First Edition vs. Modern 40K

[Snazzy]

Sometimes i think the HH series was a mistake.

[Azekai]

Sometimes i think the HH series was a mistake.

I mean... it’s a better explanation for half Eldar than the old-fashioned alternative.

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

HH is great nuff said .

[Doghouse]

The lore in RT was a lot more tongue in cheek. Rick Priestly had originally wanted to do a more mainstream sci fi seeting but fantasy was selling so it ended up being warhammer in space with elves, dwarves and orks.

 

The setting itself draws on a lot of historical references and was heavily influenced by the likes of Dune and especially the satire of 2000ad. Over time the game adopted rose tinted goggles and sought ways to incorporate more of the RT stuff as it evolved from a means of supporting the lead (lead as in licked them your brain died not lead as in to leader...although they were the leader in lead at the time I guess...) miniatures range that Citadel was producing.

 

Over time the likes of space marines evolved from criminals and feral world tribes to become the super soldiers we know and love today. Lots of the earlier references were grounded and adapted to become lore as opposed to tongue in cheek jokes. The Primarchs being the most common example with the likes of Ferrus Mannus (Iron Man) Lion El Johnson (Lionel Johnson famous for the poem the Dark Angel), Angron (was told this was Angry Ron but not confirmed) becoming these legendary characters within the setting which I think goes back to my earlier point of not licking the miniatures.

Most of this was improvising and in house jokes between the GW staff because we had very little in terms of resources back then. Never mind your fancy multipart plastic kits and honking great plastic vehicles. Best we could hope for were plastic slotted bases, metal multipart models that broke the moment you looked at them and whatever we could patch together from WW II Spitfire and Tank kits. But I digress...

 

In short the best way to sum up the evolution of 40k is take Monty Pythons Holy Grail, put it in a time capsule and bury it for a thousand years then let someone dig it up. You should also include a note that says the person finding it should start religion based around it because this is an extremely important and historically accurate artifact that can be interpretted how ever the viewer sees fit and then argue with other people about the tiniest and most insignificant detail for hours and how their interpretation is wrong because they never saw the director's cut and that Life of Brian was actually way better as a historical predecessor to MPHG anyway.

[Vermintide]

Sometimes i think the HH series was a mistake.

It was. No doubt about it.

 

Maybe one book would have been good, concentrating on the overall story. But the laser focus on every single person in their own individual book is just... Ugh. Killed it.

[Alby the Slayer]

I joined only at the end of the 2nd edition but I remember many chaos artifacts used by loyalist marine like Marneus's gauntlets. 

 

Interesting to see what shaped the now official lore.

[CK.]

Sometimes i think the HH series was a mistake.

I’m neither agreeing nor disagreeing, but could you elaborate? What makes you think so?

[Karhedron]

The Primarchs were demigods of legend and the tale of the Horus Heresy was more mythology than history. Some people feel that peering behind the veil and revealing Primarchs as flawed beings of flesh and blood (albeit powerful ones) robbed it if its sense of awe and magic. Some of the early legends of Primarchs felling Titans would be pretty difficult to portray now (although Sanguinius pulled it off in Titandeath).

 

I have to say that I do not personally agree with this takeand have generally enjoyed the expansion of the background. However I respect other peoepls' rights to feel differently.

[Gederas]

The Primarchs were demigods of legend and the tale of the Horus Heresy was more mythology than history. Some people feel that peering behind the veil and revealing Primarchs as flawed beings of flesh and blood (albeit powerful ones) robbed it if its sense of awe and magic. Some of the early legends of Primarchs felling Titans would be pretty difficult to portray now (although Sanguinius pulled it off in Titandeath).

 

I have to say that I do not personally agree with this takeand have generally enjoyed the expansion of the background. However I respect other peoepls' rights to feel differently.

Sanguinius pulls it off in Titandeath, Angron stops a Warhound from stomping on Lorgar (imo, that's more impressive than Sanguinius' felling of a Titan). We also had Magnus' truly awesome "beat a mother with another mother" moment against those two Eldar titans....

 

So that's three Primarchs taking on a Titan and winning.

 

Also, even in actual mythology, Gods, Demigods and Titans were shown to have flaws. Look at Greek Myth. Zeus was an utter and horndog and roughly 80% of problems in Greek Myth were because he couldn't keep it in his robes, Poseidon was a cranky manchild half the time (and another source of "causing problems because he can't keep it in his robes" [poor Medusa]), Aphrodite was petty, vindictive and cheated on her husband constantly with both gods and mortals alike, etc.

 

Just because they're near-mythical demigods of legend doesn't mean that they can't have flaws and personalities. In fact, them NOT having any is less accurate to actual myth.

Edited September 14, 2020 by Gederas

[Snazzy]

 

Sometimes i think the HH series was a mistake.

I’m neither agreeing nor disagreeing, but could you elaborate? What makes you think so?

 

 

I was being cheeky.  Most of the Heresy series is good, and sheds light on aspects that were glossed over previously.  The Shattered Legions got a lot of copy for being being massacred, for instance.  But, every so often, something like Malcador's hybrid Eldar friend, or Erda, or attempts to make Fulgrim seem sympathetic just don't land with me.  Hey, no one bats 1000.

[Lord_Caerolion]

 

The Primarchs being the most common example with the likes of Ferrus Mannus (Iron Man)

 

Just gotta correct that Manus is latin for "hand", so his name is literally Iron Hand.

[Gederas]

The Primarchs being the most common example with the likes of Ferrus Mannus (Iron Man)

Just gotta correct that Manus is latin for "hand", so his name is literally Iron Hand.

Yup. Iron Hands with his iron hands, leading his Legion the Iron Hands :lol:

 

[Lord_Caerolion]

The FW black book at least changed it to a deed name, it's not a normal one. He got called Ferrus Manus on Medusa by the population because he has iron hands.

[Gederas]

The FW black book at least changed it to a deed name, it's not a normal one. He got called Ferrus Manus on Medusa by the population because he has iron hands.

That just begs the question, did he name the Legion after himself or did they choose the name after his?

 

[Lord_Caerolion]

It seems he named them. The direct quote is "In a scant few years, Ferrus Manus was transferred full control of the Xth Legion which he took command of body and soul, renaming it and remaking it in his image".

[Closet Skeleton]

Originally Primarchs was just a title for any revered Chapter hero, so keeping Primarch relics was a thing before the standard definition of Primarchs showed up.

 

Navigators were more likely to be found just wandering around and assassins and other characters could be navigators.

 

Space Marines were more like the Terran Marines in starcraft in the early days I think. I wish we had new solar auxillia in plastics for 40k to capture that lol. Solar aux version of an invictor style walker for example would be sweet etc.

 

Page 153 of 40k: Rogue Trader

 

 

The Legiones Astartes is the official title of the warrior organisation more commonly known as the Space Marines. [...] Most of its troopers are recruited from feral planates, where traditional warrior castes compete for the honour of becoming a 'warrior of the gods'. [...] For true aggression and psychotic killer-instinct, however, few recuits can best the murderous followers of the city-scum that roam the darkest pits of the hive-worlds. [...] They make ideal Space Marines, and whole gangs of city-scum are sometimes hunted and captured for this purpose. Some recruits come from the civilised areas of the Imperium - but not very many.

 

Young recruits are subjeted to many hours of intenseive training and indoctrination, leading ot physical and mental changes. Their bodies are toughened by bio-chem, and their resolve is hardened by psycho-surgery. A special black plastic carapace is merged with their natural flesh, forming a sort of identity tag as well as permanent protection. All this preparation is intended to turn the prospective Marine into a disciplined killer, or at least a controllable one.

 

The non-Black carapace organs were introduced in white dwarf a few months later but they were always super soldiers with implants and body modification.

 

The minotaurs chapter are recruited from prisons in current fluff, that's closer to Star Craft than first ed's 'rounding up poor gangsters'. To me the point of this paragraph is more suggesting that the Imperium is so unequal that the lowest members of society on developed planets are more similar to people from undeveloped planets than they are to their richer neighbours.

 

But all in all its just an exagerration of the Gurkhas and council estate recruits of the contemporary British military. The line about there not being many 'civilised' recuits seems to be a veiled version of the old anti-war critic that the rich never get used as cannon-fodder. Personally not my kind of satire as it seems to mostly just recreat the de-humanising way impovierished people are described in both foreign countries and urban areas without any real form of amusing exageration or commiting to an actual point in its  commentary. Foremost it just seems to be exploiting real world ideas and rhetoric for escapist flavour.

 

The Rainbow Warriors existing.

 

Rainbow warriors have always existed, they showed up whenever large amounts of colour schemes were shown in 2nd and 3rd ed material.

 

 

Off the top of my head with poor memory cells

1. Eldar moving from pirate raiders to craftworlds

 

Craftworld Eldar are the main kind of Eldar in the original rulebook, pirates are given a short mention.

Edited September 15, 2020 by Closet Skeleton

[N1SB]

 

In short the best way to sum up the evolution of 40k is take Monty Pythons Holy Grail, put it in a time capsule and bury it for a thousand years then let someone dig it up. You should also include a note that says the person finding it should start religion based around it because this is an extremely important and historically accurate artifact that can be interpretted how ever the viewer sees fit and then argue with other people about the tiniest and most insignificant detail for hours and how their interpretation is wrong because they never saw the director's cut and that Life of Brian was actually way better as a historical predecessor to MPHG anyway.

 

This is honestly the best description of 40k I've ever read.  This is the Gospel of Doghouse.

[Aqui]

Adepta Sororitas had their very first appearance, despite not even having models. Mind you, they were wearing Mark VI armour and were tasked with keeping Marine Chapters in line amongst other things.

 

Rainbow Warriors were last seen in the...seventh? Edition Codex. There was a brief passage about how their Chapter Master with two others from other Chapters died in a campaign. Have also had their planet marked on the map of the Imperium, albeit with Records deleted marked under the name.

[Snazzy]

I was not aware of the later references to the Rainbow Warriors.  They even included the RT style helmet stripes on a MKVII armored model.

[Aqui]

They're kinda like "Blink and miss them" references to be honest. Unless you know where to look its easy enough to not realise.

[Chaplain Killmer]

The RT setting wasn't the grim dark setting that we have now. At least not right from the start. Someone in this topic called it wild and thats a good description. The first setting was more like frontiers - western style and that you can see on many illustrations in the book. The marines being killers and criminals is correct too - there was even a WD from that time where GW actually felt inclined to print the complete composition of a Ultramarines Company  with names and gear for every single member of the company. Many of them had frenzon dispensors and similar whacky gear - so yes they were very different to the methodic "angels of death" today. But many bits of the background got ironed out to todays setting fairly quickly even far from as detailed as today - with the dawn of the 2nd editions the setting was very much in place as it's today. Just look at the old codices - if you don't go for tiny details most fluff didn't change much. The circle is closing with Blackstone, and the other recent small  releases where GW is basically going back to these days.

[battle captain corpus]

The fluff & canon differences are vast and meandering frankly. As someone who remembers most (if not all?!) editions etc I have found that its actually quite staggering the background material that has been covered!

 

BCC

[b1soul]

Sounds like the 1ED Space Marines were a lot more like StarCraft Marines.

 

I wish someone did a story of a Warp ship stumbling into a 1ED-based alternate universe

[Snazzy]

They were still organized like monastic enclaves, though.  The trappings of blood rituals and a depiction of The Fang played into what we know about the Astartes.

[Lord_Starscream]

The Primarchs were demigods of legend and the tale of the Horus Heresy was more mythology than history. Some people feel that peering behind the veil and revealing Primarchs as flawed beings of flesh and blood (albeit powerful ones) robbed it if its sense of awe and magic. Some of the early legends of Primarchs felling Titans would be pretty difficult to portray now (although Sanguinius pulled it off in Titandeath).

 

I have to say that I do not personally agree with this takeand have generally enjoyed the expansion of the background. However I respect other peoepls' rights to feel differently.

 

Though I love the Horus Heresy, I do think some of the retcons of events or fates of some of the characters involved were poor decision.

 

Fulgrim, as a character, for instance, feels like he was let down by the Heresy. His backstory was much better served with him being nothing but a slave, or prisoner, trapped within a painting or his own body, as a demon corrupted everything he held dear, even his own body. It's just a better ending for that character, and poetic, that the Daemon not only killed Ferrus Manus, but in a way, killed Fulgrim as well. Such was the danger of being involved with Chaos.

 

Now he's just el-generico-Slaaneshi-Daemon. IMO, he's become the worst character in the series. Ironically, in 40k, I'd argue Lucius was. So uhm, it's fitting I guess? lol

 

I also liked how there were hints before, and even at the beginning of the HH, that the Dark Angels weren't necessarily traitors, but they were looking out for their own interests more than that of their cousins and the wider Imperium. I loved that, and it matches their modern lore to this day, where they will let the imperium bleed for their own personal interests, but instead, now they are super-loyalists, led by Unlikable Guilliman.

 

Sure, tons was done for great expansions. Lorgar's character is incredible in the HH imo, from start to finish. Horus was fleshed out beautifully. Guilliman was given flaws and made a compelling character, and the list goes on. It's not so much a problem that these characters because flesh-and-blood, and became fascinating, it's more the issue that some of their prior lore was just... better than what HH came up with, sadly.