Warhammer 40K: (In)Famous Death Worlds Of the Imperium
What is a Death World and why would you live there? Because it’s where only the strongest of the strong survive!
In the Grimdark Universe there are many worlds classified as a Death World. These are planets in which the native flora and fauna have evolved into highly aggressive and dangerous forms. These planets can range from carnivorous jungle planets, to barren wastelands, to sub-zero icy fjords. Today, we’re going to take a tour of some of the most famous Death Worlds in the Imperium.
Catachan
Catachan is arguably the most famous Death World in the Imperium. It’s a Jungle Planet in which everything is trying to kill you. It has an impressive ecosystem of deadly predators ranging from the Brainleaf all the way to the dreaded Catachan Face-Eater. Seriously, everything on this planet wants you dead! Where do you think those Catachan Jungle fighters got all those muscles?
Baal
Baal and it’s two moons form the Baal System. But the main planet is the homeworld of the Blood Angels. But make no mistake, Baal is a Death World. This world used to be an idyllic place but a viral and nuclear war ravaged the surface and turned it into a toxic wasteland. Life is harsh and unforgiving and the people that live there had to become scavengers. It wasn’t until the arrival of Sanguinius that some sort of order was restored.
In the current timeline, Baal has once again been ravaged by a Tyranid Invasion – both moons have been severely damaged with Baal Prime being rendered barren after the events of the war and the opening of the Great Rift.
Fenris
Fenris is the homeworld of the Space Wolves and is a harsh ice planet and Death World. The orbit of Fenris actually contributes to this hard life – for starters, it takes roughly 3-4 Terran years for a full orbit. During the Summer, massive volcanic activity on the planet spews for great lava flows. This melts ice and churns the seas into raging floods and tidal waves. Then, in the winter months, the temperature drops so low that everything then ices over. What was once flood plains becomes glacier-like areas.
There is one massive land-locked area, but the seas dominate the planet. The volcanic activity and the earthquakes make for a very unstable geography and the barbarian tribes that live there have a nomadic lifestyle. Between the massively shifting temperatures and the deathly fauna, Fernis will kill the unprepared in short order.
Cretacia
Cretacia is the new home of the Flesh Tearers Chapter. For several millennia they were a fleet based chapter but, after discovering human colonists had not only inhabited this harsh world and thrived, they made this planet their home by way of the Right of Conquest. The planet itself is home to massive beasts and native monsters – huge reptilian predators almost the size of Scout Titans. To say the creatures on the planet were deadly is an understatement.
But the Flesh Tearers did manage to clear areas and make contact with the Humans and thus they decided that if these Humans could survive here they would make an excellent pool of recruits to the chapter.
Since the Great Rift opened, the planet was encircled by a Warp Rift that is known as the Annihilus.
Luther Macintyre IX
Luther Macintyre IX is a plane in the Segmentum Tempestus notable for being the homeworld of the burrowing, desert-dwelling Ambull species. The planet is covered in vast deserts. The sandstorms that plague this world are capable of flaying a man’s skin from his bones. The wildlife on the Death World are formidable in the extreme.
Luther Macintyre IX is thought to be a possible Necron Tomb World, and is home to enormous Ambull colonies. The world also contains Mica-dragons, the teeth of which were used to create the mighty chainaxes Gorechild and Gorefather, wielded by the World Eaters’ primarch, Angron, and subsequently, Kharn the Betrayer.
Iax (Ultramar)
Iax, also known as the “Garden of Ultramar”, is a planet in the stellar realm of Ultramar. The planet was an Agri World whose climate and fertility has made it one of the most productive worlds in the Imperium. There were no large cities on Iax, its land given over to producing quality food. The oldest and most urbanised area is the ancient fortress city of First Landing, its tall citadel withstanding the barrages of invaders over the centuries.
During the Plague Wars, Iax became the site of major fighting. A group of Imperial Guard refugees brought to Iax were revealed to be unwitting Daemonic vessels, transforming them into Plaguebearers who managed to summon a cohort of Great Unclean Ones under Ku’gath. The Daemons summoned vast armies which ravaged the planet. Later, Roboute Guilliman and Mortarion engaged in a fateful duel on the planet as Imperial forces enacted Exterminatus. It is now a Death World which according to Guilliman will take centuries to be freed of corruption, if ever.
Saul Tarvitz of the Emperor’s Children was a key combatant on “Murder”
Murder aka One-Forty-Twenty
Murder was a Death World inhabited by an arachnid race dubbed the “Megarachnids” by the Emperor’s Children and Blood Angels Space Marines that encountered them. The planet was originally designated One-Forty-Twenty, signifying that it was the twentieth world to be encountered by the 140th Expeditionary Fleet. It was renamed after the last received transmission of Captain Khitas Frome, leader of the Blood Angels company that was the first Imperial force to land on the planet, and was soon wiped out: “This. World. Is. Murder.”
Due to atmospheric turbulence, all landings on the planet became disorganized and individual shuttles easily became separated from one another, forcing the Space Marines to fight in relatively small groups while searching for each other. One such group, lead by Emperor’s Children Captain Saul Tarvitz, discovered large rock-like structures that resembled dead trees. These “trees” had the bodies of several Blood Angels Space Marines impaled on many of the branches with a flying variant of the Megarachnids feasting upon the bodies.
Upon destroying a few of the structures, Captain Tarvitz discovered that they were what was causing the massive atmospheric turbulence and managed to destroy a number of the “trees”, thus allowing a relief force of the Emperor’s Children, and newly-arrived-Luna Wolves and the Blood Angels (including their Primarchs – Horus and Sanguinius, Imperial Army regiments and Titans of Legio Mortis) to land and begin a full scale assault on the hostile natives.
After a short, yet violent, campaign against the Megarachnids the forces of the Crusade were approached by vessels belonging to an advanced human society called the Interex. The Interex informed Warmaster Horus, that the Megarachnids and the Interex had once met in a massive war. Upon the defeat of the Megarachnids the Interex removed all of their interstellar travel capabilities and transplanted them to the world, which they called Urisarach. Their intention was for the world to act as a reservation for the violent and only semi-sentient species, one where they could live unmolested by outsiders, and vice-versa. So the Imperial campaign of Murder was officially stopped, by a firm decision by Horus himself.
If you want to check out more Death Worlds the Lexicanum has a huge list. However these planets are probably the most well known. There is one more Death World that is quite famous as well but that is because Death World can also mean “at the moment of demise.” And that world is Caliban – aka The Rock.
Do you have a favorite Death World? Let us know about it in the comments!
