Incline Warhammer 40,000 Lore Thread

[Heroic Liberator]

Title says all. About time that we had a dedicated lore thread for the setting.

And on that note, we've finally obtained a description of Perturabo's Daemon Primarch form in the lore:

Even before his elevation to daemonhood, the primarch had been colossal, but now he was a giant plated in silver and steel, encased in armour that was more a fortified sarcophagus than anything wrought for a living being. Edged in yellow and black, scarred from ten thousand wars and seamed with weld-line like scars, it was known as the Logos, its textures strangely alive, like a skin of metal and flesh combined.

Perturabo, the Lord of Iron himself.

He went without helm, his head a nightmare of pallid, dead flesh, necrotic and bleached of colour - like a corpse dragged from a depthless ocean trench. Thick cords of ribbed cabling pierced his skull, running back across his scalp in hissing cornrows. Eyes that were gimlet black, yet lit from within by the coldest light, stared out from a face that had known only bitter disappointment and had been cursed by inevitable betrayal.

Dassadra dropped to one knee as the Lord of Iron approached.

His mighty hammer, Forgebreaker, had been crafted by another, but had changed so profoundly from its original appearance that even had its original maker been alive to see it, he would no longer recognize the craft as his own.

Taken from one of the two short stories (alongside Warbreed) added to the new reissue of Storm of Iron. And as a sidenote, Perturabo has a lengthy conversation with Honsou in Warbreed while engaging in the tabletop gaming tradition of the Iron Warriors as a testing of the latter by the former.

Spoiler

Wish I had gotten my hands on one of these beauties:

 

[Heroic Liberator]

Anyhow, I guess I'll use this thread to post new lore vids (from a few quality Wh40k YTers) as they release until people join in for some lore talks.

 

[Storyfag]

Lots of HERESY, itt so far. Here, Lord Admiral Storyfag will fix:



And another one of my favourites:

 

[Bara]

No on tell Victor that they killed all the dwarfs here or he'll never leave the thread. :D

 

[Hobo Elf]

Just finished reading Dante last night and it just confirmed all my suspicions. Blood Angels are a bunch of hypocrite goobers and that includes their goldenboy darling. The only good chapters are Salamanders and Space Wolves. Prove me wrong.

 

[Bara]

The only good chapters are Salamanders and Space Wolves. Prove me wrong.

Are we basing good only on the fact that they actually care about civilian life and will fight for it instead of just ignoring them for the mission instead?

If so wouldn't the Lamenters count also?

 

[Hobo Elf]

The only good chapters are Salamanders and Space Wolves. Prove me wrong.

Are we basing good only on the fact that they actually care about civilian life and will fight for it instead of just ignoring them for the mission instead?

If so wouldn't the Lamenters count also?

I'm basing it on: how cool the dudes are, the favored fighting tactics of the chapter, army paint color, chapter aesthetic in general and the amount of dickish stuff they engage in (or rather, don't engage in). Being nice to civs is a good way to set them apart in 40k for me but it's not the only thing I look for in a chapter.

 

[spectre]

So, to derail it a bit from the typical Space Mariner wank, I really liked what they did with the lore in the Warhammer: Mechanicus vidya. Straight off the bat, the pairing of antagonists - Adeptus Mechanicus vs. Necrons - was an unusual thing, I quite liked how they kept silently pushing the point that even compared to skeletons made of living metal, the supposed champions of humanity are way past being barely recognizable as human beings (nevermind the outward appearance) with their calculated approach to life and contempt for unaugmented flesh.

To further show this, as your magos become more efficient in combat (and brutally so, let me say) they gradually change from their mostly human form to a mass bristling with tentacles and gun servos, propelled by metallic, spidery legs.
Some well written stuff (the characterization was especially brilliant, you get all the expected character tropes with 1337-speaking tech nut, the obligatory religious nut the novice but down-to-earth troop commander, gives you a thorough picture of how the faction thinks and operates), It's a darned shame the game actual plateaus way too quickly, becoming boring and grindy.

 

[baud]

about 40k, I was wondering about one thing: cloning exists, right? So if you clone a psyker, do you get another psyker? And for blanks/nulls/pariahs?

 

[John Keel]

about 40k, I was wondering about one thing: cloning exists, right? So if you clone a psyker, do you get another psyker? And for blanks/nulls/pariahs?

Iirc Fabius cloned himself & Horus quite a bit so yeah probably

 

[Storyfag]

The only good chapters are Salamanders and Space Wolves.

Do not mention the Wolves.

 

[hello friend]

Just finished reading Dante last night and it just confirmed all my suspicions. Blood Angels are a bunch of hypocrite goobers and that includes their goldenboy darling. The only good chapters are Salamanders and Space Wolves. Prove me wrong.

Loyalist Alpha Legion

 

[Akratus II]

Pre-heresy Thousand Sons.

But my own favorite faction is the Eladrith Ynneas. The Commorites. The True Kin if you will. My roommate started collecting Guard like a year ago and obviously I couldn't not join in. I looked at all the factions and to my surprise it seems my loyalist days are done. I immediately fell in love with the Drukhari range, even moreso when I found their lore also tickled my fancy. I've been reading all the books the Drukhari appear in. Even Valedor which is mostly about craftworlders fighting the Tyranid, but has two scenes where the Drukhari feature, and in more minor ways through the book. After this there's Lukas the Trickster with Lord Sliscus which is supposed to be a great character. I've gone through the path of the dark eldar before this and all of the short stories they feature in, that I've found so far. It's too bad their potential hasn't really been utilized. ADB has said if he could choose whichever story to write it'd be one about Commoragh, something about a dark Romeo + Juliet type story that takes place in the dark city. I'd love to see that. It's obvious the Dark Eldar isn't really a favorite of GW's but at least they have a kick ass model range.

 

[Storyfag]

POST-heresy Thousand Sons for me, as far as any and all SPEHSS MEHREENS go. There is something moving in the tragedy of Magnus. And therefore great beauty and justice in the Change he has brought to the Fenris system.

But my heart belongs to the Imperial Navy. Being an avid sailor, I couldn't have it any other way.

 

[lightbane]

Random fact: Leftards and Something Awful goons hate Blood Angels because they're clearly nazi apologism, due all of them being cute blonde boys with blue eyes and superhuman. They're also rather nice personality-wise when they don't fall to the Rage IIRC.

about 40k, I was wondering about one thing: cloning exists, right? So if you clone a psyker, do you get another psyker? And for blanks/nulls/pariahs?

Depending on who's doing it, you can do that and then some. There was an attempt at making better Imperial Guards, but they ended up as unlucky abominations (and no, I'm not talking about the Lamenters).

But my own favorite faction is the Dark Eldar.

Fixed.

 

[Storyfag]

Random fact: Leftards and Something Awful goons hate Blood Angels because they're clearly nazi apologism

I'm surprised they don't consider the entirety of 40k to be nazi apologism.

 

[Heroic Liberator]

how cool the dudes are, the favored fighting tactics of the chapter, army paint color, chapter aesthetic in general and the amount of dickish stuff they engage in (or rather, don't engage in).

Then the Iron Warriors have you covered.

Spoiler

They do not do 'dickish' stuff since their (mis)treatment of others is purely utilitarian in nature.

Spoiler

Even the dreaded Daemonculaba.

Anyhow, I wish that GW would've retconned the IW as being renegade rather than CSM post-HH. Or at the very least that they would've kept Perty as a non-ascended Chaos-affiliated primarch. Given the description of his daemon form in the OP though, I'm guessing that they'll have his daemonhood be the byproduct of either him purposedly infecting himself with the IW-refined variant of the Obliterator Virus and/or of Perty merging himself with a crafted daemon armor through the usage of the Forge of Souls. Either case would be better than the vanilla alternative of the Chaos Gods uplifting him in my book.

And while still on the topic of the IWs, wish we'd get to see the relationship between them and the Dark Mechanicum being fleshed out some more in future novels. Those two factions were meant for each other post-HH.

 

[Storyfag]

Either case would be better than the vanilla alternative of the Chaos Gods uplifting him in my book.

IDK, I'd say it'd go a bit too much against the established Daemon lore. At best he should carefully balance the influence each of the Four has on him by leveraging pacts with the other three.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

The only good chapters are Salamanders and Space Wolves.

Do not mention the Wolves.

Space Wolves are cool, eh outdrank the Emprah and doesn't afraid of anything.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

And what have you against the Fenris Boys, Storyfag ?

 

[Storyfag]

And what have you against the Fenris Boys, Storyfag ?

As mentioned before, their unwaranted and unprovoked attack on Prospero.

 

[ERYFKRAD]

And what have you against the Fenris Boys, Storyfag ?

As mentioned before, their unwaranted and unprovoked attack on Prospero.

What's all this then?

Prospero was the original homeworld of the Thousand Sons Traitor Legion of Chaos Space Marines and their Primarch Magnus the Red.

It was a centre of knowledge and lore, particularly knowledge of sorcery

Nope, don't see anything wrong.

 

[Heroic Liberator]

IDK, I'd say it'd go a bit too much against the established Daemon lore.

Chaos Undivided daemon primarchs in general are quite nonsensical. Lorgar gets a pass given his mystical orientation (i.e. attaining daemonhood due to his esoteric knowledge of Chaos and/or his role as a 'prophet' rather than a champion), although even in his case it is quite iffy. In Perturabo's case though, it doesn't fit at all.

And if daemon primarch Perturabo is indeed the result of Perty merging with a daemon armor, then there's a precedent in the lore (see Maloq Kartho's case).

 

[Kalarion]

Has anyone else read Penitent yet?

There are two big "reveals": the Collegium and Constantin Valdor.

First there's the Collegium, which appears to be a group of Space Marines drawn from all Legions (yes, Legions), goals unknown. Penitent shows them briefly, and they include a Thousand Sons, a Night Lord, a Raven Guard and an Iron Hand (I think). Ravenor yanks their chains while investigating the King in Yellow. Next, the fact that Constantin Valdor appears to be said King, is alive and well, and has created a vast fortress in the Warp (metaphysically close to the Eye) from which he orchestrates his plots and engages in massive battles (combatants unknown, but presumably daemons and CSMs).

I'm not sure how I feel about this. On the surface these are really cool reveals that have potential to define the lore for the next decade. OTOH it's GW, and even though Abnett got the go-ahead to "go for it" (according to him), it's set during Eisenhorn times (so, ~400 years prior to the Gathering Storm iirc), which smells a lot like "lore that seems super exciting but in practice does nothing for the present lorescape". I hope this stuff gets committed to, but I'm not optimistic.

And of course in the current times there's Godblight. What a mess. I can't see the current stable of BL writers dealing with the Emperor being more active in an engaging way at all. The only authors I would currently expect to be able to treat something that monumental in a deserving fashion are... uh... Chris Wraight? John French? Maybe Dan Abnett?

Some of the "new" authors (getting novel-length material published in the last 5 years or so) are pretty fun though. I like Rachel Harrison and Robbie MacNiven in particular. Danie Ware is adequate. One thing I liked about Harrison was her taking the time to devote a POV to a Line Psyker. We haven't seen much (any?) of that before, and I thought she did both Raine and Zane justice. I'm looking forward to future work from both authors.

 

[Lyric Suite]

So i'm plodding along the Uriel Ventris books. They aren't super great but i needed something lightweight to read at night before falling aleep so whatever.

Just finished the one about the Tyranid fleet and i'm in the middle of the part where Uriel gets accused of heresy, which has me thinking.

It seems the author is one of those euphoric folks and it seems he has made it his business to just undermine the setting. He seems to create situations where the protagonist has no choice but to break the Codex of the Astartes in order to achieve victory (until the last one, where he leads the Deathwatch team on the raid to the hive ship for no other reason that he is the protagonist of the story), but the situations in question are so weirdly specific it makes the whole system of belief of the marines seem retarded.

My question is, do the fans of this setting really accept the setting for what it is or are they all like Graham McNeill? I'm guessing the latter, right?

I was kinda of expecting the basis of the Codex to be similar to the probabilistic science of Hari Seldon in the Foundations stories, or something akin to the preconition abilities of Paul in Dune (which also involved a lot of determinstic prediction thinking). Guilliman is supposed to have a preternatural intelligence, so i thought the idea is that he understood things that went beyond what a normal person could understand and that is why the space marines followed his Codex religiously. Literally, as it were.

Instead apparently it's just a foil to make Fedoratards feel smart about not following the rules, which just makes the setting seem banal as shit. Tell me i'm wrong.