History of Clan Wolf

The history of Clan Wolf is as glorious as it is long. Chosen by Nicholas Kerensky to be the bearers of his legacy, the Wolves have established themselves as one of the preeminent Clans. The Wolves have the distinction of being the only Clan to absorb or annihilate two other Clans: the Wolverines and the WidowMakers. The Clans recent split into two factions (the Wolves, led by Khan Vladimir Ward, and the Wolves-in-exile, led by Khan Phelan Kell) has seriously weakened both groups. The Wolves under Khan Phelan, however, increased their strength significantly by capturing an entire Smoke Jaguar Cluster during Operation: Bulldog.

During the Second Exodus War, the Wolves distinguished themselves as a hardhitting and wily foe. When the Wolverines broke with the Clans, Clan Wolf won the honor of destroying the Wolverines and absorbing what remained. The battles which followed nearly crippled the Wolf forces - already dangerously low to begin with. The Clan's success sparked more inter-Clan fighting between the Wolves and the WidowMakers. The matter came to a grisly end when Clan Wolf declared a Trial of Absorption against Clan WidowMaker.

The Widowmakers claimed that Wolf personnel were responsible for a series of uprisings by Widowmaker lower castes. Wolf Khan jerome Winson refuted the claim, citing the WidowMakers inability to handle their own lower castes as proof of their weakness. In the end, the Wolves declared and won the right to call a Trial of Absorption against the WidowMakers. The Wolf forces, led by Khan Jerome Winson,  engaged in a savage fight against the WidowMakers. At the height of the battle, Khan Winson and WidowMaker Khan Jorgennson paired off in single combat to decide the fate of the two Clans. Khan Winson quickly gained the upper hand in the battle when, unexpectedly, a Star of WidowMaker mechs lept into the fray and attacked Khan Winson. The other Clan Khans, who were witnessing in their 'mechs nearby, rushed to the aid of Khan Winson. In the battle, ilKhan Nicholas Kerensky was killed by a WidowMaker laser blast. Shocked and enraged at the ilKhan's tragic death, the Wolves utterly destroyed the WidowMaker forces and claimed all that was theirs.

Interestingly, the death of ilKhan Nicholas Kerensky led to a era of peace and prosperity for the Clans. In the 2800's, Clan Coyote scientists perfected the OmniMech, while Wolf scientists created the Elemental battle armor suit. The Wolves, within a few years, improved on the original Elemental armor design by adding harjel to the system after fighting a series of preemtive batchalls with Clan Sea Fox. Within four Clan generations, hundreds of massive soldiers were filling the ranks of Clan infantry units. The Wolf Clan also prospered as its merchants and scientists expanded the limits of the Clans' knowledge and resources. By the end of the so-called Golden Century, Clan Wolf was regarded as one of the most powerful and influential of all the Clans.

Dragoon Compromise

In 3001, Khan Nadia Winson of Clan Ghost Bear brought forth a proposal to launch an invasion of the Inner Sphere. The Crusaders held a majority of votes in the Grand Council. Wolf Khan Kherlin Ward, the leader of the Warden movement, proposed to send a reconnaissance force in ahead of the main Clan force. Without sufficient information, he claimed, the invasion could turn into a disaster if the Inner Sphere armies were ready.

Ward's plan to send an expeditionary force to learn the status of the Successor States proved resourceful enough that enough Clans agreed to the proposal. Many contended, however, that the force should be led and manned by trueborn warriors claiming that freeborns would be unsuitable and untrustworthy of such a mission, but that motion was swiftly defeated. In 3005, Wolf's Dragoons entered the service of House Davion.

Over the next thirty years, the reports from the Dragoons were received further and further apart until they finally stopped in the early 3030's. The Crusaders used this to prove their point that the freeborn force was as untrustworthy as predicted. The Crusaders, particularly Falcon ristar Elias Crichell, argued eloquently that the time had come for invasion. It took another fifteen years and the accidental arrival of the Comstar vessel Outbound Light to bring matters to a head.

Invasion

In 3047, Smoke Jaguar Khan Leo Showers presented evidence, gained from the interrogation of the Outbound Light's crew, to the Grand Council that showed that their worst fears were coming true. Far from what they had believed, the Successor States were on the road to recovery and rapidly gaining back their technological edge. Technology which had long been denied the Inner Sphere was being rediscovered and rebuilt at a tremendous rates. Scientific advances in all areas, especially military, were given highest priorities and the Federated Commonwealth appeared as though it would emerge victorious over its rivals.

Wolf Khan Ulric Kerensky, an ardent Warden, protested mightily against the upcoming invasion. He was dismayed somewhat when even the Wolve's closest allies went along with the plan. He declared a Trial of Refusal and skillfully negotiated the odds down to four to one. The Wolf forces proved again their formidable prowess, particularly the Third Battle Cluster, but victory was snatched from their grasp by virtue of sheer numbers.

To further punish the Wolves, the Crusader Clans forced Clan Wolf to accept a role in the invasion. The Clan was assigned one of the less attack corridors. The Wolf's route would pit them against the weaker and relatively untried Free Rasalhague Republic. The Crusader Khans believed that this avenue would provide little in the way of battle and glory for the Wolves. This would, in their eyes, further humiliate Khan Ulric Kerensky and weaken his position.

The early battles in the Periphery at first proved everything that ilKhan Leo Showers had said about the Inner Sphere. The warriors the Clans faced in the first few months were mostly dishonorable, undertrained and -equipped pirates in outdated equipment. Except for the Falcon's battle for Von Strang's World and the Wolves encounter with the Kell Hounds on The Rock, none of the invading Clans faced any real challenges. Their belief's in the degeneracy of the Inner Sphere confirmed, many Crusader Khans believed they would be on Terra in a year's time.

When the Wolves struck the Inner Sphere, it was like no other invasion before. The Wolves conquered dozens of worlds in the Free Rasalhague/Federated Commonwealth corridor. A number of elite House and mercenary units were left bloodied or, in many cases, utterly destroyed. Unlike their brethren, the Wolves were extremely willing to take bondsmen into their ranks. The Free Rasalhague Army, which was quite adept at the hit-and-run tactics which plagued the other Clans, were little more than a minor nuisance for the overwhelming Wolf forces. No other Clan conquered worlds as fast as the Wolves, a fact which would ultimately help bring about their downfall in future years.

In 3050, the Ghost Bears decided to invade the Free Rasalhague capital world, Rasalhague. Although the world actually lie in the Wolf corridor, the Ghost Bear Khans successfully argued to ilKhan Leo Showers that it was close enough for their forces to attack. ilKhan Leo, ever looking for ways to slow or embarass the Wolf juggernaut, agreed to let them bid for the world. Khan Ulric, however, proved a wily adversary in the bidding. His removal of Clan Warships from his initial bid threw the Ghost Bear Khans off-balance. Seeing that they could not hope to win the bidding, the Bear Khans drove down the bidding to dangerous levels. The Wolves won the right to invade Rasalhague, but they would only have three Clusters to do so.

The Wolves emerged victorious on Rasalhague, the first Clan to capture a capital world. Subsequent political manuevering the ilKhan Leo and other Crusader-minded Khans did little to slow the Wolf assault.

The death of ilKhan Leo Showers sent the invading Clans home for a years conferring and to elect a new ilKhan. Khans Crichell and Chistu conspired with other Crusader Clans to elect a new ilKhan who would have to do their bidding. Together, they nominated Clan Wolf Khan Ulric Kerensky to the post of ilKhan. Their plan was to force the Wolf Khan to bend to their desires, thus slowing the Wolves while their own Clans caught up. To the surprise of many, ilKhan Ulric refused to play their game. Instead, he brought forth the Steel Vipers and Nova Cats into the invasion force. The Nova Cats were teamed with their longtime rival the Smoke Jaguars. Being teamed with the hated Steel Vipers galled the Falcon Khans, but ilKhan Ulric's requirement that the Jaguars and Falcons cede worlds for their new "partners" made things even worse. Although the Smoke Jaguars and Nova Cats quickly reached an accomodation regarding the exchange of worlds, the Jade Falcons made the Vipers fight Trials of Possession for every world. Even so, in 3052, the invasion resumed as the trueborn of six Clans returned to begin the conflict anew.

Refusal War

The years after Tukayyid were relatively quiet as the Clans fell back to their old inter-Clan raiding habits. Things changed for the worse in 3058, when Wolf Supremists put Ulric Kerensky on trial for genocide. Ulric managed to defeat the motion in the Wolf Clan Council, but the Wolf Loremaster, Dalk Carns, played one last attempt to ruin him. Carns accused Ulric of deliberately plotting the destruction of three generations of Wolf forces. The treaty he agreed to with Precentor Martial Focht would deprive future generations of Wolf warriors of needed combat experiencing, thus leaving them unprepared when the invasion resumed. Ulric forced the issue to the Grand Kuraltai, but, in spite of a eloquent defense by saKhan Phelan Kell, he was forced out of office. The Crusader element in the Kurultai attempted to repudiate the peace treaty, but Ulric declared a Trial of Refusal. The Jade Falcons won the right to battle the Wolves, but, in a surprise move, Ulric declared his intent on striking at every Jade Falcon world in the Inner Sphere with all the might available to the Wolf Clan. The ensuing battles resulted in the deaths of Ulric Kerensky and Wolf Khan Natasha Kerensky. The battles destroyed nearly ten Wolf and Jade Falcon Galaxies. In a telling blow, Khan Phelan Kell led the best of the Wolf Clan Wardens to the world of Morges where his forces, along with the Kell Hounds, defeated two Jade Falcon Galaxies. The Wolf forces then retreated to Arc-Royal, Phelan Kell's homeworld, to rest and rebuild their forces.

In a blatent power play, Jade Falcon saKhan Chistu declared that the Wolves had been absorbed by the victorious Jade Falcons. This plan fell apart when Wolf warrior Vlad, a former aide to Ulric Kerensky, denied Chistu's version of Ulric Kerensky's death. The two warriors battled and Chistu fell to Vlad. Vlad, in a deal he made with Khan Crichell, then arranged for all the surviving Wolf Supremist and Crusader warriors to form the core of a new Clan, the Jade Wolves. Shortly afterward, Khan Elias Crichell was elected ilKhan. Crichell's tenure as ilKhan was probably the shortest in Clan history. Khan Vlad Ward challenged Crichell's fitness and slew the elderly ilKhan in a lopsided battle. Vlad then disbanded the Jade Wolves and reestablished the Wolf Clan.

Rebuilding

The bloody Refusal War devastated Clan Wolf. The once mighty Clan is now split into two ideological camps: the Wolves led by Vlad Ward and the Wolves-in-Exile led by Phelan Kell. Phelan Kell's Wolves have sided with the remergent Star League while Vlad's forces are staunch Crusaders waiting to begin the invasion again.

Khan Vlad has been very politically active in the Grand Council meetings.  He and Jade Falcon Khan Marthe Pryde have an informal alliance to preserve their Clans. Khan Phelan's defection to the Inner Sphere deprived the Wolves of all of its Warden-minded warriors, effectively ten percent of the Clan's remaining strength. The remaining Wolf Clusters, all diehard Crusaders, were severely understrength and lacking available manpower. When Ice Hellion Khan, Asa Taney, attempted to absorb the Wolves, Khan Vlad and Khan Marthe teamed to crush the vote for Absorption. Vlad then manipulated the warrior caste of numerous Clans by stating that only those warriors who were members of the invading Clans would participate in the renewed invasion. Within days, the Wolf Clan headquarters was besieged with preemptive batchalls. The warriors taken into the Wolf Clan have replenished the depleted Galaxies and allowed Vlad to reform and equip seven Galaxies.

Death of a Clan

With the defeat of the Smoke Jaguars in the Inner Sphere and on Huntress, the Clans found themselves with the unprecedented prospect of an Inner Sphere invasion of Strana Mechty. The Star League Defense Force soon challenged the Clans to a Trial of Refusal over the invasion. If the Inner Sphere won, the invasion was over and the invading Clans would retain the worlds they had conquered. If the Clans won, the invasion would resume. In a bid to wreak chaos in the future, Vlad abstained from voting on the challenge. The Warden Clans refused to participate in the Trial, leaving the eight Crusader Clans to face the SLDF. As the Smoke Jaguars had only two Binaries of troops left, it was decided that each Crusader Clan would only commit two Binaries to the battle.

Vlad led the Wolf Binary into action against Kai Allard-Liao and the 1st St. Ives Lancers. The battle quickly became mired down as it became clear to Vlad that the Lancers were not afraid to fight the Wolves. This point was proven when Kai, using an ex-Smoke Jaguar Stormcrow, shot Vlad out of his Timber Wolf. The battle by then had reached a stalemate - the Lancers were too slow to catch the fleet Wolf 'Mechs, but the Wolves lacked the firepower to gain a decisive victory. With this in mind, Vlad accepted Kai's offer of a draw.

After the challenge was over and the Star League claimed victory, Vlad made a stunning announcement. Since the Wolves had abstained from the voting and they had not lost their battle, the results of the Trial did not affect them. Prince Victor offered to ready his troops at the Rasalhague/Wolf border. Vlad told him that the Wolves would wait out the truce and strike when he was ready.

Bloodnames

This is a list of the 12 exclusive Bloodnames in use by the Wolves.
A list of the non-exclusive Bloodnames will be listed when it becomes available.

Front-line Unit Summary

The sole Clan to achieve both its goals during the battle of Tukayyid, the Wolves also sustained the fewest casualties. This allowed the Wolves to quickly rebuild their military might. The strength and skill of the Wolves, however, could not prevent the crippling losses sustained during the Refusal War. Under the leadership of Khan Vladimir Ward, the Wolves have rebuilt their strength but are still viewed as weak by the other Clans. The Ice Hellions made an attempt to initiate a Trial of Absorption against the Wolves in 3059, but failed to win the votes necessary to do so. Only the sudden invasion by the Inner Sphere has prevented any more Clans from attempting to absorb the Wolves.

The Harvest Trials gave Khan Vlad Ward the needed warriors and equipment to rapidly rebuild his depleted forces. He disbanded Tau and Epsilon Galaxies and used units from them to form the core of three new Galaxies. Though still militarily weak, the Wolf forces are still as deadly as ever.

Phelan Kell's Wolves have since joined forces with the newly reborn Star League Defense Force. It is not known what level of support each side is providing the other with, but with the capture and assimilation of the Sixth Jaguar Dragoons into his forces, Khan Phelan's Wolves remain a formidable force to reckon with. Current estimates indicate a Wolf strength of at least four Galaxies, two front-line and two garrison. Rumors abound of the Wolves establishing a massive base on Arc-Royal, homeworld of the Kell Hounds, but no further information is available at this time.

The Clan military is organized by a strict system of units. The following is a breakdown by level of the Clan military from the smallest organizational unit to the largest unit.

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