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Deofuta posted:There is a bit of back and forth in those books though, with some of the other Night Lords saying Curze was much more in line with corruption than Talos ever lets on. Makes it more fun to discuss certainly. Yeah the whole chapel made of people in endless agony is kind of a giveaway that beneath all his honor and justice crap hes just a psycho that (for a while) had an outlet for his sadism in the name of order.
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Apr 1, 2014 17:32
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Angry Lobster posted:Agreed, but I think it's a side efect of being portrayed by several different writters of varied quality rather than an intended one. Really liked how Talos though about Curze and how the other members of the Legion viewed him (with amusement) as a rather idealistic fellow in a group of cynics and pragmatics. Zso also had a similar opinion if I recall correctly from Lord of the Night. Which is interesting considering that, as 1st company captain, he probably had some of the most time spent with Curze. Which means that if Curze is indeed more monstrous than he or Talos let on, it's because they willingly pull the wool over their own eyes.
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Apr 1, 2014 17:44
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Gravitas Shortfall posted:I think Angron-sans-nails would be more like another Russ - an honorable, post-human technobarbarian. He'd probably more of a liberator than a general or a statesman, what with his obvious Spartacus parallels. Meaning even undamaged he'd likely have trouble fitting in, as he'd object to the Imperium's use of slaves, its rigid hierarchy and so on. It's amusing to consider that he'd probably have rebelled -faster- (and for nobler purposes) had he not been implanted with his psycho-cyberware.
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Apr 1, 2014 18:22
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Sephyr posted:he'd probably have rebelled -faster- (and for nobler purposes) had he not been implanted with his psycho-cyberware. The real reason why the Emprah didn't remove it. 
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Apr 1, 2014 18:29
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I would actually buy that. It is now my headcanon answer for "Why did the Emperor gently caress Angron so soundly?"
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Apr 1, 2014 18:32
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Mr.48 posted:Yeah the whole chapel made of people in endless agony is kind of a giveaway that beneath all his honor and justice crap hes just a psycho that (for a while) had an outlet for his sadism in the name of order. It's implied that he may have some sort of split personality, one good and one crazy. Basically he's Batman and the Joker in a single person and it's hard to say which one was named Night Haunter and which one was Curze. Sephyr posted:He'd probably more of a liberator than a general or a statesman, what with his obvious Spartacus parallels. Meaning even undamaged he'd likely have trouble fitting in, as he'd object to the Imperium's use of slaves, its rigid hierarchy and so on. It's amusing to consider that he'd probably have rebelled -faster- (and for nobler purposes) had he not been implanted with his psycho-cyberware. Except neither of those are necessarily part of the original visoin held by the Emperor for th eimperium. If anything there doesn't seem to be much rigid heriarchy at all outside the military.
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Apr 1, 2014 18:32
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Waroduce posted:I think the Night Lords did a pretty good job portraying Curze as a bitter, fallen hero. Grew up around crime, became the justice he so sought, purchased order through fear, and than went to work on behalf of his father to bring order to the Imperium and Crusade. Worlds would fall compliant if only a rumor of the Night Lords presence was breathed, and than daddy decided he went too far and the rest is history. I also like how Curze is portrayed as untrusting of the ruinous powers, that the Night Lords should try to resist their temptations, although many don't, and that there is no traitors loyalty in the long war. Sevatar calls him out on being a total loving lunatic in denial of his own lunacy in "Prince of Crows." It's great.
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Apr 1, 2014 18:45
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VanSandman posted:Sevatar calls him out on being a total loving lunatic in denial of his own lunacy in "Prince of Crows." It's great. And he was probably right, considering he spent time in Kurze's mind and all. Seriously, the Night Lords were a train wreck of a legion and I wonder how they managed to operate as a cohesive unit, they seem fantastic as riders and pirates though.
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Apr 1, 2014 19:06
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Sephyr posted:He'd probably more of a liberator than a general or a statesman, what with his obvious Spartacus parallels. Meaning even undamaged he'd likely have trouble fitting in, as he'd object to the Imperium's use of slaves, its rigid hierarchy and so on. It's amusing to consider that he'd probably have rebelled -faster- (and for nobler purposes) had he not been implanted with his psycho-cyberware. That's my interpretation, too. What's great is that you see how alike the Khan is in Scars - Jaghatai is all about kicking tyrants in the teeth and then running away before the newly liberated masses demand he govern them, and he wonders if the Emprah is the ultimate tyrant. And then there's uncorrupted Horus, who was already drifting away from the Emprah's vision when he got Erebus'd. Civil war was inevitable, and it's not difficult to see that the lines would have been different had Chaos not gotten involved. Deofuta posted:Zso also had a similar opinion if I recall correctly from Lord of the Night. Which is interesting considering that, as 1st company captain, he probably had some of the most time spent with Curze. Which means that if Curze is indeed more monstrous than he or Talos let on, it's because they willingly pull the wool over their own eyes. Would you be eager to admit that your dad is a crazy murdering psychopath? Pulling the wool over their own eyes is one of the most believable aspects of the Night Lords. VanSandman fucked around with this message at 19:18 on Apr 1, 2014 |
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Apr 1, 2014 19:09
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Ugh double post.
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Apr 1, 2014 19:17
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VanSandman posted:Would you be eager to admit that your dad is a crazy murdering psychopath? Pulling the wool over their own eyes is one of the most believable aspects of the Night Lords.
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Apr 1, 2014 20:16
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What book is Prince of Crows from? I haven't found it in any anthology yet. I really don't envy whomever has to end up untangling the knot that is the Emperor's behavior in a book. The list of weird, bungled or hypocritical decisions that have to be justified and/or explained is so long. -No pskerism in my empire! Except for me. And Malcador. And Magnus. And astropaths and navigators. And all the Grey Knights stashed in Titan. -This Imperium will be a realm of reason, human achievement, science and enterprise! And we welcome slavers, tyrants and planets wallowing in barbarism as long as they accept I'm the boss, crack down on mutants and psykers, and pay the proper tithes! -See Angron, unleashing your legion to help you back home would have been wrong because of reasons. Bringing all of them along to be your honor guard is also a big no-no. Now take this sector-reaving armada here and play nice! I left you some homeopathy in the cabinet in case the Nails hurt too bad. -My boy Kurze! Love what you've done with the place. It's so Tim Burton, with a bit of...what is the name of that Hostel director? Anyway, you're obviously a person of extremes, as any psyker much, much weaker than myself could readily notice, so you're just he person I need to keep things nice and stable in this rising empire. Don't do anything I wouldn't, unless I totally would! *wink* -Here's the thing, Horus. You're my top dawg, so I'm leaving the whole mess to you and taking a sabbatical. No, don't ask me why, I want you to wonder. Oh, and I'm springing this whole deal of being subservient to the High Lords and having to collect tithes from newly-conquered worlds on you, because who better to deal with such clerical work than an ambitious warlord newly into the job? It's not like it makes your work Sisyphean or anything!
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Apr 1, 2014 22:37
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Sephyr posted:What book is Prince of Crows from? I haven't found it in any anthology yet. Shadows of Treachery
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Apr 1, 2014 22:45
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Sephyr posted:What book is Prince of Crows from? I haven't found it in any anthology yet. Except nikea was explicitly only about the Space Marine Librarius, which apparently may have been developed semi-independently by the primarchs but without the direct supervision of the Emperor. Sephyr posted:-This Imperium will be a realm of reason, human achievement, science and enterprise! And we welcome slavers, tyrants and planets wallowing in barbarism as long as they accept I'm the boss, crack down on mutants and psykers, and pay the proper tithes! I think the idea is that change will be gradual and that whenever possible each planet would be left to develop on its own instead of installing a new social order by force, in keeping with the whole 'strength through human diversity' thing. See also  (slavery compromise)Sephyr posted:-See Angron, unleashing your legion to help you back home would have been wrong because of reasons. Bringing all of them along to be your honor guard is also a big no-no. Now take this sector-reaving armada here and play nice! I left you some homeopathy in the cabinet in case the Nails hurt too bad. We actually don't know the whole story about Angron at all. Nobody really knows except Angron (crazy) and maybe the legion's top leadership (all dead, killed by Angron). Sephyr posted:-My boy Kurze! Love what you've done with the place. It's so Tim Burton, with a bit of...what is the name of that Hostel director? Anyway, you're obviously a person of extremes, as any psyker much, much weaker than myself could readily notice, so you're just he person I need to keep things nice and stable in this rising empire. Don't do anything I wouldn't, unless I totally would! *wink* Wasn't Nostromo an incredibly peaceful place after Night Haunter was done with it? It only really went to poo poo after kurze left. Sephyr posted:-Here's the thing, Horus. You're my top dawg, so I'm leaving the whole mess to you and taking a sabbatical. No, don't ask me why, I want you to wonder. Oh, and I'm springing this whole deal of being subservient to the High Lords and having to collect tithes from newly-conquered worlds on you, because who better to deal with such clerical work than an ambitious warlord newly into the job? It's not like it makes your work Sisyphean or anything! IIRC Horus was warmaster, civil matters like collecting the tithe was left to Mlacador and the fledglign administratum.
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Apr 1, 2014 22:53
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Cream_Filling posted:IIRC Horus was warmaster, civil matters like collecting the tithe was left to Mlacador and the fledglign administratum.
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Apr 1, 2014 23:30
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Cream_Filling posted:Except nikea was explicitly only about the Space Marine Librarius, which apparently may have been developed semi-independently by the primarchs but without the direct supervision of the Emperor. Doesn't make it any less hypocritical, unless viewed through the prism of wanting to keep everyone except the Emp's inner circle utterly ignorant about the warp and Chaos, which is another mistake in itself. Cream_Filling posted:I think the idea is that change will be gradual and that whenever possible each planet would be left to develop on its own instead of installing a new social order by force, in keeping with the whole 'strength through human diversity' thing. See also This is actually good point. It should have been handled better since it could (and did) create clashes with the most idealistic minds of the imperial bigshots and opened exploitable rifts. Cream_Filling posted:We actually don't know the whole story about Angron at all. Nobody really knows except Angron (crazy) and maybe the legion's top leadership (all dead, killed by Angron). Angron is a berserker but he's not crazy unless fully lost to the nails. He doesn't once lie or embellish the truth. If we're going to speculate out of whole cloth, let's say Horus won and vanquished the Emperor but was so wounded he got trapped in the Golden Throne, because really, imperial records are unreliable and they wouldn't want to admit their lord was killed. Cream_Filling posted:Wasn't Nostromo an incredibly peaceful place after Night Haunter was done with it? It only really went to poo poo after kurze left. Cream_Filling posted:IIRC Horus was warmaster, civil matters like collecting the tithe was left to Mlacador and the fledglign administratum. I chalk it all to "If the Big E knew his sons at all, there'd be no plot", but at some point the books will require a better explanation than that.
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Apr 1, 2014 23:50
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Shockeh posted:And yeah, the Daemon Primarchs spend just as much time plotting against each other, supporting their infernal masters or generally just dicking about (Fulgrim) as they do conquering the Imperium. They have literal Infinite Fun Space to play with in the Warp; Why should they care any more about the fate of the lovely little Imperium they came from? I like that, the actual material universe is like the elaborate model railway set up in the attic. An interesting hobby you can go have fun with on a wet Sunday afternoon.
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Apr 2, 2014 00:27
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Sephyr posted:Doesn't make it any less hypocritical, unless viewed through the prism of wanting to keep everyone except the Emp's inner circle utterly ignorant about the warp and Chaos, which is another mistake in itself. Sephyr posted:Angron is a berserker but he's not crazy unless fully lost to the nails. He doesn't once lie or embellish the truth. If we're going to speculate out of whole cloth, let's say Horus won and vanquished the Emperor but was so wounded he got trapped in the Golden Throne, because really, imperial records are unreliable and they wouldn't want to admit their lord was killed. Sephyr posted:Indeed, but that would mean that only permanent terror could bring peace, making Curze's madness sound and imperial complains about his methods hypocritical. I think. Sephyr posted:He still had to deal with the first stages of implanting the system and the bureaucrats. He openly resents this and says that he just got done stomping theses systems and now they'll start being taxed to hell meaning they'll revolt and he'll have to come back and stomp them again. The emperor likely could have stayed in charge a bit longer to oversee this big change and handed over a more sustainable enterprise to Horus. Or have put Gulliman in charge if what he wanted was imperial nation-building. OXBALLS DOT COM fucked around with this message at 00:57 on Apr 2, 2014 |
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Apr 2, 2014 00:54
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Sephyr posted:
Night Hauter posted:"Your presence does not surprise me, Assassin. I have known of you ever since your craft entered the Eastern Fringes. Why did I not have you killed? Because your mission and the act you are about to commit proves the truth of all I have ever said or done. I merely punished those who had wronged, just as your False Emperor now seeks to punish me. Death is nothing compared to vindication.
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Apr 2, 2014 02:21
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Curze might be a more interesting character if they did a slow build up to him becoming the Night Haunter. I like the idea that his homeworld broke him mentally and created his alternate personality of the Night Haunter. He was broke by what he had to become to bring Nostromo to order. When he tried to be Cruze in the crusade he couldn't understand his brothers and fathers way of pacification. So his other half, his dark half, kept whispering in his ear to commit atrocities in order to put entire planets into compliance through fear. The Heresy just became and excuse to silence Cruze and become solely The Night Haunter. Instead he was just flat out evil right from the get go and don't seem to show him as nothing but a monster for the lulz.
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Apr 2, 2014 07:17
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EyeRChris posted:Instead he was just flat out evil right from the get go and don't seem to show him as nothing but a monster for the lulz.
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Apr 2, 2014 13:21
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berzerkmonkey posted:But he is flat out evil from the beginning - Nostromo made him that way. He had to become a monster in order to survive. The whole Primarchs storyline is a nature vs. nurture argument. If he'd followed his nature, he would have been even more monstrous. At least, thats how I see the Emperor compared to baseline humanity - impossibly, monstrously powerful.
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Apr 2, 2014 13:42
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VanSandman posted:If he'd followed his nature, he would have been even more monstrous. At least, thats how I see the Emperor compared to baseline humanity - impossibly, monstrously powerful. You're saying he wasn't monstrous? The guy had a throneroom made from living people that were fused together... Being monstrously powerful and monstrous are two completely different things. And I wasn't referring to Kurze's nature, I was referring to allowing the environment around him to make him what he was.
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Apr 2, 2014 14:41
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berzerkmonkey posted:But he is flat out evil from the beginning - Nostromo made him that way. He had to become a monster in order to survive. The whole Primarchs storyline is a nature vs. nurture argument. VanSandman posted:If he'd followed his nature, he would have been even more monstrous. At least, thats how I see the Emperor compared to baseline humanity - impossibly, monstrously powerful. Is he really that evil at first? I mean his whole crusade on Nostromo is to wipe out crime and injustice, which implies some innate sense of morality and spark of nobility at his core. But growing up alone as a wildman, he has no greater ideal of civilization beyond the use of pure force. His moral judgments are inchoate and instinctive, and due to his ignorance he is unable to build any lasting institutions or structures which can maintain the peace once he is gone. These failures, his inability to trust in others or believe in things outside of or greater than himself, along with his psychic powers and the strain of committing ever greater atrocities to prove a point which nobody else accepts, eventually drives him mad. His dyign words are so bitter because he doesn't understand why everyone else doesn't see the world as he does. Maybe he really doesn't really understand what he did wrong, or else maybe the realization of his mistakes combined with the fatalist powerlessnes of already knowing the future is so terrible that he basically dies inside and regresses to a sort of bestial/childlike state as Night Haunter. It's definitely an intersting story tha tI think is very much hinted at in the material, though most of the time we only see Kurze in teh background. I don't know if it's better to have it as its own story or not, honestly. As for the emperor, I think it would be interesting to portray him as being basically a psychic gestalt of humanity as a whole. People who look into him will end up seeing what they want to see, a mirror of their own expectations and psyche. For instance, the soldier Grammaticus looks into his eyes and sees an eternity of war and conquest. As mankind regresses to barbarism in the darkness of old night, so does the Emperor become more militant. OXBALLS DOT COM fucked around with this message at 16:22 on Apr 2, 2014 |
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Apr 2, 2014 16:18
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Arquinsiel posted:You mean apart from the Avatar of Khaine? Isn't that a warp powered construct that uses an eldar exarch life to activate itself? I mean not to be picky but it doesn't really seems like its a warp entity that's made of positive emotions in my opinion.
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Apr 2, 2014 19:43
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berzerkmonkey posted:You're saying he wasn't monstrous? The guy had a throneroom made from living people that were fused together... Being monstrously powerful and monstrous are two completely different things. What I'm saying is that Kurze may be a real monstrous rear end in a top hat, but he stuck to a single planet. It takes a sick kind of vision to picture ruling a whole galaxy.
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Apr 2, 2014 20:52
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Kharn_The_Betrayer posted:Isn't that a warp powered construct that uses an eldar exarch life to activate itself? I mean not to be picky but it doesn't really seems like its a warp entity that's made of positive emotions in my opinion.
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Apr 2, 2014 23:46
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Arquinsiel posted:It's a fragmented chunk of Khaine himself actually. So it's a warp powered construct? Gotcha 
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Apr 3, 2014 21:09
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Demiurge4 posted:So it's a warp powered construct? Gotcha 
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Apr 3, 2014 21:18
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Okay, got my hands on Prince of Crows and I have to say, Sevatar is a very entertaining monster. It was a cruel tease to just leave his storyline hanging, though. I really like ADB's take on the Night Lords because they are almost too messed up to be a Legion. They don't get bad luck or betrayed in a twist that is not their fault; they legitimately gently caress things up and have to scramble to pick up the pieces. They embrace cowardice and childish spite in a way that is almost endearing, especially after reading about so many unerring, uber-loyal supersoldiers across fiction.
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Apr 3, 2014 22:20
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Sephyr posted:Okay, got my hands on Prince of Crows and I have to say, Sevatar is a very entertaining monster. It was a cruel tease to just leave his storyline hanging, though. I think ADB's suppose to be writing a Night Lords HH book with Sevatar. He really is one of the better characters we've seen.
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Apr 3, 2014 22:56
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Really? I haven't seen him mention it on his blog or FB. I'd be all like  if he were writing it though, don't get me wrong.edit: Oh wait I see, it's supposed to be a novella. Not a full novel. Still.
The Rat fucked around with this message at 23:05 on Apr 3, 2014 |
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Apr 3, 2014 23:00
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Sephyr posted:I really like ADB's take on the Night Lords because they are almost too messed up to be a Legion. They don't get bad luck or betrayed in a twist that is not their fault; they legitimately gently caress things up and have to scramble to pick up the pieces. They embrace cowardice and childish spite in a way that is almost endearing, especially after reading about so many unerring, uber-loyal supersoldiers across fiction. I'm looking forward to the omnibus. It'll be my first time reading anything about these guys. Do the Night Lords have any friendships with Space Marines outside their legion? The Garro and Tarvitz, Kharn and Argel kind or even the lovely Ahriman and Wyrdmake kind? Are the books mostly 30K or 40K?
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Apr 4, 2014 00:32
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AndyElusive posted:I'm looking forward to the omnibus. It'll be my first time reading anything about these guys. The Night Lords are probably the best written chapter due to ADB taking the lead. There aren't really any friendships within and outside of a chapter filled with murderers, thieves and rapists but Talos finds a brother of sorts within the Red Corsairs. Most of the books are 40k.
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Apr 4, 2014 00:59
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Kegslayer posted:The Night Lords are probably the best written chapter due to ADB taking the lead. There aren't really any friendships within and outside of a chapter filled with murderers, thieves and rapists but Talos finds a brother of sorts within the Red Corsairs. Said brother is an Apothecary that loathes other peoples biological messiness. I don't know why ADB's stuff works so well for me - honestly, most of the time I like happy-ish endings to things that I read, but when it's ADB writing Traitor Marines I just forget all that and enjoy the ride. He really is too good for 40k stuff. I'm so glad he doesn't realize that.
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Apr 4, 2014 06:58
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VanSandman posted:He really is too good for 40k stuff. I'm so glad he doesn't realize that. He's addressed this sentiment in his blog, and got a bit bristly about it. AFAIR he basically thinks that the idea of being "too good to write [x] (often genre fiction)" is dumb, and that he writes what he enjoys writing.
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Apr 4, 2014 07:53
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Has anyone tried reading the Dark Eldar books? I'm curious what they're like and how good they are, as DE were my first army a couple years ago. I didn't even know any DE books existed until I saw a Forbidden Planet email plugging the latest in Andy Chambers' trilogy. Also, the ebooks are collected here: http://www.blacklibrary.com/warhammer-40000/dark-eldar-ebundle.html but cost £2.50 more than buying all the books separately! What's up with that 
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Apr 4, 2014 10:17
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The scene in the Night Lords trilogy where they are working alongside another traitor chapter, get suddenly ambushed, and the other marines turn around to ask the NL for help only to realize they already ran away is still one of the funniest things I've read (next to a certain battle oath made by a character from the 3rd book). EDIT: Technically Sevatar is on the Lion's flagship that is currently orbiting Macragge in Unremembered Empire.
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Apr 4, 2014 12:37
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krushgroove posted:Has anyone tried reading the Dark Eldar books? I'm curious what they're like and how good they are, as DE were my first army a couple years ago. I didn't even know any DE books existed until I saw a Forbidden Planet email plugging the latest in Andy Chambers' trilogy. I read Path of the Renegade. It has some amusing ideas, but the characters a bit too one-note. The author also doesn't take th concept of the insanely messed-up nature of DE society and ambitions far enough; in the end its just a "chase the McGuffin" story with a few dark twists.
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Apr 4, 2014 13:46
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Don't read the Dark Eldar books. I got to the second one and it was a horrendous slog.
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