HH Series ending soon. Siege will be another series

[Felix Antipodes]

This is just a branding exercise to try and drag in a few more sales. The hardcore fans will still buy them regardless. I'm half expecting a similar approach when the siege raps up, with a 'Horus Heresy: The Scouring' label attached to the next series that follows.

 

For me, the big question is exactly how many books? Before I was thinking 3-5, now I'm fearing 5-10.

[Rob P]

 

it feels like a kick in the teeth to those that have invested in the series and who will now find that it does't actually conclude within the series.

 

This is presumably more histrionic than you intended to sound. A kick in the teeth, really?

 

"The Horus Heresy" printed on the front of the books is just a brand. So, too, will be "The Siege of Terra". The books still tell the one (very big) story whether or not they're branded the same way.

 

This is really no different from when they stopped numbering Star Trek movies after Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country and instead just used subtitles from Star Trek: Generations onwards, or the way that Drizzt Do'Urden's story is told (badly) across a number of (very bad) novel trilogies with different names.

 

 

''A kick in the teeth'' = an idiom. It's not literal. And the analogies given are not equivalent (see below for reasons).

 

 

 

Wow what a super rip-off... milk that cow GW .

How is this any more of a rip-off than making the same number of novels under the Horus Heresy banner? This is exactly like comic fans getting upset when a new #1 launches because something changes with a book. It's literally still Spider-Man having wacky adventures, so it doesn't matter if it's Spider-Man #917 or The Webtastic Wacky Adventures of Spider-Man #8. This is being upset because a rose has another name, but it's still the same flower. If they'd said the HH was such a success they were gonna do 50 more books about the Seige then yeah, that's reason to be annoyed, but the rest is just branding.

 

The analogy is not equivalent.

 

The ''nothing to see here'' facts are:

 

- Arguably the new series is going to run to exactly the same number of books that it would have under the HH label

- Arguably it's going to cover the same events it would have under the HH label

- It's just a different numbering and spine design

 

In summary: It's your favourite cereal in all new packaging.

 

There are a couple of things that bother me and to most people they might be nothing points (which is cool for them). There may be a bit of hyperbole below, but some of it isn't too.

 

The first is the implicit promise in the Horus Heresy series that you will get to the end of the Horus Heresy. The Horus Heresy books are a story arc with an ending not a setting (debatable?) - this is why the analogies are poor. I've invested, i guess, about 150-200 days of my spare time (and the equivalent financial cost of 50 books) to read into a series which doesn't end in the series. I've jumped in and bought all the books in the series with the understanding that they were building to a climax. In retrospect, and I appreciate that this was obvious to a lot of people at the time, a lot of the books are filler. It's probably a big thing that I haven't enjoyed the series as much recently and i've felt a bit compelled to finish it for completeness rather than pure enjoyment. If I felt every book was independently a cracker then maybe i'd feel different. My prediction is that the Beta Garmon book will do worse than the DG book in light of the series shift.

 

On a slightly related note, I didn't have a problem with The Primarchs series (of which I have read none) because they are the Rogue Ones to the main Star Wars story. The Siege is the conclusion of the Horus Heresy series, not a separate story arc. Just before The Scouring is the most obvious cut-off point to me.

 

Next there is the completest/collector angle. It is nice to have the numbered books on your shelf in order right to the end of the series. Again, it ties into the series being a whole arc point. I'd actually feel a lot better if they kept the spine design and numbering in some way and just called it Horus Heresy: Siege of Terra Book 1, 2, 3 etc. So the argument back is that the book design does not affect it's content. This is a collector thing. it could just be me, but, using the example of video games, who doesn't like having the physical product as opposed to a CD key? It's nice to have something you can touch. It's nice to have a physical book over an ebook (not everyone will agree). It's nice to look at a uniform line on a shelf. If I bought one of those crappy magazines that come out at Christmas along the lines of 'The James Bond Collection - with a DVD every 2 weeks for 7.99' and they formed a picture along the spine, I would be disappointed if the last one just came in a black case so the picture looked incomplete. I've still got the substance (the film) but i've lost the aesthetic. Form over substance? Of course it is, but it's not meaningless. It's like if GW brought out a new line of Space Marines that were 2-3mm taller than what you already had . It's still plastic being pushed around the table but it's not quite right.

 

The final thing, which is a little (okay, a lot of) hyperbole is concerns for the new series. I know these will be resolved over time but still. The daftest one is that the new series won't get to the end of the Heresy. It will just focus on the siege and we will have another short series dealing with the climax of the Heresy. Slightly more seriously, that we will get a series that abandons the Knights Errant and the formulation of the inquisition and that they will get another completely different series. maybe even a different one for Mars. After all it's 'The Siege of Terra'. I could also see the series being unnecessarily large. Conversely, i'm concerned characters might get cut or dumbed down to accommodate the self-contained intention of the series.

 

The things I am really looking forward to going forward are: the fate of Little Horus; finding out who lowered the shield, and the role of Oll, on the Vengeful Spirit; and Sigmisund pulling his Diomedes act.

[DukeLeto69]

It is what it is and BL have made the decision there will be a Sieg of Terra mini series. Without any doubt (in my mind) it is to generate sales against a (no proof here just gut instinct) bit of fatigue for the HH series. Personally I would have preferred they had done something like:

 

HH: The Primarchs (all focusing on events before the HH started)

HH (the main series detailing what happened between Davin and the SoT - perhaps necessary for flashbacks to Ullanor and Nikea).

HH: The Scouring

 

Obviously hindsight is a wonderful thing but I wonder how BL could have approached the HH differently? I think there was an ongoing tussle between whether the HH was a setting or a story. Perhaps if they had started out with sub branded series from the beginning it could have worked (and been established) as a setting rather than a roughly chronological story (that by necessity jumps about due to change in character focus etc).

 

Perhaps they could have had many mini series running concurrently focusing on specific legions or factions or events (such as the Burning of Propsero mini series, the Isstvan series, the Schism of Mars series, the Imperium Secundus series, the Thramas Crusade series etc)

 

I have some sympathy though as whatever approach you take it represents a logistical nightmare. It would be like trying to produce an extensive series of books about WWII when you don't actually know everything that happened during WWII and things only surfaced as you wrote the books and undertook additional research (after all there was really only a core backbone to the HH from Alan Merrit and some of it made no sense).

[b1soul]

I would have preferred the following:

 

HH main series covering main plot

(concurent HH Age of Legends series covering side-stories...basically treating Unification Wars, Great Crusade, HH as a long-term setting...Primarch series would be a mini-series within this)

 

HH Scouring series

[Knockagh]

Pretty clear to me they are setting the seige out as a seperate series. This is very frustrating, a final cash cow squeeze on a series they have massively overplayed.

Those of us who have been there from the start have seen a rash of these decisions. From the limited edition novella fiascos, them all being reprinted in the main series, to the two odd unnumbered books on Calth. All these covered by the tale that we would have every book in every format. The Calth books are missing from the numbered series. Most of us have half hardcover half paperback collections because they never rereleased all the early books in hardcover.

Anyway I’ve had a love hate relationship with this series for the last two years, before that it could do no wrong, I was besotted. But faults and all I will be there cheering on the emperor as he mounts his throne bleeding having killed his treasonous youngster.

Now get me the rest of the Forge world Heresy books!!

[DarkChaplain]

Expect the Betrayal at Calth duology to get a numbered entry alongside Hubris of Monarchia.

 

And they actually did release all the books up to Angel Exterminatus (where they changed the release format) in hardcover. They even staggered their releases over the first years after the introduction. What they didn't do is release the large paperbacks after Flight of the Eisenstein until Angel Exterminatus.

[betrayer41]

I just don't understand how this is a cash grab? Either way is would probably be the same number of books so unless a title change means higher price per book it shouldn't make a difference. Id personally rather have more books with some stinkers than too few and it feels rushed.

[Knockagh]

Expect the Betrayal at Calth duology to get a numbered entry alongside Hubris of Monarchia.

 

And they actually did release all the books up to Angel Exterminatus (where they changed the release format) in hardcover. They even staggered their releases over the first years after the introduction. What they didn't do is release the large paperbacks after Flight of the Eisenstein until Angel Exterminatus.

I didn’t realise they released them all in hardback.

 

Any ideas out there how many books the seige series will run too?

[DarkChaplain]

Honestly, I'd be happy with 10. If they maintain the current release pacing, they'd wrap it up within two years. Even if a few of them end up being anthologies, to showcase various theaters of war, I'd be pretty happy with that.

 

I really don't need a strictly linear Siege narrative. At least not fully from novel to novel. I want room for the various scattered plotlines to be finished up, even if it ends up being in novella formats. We can do 4 novellas per anthology, the way The Primarchs and such did it, and Mark of Calth also gave a good overview of the various aspects of the Underworld War. A lot of things at the Siege just don't need to be handled in full novel format, and would either need to be stretched and padded or run parallel to other plotlines with relatively little overlap. Handling things with the options of doing novellas for some pivotal moments or "minor" plotlines would be good in my book, seeing how novellas can be a bit more flexible with their chronology.

 

Give me a core line of novels that goes through the structure of the Siege arc chronologically, from the breach of the Sol System over the planetfall to the breaching of the walls, the big Primarch duels and the shield gambit, the decisive battle between Horus and the Emperor, and the immediate effects afterwards.

But leave room for various little bits, like the civilian militia, the Emperor's Children rampaging, small moments like what we had in the Night Lords trilogy at the Siege, have little vignette stories about those characters we may never hear about again afterwards, and those with a legacy beyond, like the later Chapter Masters. I'd like the Siege to offer the chance for authors across the board to put a little bow on their characters and give them a chance to shine, even if we may not have seen them in 30, 40 books now.

 

Let the Siege be a celebration of the Horus Heresy as a whole, and not a rush job.

[Taliesin]

I think I saw somewhere that  ADB was kicking it off? Please correct me if im wrong though, I don't want to spread false info.

 

BUT if this is true then.......  

 

Definitely not the case, as far as we know. On a podcast a while ago it came up that Thorpe, French and Haley are doing the opening trilogy.

[Scribe]

Really...well I guess that shoots my hopes down.

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

10 novels would be great if they are all high super high quality but TBH I doubt it and I am thinking there will be at least 15 or more. To me I could see at most only three needed at maximum .

[Orwell84]

 

I think I saw somewhere that  ADB was kicking it off? Please correct me if im wrong though, I don't want to spread false info.

 

BUT if this is true then.......  

 

Definitely not the case, as far as we know. On a podcast a while ago it came up that Thorpe, French and Haley are doing the opening trilogy.

 

 

Should work out alright then. French and Haley seem to be consistently liked; Thorpe does tend to get some flak but I've never found him horrible.

 

10 novels would be great if they are all high super high quality but TBH I doubt it and I am thinking there will be at least 15 or more. To me I could see at most only three needed at maximum .

 

Ditto. From what I heard about TBA, quality varied enormously between novels. Hopefully with tighter control it'll work out better this time.

 

Six novels might work out better, maybe toss in one anthology to cover other important/interesting elements. This way, all the legions and primarchs involved get decent airtime without bogging down the series. For my part, I just wonder who's going to pull off that final confrontation (albeit William King's already covered it in years gone by).

[mc warhammer]

I just don't understand how this is a cash grab? Either way is would probably be the same number of books so unless a title change means higher price per book it shouldn't make a difference. Id personally rather have more books with some stinkers than too few and it feels rushed.

 

 

 

cash grab is a cynical way of looking at it, but...there's no real point to rebranding or subbranding or any of that if a company does not believe it can increase sales. even just designing a new logo means investment of extra time and money...something you wouldn't do without the expectation of making that back. you could argue that it's to drag out the series for more $ or that it's a way of streamlining and fixing up a leaky ship

[Lord_Caerolion]

I'd more say it's just a case of stream-lining, to try to set a reference of "and these are the siege books" for the people that specifically want that plot arc. 

[Jareddm]

6 books is my preferred count. 10 is my limit for what I'd consider acceptable.

 

But above all, there better be a damn FW Black Book!

[ZebraM]

6 books is my preferred count. 10 is my limit for what I'd consider acceptable.

 

But above all, there better be a damn FW Black Book!

I doubt we'll get the FW black book for the siege during the BL Siege run, maybe right at the end if they work quick.

[DarkChaplain]

 

10 novels would be great if they are all high super high quality but TBH I doubt it and I am thinking there will be at least 15 or more. To me I could see at most only three needed at maximum .

 

Ditto. From what I heard about TBA, quality varied enormously between novels. Hopefully with tighter control it'll work out better this time.

 

Six novels might work out better, maybe toss in one anthology to cover other important/interesting elements. This way, all the legions and primarchs involved get decent airtime without bogging down the series. For my part, I just wonder who's going to pull off that final confrontation (albeit William King's already covered it in years gone by).

 

 

Don't take TBA as a measurement for it. It was an experiment that spanned years, different office environments and midway changes to the plot, with books being written partially at the same time and out of order with little author interaction. The Horus Heresy has had proper full-on author meetings for years and years, which already puts it above that by default. HH also doesn't have to be written on such short notice, and if there's another book needed, it'll be written, rather than an author having to roll it all up in a single half-length book because that's the format of the series.

 

TBA was a victim of its publication style, upper management putting it on ice with one philosophy and then later taking it back out with other intentions and schedules than originally intended.

 

As for the Siege, I want those 10 books to include the initial rout at least somewhat, to gauge the traitor reactions to Horus' death at the hands of the Emperor, have the remaining Primarchs pay their respects to their half-dead father on his throne, and maybe even have Wraight expand on his scene from the Leman Russ Primarchs novel for an epilogue collection.

 

But again, it really depends on how they want to pull it together. They can condense a lot into novels, but it'd also make the narrative inflexible to a degree. Having an anthology or two in there, like a "Tales of Terra" themed thing, or dedicating a book to the void war across Sol... Depending on what Swallow does in The Buried Dagger, we still haven't had an official founding of the Inquisition, where we'd see Moriana and co as well as the established ones from across the series. There's still the whole Keeler thing to wrap up on Terra... It's easy to underestimate just how much they've got to resolve before they can call it quits. That's why I expect them to take at least half a year off between the end of the HH and the start of the Siege.

[Mellow]

Isn’t it obvious?!

 

They want a mini series so that the siege can be turned into a movie (animated like the world of Warcraft one was)

 

No one was going to turn 50+ novels into a series of movies. It’s too complex for the average movie goer.

[DukeLeto69]

 

I just don't understand how this is a cash grab? Either way is would probably be the same number of books so unless a title change means higher price per book it shouldn't make a difference. Id personally rather have more books with some stinkers than too few and it feels rushed.

 

 

 

cash grab is a cynical way of looking at it, but...there's no real point to rebranding or subbranding or any of that if a company does not believe it can increase sales. even just designing a new logo means investment of extra time and money...something you wouldn't do without the expectation of making that back. you could argue that it's to drag out the series for more $ or that it's a way of streamlining and fixing up a leaky ship

Yeah "cash grab" would be a bit too cynical.

 

There are two ways of looking at the decision to split out and brand the Siege of Terra books as something different but linked to the main HH series.

 

1. BL genuinely feel the HH has become too big and unwieldy and needed a reset (as per my above post they may possibly regret not doing the whole thing as a set of standalone(ish) mini series. They may genuinely believe there are folks out there who may well enjoy just reading about SoT but don't want (or possibly need) to invest time and money in reading the previous 54 books etc.

 

2, The HH Primarch series has proven to be pretty successful (as a sub brand) and they want to repeat the format because it does generate sales. As far as I can tell there are no plans to ever release the Primarch books in MMPB so doing the SoT as a new branded series means BL can swerve their previous commitment to continue to provide the HH series in Hardback->Trade Paperback->Mass Market paperback. Instead like the Primarchs series they can do LE hardback, maybe standard hardback and trade paperback. This makes perfect economic sense to a publisher because they do not need to typeset the book more than once (which is a cost) and they don't incur additional plate making and printer set up costs from their printing/book binding supplier.

 

Also linked to both is the high likelihood that the SoT series will create a buzz and provide a hook for PR and marketing that will also then generate additional sales.

 

In addition the SoT books and name will be all shiney and new and probably attract casuals who have never bought the HH books.

 

As I said above, while I do not have access to sales figures, I would be prepared to bet that overall sales figures for the HH (not individual books but general trend) may have declined as some degree of fatigue has set in. I would wager that there are people who have dropped out over the years as their enthusiasm waned.

 

Also, there were plenty of folks who have moaned about how long it was taking to get to the SoT and who didn't want a setting, they didn't want all the "side stories" etc. Some (many) of those will have their curiosity piqued by a specific SoT series and may come back and start buying those.

 

Also...there are folks like me who have steadfastly stuck to only buying HH in MMPB. BL only receive money from me something like 18 months after an HH book is initially released in hardback. Even then they only receive their proportion of the MMPB cover price which is lower than the hardback and the trade paperback. Also I buy the MMPB from bookshops rather than direct from GW stores or website. So as a customer BL are receiving much less money from me and much delayed. There is a distinct possibility that people like me may fast track our SoT purchases (because of curiosity and wanting to be involved in the fandom discussing) and not wait for my MMPB The Buried Dagger before we start buying SoT books. So they get more money from me and sooner.

 

So rebranding offers marketing and cost saving opportunities and will likely generate more sales for BL then if they had left these books as part of the core HH series. It is a smart move financially. Just a bit annoying for some of the fans who like uniform book shelves etc.

[Knockagh]

I’m a limited edition fan boy, I’ve bought everyone of them since the new look ones came out and most of the ones before. But the primarchs run of them is pushing me over the limit. If we have another run of 10 plus books at £40 a go while the primarchs series is still running I won’t be able to do it.

I think limited eds have over reached themselves. They rarely sell out now just too many about.

[Brother Lunkhead]

I hope the Siege of Terra gets the treatment it deserves..... four or five books, yes, but a seperate series.....oh no no no no no.......... fifty books here we come

[Moonreaper666]

I hope the Siege of Terra gets the treatment it deserves..... four or five books, yes, but a seperate series.....oh no no no no no.......... fifty books here we come

Book one is about Luna, Mars and the Initial Bombardment and Landing

 

 

Book two deals with the Webway Breach, Knights-Errants and the prison in the Himalayas

 

 

Book three deals with the Grey Knights and Eldar and Daemon reinforcements

 

(Eldrad and Asurmen vs A'ngratth!)

 

(Skulltaker vs Valdor!)

 

 

Book four deals with the taking of the Spaceports, atrocities and breaching the first Palace walls

 

 

Book five is the finale

 

(Death toll and dead characters are listed in five, in the Trillions)

 

(Characters lament how the siege has change the Imperium for the worse)

[Knockagh]

I could live with that. 5 books would be grand, anymore is far far too much.

[DarkChaplain]

I'd agree if BL was doing more than its current standard word count. The sheer scope isn't so easy to condense into 5 books at this point, if it ever had been without abandoning all detail and nuance. Heck, a lot of epic fantasy authors have at least double the wordcount in their novels these days. Slaves to Darkness might have barely been 95k words. That's half of the Fellowship of the Ring, and Tolkien, despite his elaborate descriptions of wildlife, was pretty straightforward on the journey itself, and had a cast of characters that stuck together, with some of them barely getting developed until the following books. We're looking at basically 20 factions worth of Fellowship characters that need to be fit together into a system-spanning final conflict for the future of humanity.

 

Generally, the only HH novels that went over the usual length were McNeill's, most notably Vengeful Spirit (which got split into two volumes in German and French editions) and A Thousand Sons. Some novels went down to about 90k words, like The Unremembered Empire, which I'd argue is a novel that is comparable to the character free for all of what a Siege novel needs to handle, but absolutely failed in having any real gravitas. For reference, the Kyme anthology Born of Flame appears to be close to 140k words, versus Slaves to Darkness's 95k.

 

Frankly, I think the Siege has much too much going on to be squeezed into less pages than the first Mistborn trilogy.