HH 53: Titan Death by Guy Haley

[bluntblade]

I haven't read Titandeath yet, but the complaints that some of the Frater have had regarding Sanguinius (even if the point is them losing and regrouping on Terra) in the final battle of Beta Garmon have been the same things I've personally complained about a bunch which is the lack of tactical genius shown by Primarchs in novels or in general, outside of the Exemplary Battles in the black books. We're stuffed to the gills with the pathos of the Primarchs which I get, the HH is a grand tragedy but the authors tend to lean heavily on the flaw side of the greatness/flaw coin when it comes to presenting them. Horus hasn't once on camera shown the brilliance that showed he deserved being made Warmaster nor any of his brothers who were in the running. Primarch v primarch duels are cute and when written well some of the best stuff in the series but it's easily used as filler to show the potency of them as opposed to tactical brilliance. But perhaps I protest too much.

No, I think you're right. In the BL books we haven't had anything like FW's Conquest, which makes you believe that Horus really is that masterful a commander.

[carlisimo]

Sanguinius has been less comfortable with himself due to his visions than Konrad Curze.

 

To be fair, the Night Haunter’s visions broke him, but that allowed him to come to terms with it and move on (as a traitor). Sanguinius has been in a funk over his visions ever since Signus, and it’s not what we expected. I’m ready for him to be put out of his misery.

[b1soul]

Horus will certainly put him out of his misery

[malika666]

Any new Titan classes or weapons mentioned?

[drooling blood]

Welp. That book was tough going. Unnecessary in the grand scheme of things. But I guess BL is still beholden to flog stuff off.

Took 2 weeks instead of the usual 2 days. It wasnt, the read 3 pages of a Salamader novel, fall asleep bad. But pretty close.

Got to the part where he writes about a knight leaping stuff, scratched chin, thought C.S Goto has got some competition.

Put the book down and wont be picking it or any other stuff Haley writes about, unless its tanks, up again.

[Marshal Rohr]

Any new Titan classes or weapons mentioned?

A non-combat oriented Scout/spotter Titan that sounded really cool. Nemesis and Night Gaunts get a mention as well, which makes me thing they will get a model.

[Beren]

Welp. That book was tough going. Unnecessary in the grand scheme of things. But I guess BL is still beholden to flog stuff off.

Took 2 weeks instead of the usual 2 days. It wasnt, the read 3 pages of a Salamader novel, fall asleep bad. But pretty close.

Got to the part where he writes about a knight leaping stuff, scratched chin, thought C.S Goto has got some competition.

Put the book down and wont be picking it or any other stuff Haley writes about, unless its tanks, up again.

 

Which pattern of Knight?

[Marshal Rohr]

A Quaestoris in low gravity vaults over debris, edit, and not like transformers where it’s an athletic jump. He just kind of pushes off the ground and gets up high enough to go over the obstacle. In low gravity.

[Beren]

Makes a lot more sense in that context.

[DarkChaplain]

Things being complained about on here usually do make a lot more sense in context rather than brief cliffnote spoilers, I find.

[Orwell84]

Welp. That book was tough going. Unnecessary in the grand scheme of things. But I guess BL is still beholden to flog stuff off.

Took 2 weeks instead of the usual 2 days. It wasnt, the read 3 pages of a Salamader novel, fall asleep bad. But pretty close.

Got to the part where he writes about a knight leaping stuff, scratched chin, thought C.S Goto has got some competition.

Put the book down and wont be picking it or any other stuff Haley writes about, unless its tanks, up again.

 

Took me a week from last Saturday so I get what you mean. Parts of this novel I did like: the opening flashback to Solaria's homeworld, the scenes with the Dark  New Mechanicum (as we rarely see non-Astartes traitor perspectives), and the amusing exchange about childbirth between pregnant Esha and the magos medicae. But the combat scenes tended to blur into each other by the end; only Sangy's take-down of Axis Mundi was noticeable.

 

The final scene with the Great Mother also stood out for me: 

 

she discovers that the Imperial Truth was indeed a lie and that all anybody can look forward to on dying is a glimpse of heaven followed by hordes of daemons and horror. At least her soul was saved by the Machine-God, but still I found it very depressing even by 30k standards.

[mc warhammer]

she discovers that the Imperial Truth was indeed a lie and that all anybody can look forward to on dying is a glimpse of heaven followed by hordes of daemons and horror. At least her soul was saved by the Machine-God, but still I found it very depressing even by 30k standards.

 

 

so souls can actually be saved, right? they don't ALL get gobbled by chaos?

[Apothecary Vaddon]

we've kind of known that souls can be saved, even by the Emperor, from written fiction before. Imperial Glory's ending had the protagonist regiment end up at the Emperor's side, prepping with a whole host of other people who'd died in service to the Imperium, IIRC

[mc warhammer]

right, good to know...i’d gotten the impression from some posters here that wasn’t a possibility. cheers

[Marshal Rohr]

I don’t know how accurate that is given ADB has explicitly said all souls are consumed.

[mc warhammer]

hmmm, ok...back to being confused then

[godking]

I don’t know how accurate that is given ADB has explicitly said all souls are consumed.

Cyrene's soul was returned from the warp this would not have been possible had her soul been consumed

[1ncarnadine]

 

 

I don’t know how accurate that is given ADB has explicitly said all souls are consumed.

Cyrene's soul was returned from the warp this would not have been possible had her soul been consumed

You're willing to trust a ritual involving Erebus?

[Rob P]

There is no consensus on this. My head canon is that souls can survive in the warp but they are prey for warp entities.

 

Perhaps belief in the Emperor in the corporeal world creates a pocket realm of the Emperor in the same way that other gods have realms inhabited by their daemons. Perhaps not.

 

It's confusing because the warp is a place but it's also an energy. Are ghost warriors (e.g. those seen in MoM(?) actual dead heroes or just a manifestation of warp energy?

 

When someone is made a daemon prince, to what extent is it the same person? Is it a clone of them made in warp energy or are they elevated? To what extent are the denizens of the warp soul eaters and to what extent do the souls just disperse? Is the warp full of chaotic entities? Are therefore areas of the warp empty of entities? To what extent are chaotic entities (not the gods) independent of belief in the corporeal universe? What really happens to the soul when things die but don't die? (e.g. perpetuals / Eldar going into soul stones)

[Scribe]

We know that not all souls are consumed, because of Cyrene, and Daemon's being made of specific Souls. Then you have things like Legion of the Damned, Saint's, and so on. If I remember right Cyrene was being tormented by Daemons while 'dead'.

 

This note on some afterlife gathering is interesting because (and I have not read this book) it imply's that the Emperor-As-Warp-Power already exists, and has a Realm within the Warp. Heck now we have someone saying they went to be with the Omnissiah, and we have never (to my knowledge) had confirmation on the Omnissiah as a Warp Entity (its the Dragon duh!).

 

This poses a number of questions.

 

1. Did the author make a mistake? Lets assume not.

 

2. In that case, has the Emperor-As-Warp-Power (EAWP) been 'born' like when Slaanesh was born? If so, when did that happen? It must have been post HH..in fact, it would have to be a very recent thing, because you cannot tell me that the likes of Lorgar, Magnus, and Mortarion would not be aware of a new God in the Warp, that was the Emperor Reborn. Its comical to even suggest it.

 

3. If the EAWP has not yet been fully realized, is this similar to the old (3rd? 2nd?) Starchild fluff? Is this an army in waiting that is somehow under the protection of a currently dormant or stirring Warp Power?

 

4. We know that there are relationships between the Warp Powers, and we have been told for literally decades that the Big 4 are the most powerful of their kind, but not the ONLY of their kind. The Chaos Gods, Mork and Gork, and the Eldar Powers (Khaine still exists, though shattered, Isha is with Nurgle, and Cegorach is still out and about) but these God's are aware of eachother and would seem to have relationships, as the sharing of a 'portfolio' in the old D&D sense, Khaine and Khorne, Isha and Nurgle, Cegorach and Tzeentch, for example.

 

5. Not all Soul's are consumed, again, as we have Soul's hidden (Infinity Circuit) Soul's 'saved' aka Consumed by a God not Chaos, and then the oddly out of place Perpetuals (thanks again Abnett) just seem to exist under some mode of protection.

 

All very interesting stuff, and it would make sense if the Emperor had croaked and been reborn as the Starchild fluff had it outlined decades ago.

 

EDIT: I still maintain that the recent Eldar changes did more damage to the fabric of the setting than anything post Gathering Storm, but one off things like in that Guard book dont contribute to a unified vision certainly.

[Scribe]

Orwell84: What exactly was so distressing about the scene if I may ask? I'm curious if I should get this as I'm looking for a dose of my grim darkness over the holiday. :p

[Marshal Rohr]

If the emperor does gather souls to him I personally wouldn’t consider it like the chaos gods, but a powerful psychic manipulation of the warp

[Scribe]

On what grounds though? That would mean essentially, the Emperor not even ascended, is powerful enough to deny the Chaos Gods, within their own Realm.

 

If the Emperor is a full on Warp Power, sure, fine, just like Mork and Gork keep their own, the Eldar are able to keep their's if they are dedicated to Cegorach (and again this new Eldar fluff REALLY messes things up) but if the Emperor is NOT a Warp Power, how does that work, and if he's so strong to do that and NOT be a Warp Power, does that not make a mockery of the setting anyway?

[Marshal Rohr]

Because he doesn’t need to be a warp power to have power over the warp. The gods call him anathema, so that makes me think he is something other to them. The ork gods and Eldar gods don’t have that similar influence. The astronomicon itself is painful to them and is unique to the emperor, or his death wouldn’t matter because they could just go on sacrificing more psykers, and the lore has always stated more psykers are fed into it than ever before and still it wanes. It doesn’t make a mockery of the setting because the Emperor has always been a countervailing force to chaos, since the earliest lore. If he has unlocked the ability to stop souls from being absorbed into their essence, that could be the power he learned from the on Molech. It’s also pointless if he can, because he clearly doesn’t stop the souls of his most fervent supporters from being eaten in the warp, and it’s only a select few (of which no criteria has been given) that experience this fate after death.

[Apothecary Vaddon]

If ADB did say that (I'd like to see where, what the context of that was), then it'd almost fly right into the bucket of what one author thinks versus another.