Your thoughts on the Primaris and lore progression

[Xenith]

Consider:

• Space Marine Codices come out - new models (Primaris).
• Chaos Codex came out - no new models
• Death Guard codex - new models, plague zombies
• KSons codex - no new models, ports of non power Armour goat men from fantasy.
• Guard Codex comes out - no new models.
• AdMech comes out - no new models.
• Eldar comes out - no new models.
• Tyranids come out - no new models.
• Custodes come out - unknown new models

There does seem to be a push towards phasing out anything that isn't wearing Power Armour...

Fixed that for you.

[Arachnofiend]

Consider:

1. Space Marine Codices come out - new models (Primaris).
2. Chaos Codices come out - new models (Death Guard and TKSons).
3. Guard Codex comes out - no new models.
4. AdMech comes out - no new models.
5. Eldar comes out - no new models.
6. Tyranids come out - no new models.
7. Custodes come out - new models (the entire sodding range).

There does seem to be a push towards phasing out anything that isn't wearing Power Armour...

I like how this list just skips over the Chaos Daemons codex and the new Nurgle Daemons that were released with it entirely.

[Brother-Chaplain Kage]

Oh noes, prettier Marine models! Better flee!

 

Just because you're fine with it doesn't mean everyone else will, or has to be. 

[Firepower]

I just ignore it, really.  I've been ignoring fluff since the catastrophe of 6th edition.

 

Whether or not I ultimately hate it all depends on what models arise from the new range.  They will never be Templars for me, but some Imperial Fists may loan a few to my Crusade...if they ever come out with a good looking stabby squad.  If they just slap swords on those ugly Inceptors and call it a day, then no deal :P

 

I've accepted that I have no control over how GW moves its fluff 'forward,' and the terrible decisions they make, but I have total control over the fluff I adhere to.

 

And for the record, I'm almost 32 and have been in 40k since 2nd edition.  I miss 'proper' Grimdark and the camp irony, and the virtuous paragons Marines have become and simplified good versus evil of the current setting grinds my teeth to nubs, but then I just ignore it and cuddle my 4th edition Templar dex for another night of zealous dreams. B)

[Brother Lunkhead]

I feel your pain brother I'm an old timer and love the grittiness of the old 40k universe. The new Dark Millennium storyline is not without merit but it is rather sloppy. I like the Primaris ok, but I'm not jumping up and down about them..... the whole new setting leaves me a bit..... meh. But, the sad fact is we are no longer the target audience. I haven't given up on it just yet.... I'm still holding onto the old grit and grim in my heart and head. However, I can see the day when I'm pushed over the edge and out of the way too.

 

But, until then......Courage and Honour!

[Lexington]

For twenty years, Rick Priestly and John Blanche's original vision has kept me from drifting too far in my affections, but now, this new GW has instituted a break with the past. It was the past that held me, and GW is looking to a new future.

So, there's this saying, don't remember where it came from, but it goes like this - "good stories don't give you what you want, they give you what you need."

 

The Dark Imperium is 40K's new story, or at least its new present. All the seals in the old setting that were there - materially or metaphorically - to keep all hell from breaking loose, it relentlessly tore open like a greedy little kid on Christmas morning. The Cadian Gate is smashed, Chaos has come through, Primarchs of both flavors areactive in the setting again, and all the rest of the Heresy's karmic weight is snapping back again on the Imperium that came out of its ashes. It's the End Times, you know?

 

Except it's not.

 

Despite a hundred-plus years of advancement, the setting's still just...stuff happening. Space Marines fight things, Primarchs bounce off of each other like angry little ping-pong balls, swearing vengeance against each other that'll never be fulfilled. It's all presented as big and important and a lot of unnamed, unremembered people die in the backdrop, but it's all weightless, contextless set placement for an unending war of Primarchs and their followers, forever and ever, amen.

 

It's fanservice is what it is, and no one needs fanservice. 40K's better than that, or at least it used to be. It set up Primarchs and the Traitor Legions and the possibility of a great, galactic reckoning that we all wanted, but Priestley and Chambers and all of others who made that 40K knew damn well that we didn't need to cross those thresholds. The setting's poorer not just for their personal absence, but for the lack of that kind of basic narrative wisdom.

 

The new 40K, this sad and gormless thing that wears the old setting's skin, doesn't deserve your attention or your anguish. It just deserves to be ignored.

[Lord_Caerolion]

To play devils advocate, we've been told that the setting will now be progressing. The reason stuff hasn't already happened is so that they didn't start of 8th Edition with "Enjoy the Primaris Marines! By the way, Helbrecht has fallen in battle off-screen, as has Ezekiel, Dante, Mephiston, Prince Yriel, all Imperial Guard special characters, and Gazgkhull is in full retreat after Yarrick has mortally wounded him". The characters are bouncing off each other because this is the set-up. Now that this is done, we can see Magnus and Mortarion deciding to beat each other into paste, or Lelith falling in battle only for Ynnead to not revive her for her lack of faith, etc.

 

It remains to be seen as to whether this is what will happen, or whether it's blind optimism.

[Lexington]

The characters are bouncing off each other because this is the set-up.

I think there's a larger argument to be had here around Big Characters and how their bland personal dramas dominating the setting is a terrible trend anyway, but more importantly to your point - we're past the setup. We've had our first taste of 40K's new, moving background in the Ultramar campaign this past summer. I think the fact that everyone just up and forgot about it, like, two days afterwards says all that needs to be said about how much impact future storylines will end up having.

[Marshal Rohr]

Primaris Marines are the ultimate example of being careful what you wish for. I’m convinced someone found a monkeys paw and made all the wishes really fast before they knew the consequences.

[Lord_Caerolion]

 

The characters are bouncing off each other because this is the set-up.

I think there's a larger argument to be had here around Big Characters and how their bland personal dramas dominating the setting is a terrible trend anyway, but more importantly to your point - we're past the setup. We've had our first taste of 40K's new, moving background in the Ultramar campaign this past summer. I think the fact that everyone just up and forgot about it, like, two days afterwards says all that needs to be said about how much impact future storylines will end up having.

 

 

They're giving us all the codexes first. They're not following the same mistakes they made in Age of Sigmar, and churning out books continuing the plotline, while whole races like the Elves are completely forgotten. They're now giving everyone their book before they start continuing things.

 

I do agree about the trend on overly focussing on single characters for each faction. I'm still disappointed about the Farsight Enclaves books that were supposed to be about the subfaction as a whole, but ended up just being "here's the history of Farsight, with a handful of paragraphs about his bestest buddies. Oh, and here's a sentence or two about the planets that comprise the Enclaves".

[SpecialIssue]

Primaris are the result of commercial realities taking precedence (as they should for a public company) over lore. In the short term, lore is made up - it doesn't matter, you can make up almost anything to justify any release.

 

But 40k was built on a foundation of myth, legend, half-truths, lies and forgotten ages. It is built on the gravitas that comes with giving glimpses of the power and scale of the universe, leaving immense mysteries and conflicting views unresolved. Lately GW has merely been riding, and crudely cashing in, on 30 years' worth of buildup of this gravitas. The Primarchs are only viewed with such awe and their comeback as such an event because for decades we knew them as how they were known in-universe - as distant legends. Now they're just another character, a flash-in-the-pan release that is a commodity that soon fades into ignoble normalcy.

 

The latest release of the Adeptus Custodes is perhaps the most recent example of this.

Marshal Loss, on 06 Jan 2018 - 11:49 PM, said:

By the standards of Warhammer 40,000, they are an absurdly rare and hyper-elite force that is borderline mythic to everybody in the setting. When Grey Knights were part of Daemonhunters, you'd rarely see more than a single squad or two with a master, lending their might to another Imperial Force. It helped preserve that mythic quantity. I liked that a lot, and I'm sure others did too.

 

Custodes have been traditionally even rarer. Limited to the throne world for 10,000 years, the bodyguards for a monarch who is essentially a corpse that has a useful function as a giant psychic light bulb. Making them a full army takes away from of that mystique because now they're just a full army like everything else.

 

There are pros and cons to both sides here. People love mystery and want to know more and see more, which leads to GW fleshing it out (see: the Horus Heresy) and monetising it, which in turn kills the mystery and keeps the cycle going on. Ten years ago Grey Knights felt insanely cool and special to me. Now they're just another army. It will be the same with Custodes. I'm glad people enjoy them and are going to play them, don't get me wrong; all the power to them. But it's not for everybody. I'd prefer new xenos or something exciting and different rather than just another super rare Imperial faction shoved into the limelight. Also, FW has already released Jetbikes and Terminators for Custodes...

 

Nobody should be saying they 'shouldn't be an army,' though, but to each their own.

 

SpecialIssue, on 07 Jan 2018 - 01:00 AM, said:

I will be sad to see the sense of wonderment and awe that the Custodes once had, that last golden link to a forgotten age cloistered away at the heart of the Imperium, lost to commodification as just another army.

 

In order for the fiction to have any resonance, there needs to be some restraint on what legends are de-mythified.

 

There were far more pressing needs in other armies that are far more prominent in-universe, and whose themes aren't wrapped up in mystery and rarity, that needed new models. Plastic Eldar aspects, Tau auxiliaries, Renegade Guard, Rough Riders, Dark Eldar beasts, Chaos marine basic kits, Sisters of Battle for chrissakes, etc etc.

 

The commercial aspect of this release I feel is blatant - loyalist PA sells, no matter the flavour, and so whenever possible, it'll be done, and damn the mythology and themes that made it possible. It doesn't matter that there are only 10,000 of em in the entire galaxy, or that they're role isn't supposed to be open warfare. That is fluff, not hard sales.

 

I would like a bit more stewardship of the IP, not its milking. Broadening and exploring the universe as at the 41st millennium, not reducing it to a Greatest Hits of the Horus Heresy - safely piggy backing off what has been shown before, cashing in all that mystique and awe built over decades for a single flash in the pan that then relegates its source to ignoble normalcy from then on.

 

Flick through Visions of Heresy and all that artwork by Blanche and Smith. Will the awe and wonder in those images ever be the same, as the unattainable and only imagined, that glimpse into something above and beyond the tabletop? That is how the Custodes have been, and should be in the 41st millennium. Restraint in giving away the secrets and rarities people clamour for is important for the setting's long-term integrity.

 

And so it goes. Trading the themes that set 40k apart from all other settings and sci-fi cheaply, for a flash-in-the-pan release. Till as Lexington said, 40k is only wearing the skin of what it was before, while everything that made that image possible and gave it weight in the first place, the themes, the struggles, the ugliness and complexity, has all been discarded.

 

I believe I can come up with a much better, more moving idea over what the Custodes are in the 41st millennium.

"Hidden behind their armour, seen only as immovable sentries or unspeaking giants roaming through the Palace, entering or exiting from doors and passages which no-one but they have knowledge of or are privy to. The secrets of their creation dying with Malcador and the Emperor, it is suspect that these statuesque giants are immortal, and now irreplaceable, even if the Imperium knew how to communicate with their leadership reliably. Gene-crafted to guard over the Emperor over all else and loyal only to His commands, their mysterious lack of communication and indeed, intervention in Imperial politics means that any appointments of the Captain-General to one of the High Lords is now largely used as a political tool, thanks to his almost guaranteed absenteeism. Nevertheless, they remain a physical reminder of ancient glory and wonder, an unblemished memory-in-the-flesh of the 10,000-year-old legends that the Imperium is built on."

 

Now look at the images of the Custodes by Blanche and Smith and see the awe in their image that I see, and indeed the High Lords in-universe themselves see.

 

Repeat for the Primarchs, the 13th Black Crusade, the power and status of the Adeptus Astartes, Grey Knights, etc, etc.

[Jarl Caldersson]

I'm going to be blunt, so dont take offense.

 

I don't hate the Primaris. I hate their loadouts. I want a marine like Tacticals/Grey Hunters that can shoot a bolter and wield a chainsword. Elites/Wolf Guard that can wield a stormshield and a frostblade/frostaxe/lightning claw/elite weapons. I want to be able to use a rhino and Land Raiders. Most importantly, to me, I want Terminators!

 

I also fear them. I fear them because I fear that if I started building an army they would be replaced. I fear the little time I spend on building, painting, cherishing a army, will be wiped away IF GW release a Primaris I want. I fear that my favorite unit, terminators, will fall away and be forgotten.

 

GW needs to stop playing games, poking and teasing, and just come straight with us. They are putting hatred and fear into their community by release the Primaris, and the releasing the DG. Is the DG a problem,  not directly but yes because they are much larger than normal SM and thus people hope/fear that true-scale marines are coming.

 

 

EDIT: People feeding rumors and the Rumor Engine itself isn't helping, because a picture could mean something you want is coming. Maybe that generator thing might be a terminator generator, maybe it isn't.

[battle captain corpus]

@mOnolith: I sincerely doubt that GW are naïve enough to wedge Primaris into the Chaos Codecies...and if they do...I will just ignore them as they hold zero interest to me as both a hobbyist and a Chaos player. ;)

 

BCC

[DuskRaider]

I don't mind the Primaris models per say if I view them as GW's attempt to true scale the line. I'm find it disturbing the models no longer have the iconic Chainsword and they seem very monopose, however. When it comes to the new setting... oh god, it's garbage. GW (Citadel) have definitely displayed they are a model and hobby company with the recent fluff which is often just pigeon holed and jammed into the setting by force without any regard to the past at all. I think GW did this for a few reasons: 1) to get people to buy Marines again. 2) To cash in on the truescale community. You don't have to play Primaris as Primaris and they make a lovely base for truescale / artscale Astartes. 3) Chapterhouse Studios. Just before the infamous lawsuit, CHS had release their truescale kits. Now GW has Primaris. Coincidence? *shrug*

 

With that I live by my own fluff, which mainly just revolves around my Grand Company. I do face my friend's pure Primaris list occasionally (and he just got that giant stupid looking FW vehicle too), but it is what it is. 

[Beta galactosidase]

GW has long shown the fans that loyalty means nothing in the face of reporting profit to the shareholders.

 

Priestley and Chambers and all of others who made that 40K knew damn well that we didn't need to cross those thresholds. The setting's poorer not just for their personal absence, but for the lack of that kind of basic narrative wisdom.

 

The new 40K, this sad and gormless thing that wears the old setting's skin, doesn't deserve your attention or your anguish. It just deserves to be ignored.

 

Primaris are the result of commercial realities taking precedence (as they should for a public company) over lore. In the short term, lore is made up - it doesn't matter, you can make up almost anything to justify any release.

 

Lately GW has merely been riding, and crudely cashing in, on 30 years' worth of buildup of this gravitas.

 

I would like a bit more stewardship of the IP, not its milking. Broadening and exploring the universe as at the 41st millennium, not reducing it to a Greatest Hits of the Horus Heresy, cashing in all that mystique and awe built over decades for a single flash in the pan that then relegates its source to ignoble normalcy from then on.

It is true. Recreation and aesthetic stimulation can be very poorly served by a publicly held company. You could even say that shareholder profit has alienated you from what you liked about what you do with your time.

[Warpmiss]

@mOnolith: I sincerely doubt that GW are naïve enough to wedge Primaris into the Chaos Codecies...and if they do...I will just ignore them as they hold zero interest to me as both a hobbyist and a Chaos player. ;)

 

BCC

Honestly, if we got Chaos Primaris and they looked cool I'd buy them since I only buy models I find appealing. If I didn't like their fluff I'd just say exposure to the Warp made them bigger. (Just like Nurgle has turned the PM into thicc bois)

[Corswain]

I really don’t like Primaris, models or fluff, but they haven’t killed 40K for me.

Even if they do squat regular marines, I’m probably still going to enjoy 40K universe. I will just focus elsewhere or in other time periods.

 

They terrible, in my opinion, and it seems like there are a lot of people who feel the same but the easy solution is - Don’t buy them!

 

GW is a business. If it doesn’t sell, they aren’t going to support them, if regular marines do sell, they will support them. We really have to vote with our wallets on this one.

 

Said my piece, I’m out. Before this thread gets nasty.

[DuskRaider]

@mOnolith: I sincerely doubt that GW are naïve enough to wedge Primaris into the Chaos Codecies...and if they do...I will just ignore them as they hold zero interest to me as both a hobbyist and a Chaos player.

 

BCC

 

I can almost guarantee you GW will release Primaris-equivalents for Chaos. 

[Lucerne]

Primaris designs annoy me because they're glorified truescale model frames with a bunch of redundant drek plastered on making them less perfect for their ideal role as truescale conversion kits for Astartes. That literally means everything other than the bodies of the bolt rifle Marines is useless to me...and that's a lot of wasted plastic from my POV, never mind how they're annoyingly not quite right in the details for the older marks of power armor.

[Calyptra]

Ifthe xeno's got revamped first, and marine players knew they were getting revamped down the road, they'd speedbump hard and panick and hitting sales hard, do most of the power armor revamps first, then focus on the xenos.

 

This causes the xeno players to get excited awaiting there line revamp/new models, and mitigates the speed bump of revamping the marine line.

No, this causes xeno players to get tired of waiting and drift off to other games. The ones who are left just assume they're never going to get any new models.

 

Why do you think there are so few xenos players?

 

When was the last time you saw a Xenos player excited about something?

 

Regarding Primaris marines:

 

I'm 40 and started playing back in Rogue Trader. I still love the setting, but at this point I pretty much ignore anything having to do with space marines. Basically, after years of not getting anything for my faction, I stopped caring about the one GW was clubbing me over the head with.

 

Primaris are definitely stupid. If GW hadn't killed my interest in space marines by attempting to drown me in them, I'd probably be angry about it, too.

[totgeboren]

@mOnolith: I sincerely doubt that GW are naïve enough to wedge Primaris into the Chaos Codecies...and if they do...I will just ignore them as they hold zero interest to me as both a hobbyist and a Chaos player.

 

BCC

 

To be realistic, do you think it likely GW will redo the Berzerker box from the 90s and the CSM box from... a few years after in the old scale? With a bit of luck, any new models we get will be in the TS/DG scale, and not the Primaris scale, but that is far from given.

 

Anyway, I think the Primaris models look pretty cool. It's just such a pity that the lore for them clashes so horribly with the setting. The models are an addition, but the lore for them only takes away.

And the big frustration is that there was no reason why they would need to be done like they were done.

 

The lore could as well have been that they were rushed, a panicked stop-gap to halt the tides of Abbadon. Even-better-super-troopers, but essentially Thunder Warriors in a new form. Genetic instability could be common, with them dying from cancers, suffering from mental deficiencies or whatever after just a few decades of service, only a lucky few becoming as old as the venerable marines of the Emperors making. Have them as candles burning at both ends, and they could take the role of a new model range without trampling on the lore or old gamers. They could be an addition to the SM range and lore that was just as dark and bleak as the supposed 'End Times' should indicate.

Now they are added as a shining beacon of hope, something that is sure to win against Chaos, and that doesn't really deliver a sense of desperation.

 

Tied to this is the poor implementation of the Primarchs. The huge and horrible 40k universe was reduced to a single room in a sitcom, with the main actors/Primarchs going in and out like some episode of Friends. Also, due to all their importance, nothing they do feels important. No one can win, no one can die. All sense of hopelessness and desperation just evaporate when we know Guilliman will always arrive just in time to save the day.

[Ishagu]

Eldar and Tau have fantastic and complete model ranges. Neurons, Dark Eldar and Orks have great models but could use a new kit or two. Tyranids have pretty much everything you'd want.

 

I fully expect new models will come, perhaps not with the current codex wave as it seems to just be focused on quick fire releases.

[Radiation]

Have we seen a new Marine kit release since the Primaris range introduction? The Marine line is dead. You wont convince me otherwise until a new kit is released. 

[Leif Bearclaw]

 

So, there's this saying, don't remember where it came from, but it goes like this - "good stories don't give you what you want, they give you what you need."

 

The Dark Imperium is 40K's new story, or at least its new present. All the seals in the old setting that were there - materially or metaphorically - to keep all hell from breaking loose, it relentlessly tore open like a greedy little kid on Christmas morning. The Cadian Gate is smashed, Chaos has come through, Primarchs of both flavors areactive in the setting again, and all the rest of the Heresy's karmic weight is snapping back again on the Imperium that came out of its ashes. It's the End Times, you know?

 

Except it's not.

 

Despite a hundred-plus years of advancement, the setting's still just...stuff happening. Space Marines fight things, Primarchs bounce off of each other like angry little ping-pong balls, swearing vengeance against each other that'll never be fulfilled. It's all presented as big and important and a lot of unnamed, unremembered people die in the backdrop, but it's all weightless, contextless set placement for an unending war of Primarchs and their followers, forever and ever, amen.

 

It's fanservice is what it is, and no one needs fanservice. 40K's better than that, or at least it used to be. It set up Primarchs and the Traitor Legions and the possibility of a great, galactic reckoning that we all wanted, but Priestley and Chambers and all of others who made that 40K knew damn well that we didn't need to cross those thresholds. The setting's poorer not just for their personal absence, but for the lack of that kind of basic narrative wisdom.

 

The new 40K, this sad and gormless thing that wears the old setting's skin, doesn't deserve your attention or your anguish. It just deserves to be ignored.

 

 

Interesting, I've had similar thoughts, but from a different direction. There's been a lot of 'big' things recently as they move 40k forward. Cadia wrecked, Biel Tan wrecked, Cypher getting to Terra (though they admittedly bottled that one), Gulliman coming out of stasis, the Custodes finishing their tea break and going to work again etc. The question is, why are these things big and have weight among the fanbase, whereas whatever happened to Konor doesn't? It seems to me its because these impactful changes are grounded in 30 years of lore, history and love. GW are cashing cheques built up over 30 years, by the creative titans that sculpted this hobby and setting into one of the most interesting and unique properties in fiction. The issue becomes, what happens when the sack is empty? They're not replacing the mystique, gravitas and legend with anything.

 

To borrow an example from video games. I'm starting to feel like we're in a period equivalent to Mass Effect 3. Whatever people's views of that game and its ending, it's generally recognised that the best bits of the story were things like Tuchanka and Rannoch, which were firmly built off of elements of the first two games. Without the groundwork  of the previous games, those segment lose a fair chunk of their pathos. Then Andromeda happened, and less talented writers, without that old foundation (plus a bit of 'how do we follow up galactic war of extinction?'), floundered the story into forgettable inanity. I hope that GW won't continue to burn through their 'history' for short term gain, and will add some mystique back, rather than another round of Marvel-esque hero brawl, but you know what they say about hope round these parts .

[Claws and Effect]

I basically ignore Primaris.

 

We have 10,000 years of history to work with. There's no rule that says our army has to be a "current" one.

 

My Raven Guard currently contain no Primaris. That's because my army is time locked just after the Damocles campaign. Shrike just got his promotion (which is how I rationalize why his statline doesn't match other Chapter Masters).

 

I use the 3rd Company for most of my army even when I include Shrike. I rationalize that as Shrike preferring to work with the same guys he led for a couple centuries over guys he doesn't know as well.

 

I'll probably include some Primaris eventually. My interpretation of how they would integrate into the Raven Guard is that they are grudgingly accepted but not fully trusted. The Raven Guard have a long memory and certainly have not forgotten what happened when Corax tried to make better Marines.

 

In my viewpoint, it's going to take quite a while for the Primaris guys to prove beyond doubt that they aren't abominations like Corax's creations were.

 

As far as the fluff goes? I'm assuming there was a whole team of guys working on the project and Cawl is just taking all the credit. It happens often enough in the real world that I can buy Cawl taking the credit for the work of others easier than Cawl doing it all himself.

 

I still think they should have introduced Cawl himself in the background way before the Primaris were introduced. He feels shoehorned in to give an explanation for the Primaris. It would have worked better if he'd been mentioned a few times as this crazy Magos that spends all his time working on some project he won't tell anyone about. Then when Primaris were introduced, we'd have gone "So that's what the nutter was working on all that time!" -instead of "Where did these bozos come from, and who the hell is this chucklehead?"