Warhammer 40K's story, how is it even remotely appealing?
- Thread starter Saviordd1
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I personally don't care for the human fluff, basically it shows a race devolved into a bunch of religious nuts.
But the Ork codex is a pretty entertaining read, at least. And most of the novels are fantastic. But I agree with you that most of the Codex and Rulebook fluff is pretty dull.
I think the idea behind the humans being such asshats is that Warhammer 40k is trying to present a scenario in which there is no clear 'good guy', so that no one has any reservations about playing a certain army.
A few examples.
Humans are well, humans, and we naturally empathize with them. But, the Imperium of Man is extremely zealous and obsessed with manifest destiny. It's not even clear that their Emperor is still even doing anything for them.
I personally really want to be able to like the Eldar. I think it's sort of implied that humans and Eldar are on relatively friendly terms (they don't outright try to murder each other. Usually). But the Eldar are obsessed with destroying everything even remotely tied to Chaos, and the humans could ally with them, but consistently choose not to, and I think this is meant to show both 1.) how big of a bunch of dicks the humans are and 2.) how obsessive and manipulative the Eldar can be.
The Necrons (in the new fluff) just want their lives back. Their ultimate goal is to reverse the biotransference, which is certainly understandable.
And Tao are dirty commies. Actually, they really do seem to be the only non-absolute-dick race in the story.
But the Ork codex is a pretty entertaining read, at least. And most of the novels are fantastic. But I agree with you that most of the Codex and Rulebook fluff is pretty dull.
I think the idea behind the humans being such asshats is that Warhammer 40k is trying to present a scenario in which there is no clear 'good guy', so that no one has any reservations about playing a certain army.
A few examples.
Humans are well, humans, and we naturally empathize with them. But, the Imperium of Man is extremely zealous and obsessed with manifest destiny. It's not even clear that their Emperor is still even doing anything for them.
I personally really want to be able to like the Eldar. I think it's sort of implied that humans and Eldar are on relatively friendly terms (they don't outright try to murder each other. Usually). But the Eldar are obsessed with destroying everything even remotely tied to Chaos, and the humans could ally with them, but consistently choose not to, and I think this is meant to show both 1.) how big of a bunch of dicks the humans are and 2.) how obsessive and manipulative the Eldar can be.
The Necrons (in the new fluff) just want their lives back. Their ultimate goal is to reverse the biotransference, which is certainly understandable.
And Tao are dirty commies. Actually, they really do seem to be the only non-absolute-dick race in the story.
Warhammer 40k is a series made by and for socially autistic man-child sperglords. It has performed well catering to this niche.
I enjoy the lore because of how it begs various questions, while letting the audience go hog wild with the source material. Even in the, up to eleven, sense, it still engages me in a rather profound philosphical sense when I consider the motivations of the characters and the impact and reactions to their actions.
Take for example the Thousand Sons. Why was the Emperor so intent on preventing his sons from gaining knowledge of Chaos? Why wasn't he just honest with them? Was he truly going to stick Magnus in the Golden Throne to power the thing? Why didn't the Emperor actually listen to the message Magnus sent instead of sending Russ after him? Why was Russ so quick to jump on the chance to kill Magnus ordered by Horus; which contradicted his orders from the Emperor? Is Ahriman still seeking away to reverse the Rubric? How did he feel at the time when he realized what he did?
Even with the power of what amounts to gods, they had the emotional failings of high schoolers and sibblings rivalring for the attentions of their father. Their pride and personal vendettas doomed the Empire and brought about the deaths of untold innocents.
The thing that really strikes me as intriguing is the amount of failure and loss in the setting. Now granted, they can replace most things, but I enjoy watching characters fuck up so monumentally the consequences are beyond all comprehension. I like the fallible nature of the universe and the constant struggle for people to make the decision to stand for what they believe in, in the face of universal and unending opposition. I like the lines between good and evil blurred so much it comes down to a personal choice the character makes.
With any fiction, what you put into it is often what you get out of it. Some people love it for rocket propelled chainsaws. Some people love it because an Ork strategy involves throwing big rocks at their enemy (which surprisingly affective results). Some people love it because of the heroic deeds of a handfull of soldiers fending off an tide of aliens intend on devouring everything in their path. Some people love it because an Ork travelled back in time to kill himself so he could have a spare of his favorite gun.
It's a universal of endless possibilities, where the outcome of one story may or may not have any bearing on the setting of another. Where the stakes are determined by the storyteller, but the setting continues to propell the interest of others. It's a universe of thousands of stories and characters waiting to be used by the readers and players for whatever purpose they want; political intrigue, war torn battle fields, ethical dilemmas, satiritical illustrations of complex concepts, or jsut plain old goofy fun with mechs that stop entire towns into dust.
And of course, because I find myself sympathising with the more honest "villains" of the settings, because the "heroes" are real pricks.
Take for example the Thousand Sons. Why was the Emperor so intent on preventing his sons from gaining knowledge of Chaos? Why wasn't he just honest with them? Was he truly going to stick Magnus in the Golden Throne to power the thing? Why didn't the Emperor actually listen to the message Magnus sent instead of sending Russ after him? Why was Russ so quick to jump on the chance to kill Magnus ordered by Horus; which contradicted his orders from the Emperor? Is Ahriman still seeking away to reverse the Rubric? How did he feel at the time when he realized what he did?
Even with the power of what amounts to gods, they had the emotional failings of high schoolers and sibblings rivalring for the attentions of their father. Their pride and personal vendettas doomed the Empire and brought about the deaths of untold innocents.
The thing that really strikes me as intriguing is the amount of failure and loss in the setting. Now granted, they can replace most things, but I enjoy watching characters fuck up so monumentally the consequences are beyond all comprehension. I like the fallible nature of the universe and the constant struggle for people to make the decision to stand for what they believe in, in the face of universal and unending opposition. I like the lines between good and evil blurred so much it comes down to a personal choice the character makes.
With any fiction, what you put into it is often what you get out of it. Some people love it for rocket propelled chainsaws. Some people love it because an Ork strategy involves throwing big rocks at their enemy (which surprisingly affective results). Some people love it because of the heroic deeds of a handfull of soldiers fending off an tide of aliens intend on devouring everything in their path. Some people love it because an Ork travelled back in time to kill himself so he could have a spare of his favorite gun.
It's a universal of endless possibilities, where the outcome of one story may or may not have any bearing on the setting of another. Where the stakes are determined by the storyteller, but the setting continues to propell the interest of others. It's a universe of thousands of stories and characters waiting to be used by the readers and players for whatever purpose they want; political intrigue, war torn battle fields, ethical dilemmas, satiritical illustrations of complex concepts, or jsut plain old goofy fun with mechs that stop entire towns into dust.
And of course, because I find myself sympathising with the more honest "villains" of the settings, because the "heroes" are real pricks.
I'll admit, I don't tend to think of Mass Effect in context of Warhammer, but Dragon Age still looks suspiciously like the Fantasy Warhammer setting with the serial numbers filed off...Saviordd1 said:
Mages get their power from
It's not all 1:1 like this, obviously, but Dragon Age always left me with a serious Warhammer Fantasy Battles vibe.
That said, 40k does play into a specific kind of over the top. Sort of like what you'd get if you took Dune and let it off it's meds. If you're looking at it and saying it looks "edgy", even in a 13 year old's context, then you might just be missing the point. For me, at least, the setting has always played more like a kind of parody of a serious settings.
You're actually hitting on the point of both WFB and 40k obliquely here. Both settings are built around the table top game. That's where the actual money for Games Workshop is. Dawn of War, the Black Library, Space Marine, those are all side items, and if I took all the 40k purchases I've ever made and pooled them together, I've spent less than it would cost me to put together a pair of 2k point armies for tabletop.Saviordd1 said:
The tabletop game is the main point, first and foremost. The factions aren't built around "here's a good faction, and here's an evil one", it's built around "how can we make this faction fun to play? How can we make it attractive for you to buy?"
When you actually get into the tabletop's army codices every single one starts with a line like "you should build an army of if you like , , or you like feeling like a badass". I'm paraphrasing a bit obviously, and they don't all literally say "feeling like a badass", but, the Marine Codex says (something along the lines of) "if you like fielding powerful units," Dark Eldar is "enjoy hitting and running with brutal precision", and so on.
The reason the setting is what it is, is because it's trying to sell you an army for any given faction. That said, it does boast some of the best tie in fiction I've seen. Some gawdawful tie in fiction as well, but, given most tie in fiction is borderline unreadable, it's nice to see some actually good writing.
The setting itself actually ends up better on a feminist critique than most mass media. (I still remember someone dubbing Space Marine as surprisingly the most feminist game of 2011.) Women, and men appear in positions of authority pretty frequently, and there isn't a lot of gender bias, at least in the imperial factions outside of the Astartes and Sororitas. The tabletop should probably get dinged for not having female guardsmen units available (to my knowledge, again I don't play tabletop), and a number of the games including Dawn of War sort of skim over that in the interest of not requiring more units, but for the most part, in an IG regiment, any position could potentially be filled by a member of either gender, and the same goes for most inquisitional retinue members.
That said, Orks don't have gender, neither do the Necrons or the Tyranids. The Tau do, and IIRC they actually field mixed units, but their genders aren't visibly different. (I could be remembering this wrong.)
The Eldar in both vanilla and emo have genders, though they might be the only ones where gender does lock them in. That said, I seem to recall that a person's actual gender isn't as important as the gender they adopt when they take on that role. Which means, yes, there are dark Eldar in drag... be very afraid.
Chaos fields both genders... for some things. Cultists mostly. Some daemons are gender locked based on what their unit is. Chaos Space Marines are all male... or something...
Still, a lot of the fluff focuses on the Imperium, and as a result we have a better view of that, then most of the setting.
Hmm, Bioware fan?Saviordd1 said:
If my Professors while I was getting my English Degree knew I was spending any time around Bioware during my time in college (if they knew who that was), I'd have been taken out behind the woodshed. Bioware breaks countless of those rules, Mass Effect alone does and it's not just the frickin' ending. Hell, on the lack of originality front only two characters from Mass Effect 2 lack some sort of parental/family drama in their background. Your avatar (Garrus) included.
In one per story, I can get behind one, but almost all of them? ALMOST ALL OF THEM? Including LEGION? Though the family drama of the Quarians versus the Geth comes across more fully in ME3. And the android/life conundrum is so standard in sci-fi it makes me want to cry.
Glass houses.
Warhammer 40k doesn't have a story, not as a whole, it's a setting that exists in a state of constant warfare and conflict and it revels in it. There are stories that take place there, but for the most part because it's based in tabletop gaming the strife and struggle are never ending. Furthermore, It's not trying to be a big staple of the sci-fi community, it's tie-in fiction doesn't really have any delusions of grandeur about it's own importance (*cough* Mass Effect *cough*), as a result it doesn't put key plot details into it's excess materials (*cough* Mass Effect *cough*), and it recognizes what it is, entertainment. It's over the top goryness isn't meant to be taken seriously, it's so off the map it's downright silly and the setting does play into that. Or do you think someone sitting around screaming "BLOOD FOR THE BLOOD GOD! SKULLS FOR THE SKULL THRONE!" or "DRIVE ME CLOSER SO I MAY HIT THEM WITH MY SWORD!" is trying for some sort of artistic brilliance?
It's blood, guts, and gore. However, the tie-in fiction is heralded as being surprisingly readable across the board, because it exists in a state of strife and warfare there is the possibility of telling sometimes intriguing stories about, well, fighting and how individuals, usually humans, deal with that. It's also got the useful caveat of combining religious extremism of a dark age with highly advanced technology, along with belief that it works through magic (techpriests), psychics (psykers) who will be possessed by demons (daemons), and genetically augmented super-soldiers fighting, against, helpfully killing the individuals near you, on the same side but murdering your troops, on the lines with normal people.
Warhammer 40k: Space Marine is a fun, if short, game. It's story is sorta cool and pretty basic, but combined with the over the top killing while the Space Marine character treats the whole thing like a Sunday romp through the park, after all fights a horde of orks off a planet with a platoon of three men every week. It shows. This includes an atmo-drop onto an invading enemy ship, and riding that down to the planet as the tutorial. The level of bad-ass goes up from there.
Is it over the top? Yes. Is it a hell of a good time if you like killing hordes and hordes of bad guys? Yes. My favorite part was using the jump pack and playing whack-a-mole with the power hammer.
Final bit: the Necrons of 40k are the Mass Effect Reapers done right. They are also far more deadly and way more awesome.
I love it due to the over the top absurdity of the universe.
The universe captured my attention over 17 years ago and while no longer have the time/money to invest in the TT game I love lore and story of it and still love talking about it to fellow enthusiasts, I love the DoW series and still buy the books with the Gaunt and Eisenhorn series being some of my fave reading.
It is a crazy universe with vast scope, so vast infact that you can make up just about any story setting you want. I also enjoy dumping it on people who like to start starwars vs star trek discussions
The universe captured my attention over 17 years ago and while no longer have the time/money to invest in the TT game I love lore and story of it and still love talking about it to fellow enthusiasts, I love the DoW series and still buy the books with the Gaunt and Eisenhorn series being some of my fave reading.
It is a crazy universe with vast scope, so vast infact that you can make up just about any story setting you want. I also enjoy dumping it on people who like to start starwars vs star trek discussions
Because of the multiple people who have contributed to the lore it can be a bit bizzare. But there are some excellent stories in the black library by some authors who do make good stories in the universe mainly Dan Abnet with his Gaunt's ghosts and more recently Aaron Dembsk-Bowden with the Night lords trilogy he wrote.
Why like 40k? It has giant mechs that can lay waste to armies and cities in minutes, it has huge starships carrying 10s of thousands of people with weapons that can obliterate planets. 40k has deamons and sorcery. There are cyborgs and hover tanks and the Emperor only knows what else. Basically its science fantasy thats over the top, all the tropes and cool stuff is mashed together into one universe.
Warhammer 40k doesn't take itself to seriously either, look at some of the factions for example. Orks are purely a comedy faction. The huge Space Marines and everything are purposely over the to.
Some of the books have a more serious tone but they are usually trying to tell a personal struggle or story. One of the Grey Knight novels for example trapped a Grey Knight on a Chaos held world and stripped of everything he was forced to fight in arenas. The Caiaphas Cain novels are extremely tongue in cheek.
Oh and heres da boys,
Warhammer 40k doesn't take itself to seriously either, look at some of the factions for example. Orks are purely a comedy faction. The huge Space Marines and everything are purposely over the to.
Some of the books have a more serious tone but they are usually trying to tell a personal struggle or story. One of the Grey Knight novels for example trapped a Grey Knight on a Chaos held world and stripped of everything he was forced to fight in arenas. The Caiaphas Cain novels are extremely tongue in cheek.
ADB is the new star writer for the Black Library, he has usurped Dan Adnett as my favourite writer now. His Night Lord novels along with his Horus Heresy books and the new Grey Knight novel the Emperors Gift are all epic.gibbles545 said:
Oh and heres da boys,
Personally I love it. It is a great dark sci-fi setting, something we don't actually get a lot of.
These are not novels and most games fail terribly at story telling but 40k does a good job of telling a story through their world building. Warhammer provides the setting and you provide the story through your play.
But hey, different strokes for different folks, right?
These are not novels and most games fail terribly at story telling but 40k does a good job of telling a story through their world building. Warhammer provides the setting and you provide the story through your play.
But hey, different strokes for different folks, right?
Overarching story of grimdarkdarkness is standard. Sure. I completely get that.
The way I see it, with such a huge universe, you're going to end up with a ton of small, unique tales of heroism. You're going to end up with a ton of "FK YEAH!" and "OH SH*T!" moments. The Gaunt's Ghosts series does this pretty well. Lots of regular troopers (both male and female) thrown into all these insane battlefield scenarios. It shows off the fact that there are heroes, cowards, douchebags, villains, and literally everything in between just in the Imperial Guard.
I don't know, I like the WH40K stuff. If you don't, cool. No amount of flaming will change our minds, so it's best we don't even start.
The way I see it, with such a huge universe, you're going to end up with a ton of small, unique tales of heroism. You're going to end up with a ton of "FK YEAH!" and "OH SH*T!" moments. The Gaunt's Ghosts series does this pretty well. Lots of regular troopers (both male and female) thrown into all these insane battlefield scenarios. It shows off the fact that there are heroes, cowards, douchebags, villains, and literally everything in between just in the Imperial Guard.
I don't know, I like the WH40K stuff. If you don't, cool. No amount of flaming will change our minds, so it's best we don't even start.
For a while, the game was more of a black comedy or dark satire of sci-fi tropes. Back in the early days, the game was "less grimdark and more hair metal." You're not supposed to take it seriously, you're supposed to look at the chainsaw swords, rocket machineguns, an mile high battle cathedrals and go, "dude, sick!"
This is Warhammer 40k; the dial starts at eleven.
This is Warhammer 40k; the dial starts at eleven.
If you really want to understand, take a risk. Spend some money on the Eisenhorn trilogy from the Black Library (unless you're one of those really cool people with exceptionally refined taste who look down on the Black Library... /sarcasm). There is no finer science fiction out there, in my opinion. No superiors at all, only peers.Saviordd1 said:
W40K is written on a lot of levels. It's a multifaceted universe with a huge ensemble of contributors that are relevant to a wide range of audiences. Some are repellant to me. Many are not.
edit:
http://www.blacklibrary.com/warhammer-40000/Eisenhorn-Omnibus.html
or perhaps...
http://www.blacklibrary.com/all-products/xmas-2011-eisenhorn-ebundle.html
So much time was spent figuring out the rules from the 400+ pages of the rulebook 0_O!!
So much fun with good friends!
Soooo many bullcrap battle won by vain acquaintances!
SO. MUCH. MONEY! The really stupid part of WH is how much it freaking costs!
Personally, the backdrop is rich if not always well exploited. You cannot ask too much from a setting that's primarly an excuse for relentless conflict.
Good writers can play the political aspect well I guess. But you won't catch me dead with a WH40K ""novel"" in the same room. ^^
So much fun with good friends!
Soooo many bullcrap battle won by vain acquaintances!
SO. MUCH. MONEY! The really stupid part of WH is how much it freaking costs!
Personally, the backdrop is rich if not always well exploited. You cannot ask too much from a setting that's primarly an excuse for relentless conflict.
Good writers can play the political aspect well I guess. But you won't catch me dead with a WH40K ""novel"" in the same room. ^^