This page details an undead faction of the Fallen that was risen from the dead by Dark Ether.
The Scorn
A new Fallen faction debuting in the Forsaken expansion. Recruited by Prince Uldren after breaking them out of the Prison of Elders, they are Eliksni that have rejected both the Traveler and the Fallen culture built around it, instead turning to much darker powers for their strength. To reflect this, they have moved away from the typical Space Pirate theme of the other Fallen factions and more resemble a religious cult. As of late, they have fallen under the control of The Witness and the Black Fleet, working as foot soldiers in its war against Sol.
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In General
- Action Bomb: Screebs will jump players and violently explode or blow up if they are killed. Unlike Cursed Thralls, though, they are much more aggressive.
- All Your Powers Combined: Scorn possess abilities and traits taken from all of the other enemy factions in the game.
- General aesthetics from the fallen, with their teleportation being most similar to uncorrupted Eliksni.
- Magical powers that augment their existing weaponry, like the Hive.
- Headless enemies who must be shot in a different location for precision damage (Vex).
- Shield-wielding ranged fighters who help allied units close in on you (Cabal)
- Deployable objects that either damage enemies or buff allies (Taken).
- Always Chaotic Evil: Every Scorn so far has never been anything other than a nihilistic savage hell bent on killing anything in their path. Part of this seems to be neural degradation brought on by excessive resurrection, part of it is that they are running off the last telepathic order the Barons gave them - kill everyone in Uldren's name.
- All Your Powers Combined: Scorn Chieftans are the only enemies who can possesss shields from any of the three Loght elements, and are also the only opponent able to use all three elements at the same time via their totems.
- As Long as There Is Evil: The Scorn seem capable of just reviving after death constantly and returning at full force, making them a threat that needs constant attention.
- Be Careful What You Wish For: The original Scorn were created when Uldren wished to revive Fikrul, which Riven intercepted and granted by creating the first batch of Dark Ether; this compounded his descent into villainy for her amusement. The pocket of Scorn later encountered in the Warlord's Ruin dungeon was also created by a Warlord wishing to curse the House of Kings even in death for the crime of terrorizing her home and the innocent villages around it, although in this case it only becomes this trope due to the risk of normal collateral damage since the Ahamkara responsible shared her altruistic spirit.
- Body Horror: Various pieces of armor seemed to have been grafted directly onto their bodies (including helmets fitted over their eyes). When looking at their body closer, they appear to have tumorous growths in their exoskeletons. The Screebs and Abominations take this to a whole new level. Abominations take the crown, though, being mutated to resemble Hive Ogres with way too small heads.
- Carry a Big Stick: Their melee weapon of choice, especially with their Stalkers is a mace.
- Chained by Fashion: The Scorn have spiked chains wrapped around various parts of their bodies, either to hold on armor or just to look intimidating. The Hangman, besides his loincloth, he wears nothing but chains.
- Color-Coded Armies: Much more subtly than the other factions, but Scorn in the Dreaming City and Tangled Shore have yellow banners and symbols, while those in the Throne World have purple ones. It's also a bit of foreshadowing, as the Scorn in the Throne World have become subordinates to the Black Fleet = when the Shadow Legion appears a year later, they also use purple iconography and armor.
- Cult: Ditching the traditional Space Pirate design, the Scorn look more like a cult of crazed Fallen crusaders.
- Epic Flail: One of the new melee weapons adopted by the Scorn is a flaming censer/flail.
- Enemy Civil War:
- The Scorn, despite being Fallen, are at odds with both the House of Dusk and the Spider's Fallen mob.
- As of Witch Queen, they've also gone to war with Savathûn and her Lucent Brood, having found a way to invade her Throne-World and attack her directly. This is due to the Scorn now being under the direct control of the Witness, who Savathûn just betrayed.
- Evil Counterpart: Of the Guardians. Both use powers with paracausal attributes (the Light and Darkness-infused Ether) for their strength, can come back infinitely from the dead, and can spec their powers into one of the three main elements. In addition, they display extreme lust for combat, glory, and spoils out of pure instinct, similarly to the behavior of some Guardians.
- Evil Counterpart Race: With the Fallen becoming more sympathetic, the Scorn essentially serve as this to them.
- Evil Makes You Ugly: The Dark Ether pumping through their bodies has mutated them in horrific fashions, making it clear that they're terrible monsters animated by dark power. Emphasized with their Abominations, who are hulking monstrosities that look like they should be in extreme agony from what's made them this way.
- Explosive Breeder: Implied to be the case, as the Drifter mentions that the Scorn can reproduce very rapidly in one of his Gambit voicelines.
- Evil Is Not a Toy: Hefnd's Scorn were created under the assumption that he could control them and turn Naeem's castle into an Ironic Hell as punishment for their crimes in life against humanity. Petra and Crow believe he's punching above his weight, and their existence alone attracts Fikrul and the Broken Knights to try and pick them up.
- Foil: To the Hive. Both are Insectoid Aliens who are themed after The Undead and use a mixture of Black Magic and technology, while possessing powers that makes each race an Evil Counterpart to the Guardians. Both also have massive religious undertones, with the Hive being a race-wide Church Militant while the Scorn are an insane Cult. The similarities end here, though. While the Hive seem to resemble skeletons, the fleshy appearance of the Scorn pegs them as closer to zombies. Hive technology is seemless and organic while Scorn technology is ramshackle and often spiked. The Hive are an ancient race while the Scorn were formed within living memory. Hive use their powers to try and cheat death while the Scorn have Resurrective Immortality. Most important, however, is that all Hive are sapient beings with complex motives, with some eventually defying the Darkness and, in the case of Immaru, actually going for an Enemy Mine with mankind. By contrast, excessive resurrection gradually destroys the mind of a Scorn until they are a monster driven on by instinct and psychic orders from their commanders. The end result is that while the Hive gradually become more nuanced as the Saga of Light and Dark goes on, the Scorn become Always Chaotic Evil once the Barons all die.
- Flaming Sword: In contrast to the traditional Fallen shock blades, the Scorn wield burning clubs and flails.
- Headless Horseman: Though without the horse; Ravagers have a small bolted-metal dome covering the stumps where their heads should be. It's why their Epic Flails are their weak points.
- Abominations seem to be a similar case, though it's hard to tell if they also lack a head or if it's just been crushed into their torso and hidden by the masks they wear. Kind of like the Tank from Left 4 Dead.
- History Repeats: A faction within a civilization of Insectoid Aliens who were originally blessed by the Traveller, but were weak and at the mercy of the rest of the universe, which allowed them to be corrupted into a cult of Darkness-worshipping zombies and go From Nobody to Nightmare, much like the Hive before them. Fittingly, they usurp the Hive's position as the go-to Mooks of the Darkness after Savathun betrays it.
- Hive Mind: As revealed in the Captain's Log lore book in Season of the Chosen, the Scorn are directed by the Scorned Barons mentally. With the Barons dead, the Scorn are still operating on the last command Fikrul sent them: kill everyone in Uldren's name.
- Hollywood Torch: Wraiths hold two of them, and they know how to use them.
- An Ice Person: Starting with Season of the Lost, some Scorn units have been granted Stasis abilities by the Darkness, further increasing their unpredictability. For example, the Ravagers have a chance to wield Stasis censers instead of Solar ones, allowing them to freeze you if their slam wave so much as connects to you.
- It Can Think: Season of the Lost deals with the more feral bunches of the Scorn suddenly partaking in advanced concepts of civilization such as industrialization and distinct culture, indicating that they're not entirely running on instinct and very basic mental programming, but are still 100% evil. The Witch Queen implies that their increase in intelligence is due to gaining a new master: The Witness.
- Luckily, My Shield Will Protect Me: Lurkers have a shield that can protect them from gunfire. This can make it difficult to get precision kills from the front.
- Magitek: The Scorn have adapted Hive magic and technology for their own use in place of the traditional cybernetics that other Fallen favor. The Mindbender even wields a Hive Boomer and can use an Ascendant portal.
- More Dakka: Their Pikes are not only modified to use Void Light, but they have a higher rate of fire than a normal Pike.
- Mysterious Benefactor: Week 5 of Season of the Lost reveals that the someone or something the Scorn now answer to has also been teaching them advanced concepts related to industrialization, demonstrated by them skillfully operating a mining rig and refinery to extract and process raw materials in the Shattered Realm. The Witch Queen implies that said backer is either The Witness or their Disciple, Rhulk.
- Necromancer: The Scorn have resurrected themselves multiple times through the use of Dark Ether, which was extracted from Fikrul after his own resurrection by Riven through Uldren's wish. It appears to do nothing visible to the living, but when exposed to Eliksni corpses it corrupts them into the Scorn, even removing their dependence on Ether.
- Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: Played a bit literally. A cult of alien cyborg Space Pirates who have adopted necromancy to create an undead army. Compared to the Devil Splicers, they're only missing the "Robot" part.
- Not Even Human: An alien variant. Even though they began as Eliksni, they're so corrupted and extreme that they're treated as an entirely different species, both in-universe and out.Petra Venj: The Scorn aren’t Fallen. Not anymore.
- The Social Darwinist: A whole faction of them, with an unhealthy dose of Straw Nihilist mixed in. The Scorn despise how the Fallen cling to their old ways and believe they all should have been wiped out in the Whirlwind in order to be 'reborn'. Since the Darkness couldn't finish the job, they'll step in to do it instead.
- Our Zombies Are Different: Alien Space Pirates turned into an undead cult thanks to their source of sustenance being tainted. They replenish their numbers with impunity with some of their strongest constantly reviving no matter how many times they die.
- Out of Focus: In their debut expansion, no less.. Crosses over with Never Trust a Trailer and Put on a Bus, as a lot of the pre-release material for Forsaken made a big deal about how Uldren and his Scorn would be a huge threat. Then at the end of the Tangled Shore campaign all of the Barons besides the Fanatic and Machinist are permanently killed, Uldren also gets killed, and the story shifts gears over to investigating the Dreaming City. Past that, the Scorn have not been given any significant story content since then, and only show up outside the Tangled Shore in the Dreaming City on the first Curse week, and on the Deep Six and Legion's Folly maps for Gambit. The most they've gotten is a Vanguard report that Strike fireteams are still sent into the Hallowed Lair to deal with Fikrul any time he eventually resurrects. Other than that, they've been sidelined by other races in post-Forsaken content.
- Finally brought back into Focus in Witch Queen. While Savathûn and her Lucent Brood serve as the primary antagonists in the campaign, the Scorn are a strong secondary presence throughout and become even more prominent in the post-campaign content.
- Super Smoke: Raiders have the "Smoke Dash" ability which lets them turn into a blue mist and move around the battlefield.
- We Have Reserves: The Scorn make their army out of the dead. Every Fallen they kill is turned into one of their mad "children", which they resurrect again and again.Fikrul: Kill a Fallen, I claim it as Scorn. Kill a Scorn, I raise ten more!
- The Drifter also implies that the Scorn are capable of reproduction and that they can do so quite rapidly.
- Zerg Rush: Similar to the Hive, the Scorn's units — primarily Ravagers, Screebs, Stalkers, and Wraiths — tend to come at you in a wave of bodies shrieking for your blood.
The Scorned Barons
The Scorned Barons in General
From left to right: Yaviks, Elykris, Araskes, Kaniks, Pirrha, Fikrul, Hiraks, and Reksis Vahn
The leaders and founders of the Scorn. Once just lowly Dregs from the House of Exile, these Fallen used their tenacity, cleverness, and ruthlessness to survive, eventually falling under the tutelage of the heretical Archon Priest known as Fikrul. Growing in power from stealing Ether caches, they gained a massive following and began to pillage and terrorize the post-Taken War Reef, but were eventually put away in the Prison of Elders by Cayde-6 and Petra Venj following the Red War. With the events of Forsaken, they've broken out of the Prison and are all too happy to return to plundering the sector.- Aliens Speaking English: The only Barons who don't have English banter with you are the Rider, the Hangman and the Mindbender, though the latter two are excused due to their insanity. The rest of the Barons do taunt you, albeit mostly in barely coherent English given it's implied repeated resurrections are messing with their minds.
- All the Other Reindeer: The House of Exile was comprised of renegades and other undesirables from amongst the Fallen, but the young Barons in particular were considered outcasts even within a House that was made of them!
- Big Bad Duumvirate: As the leaders of the Scorn, they (along with Uldren) are the main antagonists of Forsaken.
- Co-Dragons: While there is something of a hierarchy bewteen them, the Barons collectively serve as the commanders for the Scorn. They refer to Uldren as "King" and show great reverence for him, a notable departure from past Fallen leaders only being known as Kells and constantly having targets on their backs from underlings.
- Dark Action Girl: Elykris, Araskes, and Yaviks. All female, all just as badass and evil as their male co-Barons.
- Did You Just Flip Off Cthulhu??: With our Guardian being Cthulhu here. They kill Cayde-6, one of said Guardian's closest friends, and yet seem genuinely surprised that they're being hunted like dogs for it, and continuously mock and attack both parties even as our chraracter fires lead into them. Given it's our Guardian, who's kind of made himself an image from killing beings of godlike stature, it doesn't end well for any of them.
- Even Evil Has Standards: A victim of this - these guys used to be Dregs of the House of Exile. Given that said House appears to be the dumping ground for Fallen that aren't liked by any of their peers, the fact that these eight Dregs were kicked out of them says something about how bad they were/are.
- From Nobody to Nightmare: The Barons started out at the very bottom as Dregs of one of the smallest Houses. Now they're some of the most powerful Fallen in the Sol System and are responsible for turning large swathes of the Reef into a lawless wasteland.
- Quirky Miniboss Squad: They're the highest-ranking Scorn and Uldren Sov's right-hand-men, with The Fanatic being the highest ranking one. There's a mission for each of them where you track them down one after another, all ending in a fight against them that sports a gimmick associated with that Baron. (Yaviks the Rider speeds around on her Pike which encourages you to do so yourself, Kaniks the Mad Bomber has rigged his arena with Exploding Barrels and bombs that you need to defuse, etc.) The exception to that is The Fanatic, who is killed (except not really) on the way to Uldren in the last mission of the Forsaken campaign.
- Red Baron: All of them each possess an impressive title that reflects their specialty and role.
- You No Take Candle: Only one of the voiced Barons (the Trickster) speaks grammatically sound English, though they still get their point across and taunt you with everything they can throw at you. The Mad Bomber has it worst since he's bordering on Hulk Speak, mocking Cayde's death like the raving lunatic he is. This seems to be inconsistent, as the Fanatic and the Rifleman are shown to be speaking perfect sentences anywhere but the missions where you finally take them down. It is implied to be a sign that their minds are deteriorating due to the repeated resurrections.
Fikrul
Fikrul, the Fanatic
"I do not fear the dead! I control death!"
- Voiced by: Matthew Mercer
"I don't like this one, not one bit. He's a believer- to the core. And they're the toughest to put down."
—Cayde-6
The former Archon Priest of Kaliks Prime, Fikrul is the Archon of the Scorn, leader of the Scorned Barons, and second-in-command to Prince Uldren. After being exiled from the House of Wolves for speaking out against the Great Machine and the role of Servitors, he fell in with a small band of outcast Dregs that would eventually grow into the Barons under his guidance. The Praxic Order marks him as an outlier with the designation of VIP #4503.
- Arch-Enemy: With the death of Uldren and the other Barons, he sees himself as this to the Young Wolf.
- Back from the Dead: He comes back to life repeatedly in "The Hollowed Lair" strike with the goal of killing you so he can resurrect the Scorn without opposition and take over the Reef.
- Badass Preacher: Comes with being an Archon, as well as the de-facto leader of the Scorn before Uldren took command.
- Bring It: The gist of his taunt in "Scorned", boasting that for every enemy you kill, he'll revive them all and add them to his Scorn army.
- The Corrupter: While they were unlikely that good before, it was the Fanatic's teachings that pushed the Barons, and by extension all of the Scorn, into becoming the nihilistic cult they are now.
- Damage-Sponge Boss: Fikrul as you fight him in the "Hollowed Lair" strike comes packed with massive resistances and grows immune several times, even backing away from the fight to let his minions overwhelm you with sheer numbers. He's one of the few bosses you absolutely cannot melt with firepower in one go.
- The Dragon: Fikrul is the leader of the Scorn and the last Baron the Young Wolf faces before they confront Uldren.
- Even Evil Has Loved Ones: Despite being the leader of a death-worshipping cult, he does care about the other Barons and is utterly pissed about you killing them when you finally confront him. He also shows deep reverence for Uldren, calling him 'father' and trying to keep him from entering the Dreaming City.
- He sees all Scorn as his children, so when a group of unaligned Scorn in the Warlord's Ruin dungeon appear, he sends five of his knights to bring them home safely before they can be killed by the Guardians or claimed by the Black Fleet.
- Even Evil Has Standards: He seems to genuinely object to the player killing just to satisfy their blood lust, not having any deeper purpose beyond that and doing so because we seemingly desired to or because it was fun.Fikrul: You lack purpose, dead thing. Killing just to kill. I will show you your end when I return...
- He can't stand the thought of the Scorn being enthralled to the Black Fleet and will act quickly to retrieve any separated groups before they can full under the Witness's control.
- Evil Sounds Deep: If you ever wanted to know how a full-sized Eliksni (or rather, what used to be Fallen) sounds in English, look no further; Fikrul speaks in a sinister, bass voice dripping with hatred and desire for vengeance.
- Fatal Flaw: Wrath. He's been given functional immortality, as well as the ability to resurrect his followers, and the only thing he can think to do with this power is to provoke and try to kill the Guardian over and over and over again. It makes Firkul's central claim, that he is merely protecting his people from the Guardian, ring particularly hollow as it is his own actions that brings the Guardian down on them.
- The Heretic: He was stripped of his status, his House, and his arms for preaching against the Traveler and that the Eliksni should have perished in the Whirlwind in order to be reborn.
- Leitmotif: The Fanatic
, an oppressing and harrowing orchestral movement taking the Scorn's overall theme up a notch while also adding edgy guitar riffs, making the fight sequences against him that much more intense. - Moral Myopia:
- He's livid when we hunt down and kill the other Scorn Barons, who he regards as friends... while seemingly paying no attention to the fact that the reason we killed them to begin with was because they, alongside Uldren, killed one of our friends.
- He claims that the Guardian is driven only by bloodlust and vengeance, while being completely controlled by these feelings himself.
- Necromancer: Is stated to have powers similar to that of enemies found in the EDZ (i.e. the Taken), which may explain how the Scorn constantly resurrect themselves.
- "Not So Different" Remark: He states the Scorn and the Guardians are alike in the fact we both die and return.Fikrul: We... are alike. Trapped in death... a never-ending dance.
- Only Mostly Dead: Defied. Fikrul was the only one of the Scorn Barons not imprisoned by Petra because Variks asked Cayde-6 to kill him instead. It was only after reports of Craask's death at Fikrul and Uldren's hands that Variks asks Cayde to capture Fikrul and Uldren instead of killing them. Cayde has a hard time believing he was alive because he both killed him and watched him die.
- Resurrective Immortality: The "Hollowed Lair" strike is essentially an allegory to killing him over and over to quell his constant uprisings in the Shore, as he somehow always finds a way to resurrect himself after the strike is over. By the time of Joker's Wild, the Praxic Order notes how his ability to raise himself from the dead is not dissimilar to Ghost-aided resurrection, and that the Vanguard still deploys fireteams to suppress him, confirming he is still around and kicking.
- Shock and Awe: Wields a staff that enables him to fire precise bolts of Arc lightning at distant enemies, not unlike Abominations, and can channel Arc energy into a large circular area of constant damage wherever he desires. He has also been observed entering the fray in a strike of Arc lightning.
- Put on a Bus: It is mentioned in The Witch Queen that Fikrul was driven from the Tangled Shore recently, but that his current whereabouts are unknown.
- We Used to Be Friends: He used to be Variks' co-conspirator, and someone the latter would call "friend". This would end when Fikrul was cast out for speaking out against the Traveler and would go on to become the leader of the Scorn. Nowadays, Variks is disgusted that he once dared to consider him his friend, while Fikrul mocks Variks for clinging to the old Eliksni ways.
- What the Hell, Hero?: In his final fight, Fikrul calls out the player (and the Guardians in general) for the millions of Eliksni that they've killed when they're desperately trying to find a way to keep themselves from going extinct, and how their entire campaign against the Scorn is more about their own personal revenge than any actual justice. This ends up making him a colossal Hypocrite since not only do the Scorn all believe the Eliksni should have died in the Whirlwind and are trying to finish the job themselves, but he also goes out of his way to provoke the Guardians into attacking him and his people, making all the suffering the Guardians inflict upon them very much justified.
Elykris
Elykris, the Machinist
"All our weapons! To Fikrul and the Awoken King!"
The Scorn's weapons master and Fikrul's second-in-command, Elykris raids ships to add any weapons she can find to her hoard.- Back from the Dead: She reappears as a boss in the heroic version of the Ether Ritual public event. The title even changes to "The Baron's Return".
- Contralto of Strength: She's got the deepest and raspiest voice out of the three female Barons, and her weapons ensure that she's not to be taken lightly.
- Damage-Sponge Boss: The Machinist is by far the beefiest of the Barons, befitting of Fikrul's right hand woman. Even the strongest Super will cut less than a quarter of her health (whereas it'd do a lot more on her fellow Barons. Like Fikrul, she's also one of the few bosses in the game who automatically turns immune each time you drop one threshold of her health bar, making it impossible to melt or oneshot her.
- Macross Missile Massacre: She's able to launch a massive volley of rockets from the battery on her back.
- Number Two: She's Fikrul's right hand woman among the Scorned Barons.
- Space Pirate: In contrast to the more Church Militant feel of the Scorn, Elykris is probably the most pirate-like of any Eliksni yet seen, actively raiding ships across Reef space, slaughtering their crews, and taking anything that isn't bolted down.
- Walking Armory: In addition to the Scorn Shrapnel Launcher, the Machinist carries an operational missile battery into battle on her back. Said missile battery is the very same installed on Scorn Walkers, giving you an insight on how huge and armed to the teeth the Machinist is.
Hiraks
Hiraks, the Mindbender
"<Unintelligible Hive speech>"
"Never heard of the Mindbender? Surprise. That's just how he likes it." -Cayde-6
Once a particularly weak Dreg, Hiraks fell into the abyss of the Hellmouth. When he re-emerged, he had obtained dark powers similar to the Hive.- Ascended to a Higher Plane of Existence: Studied the Hive so thoroughly that he managed to create his own throne world in the Ascendant Realm, which he made from Cayde-6's death.
- Barrier Warrior: Of a sort, as he makes generous use of the Scorn barrier totems throughout his fight to protect both himself and his minions.
- BFG: Wields a Hive Boomer instead of the traditional Fallen weaponry.
- Foil: To Eris Morn. Both were trapped within the Hellmouth, driven partially mad and forced to adopt the Hive's ways to survive. But while Eris is a Creepy Good who still serves the Traveler, Hiraks has completely embraced the dark powers he gained.
- Go Mad from the Revelation: Whatever power he gained in the Hellmouth drove him mad enough that he never spoke an intelligible word again.
- Interspecies Romance: He took a Hive Brood Queen, In Anānh, as a consort. The Spider sends you to kill her not only to destroy the source of the Hive on the Tangled Shore, but also because he realises it would be a very bad thing if a brood of Hive with Eliksni traits were to be born.
- Mad Scientist: In true Hive fashion, Hiraks loves to perform all sorts of twisted experiments on his victims. One such experiment caused a Reef outpost he attacked, as well as the entire asteroid it was on, to begin fading in and out of our dimension.
- Make My Monster Grow: A self-inflicted version of it, Hiraks can grow in size to match the likes of Alak-Hul and Oryx's Warpriest.
- Mind-Control Device: He has set up a network of beacons & amplifiers in the Tangled Shore that have let him take control of the local Hive population.
- Mind Rape: Befitting someone called "The Mindbender", he enjoys inflicting this on his victims.
- Religion of Evil: It's implied he is trying to create one, beyond the already religious overtones of the Scorn, as on your hunt for him you encounter a dozen, mind-controlled thralls bowed down to a Scorn behind a podium. It is unclear if the Mindbender or the Scorn as a whole is the object of worship, though considering his obsession the Mindbender is probably trying to gain power from Hive tribute to grow his Throne World.
Araskes
Araskes, the Trickster
"Oh no, it found our factory of delights~! If only we'd planned for this~!"
"Whatever you do, don't trust anything she touches. I promise you, it'll bite." -Cayde-6
A smooth talker and master manipulator, Araskes is the one sent in on the rare occasions the Barons make deals. She is their bard and their envoy- and their first strike.- Dirty Coward: She is actually very weak and has poor direct combat skills, hence her reliance on subterfuge and traps.
- Evil Laugh: She likes to laugh when someone falls for her traps. And she does like to laugh a lot.
- For the Lulz: Part of the reason for what she does is that she gets a kick out of watching her enemies crumble from within.
- I Have Many Names: She is known by multiple self-given monikers and aliases, all by her design, to spread fear and confusion among her enemies.
- Let's You and Him Fight: One of her favorite tactics is to set up a situation where her enemies destroy each other for her. Once such case pitted 12 separate bounty hunter groups against each other while she made off with all the rare materials in a mine they'd all been sent to collect.
- Trap Master: Her preferred method of dealing with enemies as opposed to direct combat, escaping with her cloaking tech and letting unsuspecting opponents run into any myriad of traps she's left for them. To fool the player, her traps actually appear as Exotic Engrams, Heavy Ammo bricks, plants, and loot crates, with hardly any differences between them and the real thing. note
Reksis Vahn
Reksis Vahn, the Hangman
"KILL THEM ALL!!!"
"He likes it. Too much." -Cayde-6
A particularly cruel executioner with a penchant for torture, Reksis Vahn supplies the Barons and Scorn with the Ether they need to live- for a very bloody price, of course.- The Heretic: Possibly on a level beyond even the Fanatic, as he seems to take particular delight in mutilating Servitors, which are effectively Fallen effigies of the Traveler that are treated as sacred. Though whether he truly believes Fikrul's teachings or uses them as an excuse to indulge his sadism is debated.
- Nature Versus Nurture: A particularly dark example. The Hangman was abandoned at birth, and it is debated if it was because his parents saw the darkness within him, or if the cruel act is what made him so twisted.
- Power at a Price: The Ether he provides the other Barons with is drained from the bodies and Servitors of other Fallen, and any Scorn who want their fill have to pay 'a bloody price' to receive it. Given his methods of obtaining the Ether, it can't be anything pleasant.
- Punched Across the Room: Inflicts this on Cayde-6 in the Last Stand of the Gunslinger trailer, smashing the Hunter with his flail and sending him through a wall with a sickening crunch.
- Sadist: Takes delight in inflicting all sorts of pain on his enemies and violently torturing Servitors as he drains them of their Ether. His arena is even lined with cages filled with his past victims. Spider even notes that he sees to docking the arms of his Dregs personally, something traditionally performed by an Archon.
- Silent Antagonist: Like the Guardian, Reksis Vahn never speaks in game. His sole line of dialogue comes from a lore book.
- Torture Technician: With no Servitor of their own to produce Ether, the Hangman provides it for the Scorn by capturing & painfully draining it out of other Fallen and Servitors.
Kaniks
Kaniks, the Mad Bomber
"Cayde MURDERED ELIKSNI! Think you different!? Think you HERO!? JOKE AT YOU!!!"
"Look, we all like blowing stuff up, but there's a line. A line this guy crossed a long time ago." -Cayde-6
An insane thrill-seeker who lives for his next explosion, Kaniks is willing to level everything in sight to destroy his target.- Artificial Limbs: Several of his limbs have been replaced with prosthetics, likely from taking too many of his own explosions.
- Ax-Crazy: He's not called the Mad Bomber for nothing.
- Badass Bandolier: Of Grenades.
It was mentioned by Bungie that they specifically wanted to invoke the imagery of an old-western style bandolier, or at least a Fallen version. - Dumbass Has a Point: Emotionally and mentally disabled, but still manages to bring up the same morality arguments as Fikrul, and basically describes Cayde's death with Brutal Honesty.
- Faux Affably Evil: He calls the player "friend" and wants to play a game with them...which involves blowing them to pieces with mines.
- Laughing Mad: Cackles like a lunatic as everything around him explodes.
- Mad Bomber: It's in his title. The guy gets a kick from blowing up any target he sees.
- No Kill like Overkill: Turning the entire surrounding area to smoking rubble is perfectly fine to him if it gets his target.
- Psychopathic Manchild: His behavior is quite childish in comparison to the other Barons... and it's implied that repetitive exposure to his own explosions and numerous resurrections have done a serious number on his psyche.
- Talkative Loon: Constantly talks to the player in barely-coherent English, pretending they're friends playing a game as he tries to murder you.
- Throw Down the Bomblet: His primary method of fighting, slinging grenade after grenade at the player from his Badass Bandolier in an attempt to turn them into a red smear on the ground.
- Villainous Breakdown: Zig-zagged. The longer you fight him, the less loony and silly his madness sounds like, and the more sorrowful it does.Kaniks: Cayde MURDER Eliksni. Think you DIFFERENT, think you HERO? Joke at you.
Pirrha
Pirrha, the Rifleman
"Go on, take out your Ghost. I need the target practice."
"Trust me, kids: Keep your eyes open, head down... and your Ghost safe." -Cayde-6
A sniper and assassin-for-hire who watches over his fellow Barons from the shadows. Many adventurers and Guardians have challenged him to try and claim his fabled treasure stash, only to be met with a bullet between the eyes.- Attack Its Weak Point: He has both the wits & skills to take out a Guardian's Ghost before killing them. Cayde's Ghost was his latest kill.
- Boisterous Bruiser: Flashy, cocky and scarily competent, wasting no time in taunting you at every turn. Your Ghost notices upon his death that he was similar to Cayde's Ghost in that respect
- Cold Sniper: A vicious killer and mercenary who puts down anyone unlucky enough to enter his vast territory.
- Depleted Phlebotinum Shells: Supplementary material for Joker's Wild reveals that Pirrha's gun was loaded with a bullet normally chambered into the Weapons of Sorrow for the specific purpose of killing Cayde's Ghost, Sundance. This was the only reason he was able to kill his Ghost, as a Scorn weapon on its own would not have lethally injured them.
- Doppelgänger Attack: Will continuously create Hard Light holograms of himself as you fight that are just as capable of damaging you as the Rifleman himself, though they die easily and can be readily discerned from the real deal due to having a bright blue filter over them.
- Electronic Eyes: One of his eyes is a cybernetic implant that interfaces with his rifle, essentially allowing him to literally see through his crossbow scope.
- Energy Bow: Wields a laser crossbow in place of the Wire Rifles traditionally favored by Fallen snipers.
- Glass Cannon: Between his crossbow and his holograms, the Rifleman can drop you pretty quickly, but he can't take much punishment.
- Improbable Aiming Skills: Between his Electronic Eyes and vast surveillance network, he is able to hit targets at incredible distances and from seemingly impossible angles.
- Nemean Skinning: Wears the hide of a Cabal War Beast as a makeshift cloak, even keeping its armor and blades. With the way the hood is positioned, it almost looks like he actually has a Warbeast snout for a face.
- Schmuck Bait: The rumors of his treasure hoard have lured many foolish adventurers (and more than a few Guardians) to an early grave.
Yaviks
Yaviks, the Rider
"WHOO-HOOO!"
"I'd pay good money to watch a race between Marcus and this one." -Cayde-6
Every attack from the Barons both begins and ends with the Rider. With an army of loyal riders and their custom Pikes, she seeks to reduce the Reef to a toxic wasteland.- Ace Custom: Her squad all ride on heavily-modified Pikes, with Yaviks' in particular bearing a Scorn standard and armed with a rocket launcher & front-mounted flamethrower.
- Badass Normal: Compared to her fellow Barons. The others are bigger, more imposing, and have varying degrees of enhancements from either their own armaments or abilities they've acquired - the Mindbender's Hive magic, the Rifleman's holograms and sniping skills, the Hangman's burning flail and utter barbarism, etc. By contrast, the Rider... is just a really good driver of heavily modified Pikes. Hell, she doesn't even have a unique Baron model, she uses a standard Stalker model instead, though it's somewhat hard to tell when you're chasing her.
- Cavalry Officer: Fills this role among the Barons. Her squad are always the first ones in, scattering the enemies before the main Scorn forces move in, then coming back around to finish the stragglers.
- Hoist by Their Own Petard: Cayde originally managed to capture by beating her in a race... somehow... and her fight against you heavily encourages using the Pikes around the arena to defeat her.
- Ragtag Bunch of Misfits: Her riders are composed of outlaws, nomads and the broken remains of other Houses that she took in and gave a new purpose.
- Rape, Pillage, and Burn: Yaviks' MO, razing every target in her path and leaving it an uninhabitable, toxic wasteland.
- Shout-Out: A roving squad of nihilistic, partially-mutated humanoids that destroys everything in the path of their custom vehicles. Where have we seen this before?
- Wrench Wench: All the modified Pikes her gang rides are of her own design, and she personally maintains her own vehicle.
Other Scorn
Locus of Communion
The Locus of Communion, formerly Akriis
A mysterious Ravager resembling Reksis Vahn. It was the initial Sole Survivor of a wildly unethical attempt by Emperor Calus and Katabasis to commune with the Darkness aboard a ship called the Glykon Volatus.
- Ambiguous Situation: Season of the Haunted raises some questions about why the Locus considered Calus to be "dead" despite obvious evidence to the contrary. Did what was left of Akriis see something happen to Calus that he shouldn't have endured? Or did Akriis glimpse Calus's current state and decide it counts as well because "That Man Is Dead"?
- Exact Words: The Locus copies the voices of dead people. Season of the Haunted implies that this includes the metaphorical sense, which is why it copies Calus's voice, assuming Akriis simply didn't find Calus's survival impossible.
- Puzzle Boss: Hides in the Glykon's active boiler room after starting the boss fight. Three terminals must be activated (one of which is in a superheated room) to pump in enough coolant to temporarily make it safe to enter and damage it.
- Sanity Slippage: Even by the Scorn's standards, Calus's records indicate that the Locus is clearly not all there by the time you face it, likely as the result of it being experimented on.
- I Shall Taunt You: What little remains of its personality is the vanity to use its Voice Changeling powers to mock you by speaking in the voices of significant deceased characters over the intercom.
- It Can Think: Enough of Akriis remained in the Locus to raise two possible situations on how he viewed Calus: either he thought No One Could Survive That! and assumed Calus had died, or knew Calus was still alive but was no longer his past self and counted that as "death."
- Sole Survivor: Before the rest of the Scorn aboard the Glykon resurrected, the Locus was the only individual to survive Calus's experimentation. It was clearly changed by the ordeal, however.
- Underground Monkey: Its behavior is identical to Reksis Vahn, but is made harder by the nature of its arena compared to Vahn's.
- Voice Changeling: Noted by one of Calus's scribes to speak with the voices of the dead following the experiment he conducted. In particular, it will always copy the voice of a deceased person important to whoever it's facing.Calus: Amuse me, Traveler-spawn.Ghaul: You're not brave, you've merely forgotten the fear of death.Riven: Shall we be friends?Uldren Sov: Funny. The line between Light and Dark is so very thin.Sagira: You say that like this isn't your fault.Cayde-6: You're my favorite. Shh. Don't tell anyone.
Kruutkis
Kruutkis, Reefbane
A Scorn champion fought as part of the Astral Allignment during Season of the Lost. He's similar to Pirrha, The Rifleman, in that they fight from a distance and make liberal use of hologram technology to misdirect their opponents.
- Cold Sniper: Ticks every box.
- Me's a Crowd: Makes use of hologram technology to create duplicates of himself to misdirect opponents.
- Underground Monkey: Fights in a very similar fashion to Pirrha, The Rifleman.
Brutkis
Brutkis, Lightbane
"The Scorn are supposed to be mindless. But these... they're powerful. Organized."
An extremely powerful Scorn fought during the Witch Queen campaign. He's not a Baron, but he's still extremely powerful, and the clearest indication that the Scorn are growing in both power and intelligence.- Epic Flail: A flaming one, no less.
- Kill It with Fire: All of his attacks are infused with fire, frequently leaving behind damaging pools of flame.
- Large and in Charge: Absolutely towers over other Scorn, much like the Barons once did.
- Puzzle Boss: In order to damage him, you first need to kill the three "Shimmering Captains" that hide out in the corners of his Boss Arena, which allow you to destroy crystals, which will remove his invulnerability shield.
- Underground Monkey: He's basically Reksis Vahn, the Hangman, again, but with multiple phases of trying to remove his shield.
The Caretaker
The Caretaker
"Do Not Disrupt The Caretaker"
"SCORN. They eat away at the decay within a shell of. SCORN. Truth exists all around outside the shell of. SCORN."
A Scorn Abomination residing within the Pyramid in Savathûn's throne world. It is the first success Rhulk had with bonding the Worms to Scorn hosts.—Rhulk
- Advancing Boss of Doom: There's no getting around it - the Caretaker will NOT stop moving, and WILL make its way to the obelisks, no matter how many times you stun it. The trick is to hold it off for as long as possible in order to activate the obelisks so you can deal damage to it.
- Attack Its Weakpoint: In order to slow it down, at least two members of the raid need to regularly shoot its head and its sarcophagus when it's open to momentarily stun it, at least until the rest of the team completes their offerings to the obelisks.
- Hold the Line: The main strategy of the Caretaker's encounter involves three teams of two - one team clears off enemies, a second goes into the halls behind the obelisks to retrieve Knowledge, and a third focuses on stunning the Caretaker repeatedly to give the second team time to complete their objective.
- King Mook: A Scorn Abomination that has been joined with a Worm larvae and augmented with Pyramid tech.
- Mighty Glacier: This thing is an Abomination that's equally as slow, and far more powerful. It becomes an Exploited Trope regarding its mechanics - you're supposed to make sure it's slowed down even further as you make offerings to the obelisks, so as to make sure you can complete the offerings before it gets to its destination and wipes the raid.
- Mummy: Gives this vibe, given that it's almost completely covered in detail-obscuring cloth, and carries a sarcophagus-like structure on its back.
- Schmuck Bait: Upon entering its encounter room, the mission objective changes to "Do Not Disturb The Caretaker". Guess what you have to do?
- Super Prototype: Rhulk's first success in binding a Worm to a Scorn host. And that success proves to be very dangerous indeed, being Nigh-Invulnerable and very capable of wiping the raid team if not slowed down.
