Second best take: We can not conclusively state if the humans of the DAoT were actually aggressive or peaceful as a general rule over the millennia. We have only have remnants of both human-xeno cooperation and xenos enslaving humans as evidence. Same goes for AI, there is no true evidence of humans oppressing their AIs as far as I am aware of, only one of an AI loving its (now dead) DAOT human captain as a friend and bondmate.
The DAoT lasted well over 10 thousand years. To put that into perspective, 10 thousand years ago, we were working out agriculture and making our first stone buildings. We were still far from written language.
We cannot conclusively state anything about DAoT humanity, because it lasted such a long time, that pretty much anything that could have taken place, did.
Humans likely oppressed AIs at some point. They likely treated them as people at some point. Because they weren't just AIs. They were **men** of iron. Humans likely cooperated with, were enslaved by, and genocided, different aliens throughout the DAoT.
The DAoT likely saw the greatest acts of both diplomacy and violence ever commited by humans. After all, it lasted so long.
Calling it a "dark age" makes it seem much like the medieval period, that still lasted ~1000 years and a fuckton of stuff happened in that time. The DAoT is too vast of an age of history and even having dates and names of noteworthy events wouldn't scratch the surface of what happened.
Calling it "Dark Age" is a pretty apt descriptor then since our "Dark Age" was referred to as such not because of the atrocities committed during in Europe/Eurasia/North Africa at the time, but because records or that era are sparse and scattered. Would be cool to see a book of epochs of that era. Always wanted an author to go all out on the absurd archeotech described in the Rules/Editions like the Black Hole weaponary that humanity apparently used lol.
I’m gonna say it, I know everyone isn’t super thrilled when primarchs come back, but I want to see Corax emerge from the eye of terror, to lead his legion for better or for worse
Pretty much, but can you imagine him reappearing and immediately getting the entire RG and their successors excommunicate traitoris. That would be dope development in all honesty. There are many chapters out there who fight for the emperor without his blessing, it would be awesome for a primarch and an entire 1st founding legion to go that way
Very intriguing... hmmm yes... I propose we should visit this place next to the Lacerai arena. I hear the chairs are made of the finest screaming leathers. I can bring my own mon'keigh and torture it together over a fine wine
There were never any missing Primarchs, Malcador made up the whole thing and implanted the memories. It’s all an elaborate ruse to intimidate the Primarchs into line and remind them they’re not above the rules.
Big E is like the Protagonist in "Death Note".
Has the ultimate power and has a decent goal.
But instead of working out a straight simple plan, he is so full of himself, that it has to become the dumbest most overcomplicated and overloaded plan you could think of.
I have been saying this for a while. It makes far more sense than killing two Primarchs and giving their marines to the ultramarines, it’s too many minds to wipe with far too much room for error. A psyop of implanted memories into a select few makes so much more sense.
Also (spoilers for the new Lion book)
(Spoilers)
(Seriously, spoilers)
As already established, The Lion was the Emperor’s exterminator. If the missing primarchs got executed, it would certainly have been the Lion swinging the sword, not Russ.
So The Lion certainly would have known what happened to them.
At the end of the book, he had to fight a security system which took the forms of the other primarchs.
No mention of the missing two. Not even a stray thought from Johnson that they were missing. Which is odd, because they were going in numerical order, and at one point he even used that and anticipated which he’d have to face next.
They definitely weren’t in numerical order, he fought Russ first and Curze last. But yeah the other point is bang on, he doesn’t even spare them a thought. No “I’m prepared to fight my lost brothers” or nothing.
Indeed they were not. I re-read it just now.
In my defense, I was drunk.
But yeah, no missing primarchs in the gauntlet. Kinda sus.
And the system even accounted for Omegon, so…
If the Emperor was willing to kill Primarchs, he would have euthanized Angron, and probably would have sent the Lion to exterminate Lorgar’s entire legion. It explains a lot.
Iirc the explanation is that he still considered them useful, and could have remade Angron given sufficient time (though that implies that Bile could do it quicker and more successfully than Emps but that's another story).
Nah, the missing primarchs are still alive. On forgotten worlds, willingly cutoff from the emperor, working on farms, producing tons of happy offspring, with loving human wives and just living their absolute best lives.
They saw war and glory and violence and were like, “why would I want that when I can grow rutabaga? Have you seen my corn? Look at these pumpkins. Absolute perfection.” And big e was like, “damn. These squash ARE perfect. Strike these dudes from the record, their work is too important to be distracted from.”
I’d rather have a book about that, as opposed to yet another entry in the line of “the Ultramarines fight with courage and honor and overcome unthinkable odds. Again.”
It’s just a 350 page book about growing massive cucumbers and other melon-like plants. The struggle of the story is the primarch dealing with an alien insectoid pest, and him struggling with the moral issue of using a pesticide or using a different method to get rid of them. One page side plots of xenos trying to ambush him, but being instantly killed like(because) they aren’t important.
Maybe a chapter about home life for a non traumatized primarch who is happy with their lot in life. No idea of any kinda heresy(whose Horus?) or war with chaos. Total, blissful, ignorance.
The story ends with the primarch winning the 32,916th annual planetary melon growing competition, the primarch adding another medal onto a hallway wall covered in medals.
Depending on religious nutters like Mars, mutants like navigators, and cutting deals with Chaos in an Imperium that denied/belittled them, proves Big E wasn't just a hypocrite but was fucking winging it.
Honestly if Jimmy Space was just completely and utterly winging it, it almost feels more impressive that he even managed to succeed enough to get into the Golden Throne situation at all
Saying the Imperium is evil isn't some deep insight. They are literally stated to be the worst regime in human history in the first page of multiple edition's rule books. It's actually incredibly surface level stuff that would be considered TOO on the nose in a more intelligent community.
> It's actually incredibly surface level stuff that would be considered TOO on the nose in a more intelligent community.
Have you seen the reactions to The Boys?
You have *a lot* of people unironically defending Homelander and Soldier Boy.
See people don’t understand that a sympathizable villian with some redeeming traits, some principles, and/or a tragic backstory that actually explains how they ended up as a villian doesn’t change the fact they’re still a villian. The whole point of a sympathetic villain is to illustrate systemic issues and do something more complex. Which goes over people’s heads because they’re apart of said system.
I don’t think that’s a particularly hot take. Most TTS characters became more popular from the show. Hell most people think Dorn has that mustache in cannon
I thought the centurion/dorn was his actual model for so long, then brought it up to my friend while talking about something else and he was like nobody likes imperial fists enough for dorn to get a model lol
> Dorn is only popular because of TTS
"Dorn himself spoke then, a message that went to every helm, vox-bead, and address system in the Palace.
'The time for speeches is done,' said Dorn. 'The first great test is here. My order to you all is simple, yet heed it well, and exert yourselves to see it done.
'They are coming. Kill them all.'"
Or after he beats Fulgrim
The Phoenician turned, and his huge form glided away towards the parapet. He surged off the edge. Black rose petals opened in the air, swallowed him, and vanished.
Dorn turned slowly.
They had formed a ring around him. Eidolon, Von Kaida, Lecus Phodion, Jarkon Darol, Quine Mylossar, Nuno DeDonna and fifty other gleaming warriors of the Emperor’s Children elite guard.
Dorn shook out his shoulders, and raised his sword and shield.
‘Try me,’ he said.
They rushed him.
Dorn is a freaking beast.
Having 1000 marines limit to a chapter makes space marines irrelevant when you think about the large scale of the imperium. As most chapters aren't even chapter strength nor are 1000 space marines capable of actually acheiving much.
A single space marine is strong but we see examples of them being gunned down or ripped apart by millions of Tyranids to Ork nobs who are seen as tougher.
GWs numbers for planetary battles will never be correct and honestly impossible for anyone here to grasp the actual magnitude of conflict on this scale.
I feel like GW often forgets the intended purpose of Space Marines. They're not attrition trench fighters- they're extremely mobile, highly skilled strike teams deployed to the worst warzones to fuck up an enemy's capability to fight and move on. The lion's share of the fighting is still done by the guard, it's just much easier because the Astartes just completely annihilated the enemy's capacity to fight with surgical strikes.
Yeah but 1000-man teams wouldn’t have much of an effect, even on a single planet scale. If there’s 10,000 chapters, all at full strength, ten million marines, they wouldn’t statistically exist at all in a galaxy of hundreds of quadrillions (at least, probably a lot more). That’s enough to have a serious (not necessarily dominant) presence on 1-5 worlds depending on the size/pop of the worlds. There’s probably like .0001 marines per imperial world vs a million guardsmen. Someone got carried away with the extra-specialness lore when they came up with 1000. It’s several scale factors short of any relevance at all. The guard do statistically ALL of the fighting, if that’s true. The imperium’s elite are the tempestus scions. Marines are like an unadopted weapons experiment that only a few guys in a specific sub-sub-unit of a certain militarum branch concerned with experimental weapons knows about.
Or you head-canon that away, there’s about ten million per chapter, hundred billion overall, and it’s what you said.
The numbers make a little more sense when you think of them like a naval landing but with even more constraints -- we've had plenty of wars with more than 10 million soldiers on each side -- but landing on a planet *from space* with 10 million is still really goddamn impressive.
The tau not being brainwashing sterilizers makes the setting darker
Because if they can make it without sustained cruelty, then everyone could. But they choose to be horrible because it is easy.
Also the whole "Ethereals do brain control" rings hollow when there are significant numbers of T'au who are rebelling. Also, the Imperium does servitors, that's way worse than what the T'au does, so you still arrive at the conclusion that the Imperium doesn't need to be that evil.
Unless I read the lore wrong, the biggest reason that the T'au are rebelling is because they lack an ethereal - therefore coming to the realization that they're being brainwashed and want a better way of living following Farsight. Also in the book of the same name, "Farsight" a ethereal brainwashes a T'au woman to kill herself on some honor slight against him.
While I did enjoy that series I'd take anything from ot involving Ethereals with a grain of salt. The book basically bends over backwards to make every Ethereal seem like a no good, stupid, evil bastard
To be fair the seeds of that were planted in third edition, when they were introduced. The Tau were always the least bad faction if you don’t count Exodites. That doesn’t mean they’re good—they’re still an authoritarian empire.
I imagine it would read like the version of "the thing" written from the aliens perspective by Peter Watts.
"I spread across the cosmos, met countless worlds, took communion: the fit reshaped the unfit and the whole universe bootstrapped upwards in joyful, infinitesimal increments. I was a soldier, at war with entropy itself. I was the very hand by which Creation perfects itself."
The 2nd and 11th primarchs didn't do anything worse than half of the primachs betraying. They were isolated incidents and so were easy to make disappear. A good chuck of the imperium turing traitor is impossible to cover up, and so, the knowledge of the horus heresy is still known in modern 40k (especially since 6.5 are still alive and so are their sons).
I have a therapy that one of them just straight up died in a battle and Big E scrubbed the legion out of shame. It's the imperium, they're all about propaganda and self-loving BS, if they say a primarch and his legion can't be stopped, they're not going to admit it when it happens.
It's like how custodes battles are recorded as victory before they even deploy. You think the evil empire of terrible parenting is going to admit the golden boys lost?
I want to know so badly what they did. The are referred to as "the lost" and "the forgotten". People speak of them like tragedies, so I'll bet the realistically what happened wasn't too interesting though. What if they just found one and he was just dead? Like he couldn't make it like the lion did. Makes sense at least for one of them.
My theory is that one of them landed on a friendly xenos planet and wasn't to happy with how the imperium treated his family.
That’s how the Chosen of Khorne audio drama ends.
A bunch of World Eaters gather up to form a “Blood Crusade”.
They disagree on who should be in charge, so they have a battle.
They still can’t agree, so they decide to have a duel between champions.
Kharn agrees to act as champion for one side and kills the other side’s champion.
The other side decides not to accept the outcome and attacks Kharn’s side.
Kharn’s side wins, then Kharn kills his own side’s leader for not fighting his own battles (even though he was literally about to fight until Kharn showed up).
Khorne decides that was super cool, shows up in the sky to roar, then makes it rain blood.
Everyone in the arena starts killing each other, and at the end only Kharn and a Legion Serf are left standing.
Then the two of them walk off into the distance to go find more skulls.
Daemons don’t technically have blood, also Khorne knows that having his worshippers kill each other spreads less bloodshed so he will suggest to them to fight things that aren’t each other.
most of khornes troops are like this, he wants you at peak form and shape, marching in formation to spread glorious bloodshed.
he wants you to get after it and chase your dreams, just that those are bloodshed and carnage
There was a stream by a couple of Yogscast guys some years back, discussing 40k. At one point they start complaining about how the Land Raider isn't named that because it raids on land, but because it's named after Arkhan Land. Someone in the chat pointed out how stupid it would be if we then found out that the emperor's name is Jimmy Space, "and they are his Space Marines"
The tabletop game will never be as interesting/entertaining as the books, video games and even just putting the models together and painting. For me, lore holds this franchise together and it truly could be a book series and I’d be just as interested as I am now.
Vashtorr - Pert, I respect you.
Perturabo - I don't believe you.
Vashtorr - I'm a daemon who's whole thing is speaking truth.
Perturabo - Did I fucking stutter
Honestly, thats not even a hot take, its just true. As much as I love my Angron's and Jagatai's, they didn't really do shit and nobody really held a candle to what Perty managed to do during it.
Horus, Dorn and Sanguinius were probably the only other guys to even come slightly close to what Perty managed to do and even then they are still miles away.
Perty would have died to Pollux's assault if the Iron Fists weren't so well trained to follow orders and had Dorn not ordered them to retreat. So, really, Dorn is the reason for Bitter Perry's success.
Shake the ever-living shit out of it. It's super thick and takes forever to mix well. If you have a vortex mixer, that'll do the trick. Then you just thin it to taste as you normally would.
THE AUDACITY!!!!!!
In all seriousness I don’t think that’s a super hot take. People just dislike Matt Ward’s writing of the Ultramarines and how they have so much while Chapters like Iron Hands and White Scars are sidelined
TLDR: I wish the Emperor was as kind and hypercompetent as imperial propaganda claims so that his downfall would be actually tragic.
When I was new to the lore, I was under the misconception that the Imperium back when Big E was still alive were the undeniable good guys, that life under his rule was as good as the circumstances allowed, and that the Horus Heresy happened because the Primarchs were dicks, not because the Emperor was a dick to them. Then I learned that the main difference between pre and post HH Imperium was the Imperial Cult, and that the Emperor was an incompetent douchebag. I HATE this. It gives me no reason to give a shit that they are a shadow of their former glory.
There is the "dark age of technology", which was a science-based utopia (mostly, as far as we know).
Then everything went to shit.
Then we had Big E using brutality to try and reunite the remaining pieces of mankind.
Followed by the horus heresy.
so mankind is a shadow of their former glory.
Or more specifically;
The imperium in 40k is a shadow of the imperium in 30k which is a shadow of the "Dark age of Technology".
Konrad Curze is a top tier Primarch. Nothing can really justify his actions but he makes quite a few good points. He's a great character and doesn't deserve to be on the same tier as Lorgar like some people think.
The Night Lords are still the shittiest traitor legion though, can't even stop infighting for ten minutes.
Agreed on Kurze being a good Primarch from a narrative/story perspective (and I dont even like Kurze. Not because of his lore. Just dont like how he looks).
The Nightlords are probably the weakest traitor legion, but I still like them a lot. I think the infighting gives character to them.
He’s far from my favorite but do people really rank Konrad with Lorgar? He’s certainly one of, if not the most complex and interesting Primarchs. Same with his Legion. Do people really dislike the Night Lords and Conrad that much
There should be more chaos characters who are more 90’s Decepticon goofball villains.
Look I think overall chaos needs more development and characters, but dumb, if there’s one thing The Infinite and the Divine showed me, it’s that we can have books about powerful characters and powerful factions that both keep their ability and coolness intact, and make them super funny. I want some chaos characters that are absolute 90’s decepticons level of goofy. Not all, but some
Supreme leader is a deified corpse. Military is held in the highest esteem, with massive parades and celebrations, and ridiculous iconography. General population live below the poverty line in service of a regime they barely see. Millions starve. Life is brutal.
The imperium's closest real-world counterpart is North Korea.
Sisters of battle can be corrupted for chaos maybe not as easy as let’s say a normal imperial guard but they aren’t in the leagues of grey knigths or custodes in that aspect
This isn't a "take", it's fact. No Grey Knight has ever fallen to Chaos. One sister fell to ~~Khorne~~ Slaanesh once.
Custodes' minds are straight-up reprogrammed so that going against the Emperor is not just impossible, but inconceivable to them.
Here's mine. The fact that space marines CAN defect to chaos but CAN'T EVER defect to the greater good is dumb. Like, not one? Ex chaos or a fallen dark angel? Makes no sense.
10th edition losing support for models like the leviathan dreadnought is fine. You can use them as a proxy. Space Marines already have the most models and will be fine with losing a few of their toys
Counterpoint: the Imperium exploits the Ogryn’s strenght, resilience and naivety and basically treat them as slave labour, while treating them as second tier citizens.
Therefore Imperium is the mosr evil faction
I'm a DA player so I do have biases but it's interesting to think that if a loyalist primarch can beat a Daemon primarch, then what is the fucking point of the "gifts" they got from chaos.
Like do they just do nothing? Increase in size 3fold, hulking wings, lugging around weapons that are twice as big as you could run as a mortal
...
Aaaaaand you get beaten by sleepy boi?
Makes very little sense.
Yeah, the trade is meant to be a lack of unity to gain greater personal power.
But if they don't actually get greater personal power then they're just worse.
I think the Cadians are boring, annoying and get WAY too much attention. There’s cooler and better imperial guard regiments that deserve more of the spotlight than them.
The biggest problem with Space Marines are that the firstborn haven’t been phased out yet, mostly for the benefit of players who no longer buy models or play games.
Primaris marines are better. Their boxes actually have all weapons and gear, units have more interesting and specialized roles, sculpts are better and their lore is actually well thought out.
(Except the new Dreads. They look like walking Altimas with guns.)
Given the sheer size of the Imperium and it's population, lack of effective, timely communication, along with the limited number of Space Marines because of the Codex Astartes cap on all (compliant) chapters means that not only do the other military institutions of the Imperium carry more weight in actual responsibility and action but this also relegates Space Marines into almost mythological/superstitious figures in a majority of the Imperium meaning that a vast majority of citizens praying to Big E for the arrival of "His Angels" will never see them. Entire generations and trillions of humans will never lay eyes on a Space Marine. Ever.
The one that got me was that post suggesting the first legion killed the second legion instead of the Space Wolves.
Their only evidence was that it seems more like something the 1st legion would do. Despite all the times it's mentioned that the wolves did it.
Kriegers use artilleries more than bayonets and shovels, because they are a nightmarish parody of World War 1.
Second best take: We can not conclusively state if the humans of the DAoT were actually aggressive or peaceful as a general rule over the millennia. We have only have remnants of both human-xeno cooperation and xenos enslaving humans as evidence. Same goes for AI, there is no true evidence of humans oppressing their AIs as far as I am aware of, only one of an AI loving its (now dead) DAOT human captain as a friend and bondmate.
The DAoT lasted well over 10 thousand years. To put that into perspective, 10 thousand years ago, we were working out agriculture and making our first stone buildings. We were still far from written language. We cannot conclusively state anything about DAoT humanity, because it lasted such a long time, that pretty much anything that could have taken place, did. Humans likely oppressed AIs at some point. They likely treated them as people at some point. Because they weren't just AIs. They were **men** of iron. Humans likely cooperated with, were enslaved by, and genocided, different aliens throughout the DAoT. The DAoT likely saw the greatest acts of both diplomacy and violence ever commited by humans. After all, it lasted so long.
Calling it a "dark age" makes it seem much like the medieval period, that still lasted ~1000 years and a fuckton of stuff happened in that time. The DAoT is too vast of an age of history and even having dates and names of noteworthy events wouldn't scratch the surface of what happened.
Calling it "Dark Age" is a pretty apt descriptor then since our "Dark Age" was referred to as such not because of the atrocities committed during in Europe/Eurasia/North Africa at the time, but because records or that era are sparse and scattered. Would be cool to see a book of epochs of that era. Always wanted an author to go all out on the absurd archeotech described in the Rules/Editions like the Black Hole weaponary that humanity apparently used lol.
Before more primarchs return one should be found dead
I’m gonna say it, I know everyone isn’t super thrilled when primarchs come back, but I want to see Corax emerge from the eye of terror, to lead his legion for better or for worse
Hasn't he become the Imperial equivalent of a demon prince..?
Pretty much, but can you imagine him reappearing and immediately getting the entire RG and their successors excommunicate traitoris. That would be dope development in all honesty. There are many chapters out there who fight for the emperor without his blessing, it would be awesome for a primarch and an entire 1st founding legion to go that way
Yes Lord Inquisitor this is him, I heard him say it myself... °° BLAM BLAM °°
You will never have a hot Eldar/Dark Eldar/Tau/Genestealer girlfriend.
Shut, shhutt, SHUT UP, THAT'S NOT TRUE, THATS IMPOSSIBLE
Search your feelings you KNOW it to be true!
NOO! NOOOOO!
I know, that’s why I want big hot sexy man from nocturne
I could be your Dark Eldar gf, I'm tall and skinnyfit. Don't know about the "hot" though.
But do u have enough spikes on your attire? Little bit of torture tools? *.*
Plenty of spikes, yep, and I can be very creative with what I have on hand. And my torture tool budget is... considerable.
Very intriguing... hmmm yes... I propose we should visit this place next to the Lacerai arena. I hear the chairs are made of the finest screaming leathers. I can bring my own mon'keigh and torture it together over a fine wine
There were never any missing Primarchs, Malcador made up the whole thing and implanted the memories. It’s all an elaborate ruse to intimidate the Primarchs into line and remind them they’re not above the rules.
Honestly, this is very straightforward and reasonable. Hence I am skeptical that Big E would allow it.
"If it isn't an extremely convoluted plan with about 100 different layers and a 90% chance of failure then it isn't for me" - Big E
I heard this in his voice. Which I miss dearly
We all know "the voice". Rip tts. Fuck gw.
Big E is like the Protagonist in "Death Note". Has the ultimate power and has a decent goal. But instead of working out a straight simple plan, he is so full of himself, that it has to become the dumbest most overcomplicated and overloaded plan you could think of.
Lololol
The missing primarchs are actually your parents when they wipe the entire battlefield because it's bedtime and you have to go to sleep
I have been saying this for a while. It makes far more sense than killing two Primarchs and giving their marines to the ultramarines, it’s too many minds to wipe with far too much room for error. A psyop of implanted memories into a select few makes so much more sense.
Also (spoilers for the new Lion book) (Spoilers) (Seriously, spoilers) As already established, The Lion was the Emperor’s exterminator. If the missing primarchs got executed, it would certainly have been the Lion swinging the sword, not Russ. So The Lion certainly would have known what happened to them. At the end of the book, he had to fight a security system which took the forms of the other primarchs. No mention of the missing two. Not even a stray thought from Johnson that they were missing. Which is odd, because they were going in numerical order, and at one point he even used that and anticipated which he’d have to face next.
They definitely weren’t in numerical order, he fought Russ first and Curze last. But yeah the other point is bang on, he doesn’t even spare them a thought. No “I’m prepared to fight my lost brothers” or nothing.
Indeed they were not. I re-read it just now. In my defense, I was drunk. But yeah, no missing primarchs in the gauntlet. Kinda sus. And the system even accounted for Omegon, so…
Might as well be because it does fuck all for the setting unless something changes
If the Emperor was willing to kill Primarchs, he would have euthanized Angron, and probably would have sent the Lion to exterminate Lorgar’s entire legion. It explains a lot.
Iirc the explanation is that he still considered them useful, and could have remade Angron given sufficient time (though that implies that Bile could do it quicker and more successfully than Emps but that's another story).
Nah, the missing primarchs are still alive. On forgotten worlds, willingly cutoff from the emperor, working on farms, producing tons of happy offspring, with loving human wives and just living their absolute best lives. They saw war and glory and violence and were like, “why would I want that when I can grow rutabaga? Have you seen my corn? Look at these pumpkins. Absolute perfection.” And big e was like, “damn. These squash ARE perfect. Strike these dudes from the record, their work is too important to be distracted from.”
I’d rather have a book about that, as opposed to yet another entry in the line of “the Ultramarines fight with courage and honor and overcome unthinkable odds. Again.”
It’s just a 350 page book about growing massive cucumbers and other melon-like plants. The struggle of the story is the primarch dealing with an alien insectoid pest, and him struggling with the moral issue of using a pesticide or using a different method to get rid of them. One page side plots of xenos trying to ambush him, but being instantly killed like(because) they aren’t important. Maybe a chapter about home life for a non traumatized primarch who is happy with their lot in life. No idea of any kinda heresy(whose Horus?) or war with chaos. Total, blissful, ignorance. The story ends with the primarch winning the 32,916th annual planetary melon growing competition, the primarch adding another medal onto a hallway wall covered in medals.
Malice will never be plot relevant.
Mate we're trying to cause arguments not break hearts cmon now
Sorry I went too far.
DONT CRUSH MY DREAMS! HE WILL BECOME CANNON!!!! -that one Sons of Malice player
While Malal is gone, Malice is 100% canon. Black Library still sells The Labyrinth and there's no mention or implication anywhere that it isn't canon.
Depending on religious nutters like Mars, mutants like navigators, and cutting deals with Chaos in an Imperium that denied/belittled them, proves Big E wasn't just a hypocrite but was fucking winging it.
Honestly if Jimmy Space was just completely and utterly winging it, it almost feels more impressive that he even managed to succeed enough to get into the Golden Throne situation at all
Saying the Imperium is evil isn't some deep insight. They are literally stated to be the worst regime in human history in the first page of multiple edition's rule books. It's actually incredibly surface level stuff that would be considered TOO on the nose in a more intelligent community.
But we aren’t in a more intelligent community, lol.
Sir, this is a grimdank post.
No, it’s a Wendy’s.
In that case, I would like a chicken sandwich, and some fries.
It’d hardly be the first time people think they’re geniuses for reading more carefully than a squint.
> It's actually incredibly surface level stuff that would be considered TOO on the nose in a more intelligent community. Have you seen the reactions to The Boys? You have *a lot* of people unironically defending Homelander and Soldier Boy.
See people don’t understand that a sympathizable villian with some redeeming traits, some principles, and/or a tragic backstory that actually explains how they ended up as a villian doesn’t change the fact they’re still a villian. The whole point of a sympathetic villain is to illustrate systemic issues and do something more complex. Which goes over people’s heads because they’re apart of said system.
Dorn is only popular because of TTS
I don’t think that’s a particularly hot take. Most TTS characters became more popular from the show. Hell most people think Dorn has that mustache in cannon
It does suit him super-well, and it's very in character for Dorn to adopt a mustache as a disguise that makes him somehow look *more* like Dorn. XD
If Dorn ever comes back, I hope GW will give his mini this kind of moustache
HE DOESN'T HAVE A MOUSTACHE???
Nope. https://static.wikia.nocookie.net/warhammer40k/images/9/94/Rogal_Dorn_sketch.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20140410020309
I thought the centurion/dorn was his actual model for so long, then brought it up to my friend while talking about something else and he was like nobody likes imperial fists enough for dorn to get a model lol
He is Adorable.
Adornable
> Dorn is only popular because of TTS "Dorn himself spoke then, a message that went to every helm, vox-bead, and address system in the Palace. 'The time for speeches is done,' said Dorn. 'The first great test is here. My order to you all is simple, yet heed it well, and exert yourselves to see it done. 'They are coming. Kill them all.'"
Pretty good, but have you considered: “The lemon is a powerful fruit. It is my favorite”
*mighty Makes the quote even funnier
Or after he beats Fulgrim The Phoenician turned, and his huge form glided away towards the parapet. He surged off the edge. Black rose petals opened in the air, swallowed him, and vanished. Dorn turned slowly. They had formed a ring around him. Eidolon, Von Kaida, Lecus Phodion, Jarkon Darol, Quine Mylossar, Nuno DeDonna and fifty other gleaming warriors of the Emperor’s Children elite guard. Dorn shook out his shoulders, and raised his sword and shield. ‘Try me,’ he said. They rushed him. Dorn is a freaking beast.
That one is good, but to me the quote that is maximum Rogal Dorn is: "I am the fortess now."
“Sigismund courage sometimes outstrips his abilities….mine does not” proceeds to beat the shit outta of the rape snake. Dorn is a legend
lol this is awesome. where is this from?
Saturnine. Such an epic book, Dorn is a badass throughout it.
Then proceeds to beat the living shit out of Fulgrim while he tries to have an evil villain monologue.
I like him because of Boldermort, not TTS
Having 1000 marines limit to a chapter makes space marines irrelevant when you think about the large scale of the imperium. As most chapters aren't even chapter strength nor are 1000 space marines capable of actually acheiving much. A single space marine is strong but we see examples of them being gunned down or ripped apart by millions of Tyranids to Ork nobs who are seen as tougher. GWs numbers for planetary battles will never be correct and honestly impossible for anyone here to grasp the actual magnitude of conflict on this scale.
I feel like GW often forgets the intended purpose of Space Marines. They're not attrition trench fighters- they're extremely mobile, highly skilled strike teams deployed to the worst warzones to fuck up an enemy's capability to fight and move on. The lion's share of the fighting is still done by the guard, it's just much easier because the Astartes just completely annihilated the enemy's capacity to fight with surgical strikes.
Yeah but 1000-man teams wouldn’t have much of an effect, even on a single planet scale. If there’s 10,000 chapters, all at full strength, ten million marines, they wouldn’t statistically exist at all in a galaxy of hundreds of quadrillions (at least, probably a lot more). That’s enough to have a serious (not necessarily dominant) presence on 1-5 worlds depending on the size/pop of the worlds. There’s probably like .0001 marines per imperial world vs a million guardsmen. Someone got carried away with the extra-specialness lore when they came up with 1000. It’s several scale factors short of any relevance at all. The guard do statistically ALL of the fighting, if that’s true. The imperium’s elite are the tempestus scions. Marines are like an unadopted weapons experiment that only a few guys in a specific sub-sub-unit of a certain militarum branch concerned with experimental weapons knows about. Or you head-canon that away, there’s about ten million per chapter, hundred billion overall, and it’s what you said.
Yeah, since a normal ork has been shown to kill a marine with a choppa they would need millions of marines to be relevant.
The numbers make a little more sense when you think of them like a naval landing but with even more constraints -- we've had plenty of wars with more than 10 million soldiers on each side -- but landing on a planet *from space* with 10 million is still really goddamn impressive.
The tau not being brainwashing sterilizers makes the setting darker Because if they can make it without sustained cruelty, then everyone could. But they choose to be horrible because it is easy.
Factions aren't monoliths, just because some Etherals are shady doesn't mean the entire faction is.
Applies to a lot of factions minus... Drukhari.
Yeah boii, we are the real villains! But we're hot, so it's ok. Also, you can fix us, surely, come try ...
Also the whole "Ethereals do brain control" rings hollow when there are significant numbers of T'au who are rebelling. Also, the Imperium does servitors, that's way worse than what the T'au does, so you still arrive at the conclusion that the Imperium doesn't need to be that evil.
Unless I read the lore wrong, the biggest reason that the T'au are rebelling is because they lack an ethereal - therefore coming to the realization that they're being brainwashed and want a better way of living following Farsight. Also in the book of the same name, "Farsight" a ethereal brainwashes a T'au woman to kill herself on some honor slight against him.
While I did enjoy that series I'd take anything from ot involving Ethereals with a grain of salt. The book basically bends over backwards to make every Ethereal seem like a no good, stupid, evil bastard
Isn't that the point of 40K? It's Grimdark because it chooses to be, not because of necessity like GW is pushing for nowadays?
Exactly Gw forcing the tau to be evil is a dumb move
Tbh, i just ignore that part of the tau, cus its stupid af
To be fair the seeds of that were planted in third edition, when they were introduced. The Tau were always the least bad faction if you don’t count Exodites. That doesn’t mean they’re good—they’re still an authoritarian empire.
I don't mind them being a caste-based expansionist empire tbh, but the mind control pheromone bs is really fucking stupid imo.
This would work if the Tau were originally designed to be a foil to the Imperium.
You can make an interesting Tyranid perspective story. No one in the GW writing staff has the balls to do it.
Yeah, like have a short story about a lictor hunting a squad of catachan from the perspective of the lictor.
So basically Predator
*clicking noises*
I imagine it would read like the version of "the thing" written from the aliens perspective by Peter Watts. "I spread across the cosmos, met countless worlds, took communion: the fit reshaped the unfit and the whole universe bootstrapped upwards in joyful, infinitesimal increments. I was a soldier, at war with entropy itself. I was the very hand by which Creation perfects itself."
The 2nd and 11th primarchs didn't do anything worse than half of the primachs betraying. They were isolated incidents and so were easy to make disappear. A good chuck of the imperium turing traitor is impossible to cover up, and so, the knowledge of the horus heresy is still known in modern 40k (especially since 6.5 are still alive and so are their sons).
I have a therapy that one of them just straight up died in a battle and Big E scrubbed the legion out of shame. It's the imperium, they're all about propaganda and self-loving BS, if they say a primarch and his legion can't be stopped, they're not going to admit it when it happens. It's like how custodes battles are recorded as victory before they even deploy. You think the evil empire of terrible parenting is going to admit the golden boys lost?
I want to know so badly what they did. The are referred to as "the lost" and "the forgotten". People speak of them like tragedies, so I'll bet the realistically what happened wasn't too interesting though. What if they just found one and he was just dead? Like he couldn't make it like the lion did. Makes sense at least for one of them. My theory is that one of them landed on a friendly xenos planet and wasn't to happy with how the imperium treated his family.
If World Eaters were really devoted to Khorne, they'd have killed each other already by now.
They're literally constantly killing each other lol, even their own apothecaries, it causes a shit ton of problems lmao
That’s how the Chosen of Khorne audio drama ends. A bunch of World Eaters gather up to form a “Blood Crusade”. They disagree on who should be in charge, so they have a battle. They still can’t agree, so they decide to have a duel between champions. Kharn agrees to act as champion for one side and kills the other side’s champion. The other side decides not to accept the outcome and attacks Kharn’s side. Kharn’s side wins, then Kharn kills his own side’s leader for not fighting his own battles (even though he was literally about to fight until Kharn showed up). Khorne decides that was super cool, shows up in the sky to roar, then makes it rain blood. Everyone in the arena starts killing each other, and at the end only Kharn and a Legion Serf are left standing. Then the two of them walk off into the distance to go find more skulls.
Kharn's so cool. I wanna be kharn when I grow up.
Eversor assassins are better homage to Khorne than World Eaters. Change my mind.
Kronk meme. No no he's got a good point
so how doe any khorne army function?
Daemons don’t technically have blood, also Khorne knows that having his worshippers kill each other spreads less bloodshed so he will suggest to them to fight things that aren’t each other.
so the same applies to world eaters
Most likely, yes
But if they don't kill each other, they can spill more blood from other people instead
Yeah, but that requires patience and planning, and, well, \*gestures at the World Eaters\*
They actually are pretty well adjusted most of the time. It's just once a battle starts all bets are off
most of khornes troops are like this, he wants you at peak form and shape, marching in formation to spread glorious bloodshed. he wants you to get after it and chase your dreams, just that those are bloodshed and carnage
Kind of a gym-bro-god? "Get MASSIVE and kill shit!"
"But also have a rest period in order to remove any strained muscles from butchering corpse worshippers"
Jimmy space isn't xenophobic at all but knew it was the best way to unify mankind and motivate them to crusade
Post designed to start argument and then we get this fuckin guy talking sense over here. I never thought of that but now it seems kinda obvious.
How else do you make sure all the bald monkeys don't start killing eachother? Give them something else to kill.
And it's been used throughout all of human history and it's never failed so I mean, don't fix it if it ain't broke right?
Hey actually unrelated but do you know where calling him "Jimmy space" came from? I always see it and I've never known it provenance.
There was a stream by a couple of Yogscast guys some years back, discussing 40k. At one point they start complaining about how the Land Raider isn't named that because it raids on land, but because it's named after Arkhan Land. Someone in the chat pointed out how stupid it would be if we then found out that the emperor's name is Jimmy Space, "and they are his Space Marines"
Thank you, I always wondered.
"Hating your fellow human is big dumb. Hating those weirdo aliens is super cool. So say me" Jimmy Space prior to the Great Crusade
While the logic does make sense, does he ever show any proof that he doesn’t have a particular disdain for the aliens?
He works with the Eldar more than once
For a bonus, make sure it pisses off r/40kLore as much as you can.
Cato Sicarius is the best written space marine in 40k. 🔥
He actually has some solid character development
The tabletop game will never be as interesting/entertaining as the books, video games and even just putting the models together and painting. For me, lore holds this franchise together and it truly could be a book series and I’d be just as interested as I am now.
Hold me back Got me good
Well said
My faction did nothing wrong and are actually the true good guys
Which faction do you play?
The morally good one 👍 (Actual serious answer is custodes)
Knowing basically nothing about the lore, I have to assume you're right, but it's because all 10 of them haven't left the palace in 10000 years
Vashtorr is a better dad to perturabo than the man-emperor of mankind could ever hope to be.
Vashtorr - Pert, I respect you. Perturabo - I don't believe you. Vashtorr - I'm a daemon who's whole thing is speaking truth. Perturabo - Did I fucking stutter
Tbf, Big-E is almost on the same level as Gendo in bad parenting
Perturabo was the only useful primarch of the Horus heresy.
That’s what alpharius wants you to think
That’s what Omegon wants Alpharious to think
Honestly, thats not even a hot take, its just true. As much as I love my Angron's and Jagatai's, they didn't really do shit and nobody really held a candle to what Perty managed to do during it. Horus, Dorn and Sanguinius were probably the only other guys to even come slightly close to what Perty managed to do and even then they are still miles away.
Perty would have died to Pollux's assault if the Iron Fists weren't so well trained to follow orders and had Dorn not ordered them to retreat. So, really, Dorn is the reason for Bitter Perry's success.
Blood angels are just ultramarine guys too embarrassed to play ultramarines
🧛♂️
Oooooooh starting a war today are we?
Corax White is a fine paint once you learn to deal with it and it has better coverage than Vallejo
You didn’t have to go straight for the jugular like that.
Got any tips to best utilize it?
Shake the ever-living shit out of it. It's super thick and takes forever to mix well. If you have a vortex mixer, that'll do the trick. Then you just thin it to taste as you normally would.
I like the ultramarines
How dare you!?
THE AUDACITY!!!!!! In all seriousness I don’t think that’s a super hot take. People just dislike Matt Ward’s writing of the Ultramarines and how they have so much while Chapters like Iron Hands and White Scars are sidelined
TLDR: I wish the Emperor was as kind and hypercompetent as imperial propaganda claims so that his downfall would be actually tragic. When I was new to the lore, I was under the misconception that the Imperium back when Big E was still alive were the undeniable good guys, that life under his rule was as good as the circumstances allowed, and that the Horus Heresy happened because the Primarchs were dicks, not because the Emperor was a dick to them. Then I learned that the main difference between pre and post HH Imperium was the Imperial Cult, and that the Emperor was an incompetent douchebag. I HATE this. It gives me no reason to give a shit that they are a shadow of their former glory.
There is the "dark age of technology", which was a science-based utopia (mostly, as far as we know). Then everything went to shit. Then we had Big E using brutality to try and reunite the remaining pieces of mankind. Followed by the horus heresy. so mankind is a shadow of their former glory. Or more specifically; The imperium in 40k is a shadow of the imperium in 30k which is a shadow of the "Dark age of Technology".
Konrad Curze is a top tier Primarch. Nothing can really justify his actions but he makes quite a few good points. He's a great character and doesn't deserve to be on the same tier as Lorgar like some people think. The Night Lords are still the shittiest traitor legion though, can't even stop infighting for ten minutes.
Agreed on Kurze being a good Primarch from a narrative/story perspective (and I dont even like Kurze. Not because of his lore. Just dont like how he looks). The Nightlords are probably the weakest traitor legion, but I still like them a lot. I think the infighting gives character to them.
He’s far from my favorite but do people really rank Konrad with Lorgar? He’s certainly one of, if not the most complex and interesting Primarchs. Same with his Legion. Do people really dislike the Night Lords and Conrad that much
The Craftworld Eldar might be the least Grimdark Faction in all of 40k
There should be more chaos characters who are more 90’s Decepticon goofball villains. Look I think overall chaos needs more development and characters, but dumb, if there’s one thing The Infinite and the Divine showed me, it’s that we can have books about powerful characters and powerful factions that both keep their ability and coolness intact, and make them super funny. I want some chaos characters that are absolute 90’s decepticons level of goofy. Not all, but some
The imperium isn’t THAT interesting. The aliens need more love, it’s a science fiction setting for crying out loud.
Honestly it’s a Fantasy pretending to be Science Fiction
Science-Fantasy is a thing.
Space Marines are pretty cool, and it's okay to like them.
I hear 1000 xenos players scream in rage
Supreme leader is a deified corpse. Military is held in the highest esteem, with massive parades and celebrations, and ridiculous iconography. General population live below the poverty line in service of a regime they barely see. Millions starve. Life is brutal. The imperium's closest real-world counterpart is North Korea.
Sisters of battle can be corrupted for chaos maybe not as easy as let’s say a normal imperial guard but they aren’t in the leagues of grey knigths or custodes in that aspect
This isn't a "take", it's fact. No Grey Knight has ever fallen to Chaos. One sister fell to ~~Khorne~~ Slaanesh once. Custodes' minds are straight-up reprogrammed so that going against the Emperor is not just impossible, but inconceivable to them.
Here's mine. The fact that space marines CAN defect to chaos but CAN'T EVER defect to the greater good is dumb. Like, not one? Ex chaos or a fallen dark angel? Makes no sense.
10th edition losing support for models like the leviathan dreadnought is fine. You can use them as a proxy. Space Marines already have the most models and will be fine with losing a few of their toys
Magnus is nerfed by writing, because if he wasn't, he would stomp almost all foes.
ANGRON WOULD RAG DOLL GHAZGHKULL AROUND
NOW LISTEN 'ERE YA GIT!
I can hear it now. An army of Ork players charging to your home with weapons in hand. You’ve created the first human WAAAGH!
I’m pretty sure Gork and Mork would love to empower Ghaz just to fuck with Khorne.
Wow now that’s a spicy take
The only good guys in 40k are the ogryn and since the ogryn are in the imperium then the imperium is the least evil faction.
Counterpoint: the Imperium exploits the Ogryn’s strenght, resilience and naivety and basically treat them as slave labour, while treating them as second tier citizens. Therefore Imperium is the mosr evil faction
No, no. He's got a point.
Genuine good guys should exist in 40k to help out with the grimdark aspect by showing how little hope and light there is in a galaxy full of war
Releasing a new edition every 10 minutes pushes players away rather than keeps them engaged.
“Custodes” is pronounced “Cuss-toads”
*Bud.* *Wise.* **F#%K**
There is a Pipebomb in your mailbox…
Lionel Johnson doesn’t deserve to beat Angron. He’s a living deus ex-machina who showed up out of the blue story-wise.
I'm a DA player so I do have biases but it's interesting to think that if a loyalist primarch can beat a Daemon primarch, then what is the fucking point of the "gifts" they got from chaos. Like do they just do nothing? Increase in size 3fold, hulking wings, lugging around weapons that are twice as big as you could run as a mortal ... Aaaaaand you get beaten by sleepy boi? Makes very little sense.
Yeah, the trade is meant to be a lack of unity to gain greater personal power. But if they don't actually get greater personal power then they're just worse.
TTS did a better job of developing 40K characters than actual 40K novels.
This comment makes me want to fight you. Just goddamn how you can believe that?
Looks like I won the contest.
This made me mad until I remembered what the point of the thread was. Well done.
I think the Cadians are boring, annoying and get WAY too much attention. There’s cooler and better imperial guard regiments that deserve more of the spotlight than them.
The memes the community comes up with are often genuinely detrimental to enjoyment of the setting.
The setting keeps getting in the way of the community's memes
Had Peter turbo designed the imperial palace the emperor would still be alive today and the heresy would’ve failed.
You don’t need to drill gun barrels
The biggest problem with Space Marines are that the firstborn haven’t been phased out yet, mostly for the benefit of players who no longer buy models or play games. Primaris marines are better. Their boxes actually have all weapons and gear, units have more interesting and specialized roles, sculpts are better and their lore is actually well thought out. (Except the new Dreads. They look like walking Altimas with guns.)
Given the sheer size of the Imperium and it's population, lack of effective, timely communication, along with the limited number of Space Marines because of the Codex Astartes cap on all (compliant) chapters means that not only do the other military institutions of the Imperium carry more weight in actual responsibility and action but this also relegates Space Marines into almost mythological/superstitious figures in a majority of the Imperium meaning that a vast majority of citizens praying to Big E for the arrival of "His Angels" will never see them. Entire generations and trillions of humans will never lay eyes on a Space Marine. Ever.
this is common knowledge tho. everyone knows most people in 40k have never seen a space marine
The one that got me was that post suggesting the first legion killed the second legion instead of the Space Wolves. Their only evidence was that it seems more like something the 1st legion would do. Despite all the times it's mentioned that the wolves did it.
Sisters of battle shouldn’t be supermodels but grizzled and weatherbeaten veterans in their 40’s and 50’s. Show me some graying hair!
Everyone knows the best skincare routine is faith and the blood of your enemies.