenix King of the High Elves (as well as the father of the king of the Dark Elves) took up the Sword to help fight off the Daemons. He used it to kick so much ass he eventually drove the Daemons back. During the final battle against the Daemons, while his [[Caledor the Dragontamer|best bud]] created a Vortex to syphon off the extra magic and keep the Daemons from manifesting properly, he used the sword to fight and kill all four avatars of the [[Chaos Gods]], killing a Lord of Change, Bloodthirster and Keeper of Secrets single-handedly (there was a Great Unclean One, but his HUEG dragon helped him kill that). Suck it Marneus.

Aenarion, mortally wounded, took his dragon (also mortally wounded, having been ambushed by the Bloodthirster Aenarion subsequently killed) and flew across half a continent (which, thanks to the size of the Warhammer world, means a full sized continent) back to the island then stuck it in the ground at the Shrine, where it remains to this day.

Some editions imply the Widowmaker being grabbed by Aenarion and thus causing the Dark Elves to happen is Khaine's plan come to fruition so there'd always be elves fighting and thus his portfolio would mean something. Other times, he's with the other gods in facepalming when he nabbed it and cursed himself. It's open to interpretation.

===Khaine Lives In Death===
Kane.. er, I mean Khaine... was the main focus of [[The End Times]]' third book, which focused on the conclusion of the Elven wars.

So Malekith, king of the Druchii and all-around bad person, manages to repeat the ritual of becoming the Phoenix King once again and succeeds this time, reclaiming the title that was rightfully his. [[Tyrion]], the closest thing to a guardian as Ulthuan has had the entire event, finds this to be a breaking point in a series of upsets (Including being utterly unaware that his own brother caused Tyrion's illegitimate daughter to be sacrificed to summon [[Nagash|the king of the spooky scary skeletons]] and helped cause the death of the last Phoenix King) and decides that enough is enough. At the Shrine of Khaine, Tyrion takes up the Widowmaker, and thus becomes possessed by the big guy himself as his Avatar.

This possession does a 180 on his personality; where once Tyrion was a noble prince who was dedicated to defending his land, Khaine's possession turned him into a murderous asshole. Well, that and Morathi's attempts at wooing him. This too affected the Elves as well, as they also surrendered to their murderous impulses and Witches joined with his host. Together, they rampaged through Wood Elves and murdered Orion (and Kurnous), they executed Kohril when he stole the Widowmaker in hopes of ending the war early, and generally just stopped caring about protecting their land.

This all comes to a head at the Isle of the Dead, where all Elves had a massive battle, with Malekith's side being bolstered by the ghosts of Phoenix Kings past who sought to repay a debt to their creator. Eventually Malekith, now bearing Asuryan's power, and Tyrion the Avatar of Khaine battled. It was long, bloody, and terrible, but eventually it ended when Alith Anar managed to snipe out Tyrion's heart. Tyrion's death also spelled the death of Khaine, and thus his madness faded from the world and the Old Gods faded from the world. When Tyrion was resurrected in the last book, it was free of the Bloody Handed one's influence.

===Age of Sigmar===

In Age of Sigmar Khaine (like all the Aelven gods) is dead, killed in the End Times. But the Aelven Gods are cyclical and will reincarnate if there's any bits of them left and they're worshiped enough. Most of Khaine's parts ended up in Khorne's control...somehow and were reforged into weapons for his greatest generals, except for Khaine's iron heart. Despite the greatest efforts of Khorne's forges and later Khorne himself, the heart would not break or even crack. Finally Khorne got frustrated and hurled it away where, after a lot of shit, it came into the clutches of Morathi, who declared herself the High Oracle of Khaine and started uniting Khaine's worshipers to bring Khaine back to life.

Except not. Holding onto the Iron Heart of Khaine has allowed [[Morathi]] to steal its power and she's using it as part of her plan to ascend to Godhood. After centuries of plotting, Morathi gathered the resources and tools to undertake a ritual - enter Slaanesh's belly and consume the souls of the Phoenix Kings from the World-That-Was. But Morathi hesitated when she reached Aenarion's soul, which cut hers in half, leaving Morathi one soul in two bodies. She then took all the power she'd accumulated, fused her essence with that of Khaine's heart and became the goddess Morathi-Khaine. Khaine as he was is gone in AoS, and Morathi-Khaine is all that remains... maybe. Given that Khaine's will is a strange thing, perhaps he just wanted to be a banging hot crazy snake goddess for a bit. Gods are weird like that.

===On the Tabletop===

As implied by the name, the Daughters of Khaine faction is entirely devoted to Khaine and as such they get their own Avatar of Khaine model. This can be taken either on foot or as part of a Cauldron of Blood, but unlike the 40k version, it's not the heart of a Craftworld or Temple but simply an iron statue, animated by magic. As such it requires continual prayers from Daughters of Khaine Priests to stay awake and moving, at least until you hit turn 3 in an all-Daughters army, at which point it wakes up permanently as part of their escalating table allegiance ability (there are a lot of bonuses to playing all Daughters of Khaine, the girls do not play well with others).

Once he's awake however, he's an incredibly brutal close combat unit. Clocking in at 180 points (or included as part of the 300/330 for a Cauldron) he moves 9 inches a turn, has a short ranged shooting attack that can hit hard (6 shots, 3s to hit, 3s to wound, -1 rend, 1 damage, just don't ask how it hurts Magmadroths) and in close combat he's got 4, 3 to hit, 3 to wound, -3 rend, 3 Damage hits. Yes, flat 3 damage. Alone he can very easily wreck entire units or annihilate monsters (especially since the turn he wakes up automatically, he gets rerolls of 1 to hit) and on top of a Cauldron he can help the Cauldron eat squads. The only downside is he's basically only a beatstick, only having a small +1LD aura (which is active whether he's awake or not). Still, as the monster at the front of a brutal charge, he certainly does the job.

== Trivia ==

* Khaine was inspired by and named after Cain from the Abrahamic Scriptures; the first human born outside the Garden of Eden and the first murderer (the victim was his younger brother Abel). Interestingly, some of the Eldar/Elf gods are considered siblings. Also, while Cain was marked by God to prevent others from killing him, Khaine the elf god was marked by the god Asuryan for his murder of Eldandesh.
* The Wailing Doom (known as the ''Suin Daellae'' by the Eldar) wielded by the Avatar also bears close similarities with the mythical weapon of the Irish god Lugh, a [[Awesome|howling burning spear so bloodthirsty it was able to throw itself at the enemy like a fucking missile and was never tired of slaying shit.]]

==Gallery==
<gallery>
Image:M3470223a 99120212009 2013CauldronOfBlood01 873x627.jpg|Dark Elf Cauldron of Blood, a mobile shrine to Khaine administered to by his fangirls.
Image:AvatarofKhaine.png|Here we can see Khaine being a little bit mad at Isha lying about that ”time of the month”
Image:1236357978434.jpg|The Avatar of Biel-tan, soon to get its shit kicked in.
Img4acfaf8c4d2c9.jpg|An Avatar of Khaine has arrived and he would like a word or two with Khorne.
99590104004 AVATARWITHWAILINGDOOMSPEAR4.webp| An Avatar of Khaine about to bring down its mighty spear on some foes.
</gallery>

== Navigation ==

[[Category: Warhammer 40,000]]

[[Category: Xenos]]

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[[Category: Craftworld Eldar]]

{{Eldar-Forces}}

{{High Elves}}

{{Eldar-Gods}}

[[Category: Dark Elves]]

Lumineth Realm-Lords

2021-01-29T08:12:42Z

2406:3400:20F:FFC0:97C:9E80:BC00:599B: /* Society */

{{Age of Sigmar Faction|Faction=Lumineth Realm-Lords|Logo=Eltharion's essence.jpg|Alliance=Order|Motto=FOR <s>ULTHUAN</s> HYSH!!!!!}}
{{Topquote|The phoenix must burn to emerge.|Janet Fitch}}
{{Topquote|Have you heard of the High Elves?|LaFave Bros Oblivion youtube video}}
{{Topquote|We must be swift as the coursing river. With all the force of a great typhoon. With all the strength of a raging fire. Mysterious as the dark side of the moon!|Be <s>a Man</s> an Aelf}}
{{Topquote|MOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!|Avalenor, the Stoneheart King}}
The Lumineth Realm-lords (also known as '''High Elves 2.0''', '''Loony Meth-Heads''', and '''Lu-methheads'''. Officially "Realm-lords", without the second capital.) are a bunch of stone and crystal obsessed elves residing in the Realm of [[Hysh]] and led by Teclis. Forced onto the defensive by Chaos, they harness the magic of their realm and refuse to go down without a fight... just like the High Elves of old, but without the "dying race" element (and the accompanying lore inconsistencies) and a surprising amount of Dorfiness, given their love of hammers, runic magic and elementals.

With a heavy Greek aesthetic, new model and the return of [[Eltharion]], good times are abound if you were a fan of the High Elves back in the world that was.

==History==
===Origins/Age of Myth===
Once upon a time, [[Teclis]], [[Tyrion]], and [[Malekith|Malerion]] found a previously assumed dead [[Morathi]] who was very much alive, who then led the odd trio to the morbidly obese [[Slaanesh]] in a cave where they beat the shit out of him until he coughed up all of the Elven souls he had consumed after [[The End Times]]. A good chunk of these souls were given to Teclis, in order to recreate the High Elves of old and bring their race back to their former glory. The initial race that came from Teclis's attempts were the [[Idoneth Deepkin]] and, well... [[FAIL|He tried]].

This new batch of Aelves seem to have come out of the oven much better, far more sane and stable than any other Aelf so far. Given the Idoneth's hostile estrangement from Teclis while the Lumineth worship and fight side-by-side with him, relations between the two are... strange. In the Lumineth Battletome the Idoneth Deepkin are their only ally option, while in the Allegiance Matrix for multiplayer games in the General's Handbook they are listed as a Desperate Coalition (to put that in perspective, that's worse than the relationship between Khorne/Slaanesh or Tzeentch/Nurgle and is the only Desperate Coalition that isn't between factions from two entirely seperate Grand Alliances. Even Drycha the crazy, genocidal racist can act nicer to other factions). Best explanation is that they do utterly despise each other, but realize there are WAY bigger threats to their own societies, so they grudgingly tolerate each other for now.

Lumineth society was built on self-improvement, absurdly impractical headgear and the accumulation of wisdom, fueled by using the power of Aetherquartz to amplify their bodies and minds. However, in the typical elven arrogance, they assumed that because Slaanesh was imprisoned they no longer had to worry about Chaos and decided to abuse the Aetherquartz like [[Skaven]] to [[Warpstone]], leading them to be the butt of many jokes about drugs.

===Age of Chaos===
Unfortunately for the Lumineth, in conjunction with the elves' own hubris, Tyrion and Teclis were very hands-off about godhood after the civilization was built. As a result, the subtle whispers of the Dark Gods entered their minds, causing envy and bitter rivalry. The subsequent campaigns of defamation and sabotage culminated in a massive civil war called the Ocari Dara, or Spirefall. The entire realm of Hysh was devastated, as the Lumineth had a habit of inventing uber-spells and doomsday devices just to see if they could, justifying it by claiming they were too enlightened to ever use such weapons for evil (which they obviously weren't). To make matters worse, the overflow of passion, pride and obsession from the war became a beacon for Slaaneshi daemons, who then invaded Hysh and would've wiped them out if Tyrion hadn't personally intervened to save the last survivors.

Teclis searched for some way to save his race from themselves, and found it when he managed to commune with Celennar, the spirit of Hysh's moon. He taught the Lumineth a new way of self-discipline, where they would bond with the elemental spirits to gain their power and wisdom. This rearrangement of Lumineth society was called the Reinvention Wars, which lasted the remaining years of the Age of Chaos and is widely credited with preventing them from becoming extinct altogether.

===Age of Sigmar===
The Lumineth were mostly unseen during the Age of Sigmar, being too focused on rebuilding their own realm in order to care about the other races.

During the Time of Tribulations, Teclis predicted the upcoming Necroquake, and ordered the construction of Aetherquartz towers in order to mitigate its effects. While this helped protect the Lumineth cities from undead invasion, Teclis failed to predict the arrival of Endless Spells, which would become a common plague upon the already magically battered landscape of Hysh.

During a meeting between Teclis and the other Aelven gods, Morathi started claiming that Slaanesh will inevitably escape. While the other Aelven gods dismissed this as the rantings of a madwoman, Teclis took this seriously and decided that the Lumineth must end their isolationism in order to purge Chaos from other realms. This hasn't endeared them well with the other races of Order, as they tend to deploy their legions without permission or warning out of the arrogant assumption that the lesser races can't be trusted to solve their own problems (arrogant ''and'' hypocritical coming from the Lumineth, who [[Eldar|nearly caused their own extinction through selfish obsessions]]). Adding to the fact that they have no problem with killing civilians and allies if they view it as necessary to cleanse Chaos, it’s understandable why some people don’t like it when they arrive unannounced. While the Stormcast have also used this approach, unlike them the Lumineth haven't earned a good reputation in-universe, and they're a bunch of Johnny-Come-Latelys compared to the Stormcast being Big Damn Heroes.

At some point, Teclis had found the remnants of [[Eltharion]]'s spirit as he was way too badass to be claimed by Nagash. After putting his soul back together, Teclis ordered armor and weapons made in the Yvressian style, found a dude who looked near identical to Eltharion, created a soulless clone of that guy's body and tried to shove our old boy's soul right in. Sadly, [[Arkhan the Black|Arkhan]] evidently cursed Eltharion so bad that any body his soul is put in crumples to dust, starting with the aforementioned souless clone. As Teclis cried like a bitch, he noticed that Eltharion's soul was able to inhabit the armor, turning him into [[Thousand Sons|a hollow suit of armor powered by light]]. Since then, Eltharion became one of the leaders of the Lumineth, as Teclis tries to figure out how to give him a normal body.

====Broken Realms====

As Morathi attempted to gain godhood and accidentally loosened the chains of Slaanesh, Teclis started pushing his army against the forces of the undead and [[Nagash]]. He plans on bringing an end to The Soul Wars and clap Nagash's boney cheeks for unleashing the Necroquake. Of course, bone daddy won't take this laying down. More to come soon.

==Society==

The Lumineth themselves are split between numerous different kingdoms withing Hysh, known as the Ten Paradises. These Kingdoms each reside on a separate Island, which used to be one landmass before it was sundered in the Age of Chaos. The center Island is Xintil, where Teclis awoke in the Age of Myth and where most of the Sigmar worshiping mortals of Hysh live. Xintil is surrounded by eight islands, each ruled by a separate kingdom. Syar, Iliatha, Ymetrica and Zaitrec are known as the Teclian nations, essentially the Athens compared to the more Spartan Oultrai, Aurathrai, Helon and Alumnia who emulate Tyrion. Each has their own culture, such as Iliatha being matriarchal and doing some cloning shit.

These Lumineth have also come to treasure Aetherquartz, a crystal mineral native to their realm. These crystals gave their wearers great knowledge and power, but it also involves [[Eldar|sucking out their emotions and personalities - a sacrifice they consider worthwhile since unfettered emotions are the Dark Prince's favorite snack]]. In this way, they're similar to [[Stormcast Eternals|Sigmar's golden bois]] in that they're constantly approaching that point where they become effectively logic-driven, uncreative and unfeeling automatons except these guys see it as an acceptable ending compared to the Stormcast's mad search to end the flaw. The emotions drained into the Aetherquartz are used as a source of power by the mages known as Scinari <s>Crack Whores</s> Cathallars, weaponizing their suppressed negative emotions to spread terror and despair among their enemies.

After the Reinvention Wars, an important part of their society has become the Aelementari Temples, cults dedicated to bonding with the landscape of Hysh, in the form of the rivers, winds, mountains or even the light of Hysh's sky (Zenith). To join these cults is extremely difficult; first one must abandon all worldly possessions, then spend years meditating and seeking oneness with the spirit of their chosen location. The final trial is fatal if the spirit deems the aspirant unworthy: those dedicated to the rivers must weigh themselves down and jump into the water, while those dedicated to the mountains must let themselves get buried alive. Yet if they survive, they gain new powers ([[Avatar: The Last Airbender|please tell me there is some legendary Aelf who has the powers of all the Aelementari.]]) While the mages get elemental magic, the warriors get more subtle powers, like the Stoneguard who can enter the "mountain stance" to become immovable bulwarks in battle. The Aelementari can also be petitioned to possess a construct body and directly fight with their disciples. The only Aelementari temple playable on tabletop so far are the mountain worshippers of the Alarith, who have taken a mountain yak called the "Ymetrican Longhorn" as their symbol, resulting in them being the butt of many cow jokes. The second temple to be officially revealed is the Wind Temple, which as of writing has no official name (Given the new model's name, seems to be Hurakan; get it, Hurakan = Hurricane, GET IT!). They too were met with a barrage of memery due to their troops riding on creatures known as the Treerunners which very closely resembled Kangaroos. Aelementari Temples were intended to teach the Lumineth humility, and it half-worked; although their civilization no longer has the unchecked hubris that led to the Spirefall, many Lumineth have become humblebraggers under the impression that after the Reinvention they have successfully overcome all their flaws and created a perfect society. It seems that the arrogance of the (A)elves is the one flaw they can never overcome.

In terms of combat strategies and tactics, their design and combat is heavily reminiscent of Ancient Greek warfare combined with a bit of Roman. The traditional Spearmen, called the Vanari Auralan Wardens, are essentially hoplites, who form phalanxes to hold the enemy in place while the archers, mages and cavalry get set up to do their stuff. Each of these phalanxes are lead by a High Warden, essentially a Lochagos, who stands at the rear to make sure shit isn't going wrong. Most of these hoplites also adorn their shields with runes. These runes represent learning and enlightenment for the Realm Lords, but seem to be more for decoration than serving an actual battlefield purpose. These Wardens are also capable of forming into phalanxes called Shining Legions, difficult to harm but also slow. These legions are also present among their brethren who wield swords and bows. The battletome also mentions unseen scout, artillery and chariot units, as well as "Loreseekers" who are trained in both magic and melee. If you're familiar with the old High Elves roster you can probably predict what they're gonna be like.

==Great Nations==
Given the Teclis focus of their current lore, only the Teclian nations have been expressed in any detail.
*'''Ymetrica:''' A mountainous kingdom with a great dedication to the Alarith Temple. Were the first Lumineth kingdom to succesfully discover how to bond with the Aelementari, which they won't hesistate to remind you at any moment. Form the vanguard of Teclis' campaign to purify the Mortal Realms. (Essentially Caledor, but replace Dragons with cow-headed earth elementals).
*'''Syar:''' The greatest craftsmen of the Lumineth, and the richest nation too. Created a lot of horrible weapons for the Ocari Dara, and swore to never create weapons again...until Teclis persuaded them that Chaos would win without their help. Just when they thought they were out, Chaos pulled them back in. (Most likely suppose to resemble Eataine due to the focus on wealth, though instead of trade they got it through weapon dealing AND trade).
*'''Zaitrec:''' The land of master wizards, and thus the place where Teclis likes to hang out most. They worship Celennar even more than Teclis though, and if they ever get to meet Teclis they're more interested in what the spirit has to say, claiming "it is better to learn from the source". Teclis is secretly [[butthurt]] over this having learned from an older source himself in the World-That-Was, much to Tyrion's amusement (for if you miss Saphery, with Celennar filling in for Lileath).
*'''Iliatha:''' This <s>simp</s> matriarchal kingdom revered women due to their belief that creating life was holy. However, they decided that the traditional method of childbirth was too gross for them, and invented a method to create clones by splitting souls. This lead to horrible excesses during the Ocari Dara, which were so dark that the other nations refuse to speak about it. Afterwards the technology was strictly regulated so that only one copy could be created per person, resulting in Iliatha having the largest population of the nations, the majority of whom are soul-bound twins (Avelorn, only with cloning).

==Gallery==
<gallery>
File:Aelve Spearmen.jpg|AELVES, WHAT IS YOUR PROFESSION!?
File:Aelve Cav.jpg|Gee, I wonder what ancient civilization these guys where based on.
File:Elf_elite_guard.jpg|Heavy armor, hammers and a stone motif... [[Dwarfs (WFB)|where have I seen this before?]]
File:Eltharion AOS.jpg|I'LL GET YOU FOR THIS, ARKHAN!
File:Befriending furries.jpg|'''Asserting dominance'''
File:Realm Lord Runes.jpg|No one tell the Dwarfs that the Elgi figured out how runes work....
File:Sitting Bull.jpg|An Alarith Stonemage. I wonder how Dwarfs would react to an elf controlling stone with magic.
File:Alarith.png|Alarith, Spirit of the Mountain. And you thought [[Settra the Imperishable|Settra]] had a lot of titles/aliases.
File:Scinari.jpg|A Scinari Cathallar. That's pronounced SIN-ar-ee CATH-ull-arr, according Geedubs themselves.
File:Sad Lady.jpg|She feels your pain.
File:Lumineth vs Khorne.jpg|A fun game of Whack-a-reaver
File:Minotaur mountain.jpg|Avalenor in all his red, stony glory.
File:Elf with heavy burden.jpg|[[Snowflame|Weaponized magic Crystal Meth]] (Doomrider approves).
File:Lumineth Box.jpg|Available now (quartz not accepted as an alternative to money)
</gallery>

[[Category:Age of Sigmar]]
[[Category:Games Workshop]]

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