Valdor: Birth of the Imperium

[b1soul]

If Terran, he probably was a Terran from one of the Asiatic hive clusters which the Scars preferred. But he's described as a Chogorian in Grey Talon.

[bluntblade]

Is he? My bad, then.

 

Wraight's not infallible, after all. I think Russ and Bjorn trade positions on Prospero between Scars and Wolf King.

[Noserenda]

I'd remember that the black books are very pointedly written by an unreliable narrator who likely didn't witness unification themselves, anything in there on the subject is almost inevitably the Emperors propaganda line

[b1soul]

It doesn't just contradict the Black Books, it also fails to jive with Dreams of Unity.

[DarkChaplain]

It doesn't jive with plenty that I remember reading, and I haven't touched any of the Black Books, and likely won't until long after the novel series is entirely finished. ForgeWorld retcons a lot of stuff as it is.

[b1soul]

True about the Black Books.

 

Anyway, I understand that this is mainly a character study of Valdor and the period fluff is secondary. So I'm sure the former was done very well by Wraight. The latter is just a bit jarring.

 

@ bluntblade

 

It's possible that in Grey Talon, Bion perceives Hibou as Chogorian when in fact Hibou is Terran. This would only work if Hibou easily passes as a Chogorian, i.e. Asiatic/Mongol appearance and looks nothing like Torghun who is a blond Scandinavian IIRC.

Bit of a stretch though as in Grey Talon, I recall he also has a Chogorian accent when speaking Gothic. I believe Hibou and Jubal have both been retconned as Chogorian per their most recent BL entries, though I would add that Jubal's inconsistency is introduced by French, not Wraight contradicting himself.

[StrangerOrders]

True about the Black Books.

 

Anyway, I understand that this is mainly a character study of Valdor and the period fluff is secondary. So I'm sure the former was done very well by Wraight. The latter is just a bit jarring.

 

@ bluntblade

 

It's possible that in Grey Talon, Bion perceives Hibou as Chogorian when in fact Hibou is Terran. This would only work if Hibou easily passes as a Chogorian, i.e. Asiatic/Mongol appearance and looks nothing like Torghun who is a blond Scandinavian IIRC.

Bit of a stretch though as in Grey Talon, I recall he also has a Chogorian accent when speaking Gothic. I believe Hibou and Jubal have both been retconned as Chogorian per their most recent BL entries, though I would add that Jubal's inconsistency is introduced by French, not Wraight contradicting himself.

Its discussed in Jaghatai.

 

Terrans were pretty monocultural and out of place with the initial Chogorian White Scars and Jaghatai sort of thought them hopeless.

 

Jubal, the most White Scar to ever White Scar was born Lucien but then when the Khan saw him after a few decades being such a classical White Scar was flaberghasted that a 'Terran' could fathom what it meant to be Chogorian. 

 

The Khan is one of the more well-rounded Primarchs but he admits himself that he has the weakness of thinking that no one gets him. Which seems to sort of translates to being low-key racist. 

 

Alot of Terrans were actually pretty good fits with the Legion, look at that Khan from Malevolence. Neither East Asian (for the given value in 30k) nor Chogorian but widely recognized as an enthusiastic and eager student of the Khan.

 

Although Jaghatai is far from being the biggest dick to his Terran sons between 'I will want a 1/10th of your heads first' Pert and 'You all suck, go into exile' Corax.

[b1soul]

In Scars, Torghun doesn't like the WS practice of heavily recruiting from the Asiatic hives of Terra. He finds it rather backward that Chogorians care about the physiognomy of Terran recruits, i.e. racial bias.

I don't know if the Terran recruits were monocultural. A lot of diverse regions on Terra. Most Terrans did seem to struggle with learning the Chogorian language though.

As for guys like Torghun Khan and Tsolomon Khan, they started becoming very rare after the Chogorians took over recruitment policy. Tsolomon Khan happily adopted WS practices but he looked very non-Chogorian in his portrait art.

By comparison, if Bion mistook Hibou for a Chogorian in Grey Talon, I am thinking he has an "Asiatic" look.

Edited November 3, 2019 by b1soul

[aa.logan]

As a LE, it is a lovely object. I’ve gotten over my sulk about it not having a Primarchs-style box, as it feels so lovely in the hand. And sad-eyed Valdor is a lovely cover. The paper is nice and thick and everything is laid out nicely. Not exactly value-for-money, as these things never really are, but I’m happy that I bought it.

 

In terms of the content, I think that this is up there with the best that BL have put out. Wright uses the relatively short word-count to do a lot. I may be tipping into self-parody here, but it’s an explicitly political novel, and that’s more than welcome. The picture that he paints of Terra both pre- and post- Unification is so very Hobbesian it hurts. Life under the warring kingdoms before the Imperium is shown to be ugly, brutal and short. The characters mainly used to portray this, Kandawire and Achilles, are really engaging and their differing perspectives of the endless war of nation unto nation compliment each other well. The Emperor isn’t really painted in a flattering light, but even if you ignore the looming threat of the Chaos Gods, it is made clear that the threat of mundane chaos requires all of humanity to be bound to his singular will- his position as the head of humanity can be used to justify all of his transgressions and betrayals of others.

 

It may be a little heavy-handed but most of the action symbolically takes place in the building site that is yet to become the Imperial Palace; there’s a whole bunch of dramatic irony and foreshadowing for the Heresy. It’s made explicitly clear that the Unification of Terra was a dry-Run for the Great Crusade in so many ways.

 

In terms of military lore, the book does a lot too. The Custodes are shown to be the ‘lions’ of the First Heretic, bespoke and individualistic, incredibly capable at all they turn their hands to but aware perhaps of the deficiencies in their humanity- Valdor, in particular seems to long for what is just beyond his emotional grasp. The Thunder Warriors are as gloriously blunt in person as they are on the battlefield and their deficiencies are writ large. There are nice glimpses of military (and civilian) tech without getting bogged down in descriptions of shiny toys, and these feel suitably removed from the familiar tanks and armour marks we know from 30k onwards.

 

I’m going to put my thoughts about the Astartes in spoiler tags in a later post, but I’m really quite taken aback by the fact that none of the prior discussion touches on some of the revelations there...

[The_son_of_Dorn]

whoa whoa whoa, so this is a confirmation to a primarch (one of the missing two) actually dying? I must have more context!

[aa.logan]

The book also gives us the biggest insights into the Primarch and Astartes projects since the long distant publication of The Great Work in *checks notes* March. What I initially thought was a really major plot development was me conflating two different gene-wrights* but the book really does tell us a lot. It revisits a key event that we’ve already seen from different perspectives in the HH series and uses the shortcomings of both the Thunder Warriors and Custodes to explain some of the reasons as to why the Astartes are the way they are. I’m putting specifics in spoilers.

 

It’s probably glaringly obvious that the scene I’m referring to earlier is the scattering of the Primarchs, but I’ll be courteous and keep the details for those who want to read them.

 

The Adeptus Astartes are named after their main creator, or at least the head of the project, Astartes. She was also part of/lead (can’t remember) of the Primarchs project. When we’ve previously seen the scattering of the Primarchs (Was it Legion, Deliverance Lost or another book at least that I can’t recall?) it’s almost been allegorical- scientists and test tubes have been glimpsed, but in a very vague and abstract way, almost as if the visions have been tailored by those presenting them to convey a point. This time, however, it’s presented in a much more real and visceral manner- smashed glass and actual intruders; the loss doesn’t feel as if it is just of the nascent Primarchs but also of the technology and knowledge that could have been used to improve the Astartes. Was Astartes herself aware of these consequences independently, which led her to try to wreck the creation of the Marines before their first deployment, or was she acting on behalf of Chaos or even the Emperor? (Probably the last one, since he wanted her labs for the Golden Throne and to put others off the scent but it could be read ambiguously)

 

The other interesting thing is the timescale. Malcador talks about how the Emperor is rushing him to complete projects, Valdor sees the First Legion as not quite being ready to deploy but does so anyway for the same reason. The idea that the Emperor (presumably) knows that he’s only so long to get Terra Unified and the Great Crusade underway/complete before the Ruinous Powers fully raise their ugly heads does go some way to explaining away his errors and poor judgement calls with Horus, Lorgar, Magnus and generally brining humanity to the brink of destruction.

 

 

*I guess that in the same way that ships have been captained by a disproportionate number of female officers in BL fiction in order to mix up the gender balance in Marine-heavy stories a little, the role of flesh-crafter seems to be filled by women more often than not...

[Angel_of_Blood]

whoa whoa whoa, so this is a confirmation to a primarch (one of the missing two) actually dying? I must have more context!

 

No. As I said in my posts, the commanders of the twenty Thunder Warriors legions, had the title of Primarch. But they themselves were no different to any other Thunder Warrior.

[StrangerOrders]

 

whoa whoa whoa, so this is a confirmation to a primarch (one of the missing two) actually dying? I must have more context!

 

No. As I said in my posts, the commanders of the twenty Thunder Warriors legions, had the title of Primarch. But they themselves were no different to any other Thunder Warrior.

 

So I am going to ask since I am trying to reconcile this with the (honestly) more believable take of the Forgeworld books.

 

Are you saying that the First Legion is explicitly stated to be 10k marines that the Emp generated for the lols and press-ganged into service without a grace period? Because previously it has usually been the position since the Black Books started that every legion was developed around the same time to an 'Alpha' stage of 2000 Astartes which were put into service at different times. With this being the root of the Alpha Legions name (they had never officially moved beyond this stage until Alpharius was found and they came out of the woodwork. It seems kinda bonkers that the position now is that they only made a single bloodline at first and made so many of them at once before even being sure the process worked.

 

It is also kind of odd that as you are saying, the book emphasizes that the Emp was in a rush. Which is really hard to believe because then an earlier Ararat and TW never fighting besides Astartes do not make sense really.

 

That would involve the Emp being in a rush but then decapitating his own army of its elite troops for years, somehow not getting mauled to death by the surviving warlords after he decided to shoot himself in the foot and only introducing a replacement years later who are both raw and only reflecting a single model of the twenty archetypes which the book goes out of its way to say he preferred to operate with. 

 

It all just seems like a bit of alot and I want to make sure that it wasn't just me misunderstanding the post.

Edited November 3, 2019 by StrangerOrders

[Marshal Vespasian]

Read some of the spoiler, gonna stop now. The book should be with me at some point this week and then I will know soon enough. Hope there is a lot of World building in there. I am interested how pre unity terra looked.

[Angel_of_Blood]

 

 

whoa whoa whoa, so this is a confirmation to a primarch (one of the missing two) actually dying? I must have more context!

 

No. As I said in my posts, the commanders of the twenty Thunder Warriors legions, had the title of Primarch. But they themselves were no different to any other Thunder Warrior.

 

So I am going to ask since I am trying to reconcile this with the (honestly) more believable take of the Forgeworld books.

 

Are you saying that the First Legion is explicitly stated to be 10k marines that the Emp generated for the lols and press-ganged into service without a grace period? Because previously it has usually been the position since the Black Books started that every legion was developed around the same time to an 'Alpha' stage of 2000 Astartes which were put into service at different times. With this being the root of the Alpha Legions name (they had never officially moved beyond this stage until Alpharius was found and they came out of the woodwork. It seems kinda bonkers that the position now is that they only made a single bloodline at first and made so many of them at once before even being sure the process worked.

 

It is also kind of odd that as you are saying, the book emphasizes that the Emp was in a rush. Which is really hard to believe because then an earlier Ararat and TW never fighting besides Astartes do not make sense really.

 

That would involve the Emp being in a rush but then decapitating his own army of its elite troops for years, somehow not getting mauled to death by the surviving warlords after he decided to shoot himself in the foot and only introducing a replacement years later who are both raw and only reflecting a single model of the twenty archetypes which the book goes out of its way to say he preferred to operate with. 

 

It all just seems like a bit of alot and I want to make sure that it wasn't just me misunderstanding the post.

 

 

I think you are misunderstanding to a degree here.

 

The First Legion warriors weren't just generated 'for the lols' and press ganged in. The Astartes programme is already fully underway, with an uncountable number of weapons, munitions etc being stockpiled for them. The 10,000 deployed here weren't rushed or press ganged in purely because of the attack. It just so happened to coincide with them being at about deployable status, if not bumped out a little quickly due to the imminent attack.

 

Didn't say the Emperor was in a rush either. He's still purging away elsewhere on Terra with the majority of the Cutsodes. The Thunder Warriors were culled due to their increasingly growing instability, many of them were not even able to take orders anymore due to the degradation. It seems, and always has done previously to me, that the Emperor culled them because of this and that his hand was more or less forced as their effectiveness decreased. He still has the Ten Thousand and by this point uncountable amount of regular troopers. By the time he culled the TW's, it would seem Terra was very much on it's landslide to being his, wasn't a case of IF he could retake Terra, but when. 

 

That and the Astartes were at this point at deployment level near enough, the First Legion just had to be pressed in a little roughly due to the unexpected treachery of Astarte and the actions of the High Lord.

[StrangerOrders]

 

 

 

whoa whoa whoa, so this is a confirmation to a primarch (one of the missing two) actually dying? I must have more context!

 

No. As I said in my posts, the commanders of the twenty Thunder Warriors legions, had the title of Primarch. But they themselves were no different to any other Thunder Warrior.

 

So I am going to ask since I am trying to reconcile this with the (honestly) more believable take of the Forgeworld books.

 

 

Are you saying that the First Legion is explicitly stated to be 10k marines that the Emp generated for the lols and press-ganged into service without a grace period? Because previously it has usually been the position since the Black Books started that every legion was developed around the same time to an 'Alpha' stage of 2000 Astartes which were put into service at different times. With this being the root of the Alpha Legions name (they had never officially moved beyond this stage until Alpharius was found and they came out of the woodwork. It seems kinda bonkers that the position now is that they only made a single bloodline at first and made so many of them at once before even being sure the process worked.

 

It is also kind of odd that as you are saying, the book emphasizes that the Emp was in a rush. Which is really hard to believe because then an earlier Ararat and TW never fighting besides Astartes do not make sense really.

 

That would involve the Emp being in a rush but then decapitating his own army of its elite troops for years, somehow not getting mauled to death by the surviving warlords after he decided to shoot himself in the foot and only introducing a replacement years later who are both raw and only reflecting a single model of the twenty archetypes which the book goes out of its way to say he preferred to operate with. 

 

It all just seems like a bit of alot and I want to make sure that it wasn't just me misunderstanding the post.

 

 

I think you are misunderstanding to a degree here.

 

The First Legion warriors weren't just generated 'for the lols' and press ganged in. The Astartes programme is already fully underway, with an uncountable number of weapons, munitions etc being stockpiled for them. The 10,000 deployed here weren't rushed or press ganged in purely because of the attack. It just so happened to coincide with them being at about deployable status, if not bumped out a little quickly due to the imminent attack.

 

Didn't say the Emperor was in a rush either. He's still purging away elsewhere on Terra with the majority of the Cutsodes. The Thunder Warriors were culled due to their increasingly growing instability, many of them were not even able to take orders anymore due to the degradation. It seems, and always has done previously to me, that the Emperor culled them because of this and that his hand was more or less forced as their effectiveness decreased. He still has the Ten Thousand and by this point uncountable amount of regular troopers. By the time he culled the TW's, it would seem Terra was very much on it's landslide to being his, wasn't a case of IF he could retake Terra, but when. 

 

That and the Astartes were at this point at deployment level near enough, the First Legion just had to be pressed in a little roughly due to the unexpected treachery of Astarte and the actions of the High Lord.

 

I conflated everyone's spoilers, shouldn't have said 'you' perhaps. But others have hinted at a hurried pace. 

 

It is an interesting take if the matter was that the TW simply became utterly unstable long before he got the Astartes off the ground.

 

I notice you mention Astarte, so she is a traitor then? That seems at odds with Belisarius Cawl's book, where Sedyne seems to act as if her name is only recently out of favor and disappointed by the fact. Seems a bit weird of a reaction if she was a traitor given that the Imperium tried hard to eliminate records of those rather successfully.

Edited November 5, 2019 by StrangerOrders

[DarkChaplain]

Yeah, the Astarte bit doesn't make sense to me. Sedayne talks about her both during the creation of the Legiones Astartes gene-tech, and her name gets brought up post-Heresy as well, with her legacy tarnished, but not to that level. Why'd they even keep the name of "Astartes" if her fall from grace was so impactful re: the Primarch Project, and it happened before first deployment of them? Not like the project was widely publicized outside the Emperor's chosen few yet.

[Splog]

Yeah, the Astarte bit doesn't make sense to me. Sedayne talks about her both during the creation of the Legiones Astartes gene-tech, and her name gets brought up post-Heresy as well, with her legacy tarnished, but not to that level. Why'd they even keep the name of "Astartes" if her fall from grace was so impactful re: the Primarch Project, and it happened before first deployment of them? Not like the project was widely publicized outside the Emperor's chosen few yet.

This is answered in the book

[DarkChaplain]

Feel free to enlighten me, then. I won't be reading the book until it goes up for general release at the earliest, and probably a good bit later than that, seeing my dropping enthusiasm for the subject.

[MegaVolt87]

 

Yeah, the Astarte bit doesn't make sense to me. Sedayne talks about her both during the creation of the Legiones Astartes gene-tech, and her name gets brought up post-Heresy as well, with her legacy tarnished, but not to that level. Why'd they even keep the name of "Astartes" if her fall from grace was so impactful re: the Primarch Project, and it happened before first deployment of them? Not like the project was widely publicized outside the Emperor's chosen few yet.

This is answered in the book

 

 

1+ would like that explained in spoilers as well. 

[The_son_of_Dorn]

+1 also

[StrangerOrders]

+1 Here as well 

[Splog]

I’m away from the book at the moment, so I might be glossing over some nuance, but...

 

The Emperor at that point in time retains a sense of humour. He enjoys irony. Or at least Malcador (?) thinks he will enjoy the irony of Astarte’s name remaining on the ‘space marine’ project documents

 

IMO it works.

[The_son_of_Dorn]

So adeptus astartes roughly translates to "competent rouge scientists"

[Ishagu]

From the reactions in this topic I've decided to give this a miss...