Horus Heresy Sci-Fi

[Cews]

Hi guys, I'm new to this whole thing of actually CONTRIBUTING to the forums. I've snuck around, creepily looking at everyones post for ages like that guy who has to introduce himself to everyone every time he moves to a new neighborhood... Actually really wanted to talk about this though so I've decided to get involved!

 

All hail the admins, glory to the servers!

 

Pleasantries aside here is my peeve:

 

I've read a lot of novels from Games Workshop and for the past few years I have, like many of you, consumed a staggering amount of HH novels, novellas, e-books and a-books greedily. I'm a huge lover of Sci-Fi and love military Sci-Fi in particular. HH is perfect for both these romances. The fluff is just so rich in tone and I love 40k for that reason alone.

 

However, I feel I lack more Sci-Fi elements. Some of the novels have great passages with some great Sci-Fi that remind us how far into the future we really are. Blink-klicking responses to orders into retinal displays, spitting/licking/kissing data slates for authorization and so forth is just great stuff and really adds to the ambiance of many scenes. 

 

But these passages are so few and the space between them is so distant that warp travel is required to join them. At times I feel that the richness of the fluff is holding it back, if that makes sense. Some of you have talked in a previous post about writers over-using phrasing and the same seems true of the more futuristic elements of 30k. Warp engines are engaged, servos click and hum, power fields are activated... It's come to the point now that to me it reads like a modern army with cool gear. I want to be enthralled by the future, I want to be enticed and get my fantasy into over drive and I'm missing this.

 

How do you guys and girls feel, do you agree or do you have a great passage in your head that gave a good example of great Sci-Fi? I'd love to go all nostalgic over some good scenes :)

 

[Odsox]

So... wait... so...

 

Hang on. What are you driving at, exactly? Because when you say it's lacking sci-fi elements, are you forgetting the city-sized void-capable warships, the unnumbered legions of genetically enhanced superhuman demi-clone soldiers, walking metal gods with laser cannons bigger than a gunboat, the ability to teleport, move between realities, survive death through cloning, fighting bare-faced on the skin of a starship, predatory alien races out the wazoo, and of course a galaxy-spanning, dystopian empire held together by the psychic might of a corpse tied into a collosal throne that amplifies a psychic presence to such an extent that it can be "seen" from across the galaxy, not to mention those crazy Mechanicus fellows?

 

I think you need to come a bit more specific, brah. That all seems pretty Sci-Fi to me.

 

Od.

[Conn Eremon]

It might be important to remember that Warhammer 40k is more space opera than it is scifi. That is to say, a fantasy setting all dressed up like scifi. 30k might be a bit more scifi-ish.

[Marshal Rohr]

How in Gods name do you think BL authors are more scifi than fantasy? I've yet to read one convincing description of military hardware that sounds remotely like a science fiction novel. They will spend a whole paragraph describing a blood letters horns made from the souls of aborted babies, but can't spare the word count to describe how a legion is organized.

[Cews]

So... wait... so...

 

Hang on. What are you driving at, exactly? Because when you say it's lacking sci-fi elements, are you forgetting the city-sized void-capable warships, the unnumbered legions of genetically enhanced superhuman demi-clone soldiers, walking metal gods with laser cannons bigger than a gunboat, the ability to teleport, move between realities, survive death through cloning, fighting bare-faced on the skin of a starship, predatory alien races out the wazoo, and of course a galaxy-spanning, dystopian empire held together by the psychic might of a corpse tied into a collosal throne that amplifies a psychic presence to such an extent that it can be "seen" from across the galaxy, not to mention those crazy Mechanicus fellows?

 

I think you need to come a bit more specific, brah. That all seems pretty Sci-Fi to me.

 

Od.

Aah, I see where I might have been vague.

 

No, what I mean is that I want more new stuff that isn't just canon already. We know about the grand stuff like warp drives and titans and genetically enhanced super humans. What I guess I'm driving at is that I'm a bit fed up with this stale setting. I like to be amazed by my Sci-Fi (and the fighting on the skin of the ship I really liked, to that point). I just feel that it would be great to get more than "the ship travels fast, because warp drives", "the marine was big, because genetics", "the titan was huge, just really, really huge". We know these things already, what I enjoy is when these novels give us a snippet of how people actually live in these times. The small things that form their culture and what makes them different from you and me. Pick up The Forever War, Neuromancer, Starship Troopers, 1984, The Culture Novels, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, all these have subtle things that make living in that time different from living in ours. 40k has been fleshed out a lot with these details, but I would love to see a better, more hi-tech version in 30k. Do you get what I'm driving at? Huge things made of metal is Sci-Fi, sure, but it isn't the best Sci-Fi it can be. It dosn't really get you stuck in there and feel ":cuss, I could really see that happening if we had 20000 more years of research". 

 

Life aboard a star ship would be anathema to us, I want to know more about all the details :)

 

How in Gods name do you think BL authors are more scifi than fantasy? I've yet to read one convincing description of military hardware that sounds remotely like a science fiction novel. They will spend a whole paragraph describing a blood letters horns made from the souls of aborted babies, but can't spare the word count to describe how a legion is organized.

Well yes, this is the point I'm trying to make. More details please, make us believe this :cuss could work!

 

Now, I do realize that suspension of disbelief is key to reading Sci-Fi and Fantasy. But great Sci-Fi shouldn't just say "it's the future, lasers and starships exist. Good, let's get on with the story", a great Sci-Fi should build up a world around you that amazes. Think of the computers in Minority Report, which they designed by asking themselves "how would we interact with this tech in the future?". Great stuff and great details. Great big things isn't a sign of an advanced technology, it's just a sign of a huge budget.

[GhostLegion]

sci fi and fantasy both have multiple layers which both define the genres and refine the desires and predilections of their respective readers.  sure this is a known quantity, but it does bear being repeated from time to time.  the key to all this is figuring out which sub-genre you want.  for science fiction, the primary ones are hard sci-fi and space opera.  fans of hard sci-fi will look for the science behind the fiction....fans of space opera generally look for the story and let the science flavor things.  from this very loose differentiation, all wh40k fiction is space opera...

 

now, having said this sure, some of the black library books bring up more of the technology in the 40k universe than others....but all have it as a part of the environment.  the post heresy books have a greater tendency to identify the mechanical nature of things in the imperium and leave the more alien descriptions fast and loose...  I would argue this is a good thing as the high majority of these books are imperial in nature and thus would have less an idea of what the alien tech is or can do....other than the descriptions of weapon effects that is.  Similarly I would argue that, from an in situ perspective, a normal person would focus less on the familiar and more on the strange....thus leading to greater detail descriptions of what characters see around them or what they are fighting than to describe the third button on the left sleeve of the overcoat worn by Sven the valhallan private in the third squad of the fifth platoon in G company of the 2314st valhallan artillery as part of the 5th army fighting in the podunkian crusade in the Fer system within some segementum in the east of the galaxy.....none of this is really relevant to the reader, and by the time all this is described, the ravener attacking this poor guardsman got bored and fell asleep.

 

no im not arguing that any of this is intentional on the part of the authors, but rather that it isn't relevant to the reader or the story itself.  remember these books are about story.  if it suits the story to have characters sitting around a campfire in the trenches between attacks, they'll sit there...one of them might even toss a spare lasgun magazine into the fire for a recharge while theyre talking about his shooting that day....later tossing a magazine into the fire might cause it to explode and kill something that needed to die at that moment. (of course when that happens, someone will complain of deus ex machina...but hey).

 

put it this way.  is the science relevant to the story....maybe, maybe not.  most in the 40k environment transpose science with religion afterall...but for the sake of argument lets just say that yes it is relevant as part of the environment.  now, as part of the environment...and knowing its there...and knowing a story needs to be told for the book to work out...do you really think the authors need to spend paragraphs...pages...describing the turning of a nut...or discussing the timing required for targeting and firing building sized projectiles across the vastness of space while at whatever speeds theyre traveling in order to actually hit their targets...or identifying how much energy a lasgun needs...nevermind a lascannon or a lance battery....or do the authors even need to define how ships travel to and through the warp?  (hell star trek and star wars don't go into how much energy or calculations or other information is needed to travel beyond lightspeed....you tend to get a "turn him off or shut him up" in those moments on the one hand and "I dinnah have the power" on the other)....  still, if these descriptions are what youre looking for, im sorry to tell you warhammer fiction just wont scratch that itch. 

 

now if you want a story where joe (good ol' joe, you remember joe...he saved so and so at that place that time...ah joe...love that guy), just happens to be staring down a charging carnifex and fumbling for a spare magazine which just wont quite fit into his rifle until the critter is uncomfortably close...well warhammer might just answer that need.  (but but what happened to joe? .....shhhhh, that's not important right now).

 

I guess what im trying to say in a long winded way is in warhammer fiction the weird gets attention...the strange gets remarked on...impossible angles of construction become regular...and those glasses on the mantelpiece probably wont get you killed if you leave them alone (bonus points for that reference).  however, little things that are natural will probably be unremarked, a gun will shoot (unless it doesn't), a tank will move, a ship will fly, and a titan will walk...all without the reader needing to know how or why such things happen....  I mean really, do you need to know how a car works to drive?  and were you writing about a family trip would you really describe the principles and function of an internal combustion engine and power to weight ratios and the effect of torque?  some things just don't matter to the story...it is enough that the thing is there and working...and when it doesn't, that it has an effect on things....

[Odsox]

Aha! I get it! You want more SCIENCE with your Sci-Fi!

 

I think you might be waiting a considerable while for that kind of high-brow sci-fi to show up in a Black Library book, chum. The BL authors are talented and all, but this isn't The Electric Crocodile we're reading here.

 

This is ACTION MOVIE: THE NOVEL!

 

But now I get what you're saying, I do tend to agree.

 

Od.

[Jareddm]

If you're looking for slightly harder sci-fi in a 40k setting, I highly recommend Guy Haley's novels of Baneblade and Death of Integrity. You can really see in his writing how the gears in his head are turning going, "wait, how would this ACTUALLY work?" It's certainly nothing you'd traditionally classify as "hard" sci-fi but it's still a noticable step up from other BL authors and I find it very much appreciated.

[Kol Saresk]

How in Gods name do you think BL authors are more scifi than fantasy? I've yet to read one convincing description of military hardware that sounds remotely like a science fiction novel. They will spend a whole paragraph describing a blood letters horns made from the souls of aborted babies, but can't spare the word count to describe how a legion is organized.

You're thinking of military sci-fi Marshal, not sci-fi in its entirety.

[Marshal Rohr]

 

How in Gods name do you think BL authors are more scifi than fantasy? I've yet to read one convincing description of military hardware that sounds remotely like a science fiction novel. They will spend a whole paragraph describing a blood letters horns made from the souls of aborted babies, but can't spare the word count to describe how a legion is organized.

You're thinking of military sci-fi Marshal, not sci-fi in its entirety.

 

 

I was thinking more like Kubricks work in 2001 Space Odyssey. That wasn't military sci-fi, but it took all of our real world expectations for how space travel would work and fashioned it into visual reality for us to digest. Velcro shoes on the space liner, spinning cabins to simulate gravity, soundless space. All of that made me feel like I was actually watching someone in space for parts of the movie. Gravity was pretty good too, minus a few nitpicks here and there, it was really good about making you feel like you were out there spinning uncontrollably. 

 

I spend a hell of a lot of time reading about space suits and the development programs working on them right now. Looking at power armor, there are ways to explain how it works, how it would alter traditional tactical doctrine, etc. We don't get any of that science though. In KNF they talked about people using their power packs to propel themselves. Well unless those two vents can spin in a 360 and intuitively are able to calculate exactly how a marine is tumbling, it wouldn't do anything besides spin him in a circle and push him forward in zeroG. A space marine's pressurized under layer would do more to stop bleeding than a super advanced hemostatic capabilities. 

 

You can't have space fantasy stories about militaries and not bring in military scifi. 

[MordentHex]

sci fi and fantasy both have multiple layers which both define the genres and refine the desires and predilections of their respective readers.  sure this is a known quantity, but it does bear being repeated from time to time.  the key to all this is figuring out which sub-genre you want.  for science fiction, the primary ones are hard sci-fi and space opera.  fans of hard sci-fi will look for the science behind the fiction....fans of space opera generally look for the story and let the science flavor things.  from this very loose differentiation, all wh40k fiction is space opera...

 

now, having said this sure, some of the black library books bring up more of the technology in the 40k universe than others....but all have it as a part of the environment.  the post heresy books have a greater tendency to identify the mechanical nature of things in the imperium and leave the more alien descriptions fast and loose...  I would argue this is a good thing as the high majority of these books are imperial in nature and thus would have less an idea of what the alien tech is or can do....other than the descriptions of weapon effects that is.  Similarly I would argue that, from an in situ perspective, a normal person would focus less on the familiar and more on the strange....thus leading to greater detail descriptions of what characters see around them or what they are fighting than to describe the third button on the left sleeve of the overcoat worn by Sven the valhallan private in the third squad of the fifth platoon in G company of the 2314st valhallan artillery as part of the 5th army fighting in the podunkian crusade in the Fer system within some segementum in the east of the galaxy.....none of this is really relevant to the reader, and by the time all this is described, the ravener attacking this poor guardsman got bored and fell asleep.

 

no im not arguing that any of this is intentional on the part of the authors, but rather that it isn't relevant to the reader or the story itself.  remember these books are about story.  if it suits the story to have characters sitting around a campfire in the trenches between attacks, they'll sit there...one of them might even toss a spare lasgun magazine into the fire for a recharge while theyre talking about his shooting that day....later tossing a magazine into the fire might cause it to explode and kill something that needed to die at that moment. (of course when that happens, someone will complain of deus ex machina...but hey).

 

put it this way.  is the science relevant to the story....maybe, maybe not.  most in the 40k environment transpose science with religion afterall...but for the sake of argument lets just say that yes it is relevant as part of the environment.  now, as part of the environment...and knowing its there...and knowing a story needs to be told for the book to work out...do you really think the authors need to spend paragraphs...pages...describing the turning of a nut...or discussing the timing required for targeting and firing building sized projectiles across the vastness of space while at whatever speeds theyre traveling in order to actually hit their targets...or identifying how much energy a lasgun needs...nevermind a lascannon or a lance battery....or do the authors even need to define how ships travel to and through the warp?  (hell star trek and star wars don't go into how much energy or calculations or other information is needed to travel beyond lightspeed....you tend to get a "turn him off or shut him up" in those moments on the one hand and "I dinnah have the power" on the other)....  still, if these descriptions are what youre looking for, im sorry to tell you warhammer fiction just wont scratch that itch. 

 

now if you want a story where joe (good ol' joe, you remember joe...he saved so and so at that place that time...ah joe...love that guy), just happens to be staring down a charging carnifex and fumbling for a spare magazine which just wont quite fit into his rifle until the critter is uncomfortably close...well warhammer might just answer that need.  (but but what happened to joe? .....shhhhh, that's not important right now).

 

I guess what im trying to say in a long winded way is in warhammer fiction the weird gets attention...the strange gets remarked on...impossible angles of construction become regular...and those glasses on the mantelpiece probably wont get you killed if you leave them alone (bonus points for that reference).  however, little things that are natural will probably be unremarked, a gun will shoot (unless it doesn't), a tank will move, a ship will fly, and a titan will walk...all without the reader needing to know how or why such things happen....  I mean really, do you need to know how a car works to drive?  and were you writing about a family trip would you really describe the principles and function of an internal combustion engine and power to weight ratios and the effect of torque?  some things just don't matter to the story...it is enough that the thing is there and working...and when it doesn't, that it has an effect on things....

nicely said. By the way. Bonus points: Eye of Terror if im not mistaken, should have listened to the assassin!

Lords of Mars I found to be rather full of little details and the workings of readily known and unknown things. haven't got to the sequal book yet though but hoping its just as good as the first in this reguard.  Death of Integrity was very well done as well.  I enjoyed that greatly.  Next time you think all of the marines Implants are not important, think again. :P

[Kol Saresk]

So an armor that has an onboard computer capable of regulating a nuclear power plant, handle comm-traffic from literally hundreds of sources as well as monitor the bio-signs of each of those, interpret haptic gestures as simple as blink-clicking and as complex as sub-vocalization, calculate trajectories, register the texture of what it is a marine is touching with his armored gauntlet and keep an ammo count would be incapable of calculating movement and tumble of itself? Okay.

 

But honestly, look at Star Trek and Star Wars. Where is the explaining of how the warp drives, hyperdrives, slipstream drives and transwarp drives come into play? They really don't. What is the difference between a photon torpedo, quantum torpedo and tricobalt torpedo? Isn't really one given other than "bigger boom". What is the difference between a turbolaser, laser, blaster, phaser and disruptor?

 

How does the Death star blow up an entire planet with a laser? How does something survive in fluidic space? How is the HoloNet capable of instantaneous communication across the galaxy when it takes years for light to travel the same distance?

 

The overall genre of science fiction is imaginative. Take something that can be imagined within the realms of science, make it real and then begin forming a story around it. Every little detail doesn't have to be explained. Sci-fi only has to be believable, not explained.

 

And the thing about 40K is that in a way, the OP is right. It isn't science fiction, it is science fantasy. The impossible made probable, rather than the improbable made possible. The reality is, belief is not required. Otherwise we have to explain things like the relationship between the warp and the materium.

 

And honestly, I don't care about explanations. I want story. I don't need to know how a computer that has such a level of sentience it is called a spirit calculates the tumble of a Marine. I don't care why the ships in Star Trek have saucers and wings, but everywhere else they are cylinders and rectangles. I don't care that the Emperor is making an impossible phone call to the Space Pizza Hut on Dromund Kaas to surprise his mistress with dinner while he is on Coruscant. I don't care that Hell's Gate doesn't explain how the gates that let them travel between alternate realities, or how they use magic to genetically engineer dragons.

[Marshal Rohr]

First, the way a space marine backpack is designed makes it impossible to project enough counter forces to halt a tumble with the 6 vents it has. That is my point. 

 

Second, its fine to have the Warp being so far beyond scientific comprehension that it can only be understood as supernatural is fine and dandy, in the same way people used to think Thunder has the work of gods and the sun was a chariot. But that is no excuse to gloss over or ignore the military science fiction aspects required, and this is the most important part, for us to understand the game we are playing. It doesn't make sense to me, that telling me I don't understand the setting because I want to know if there is a 249 or a designated marksmen equivalent of a bolter for modeling purposes. I makes no sense to me that somehow 'I don't get it' because I want to know if space marines even need to clear a room like 5 guys in IBA or if they can burst through a wall instead. 

 

I understand that the Gal Vorbak's journey into the EoT wouldn't make sense if A D B spent time explaining that the something happening in two separate rooms on the ship actually happened years apart and simultaneously once inside because the Warp defies quantum mechanics or something doesn't help the story. But damn, it would be really, really nice to know if space marine actually look through eye lenses, or a projection from cameras housed in behind the eye lens. 

[Kol Saresk]

And in a universe where there is a nuclear power plant in that backpack(practically impossible, theoretically improbable by today's standards; unless I've missed something), why is it "impossible" in a genre where the impossible is supposed to be made probable?

[Jareddm]

But damn, it would be really, really nice to know if space marine actually look through eye lenses, or a projection from cameras housed in behind the eye lens. 

That would go a long way to explaining why there's so many helmetless marines. That is if a hard enough head strike blows out the cameras and otherwise leaves a marine blind.

[Marshal Rohr]

You could have portable fusion plants given the appropriate materials and shielding. Then whatever the Moores law equivalent for machinery would take over.

 

Really though the differences are clear. A human who can conjure fire with his mind is fantasy. A human who has evolved a specific set of genes required to tap into an unknown, omnipresent, and unlimited source of energy fueled inexplicably by human emotion to manipulate physical reality and the properties of matter around him is science fiction.

 

Warp fire wouldn't be some explosion of otherworldly colors that looks like combusting hydrogen. It would be science fiction if it was an immediate change in the state of the physical object caused by a human with the warp gene using his emotions (fuel) to alter the matters state with his mind.

 

 

And why do none of the authors delve into the revelations in sociology and psychology that the existence of the warp would bring. Isn't it important that enough depressed people living on one planet would cause Nurgle to manifest? Or an angry mob would make blood seep from the walls?

[Kol Saresk]

Except in 40K, you don't always have to have the "right genes" to tap into that power. Being born just right happens to be the fastest and "safest" way to do it.

 

It is science fantasy. It has a little science, and a little fantasy.

 

Ironically, science fiction(as a very broad genre) supposed to deal with sociological and psychological issues as it is supposed to take the introduction of certain concepts and ideas(cloning, alien species, parallel realities, etc) and then show a little of how they impact human society, or have impacted human society.

 

For example, I am reading a novel right now that is way into the future. One of the characters has internal dialogue about religion. Specifically about how some aliens on his ship invited him to one of their services. He comments to himself that he doesn't understand religion in the broadest way because humanity as a general has become so enraptured with the atheism it sees inherent to the sciences that religion is a minority in human culture and that maybe one in ten "religious" humans actually believe in what they do rather than just following the crowd.

 

40K actually doesn't have much of that. It just takes what we already know and fear in the worst stereotypes, makes them the typical existence, magnifies them and then says "This is your sandbox."

 

Science fiction is a collaborative genre meant to encourage thinking. Most of the encouraged thinking I see in 40K comes from the fans, not the background. After all, look how much thinking Vulkan Lives and Deliverance Lost encouraged.

[Chaeron]

Interesting that you raise this - Abnett's work in reviews is often categorised as military sci-fi, and I'd probably call the genre  overarchingly one of science fiction and fantasy. I don't clamour for it to be more than it is, but interesting to see how others position it as a literary genre.

[Conn Eremon]

His Gaunt's Ghosts stuff is, but I think that label is added for little more reason than ease. The setting appears like scifi, even though it has an obvious fantasy core once you look past the presentable surface, and the series is about the setting's military. Therefore, military scifi.

 

It is as inaccurate a label as calling Star Wars' original trilogy, which is about a militant rebel army fighting an insurgency, a military scifi. But, it is an easy one to slap on.

[Wade Garrett]

A human who has evolved a specific set of genes required to tap into an unknown, omnipresent, and unlimited source of energy fueled inexplicably by human emotion to manipulate physical reality and the properties of matter around him is science fiction.

 

HARRY POTTER is a science fiction setting now?

[GhostLegion]

Hmm...come to think of it we might just as well leave off and point to that wonderful quote... (paraphrasing) any sufficiently advanced technology might as well be magic.

 

Cant always explain it..it just is

Dont know why it works...it just does

And when it doesnt? When things just start to go, well, wrong? Why then there are...spoilers...

[Brother_Ead]

I just finished Flight of the Eisenstein and one thing I really appreciated about it was the alien bottle ship. It was a generation ship relying on centrifugal force to generate gravity and it contained its own biosphere. The description of the ship inside was great. Instead of there being a horizon in the distance, the ground rose up and curved back around to the other side as though it were a hollow planet turned inside out. To board the ship, the Astartes used boarding pods to breach the outer shell. From the perspective of the aliens, they would have appeared to be burrowing under the ground. They rose up from the bottom of an artificial lake. To top it off, the aliens evolved in an atmosphere of chlorine gas. Unlike aliens in many other science fiction settings they were completely alien. No humans with nose ridges. They didn't resemble humans in any way whatsoever. That was actually refreshing.

 

Forget the bio-metrics. Those are a few decades off in our time. The alien bottle ship and other examples like it are where it's at.

 

I will grant that it was the first time in the Horus Heresy series evoking science fiction in the far distant future. I want more of that too. Maybe what you're sensing from it is the deep connection the setting has with our ancient past as well. The Primarchs and Astartes evoke a setting much more like Homer's Odyssey or Jason and the Argonauts. It is as much historical fantasy as it is distant future science fiction. That sort of apparent contradiction is part of the appeal though. It's like when you combine chocolate and peanut butter. You wouldn't think they'd go together, but they do.

[Cews]

Well the point I was trying to make wasn't just that I want things to be explained. I do not want a long "How It Works" as a military novel. I think Forge World releases some of those already and that's not really the thing I'm going for.

 

Rather, I want some more original thinking with new techs. I brought up the dataslate i URE as an example. Saliva works as an identifier in the system. I thought this was a great touch (and then that tech is used as a way to drive the plot, very well done). In Honour to the Dead, there are some great passages where we get to spend some quality time in a titan. Amazing, I loved every second of that. Monofiliment swords are another of those great things.

 

Can anyone think of more examples?

[Cews]

I just finished Flight of the Eisenstein and one thing I really appreciated about it was the alien bottle ship. It was a generation ship relying on centrifugal force to generate gravity and it contained its own biosphere. The description of the ship inside was great. Instead of there being a horizon in the distance, the ground rose up and curved back around to the other side as though it were a hollow planet turned inside out. To board the ship, the Astartes used boarding pods to breach the outer shell. From the perspective of the aliens, they would have appeared to be burrowing under the ground. They rose up from the bottom of an artificial lake. To top it off, the aliens evolved in an atmosphere of chlorine gas. Unlike aliens in many other science fiction settings they were completely alien. No humans with nose ridges. They didn't resemble humans in any way whatsoever. That was actually refreshing.

 

Forget the bio-metrics. Those are a few decades off in our time. The alien bottle ship and other examples like it are where it's at.

 

I will grant that it was the first time in the Horus Heresy series evoking science fiction in the far distant future. I want more of that too. Maybe what you're sensing from it is the deep connection the setting has with our ancient past as well. The Primarchs and Astartes evoke a setting much more like Homer's Odyssey or Jason and the Argonauts. It is as much historical fantasy as it is distant future science fiction. That sort of apparent contradiction is part of the appeal though. It's like when you combine chocolate and peanut butter. You wouldn't think they'd go together, but they do.

Oh this. Yes, this! Great stuff!

 

And I agree, I think the semi-mythological setting is one of the biggest treats of 40k. 

 

I still want to know what happened to Joe and the carnifex though...

[Chaeron]

His Gaunt's Ghosts stuff is, but I think that label is added for little more reason than ease. The setting appears like scifi, even though it has an obvious fantasy core once you look past the presentable surface, and the series is about the setting's military. Therefore, military scifi.

 

It is as inaccurate a label as calling Star Wars' original trilogy, which is about a militant rebel army fighting an insurgency, a military scifi. But, it is an easy one to slap on.

 

Yeah, certainly as a subgenre of sci-fi anyway. I'm not saying it's a bad term per se - I just wonder if it's necessarily the right one. I've seen ADB's, amongst others, slapped with that tag too.

 

Not that I'm clamouring for a new, more appropriate subgenre or name necessarily - but it's interesting from a literary point of view to see where one positions it.