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Cooked Auto posted:They also came out during that era where GW thought it was a great idea to ramp up the grimdark in the setting to absurd levels. but in a stupid and bad way that made it clear they forgot the grimdark worked because of the satirical edge
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Oct 18, 2022 19:52
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Everything I heard about War of the Beast is a lot of horrible stuff with no satirical point yeah. Like you could say they turned the ork homeworld into what Terra would become or was? with the stuff I saw posted about how they factory farm squigs and or grots with a high lords type thing going even. But didn't seem like that was waht they were going for even.
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Oct 18, 2022 23:36
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A suggestion I read on the wiki was that Ullanor was the homeworld for the Orks as a species, so the Korks (that they evolved from) were drawn to it creating the War of the Beast. Which is also why Armageddon constantly has Orks bearing down on it in "modern times".
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Oct 18, 2022 23:40
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any good tau books?
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Oct 19, 2022 02:12
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Improbable Lobster posted:but in a stupid and bad way that made it clear they forgot the grimdark worked because of the satirical edge The attitude was prevalent in almost all of the 40k writing back then, not just that series. I still find the writing in the Scion codex to be eye rollingly bad. https://www.warhammer-community.com/2022/10/19/an-unlikely-hero-comes-to-the-mortal-realms-in-godeaters-son/ This week's BL announce it Godeater’s Son by Noah Van Nguyen. A book that promises to offer a look on the other side, on those who doesn't fully appreciate Sigmar and the Stormcast coming into their life.
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Oct 19, 2022 14:16
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Are there any good Dark Angels books?
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Oct 19, 2022 15:03
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Cooked Auto posted:I still find the writing in the Scion codex to be eye rollingly bad.
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Oct 19, 2022 15:11
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The best bit of the Scion codex is the entry on the 55th Alphic Hydras.
Gravitas Shortfall fucked around with this message at 15:39 on Oct 19, 2022 |
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Oct 19, 2022 15:36
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Okay, I've got a wild theory here about these alphic hydra guys with a three headed emblem
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Oct 19, 2022 15:48
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My source came through again and I got Void King early, almost finished and it is very good. Marc Collins is a great new author and the rogue trader stuff is very interesting. There are actually 4 different rogue trader dynasties involved and they are all part of a compact with one of the dynasty's head the king over all 4 houses. It's an interesting political setup and one I hadn't heard before with rogue traders.
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Oct 19, 2022 15:57
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Cooked Auto posted:The attitude was prevalent in almost all of the 40k writing back then, not just that series. I still find the writing in the Scion codex to be eye rollingly bad. This book looks very interesting to me. We don't get too many Chaos staring books on the Mortal Realms side.
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Oct 19, 2022 17:52
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Siivola posted:Any choice bits or is it all just "woo sturmtruppen"? I take an equally dim view of that book. From what I remember, they described almost all the training and selection as lethal. This really irked the pedant in me. I am more of a fan of Abnett's imperial guard type stuff, which is steeped in 40k's grimdark setting atmosphere but also owes something to fictionalised real world military stuff. Now in the real world, all training is on a spectrum from 'train through', ie you want to get as many of the starting trainees as possible through the program, and 'select out', where you purposely have summative tests where any failure of the standard, or indicating that you don't want to be there, gets you off the course. The 8th ed Militarum Tempestus is the latter approach dialled up to a truly stupid degree. I know all 40k at any time is supposed to be ridiculous, and the fact it wouldn't really work could/should be taken as a commentary on the toxicity of the Imperium. But the stormtrooper (sorry, Tempestus Scion) training at the Schola Progenium described in the book just wouldn't produce any trained soldiers. The trainees get killed en masse. The 2 approaches I mention above do correlate with how 'elite' the trained product is, but even more than that, they're dictated by how big the recruitment pool is. The recruitment pool for the Schola Progenium is explicitly orphans of imperial servants. So regardless of how big the Imperium is, its scale is strictly limited relative to the overall military machine. It doesn't make any sense for them to be this selective. Like the space marine selection stuff mentioned in many other silly books, they're slaughtering potentially very good soldiers at a high rate, often in tests that aren't controlled at all, so it's not like the better trainees are necessarily the ones that survive. The one that sticks in my head is that for the commissars or scions, I forget, one of the final tests, to check their resolve or some bullshit, is to execute another student. At this rate that's one of a very small surviving percentage of passed trainees. Boom, that's it, killed them to prove a point to one of the others. I mean this could all be taken as satire, but the general tone seemed 100% serious and full of fawning over how incredibly hard the fully trained scions are. Classic spartan-myth-worshipping bollocks. "We'll make all of them crawl miles through broken glass, presumably some of them will survive and naturally they will be superb soldiers!" "No, I have a better idea. Let's rigorously train a load of hand-picked child soldiers from exclusively indoctrinated backgrounds, literally for years. Then we'll do your thing, ensuring only a small percentage will actually give any return of service" "Wonderful idea lord-general"
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Oct 19, 2022 18:28
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Benagain posted:Okay, I've got a wild theory here about these alphic hydra guys with a three headed emblem I like that either A. The Ultramarine are putzes and will get got at some point in the future, or B. They know its a trap and are keeping them close to see exactly how its a trap and turn it right around on the Alpha Legion. Oh and also C. A forgotten loyalist project of an Alpha legionnaire long dead would also be amusing, especially combined with B. All three options make me laugh.
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Oct 19, 2022 18:41
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Maybe D the alpha legion set it up as an obvious trap but made them super good soldiers that were perfectly loyal so theyd waste resources watching them
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Oct 19, 2022 18:49
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Reading that I thought it would be amusing if it was E - it's a big galaxy and there's bound to be coincidental naming at some point, with that regiment having zero connection at all to the Alpha Legion. But E & B combined would actually be the funniest. The Ultramarines fully suspect that this is an Alpha Legion plot, keep taking "recruits" from the regiment for interrogation to prove their suspicions, and have multiple contingency plans at all times for when the Alphic Hyrdras show their true colors. Meanwhile, it turns out that these dudes are just very good, loyal soldiers of the Imperium who are proud of their affiliation with a legendary Space Marine chapter and all dream of excelling enough to be recruited themselves.
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Oct 19, 2022 18:51
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Genghis Cohen posted:I mean this could all be taken as satire, but the general tone seemed 100% serious and full of fawning over how incredibly hard the fully trained scions are. Classic spartan-myth-worshipping bollocks.  Anyway on a positive note I finally read Dan Abnett's Xenos. It was okay. Now I'm trying to decide if I want to get a cheap Audible sub, and if I do, do I want to spend the first credit on the second Vaults of Terra book or the second Eisenhorn. Both Wraight and Abnett "get it", and they write in the same techno thriller inquisitor sub-genre. I think Wraight's novel was more polished overall and I loved how massively gothic it all was, but Abnett's universe is so much weirder that I'm kind of curious to see where it all goes.
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Oct 19, 2022 19:11
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Siivola posted:Aw. That part about the trainees having to shoot one another is such a tired old trope that I'm surprised they went for it. Yeah sure the regime is so bad its jackbooted cronies are also victims. Xenos was basically one of the very first novels, which is probably why it's unpolished (memory serves, Xenos was the first use of the phrase "Dataslate").
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Oct 19, 2022 19:25
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Reminder that the new Angels of Death came out today on Warhammer TV. It's a pre-quel about how the ships captain became the ships captain. The animation is better quality then the first season and its 25 minutes long! Very good.
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Oct 19, 2022 19:53
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OPAONI posted:I like that either A. The Ultramarine are putzes and will get got at some point in the future, or B. They know its a trap and are keeping them close to see exactly how its a trap and turn it right around on the Alpha Legion. Or option F - Those aren't really Ultramarines... 
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Oct 19, 2022 20:14
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D-Pad posted:Reminder that the new Angels of Death came out today on Warhammer TV. It's a pre-quel about how the ships captain became the ships captain. The animation is better quality then the first season and its 25 minutes long! Very good. I've gotta say after finishing this it is by far the best thing Warhammer TV has put out. Exceptional. If we can get this quality going forward it would make the sub worth it at 3x the price.
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Oct 19, 2022 20:15
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I really liked angels of death despite it looking like a dawn of war mod at times, reminded me of an old BBC production.
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Oct 19, 2022 20:51
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Genghis Cohen posted:I mean this could all be taken as satire, but the general tone seemed 100% serious and full of fawning over how incredibly hard the fully trained scions are. Classic spartan-myth-worshipping bollocks.
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Oct 20, 2022 00:38
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Arquinsiel posted:I think it's broadly intended to be in-universe spartan-myth bullshit propaganda to convice the masses. Cain went through the Scholam and mentions the most dangerous thing there being caught trying to look into the Soritas showers or similar Animal House-esque poo poo. I would dearly love a 40K version of Porky’s. Like the fat redhead psyker kid is levitating himself to hide in the rafters of the sororitas dorm but just as they’re about to undress the blank kid walks past and he falls down in the middle of them. Edit: Fast Times at the Schola Progenium. DAD LOST MY IPOD fucked around with this message at 01:19 on Oct 20, 2022 |
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Oct 20, 2022 01:12
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Arquinsiel posted:I think it's broadly intended to be in-universe spartan-myth bullshit propaganda to convice the masses. Cain went through the Scholam and mentions the most dangerous thing there being caught trying to look into the Soritas showers or similar Animal House-esque poo poo. one of the reasons i like the cain books is it shows kinda of "lighter" and i guess more um "liberal" side of the imperium. like poo poo still bad and etc but its clear that like human nature just mundaity exists. like its not just "and then the drill abbot beat timmys brains in and made him servitor and only one kid graduated". Genghis Cohen posted:I take an equally dim view of that book. From what I remember, they described almost all the training and selection as lethal. This really irked the pedant in me. I am more of a fan of Abnett's imperial guard type stuff, which is steeped in 40k's grimdark setting atmosphere but also owes something to fictionalised real world military stuff. Now in the real world, all training is on a spectrum from 'train through', ie you want to get as many of the starting trainees as possible through the program, and 'select out', where you purposely have summative tests where any failure of the standard, or indicating that you don't want to be there, gets you off the course. The 8th ed Militarum Tempestus is the latter approach dialled up to a truly stupid degree. I know all 40k at any time is supposed to be ridiculous, and the fact it wouldn't really work could/should be taken as a commentary on the toxicity of the Imperium. agreed. id prefer it if it was a dark parody of spec ops culture/training mixed with them actually being genuinly good at their jobs in realistic ways.
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Oct 20, 2022 01:22
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Dapper_Swindler posted:agreed. id prefer it if it was a dark parody of spec ops culture/training mixed with them actually being genuinly good at their jobs in realistic ways.
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Oct 20, 2022 01:50
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Benagain posted:Okay, I've got a wild theory here about these alphic hydra guys with a three headed emblem Iron Warriors?
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Oct 20, 2022 02:28
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Dapper_Swindler posted:one of the reasons i like the cain books is it shows kinda of "lighter" and i guess more um "liberal" side of the imperium. like poo poo still bad and etc but its clear that like human nature just mundaity exists. like its not just "and then the drill abbot beat timmys brains in and made him servitor and only one kid graduated".
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Oct 20, 2022 03:30
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I'd really like to read a chaos marine book from the POV of a recently-made legionaire. We already have tons of veterans of the Heresy on the spotlight, so I think a take from someone elevated from ship holds or raided imperium worlds or even heretic warrior clans, and thrown into an eternal war, would be fun.
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Oct 20, 2022 03:39
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Sephyr posted:I'd really like to read a chaos marine book from the POV of a recently-made legionaire. We already have tons of veterans of the Heresy on the spotlight, so I think a take from someone elevated from ship holds or raided imperium worlds or even heretic warrior clans, and thrown into an eternal war, would be fun. I believe there is at least one short story in the HH series that follows a freshly made legionnaire that was rushed through the process to build up the traitor forces before the siege of terra but I can't think of the name.
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Oct 20, 2022 06:03
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The solar war briefly follows a group of them as they die in droves.
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Oct 20, 2022 06:17
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Arquinsiel posted:I think it's broadly intended to be in-universe spartan-myth bullshit propaganda to convice the masses. Cain went through the Scholam and mentions the most dangerous thing there being caught trying to look into the Soritas showers or similar Animal House-esque poo poo. He does off-handedly mention that Schola Progenium uses convicted serious criminals for target practice, but doesn't dwell on it and apparently considers it business as usual. In the same book where he chuckles at Sororitas trainees using their power armor for the first time to attempt to impress the commissar trainees they fancy. In short, Ciaphas Cain is a land of contrasts
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Oct 20, 2022 07:27
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Dapper_Swindler posted:one of the reasons i like the cain books is it shows kinda of "lighter" and i guess more um "liberal" side of the imperium. like poo poo still bad and etc but its clear that like human nature just mundaity exists. like its not just "and then the drill abbot beat timmys brains in and made him servitor and only one kid graduated". Make the training genuinely lethal if you do it as intended, but the real goal is to encourage a kind of deviousness that circumvents lethal peril. The stupid or unimaginative get mulched or turned into servitors while the smart go on to be scions or commissars or whatever.
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Oct 20, 2022 08:34
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Has anyone else read the Ferrus Manus Primarch novel, and is he meant to come off as a big mardy baby or did I miss the point? Some dude made a tactical blunder so Ferrus forces him into another one, deliberately, to prove a point of some kind. Fair enough he was cross with the ultramarine, is that rectified by sending him and his men to pointless deaths to “regain their honour”? Guy needs his head cutting off if you ask me. Glad someone made fun of his stupid name/hands.
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Oct 20, 2022 09:05
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Sanford posted:Has anyone else read the Ferrus Manus Primarch novel, and is he meant to come off as a big mardy baby or did I miss the point? Some dude made a tactical blunder so Ferrus forces him into another one, deliberately, to prove a point of some kind. Fair enough he was cross with the ultramarine, is that rectified by sending him and his men to pointless deaths to “regain their honour”? Guy needs his head cutting off if you ask me. Glad someone made fun of his stupid name/hands. Yes, Ferrus is portrayed as a douchebag, not sure if it was intended or it's just plain old bad writing.
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Oct 20, 2022 10:10
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Genghis Cohen posted:
This is one of the things that the Dante got right. Sure, the initial sift was an insane trial that got kids killed, but at least it had multiple ways for aspirants to qualify (even though the preferred method was to loving fly to the recruitment temple is a makeshift glider over a valley of certain death ). But once they were in the process of trying out for the Blood Angels - one of the most esteemed, violent legions to exist - they would allow aspirants to leave with respect of knowing that they had already achieved more than most. Even at the point where some aspirants were rejected at the final hurdle, they were recognised as superlative recruits and would be found critical roles within the legion that had high honour and were recognised. Then again... when you live on a death world, the planet does most of the initial sorting for you.
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Oct 20, 2022 10:39
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The Space Marine recruitment process kills a lot of applicants just because it involves a massive amount of surgery and genetic manipulation that doesn't always take. Washouts that just fail the trials become chapter serfs AFAIK, who can act as pilots, drivers, and/or militia.
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Oct 20, 2022 10:53
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Calax posted:So, a bit ago I read Honorbound by Rachael Harrison (A Commissar novel). And it plays everything entirely straight. She goes to the Schola and her sister gripes at her because she got into an unsanctioned fight. Legit had trouble getting into the story because the main character didn't feel like a human. There was never any hijinks, just DUTY. That’s when to me 40k is at its most meh. When it play’s everything completely straight, not even in like a glorification way but just like trying to make it 40k post Clancy Clancy airport fiction. There is no humor or even really weird hosed up stuff good or bad, just straight boring. Fearless posted:Make the training genuinely lethal if you do it as intended, but the real goal is to encourage a kind of deviousness that circumvents lethal peril. The stupid or unimaginative get mulched or turned into servitors while the smart go on to be scions or commissars or whatever. Exactly. Warden posted:He does off-handedly mention that Schola Progenium uses convicted serious criminals for target practice, but doesn't dwell on it and apparently considers it business as usual. In the same book where he chuckles at Sororitas trainees using their power armor for the first time to attempt to impress the commissar trainees they fancy.
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Oct 20, 2022 12:33
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once again abnett's version is way better. schola progenium is just an especially bleak mid-20th-century british public school. there's no way blenner came out the hardass murder-your-friend version, it is not possible.
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Oct 20, 2022 12:48
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Dapper_Swindler posted:That’s when to me 40k is at its most meh. When it play’s everything completely straight, not even in like a glorification way but just like trying to make it 40k post Clancy Clancy airport fiction. There is no humor or even really weird hosed up stuff good or bad, just straight boring. It's a tricky balance, to be sure. You can't really have the unique flavor of the setting with the whole "whole populations lost due to rounding errors in the Administratum, pilgrims flocking to Terra just to die in the Throneworld, comissars and Inquisitors with total power enforcing 'Blessed is the Mind too small for Doubt', innocents condemned because innocence is also heresy" and the go oh wait, that's just the Imperium's back road, Main Street is actually cool, smart open-minded people having a laugh! Those hicks sure give us a bad name, haha.
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Oct 20, 2022 13:22
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I think 40k works best as a large scale fascist type state. Decent worlds and organisations exist but should only serve to set up what happens when those run against the horror of the wider system (mass executions and enslavement due to bureaucratic error). Playing it straight up, Sparta glorification is not only dull but just raises questions about how the gently caress this system is sustainable. Putting in seemingly sensible and functioning worlds works makes it believable that this system survives and showing what happens when the fanaticism or hierarchy tube against it shows why it's crumbling and unsustainable. 40k is the tale of a fascist Ubermensch sizing total control of humanity in a universe where there actually are outside and inside forces aimed at the downfall and destruction of the Volk. And how it it's still a complete disaster and a horrific existence that simple obliteration it's probably the best case scenario.
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Oct 20, 2022 14:38
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