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Path of Heaven - Discussion


b1soul

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I don't think the Heresy needs to end after the siege. Forgeworld and bl have set up as lot of potential great stories. I do think we should get to the "end" first, though, and Path of Heaven seems to help in that regard.

 

I think it was mentioned in Convention Secundus that the Heresy series ends with Horus v The Emperor, and that after that we'd get a series about The Scouring which would cover all that stuff.

Just finished it myself (was staunchly avoiding this thread for fear of spoilers until then :p )

 

I really enjoyed it, maybe not quite as much as Scars, but that's more a statement about how good Scars was than anything else. This one's still in my top 10 novels of the series.

It definitely picks up as it goes. The first part does drag somewhat, but I don't feel that's due to bad writing, that's just part of what it's showing. The Scars are worn down and less exuberant than they were, caught up in a complex, scattered conflict where some may feel like they're dying but achieving little. I think that comes across. And it really takes off once we do get past that.

 

Favourite bits:

 

 

Yesugei's sacrifice. As soon as he says he knows what needs to be done I was thinking "No, Yesugei, don't do it...", and I could feel those he contacted, his friends, so desperately wanting to stop him. Ilya crying out, Arvida determined to change it with perfect Thousand Son pride, the Khan ordering him down. It was a powerful moment.

The Emperor's Children. They were well crafted, with some genuinely funny moments, and you can see their transition continuing even now.

 

Mortarion. We don't see a huge amount of him and the Death Guard, but what we do see only reaffirms my desire to see Mr. Wraight do the novel showing their fall.

The Khan's battle with Manushya-Rakshsasi, god that was awesome. Pure determination from the Khan turning into an epic speech. When I got to "So look on me now, yaksha, and know your slayer" and tearing out the daemon's still-beating heart I just had to stop and put some Slayer on, it was too damn metal not to :D

 

 

 

I really wish the reader didn't make voices for the characters they all sounded terrible.

Bad Asian accents when Scars speak Gothic?

By the end of the book I felt that every astartes is a chain smoking alcoholic the way every voice was raspy. Poor Mortarion was the worst, he sounded like a frog with asthma. Maybe because I always figured Mort to have a soft whispery voice and this was so over the top for a primarch that moves silently and sneaks up on everyone.

I can never bring myself to buy an audio version of a book because of that. I listened to the excerpts on black library and all I can think of is "Just make it an actual audiobook with real voice actors".

 

Listening to an audio only voiced by one person will never be as good as Butchers Nails or Red & Black.

Nitpicking: Those are "actual audiobooks". Audiobooks are plain readings by a consistent narrator. What you're refering to are audio dramas. They're dramatizations with different actors, sound effects, soundtracks and what not.

My mistake.

This is a good point... the sheer cost in producing an Audio Drama such as Butchers Nails (wub.png ) and more recently The Eagle's Talon or Red Marked for example is astronomical when compared to a reading from one solitary Voice Actor for an Audiobook. Sword of Truth is BL's longest Audio Drama clocking in around 2 hours 20 for £14.99 while Red Marked is 1 hour 15 for £9.99. The newly released Seventh Serpent Audiobook by comparison runs at 4 hours 30 for £14.99 while the Path of Heaven runs at 13 hours 30 for £29.99. I think to make any kind of return for a 13 + hour Audio Drama they'd be charging us around the £100 mark eek.gif

Not saying that i wouldn't enjoy a Novel such as The Path of Heaven done in this format, just that i probably couldn't afford it lol! sweat.gif

My fav Mortarion voice is still my tied-for-fav narrator: Martyn Ellis in A Thousand Sons. You gotta hear it, at Nikea, the raspy inhaling breathes of poisonous fumes and how you could tell Morty's voice was giving out at the end of each sentence, and the hateful emotion, and the ad-libbed wheezes and gasps. Banks's take on Mortarion was better than Armstrong's in Vengeful Spirit. Also my other fav narrator is the mighty David Timpson, whose voice talents I first fell "in love with" in my first and still finest bit of audio drama casting, in Butcher's Nails as Angron. Even knowing dik-all about the HH at that time I was struck by that voice matching this new angry guy with roid rage and axes on the cover of the CD. Just perfect.wub.png

My fav Mortarion voice is still my tied-for-fav narrator: Martyn Ellis in A Thousand Sons. You gotta hear it, at Nikea, the raspy inhaling breathes of poisonous fumes and how you could tell Morty's voice was giving out at the end of each sentence, and the hateful emotion, and the ad-libbed wheezes and gasps. Banks's take on Mortarion was better than Armstrong's in Vengeful Spirit. Also my other fav narrator is the mighty David Timpson, whose voice talents I first fell "in love with" in my first and still finest bit of audio drama casting, in Butcher's Nails as Angron. Even knowing dik-all about the HH at that time I was struck by that voice matching this new angry guy with roid rage and axes on the cover of the CD. Just perfect.wub.png

Yes!! David is sorely underused these days, and his performance as Angron was crazy good! He also used this same style for Seth of the flesh tearers in Blood in Machine, that literally had me believing he was a psychotic killer of orc flesh! Sadly though along with Sean Barrett and Martin Ellis since Black Library moved their audio production away from Heavy Entertainment and in house they haven't really used these three in many recent projects at all. I'm hoping they get Martin back to handle The Crimson King though, that would be awesome!

John's Mortarion was a little weird though, at first i had trouble listening to it as it reminded me of a mutant or goblin! We do have to take into account the ADR Directors input for these books too though as they won't let the voice artist just do what they want. I know Samual Gunn used to pretty much do all the direction for Black Librarys audio books / dramas when handled by Heavy Entertainment but there's no credits for directors these days. I'm just glad that Stephen Perring wasn't given Path of Heaven, for me he completely butchered everything he touched in War Without End!

Just finished it myself (was staunchly avoiding this thread for fear of spoilers until then tongue.png )

Snap!

Thoroughly enjoyed, really good read.

Two minor things about the Deathshroud though...

The classic 'two Deathshroud within 49 paces of Mortarion' didn't seem to happen in this - which is a shame, just because I really liked that as a 'thing'! Appreciate Scars saw seven of them cut down at once but...

And, then why only 12 teleporting with Mortarion? I could understand 13 and Mortarion, or 14 of them - just seemed odd to specific the number without linking it to the traditional favoured number, I felt!

Two, incredibly minor things, just as a lover of all things Death Guard laugh.png

On the subject of all this audio, has anyone listened to Grey Talon?

 

Yup, it's a real high quality piece! The story is a great little expose into the mind of Iron Hand Bion Henricos who we met in Scars and also focuses quite a lot on Hibou Khan from the same novel, he also appeared in the short story Little Horus but was unfortunatly absent from Path of Heaven... I'm hopeful that the rest of the Meduson Anthology follows suit, as far as I'm aware it hasn't had a regular release yet other than this audio adaption which was followed by The Either from the same collection. Both are really well done, easily on par with the production quality of Red Marked.

My fav Mortarion voice is still my tied-for-fav narrator: Martyn Ellis in A Thousand Sons. You gotta hear it, at Nikea, the raspy inhaling breathes of poisonous fumes and how you could tell Morty's voice was giving out at the end of each sentence, and the hateful emotion, and the ad-libbed wheezes and gasps. Banks's take on Mortarion was better than Armstrong's in Vengeful Spirit. Also my other fav narrator is the mighty David Timpson, whose voice talents I first fell "in love with" in my first and still finest bit of audio drama casting, in Butcher's Nails as Angron. Even knowing dik-all about the HH at that time I was struck by that voice matching this new angry guy with roid rage and axes on the cover of the CD. Just perfect.wub.png

Yes!! David is sorely underused these days, and his performance as Angron was crazy good! He also used this same style for Seth of the flesh tearers in Blood in Machine, that literally had me believing he was a psychotic killer of orc flesh! Sadly though along with Sean Barrett and Martin Ellis since Black Library moved their audio production away from Heavy Entertainment and in house they haven't really used these three in many recent projects at all. I'm hoping they get Martin back to handle The Crimson King though, that would be awesome!

John's Mortarion was a little weird though, at first i had trouble listening to it as it reminded me of a mutant or goblin! We do have to take into account the ADR Directors input for these books too though as they won't let the voice artist just do what they want. I know Samual Gunn used to pretty much do all the direction for Black Librarys audio books / dramas when handled by Heavy Entertainment but there's no credits for directors these days. I'm just glad that Stephen Perring wasn't given Path of Heaven, for me he completely butchered everything he touched in War Without End!

Oh man, I'd love to see Ellis do Crimson King. Feels almost...necessary:) I'm not sure how the move in-house has affected actors but I would imagine it's obviously not more expensive to do it this way so maybe just actor availability? UK actors have something like equity has in the States. But BL are wise in practice, so hire an actor and make the most of that actor's day, which may be more than one work, naturally (especially for actresses).

I didn't mind Perring, though frankly it was nice to get some variety. What did you not like about Perring, just curious? I miss Barret who was on BNails, and that first experience I was stunned at that voice, all the voices on that audio drama, and how it so perfectly fit with the idea of the IP in my head. Like, crazy good! Timspon I miss but at least he's done Fulgrim, Legion, Angel Ext...I don't think any others as a narrator. He was in Perfection and Gotrek's voice (like Angron's voice) when they did a full drama after the Slayer of the Storm god audio several years ago. They need to bring back Danny Webb as well. His Lightning Tower/Dark King still one of the best. When I heard him read the teaser trailer in 2014 for End Times I was so psyked! Oh well.

@plague - I listened to Grey Talon again right after relistening to Scars and then just now restarting PoH. What are your thoughts with GT?

Finally got the book. The writing is good so far, but I must admit it is difficult to enjoy, mainly because of the heavy focus on the Third Legion (I call them that because the true Emperor's Children died on Isstvan III). I just find them so...utterly contemptible and disgusting, that any scenes where they are not getting slaughtered grates.

 

Just finished it myself (was staunchly avoiding this thread for fear of spoilers until then :P )

 

 

Snap!

 

Thoroughly enjoyed, really good read. 

 

Two minor things about the Deathshroud though...

 

 

The classic 'two Deathshroud within 49 paces of Mortarion' didn't seem to happen in this - which is a shame, just because I really liked that as a 'thing'! Appreciate Scars saw seven of them cut down at once but...

 

And, then why only 12 teleporting with Mortarion? I could understand 13 and Mortarion, or 14 of them - just seemed odd to specific the number without linking it to the traditional favoured number, I felt!

 

Two, incredibly minor things, just as a lover of all things Death Guard :lol:

Nah, there were some Deathshroud who walked away from the Prospero duel (always thought Arvida deserved more credit for surviving an all-out brawl between Terminators)

Having finally read it myself, I have to say I was very pleased. I've been critical of Wraight's writing before, particularly Scars and Battle for the Fang, but a lot of the moments I cringed at in those two novels were very much absent in this one. The two biggest improvements were with the Primarchs (everything here was leagues better than that Ullanor scene from Scars) and the Legion character (which was not as much of a racial caricature this time).

 

All in all, I enjoyed reading this novel. I liked how he is showing the evolution from Legion to Chapter, with the Master of the Hunt taking over as the Second in Command and the bitter, hateful Tachseer being seen as the spiritual heart of the Legion due to his role in Scars. Eidolon was much better than in Fulgrim, though a bit one-dimensional still.

 

If Wraight's future works are closer to this than the likes of Battle for the Fang, I will be very happy.

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