Battle for the Abyss

[aekold]

Worst part for me was the fact that the Abyss neede to arrive on time at Calth to carry out its mission. Yet they travel through the warp where travels may take days, months or years, depending on the weather in the warp. A bit of an oversight IMHO.

 

I really liked the thousand son character though.

[Raven Angel]

I think part of the deal with the traitors is that the powers of chaos are supose to insure they get were they need to be when they need to be there.

[Senseilord Ashahara]

It was a Ben Counter book.

Is that too flipant?

 

In all his books, some of it is inspired, some of it is plain silly.

And he cannot write a propper ending to save his life.

[Vassakov]

It's the weakest of the HH books so far (as I choose to count Descent and Fall together, as always intended :) ), as it adds little to the overall plot of the Heresy and has perhaps 2 good characters - as a Wolf player, I felt Byrnngar was a poor, caricature of a SW. The Word Bearers I half expected to be twirling thin moustaches and the UM is so laughably "by the book" it's almost painful.

 

The plot can be best summarised as:

 

 

WB build a big ship to destroy a moon and therefore cripple the UM before the invasion at Calth. UM get wind of this, and so about 30 Marines, 2 cruisers and some escorts go up against 1000 WB's and a Super Ship. After a few (pretty good, actually) fights, the UM's blow up the ship and everyone dies. Overall impact on the HH = 0

 

 

Basically, my main criticism is it adds very little, and has a Simpsons-esque "And everything returned to normal" ending. None of the characters generate any real empathy or interest and the plot meanders around and then stops.

 

Buy Mechanicum instead - a far worthier read.

[Pacific81]

Or buy both, they are completely different books covering completely different, but important, parts of the Heresy that are necessary for the larger picture.

[Lady_Mournival]

It was a decent novel; I'm just pretty irked that it didn't really focus on one legion like the rest of the books (every legion needs their own book) but on the other hand; the only bad parts were the ultras whereas the WordBearers, the Space Wolves, World Eaters, and Thousand Sons were pure awesome in a bowl..... So I think to some it up I'd have to say it's worth the buy and the read through the dull bits. I encourage anyone to pick it up just for the all too valuable insight.

[Lord Lorne Walkier]

I liked the book a lot. The insight into the Council of Nikea was worth the read alone for me. I will agree that the WB's did not match up too well against the loyalists but lets be honest, they where up against a pretty elite group. 4 Captains (one a Librarian), a Honor guard, and 40 Assault Marines with most of the fighting being close quarters. Cestus IMO showed the same kind of repressed psychic abilities Ive seen in Loken and others. Skraal is one of the better parts of the book. Seeing a Loyal World Eater in action is something Ive been waiting for a long time. It has been my theory that the HH novels for the most part (excluding Legion) are told from the point of view of survivors. This book would seem to throw a wrench into that unless you take my even more extreme view that Mhotep Lives on past the end of the book. Now i know this will make some just :D ;) ;) but if i can see Loken Living past Istavaan III i could see the 1k Son getting a last second rescue. He would make quite the founding member of the Grey knights should he get the divine intervention he so deserved.

[Brother Subtle]

the thousand sons marine saved the book for me, without him it kind of flopped. but then again im not a fan of the smurfs.

get it, id feel weird owning all the other books (which i do) and not having the complete set. there is some ok stuff in it.

its still the weakest of the series.

[Solid Zaku]

Eh, I've read William Kings Space Wolves, and I've read the Smurf Omnibus. Both were equally better than their depictions in this book. Average, drunk off his power armored arse Space Wolf, and 'oh, is what I'm doing really against the law?' questioning Smurf. Nothing really new. What moved the Heresy plot along is that now the Ultras know that the WB's are bad, and they're going to tattle against the WB contingent palling around with Rogal Dorn on Terra. In that sense, it moves the plot along rather well.

 

Most of the fight scenes went along well, but I was disappointed with the 'pull lighting out of a cloud above my head' psychic fights.

[Raven Angel]

I have to say I have not read anything else of Ben counters yet so I reall don,t know his style but if Ihad to guess I,d say he was less then thrilled to get a story that in the end served no pupose. I think it was tossed in there for the sake of having the "good guys" win one for a change at this point but it ends up being a total waist as no one will ever know what happend. I also disliked how all the different Legions got type cast representitive instead of something fresher and a bit more eye chatching. The Naval stuff was ok untill the Word Bearers unleashed their phaser cannon and made sure that their would be no more cool stuff there. All in all it just seems like filler. Like it was kraned out to fill space and like it really needed more development time to grow too its full glory. I don't know the book just feels more like a draft rather then a finished story to me.

[Pacific81]

Several years ago a sci-fi movie was released called Solaris, starring George Clooney (please bare with me here!)

 

The story revolved around a scientist working on a space station investigating a loss of communication with earth. When he arrives, he is shocked to find his wife onboard, who had committed suicide several years previously on earth. Now, there are alot of things going on in this film; The loony scientist living on the station, the enigma of the living planet below and mysterious deaths on the station. But, all this is by-the-by and (this is an example of the efficacy of science fiction) - it is raising the question of something which would be impossible within our normal lives - i.e. how would we behave and what would happen if we ever came into contact again with a loved one who had died?

 

Now, I'm not saying that there is anything like this complexity of storytelling or underlying pragmatism within Battle for the Abyss, but I can't help but feel that amongst all the discussion of the stormtrooper-esque ineptitude of the Word Bearers and burping Space Wolves the prime message of this book is being missed. BftA creates a situation for us where several marines from different legions (who would ultimately end up fighting on different sides of the Heresy) are working together, and it shows us their interactions and the underlying insecurities of the Great Crusade.

 

History will paint the World Eaters as traitors, yet here there are far more similarities in character with the Space Wolves than there are differences. Cestus, who is enough of a realist to understand that they need Mhotep and his sorcery if they are to have a chance of victory, loses a friend in the Space Wolf and is haunted with visions of treachery and betrayal despite the pressing concerns of their mission. If one such as an Ultramarine can end up in such a moral predicament, then it paints the Heresy in far more of a shade of grey than many of the other Horus Heresy titles; BftA adds a level of ambiguity to the personal decisions made by each and every marine when Horus declared himself as the rightful ruler of mankind, and mitigates alot of those who have simply been painted as 'evil' or lacking in morality for siding against the Emperor. Things most certainly could have been very different had things happened a little differently.

 

The book also shows how everything within the Great Crusade was not entirely rosy between the legions - there was a thin veil of brotherhood, and common direction, and this book reinforces the other titles which have revealed this to be all to thin. I'm not saying that this excuses any of the quite valid criticisms of the book which have been posted, but I think in terms of the wider picture of the Horus Heresy Battle for the Abyss is vital in carrying accross to the reader the ethos surrounding the Heresy.

[Raven Angel]

While I agree with your assment I do think an opertunity was missed here as all the marines where for the most part painted in the sterotypes of their resptive legions. I don't think a World Eater captain would be stupid enough to leave a trail of bodies in his wake in the middle of a stealth assualt. Likewise I don't beleive that a Wolf would go off and get drunk after an argument in the middel of a combat situation. These actions are at odds with common sence and play into post HH veiws of these groups that did not need to be completely acurate. Opurtunities to really expand on the character of these seldom seen thus far legions were missed. I will grant a bit of a better job was done with Mohtep but it still plays to the sterotype of his legion and does not explain things like why he's such a good demon fighter when the other marines are cluless about such things.

 

I had some time to think and I know what it is about this book and the other books that have been bothering me. Its the fact that the writers of the later books are afrade of letting us acctully like some of their characters. When all of us started this we already knew who the good guys and bad guys would be. That didn't stop Abbnet; he mades love Horus and his men anyway. Thats what made the first books so good. We had an emotional investment. We all knew what would happen but we kept reading because somewhere inside we wanted to be wrong. This is the thing that none of the other writhers have replicated in their stories. This is why the other books seam less then they should be.