Mortis

[Brother Dimetrius]

Still waiting for my copy. Was due to be delivered last week, but currently still stuck in the transit center in Germany.

Status updated to

 

"Held in Warehouse

UPS is holding the cargo at a secure facility, pending instructions and agreement."

 

Looks like getting these things swiftly will be a a a thing of the past :(

 

[I_Am_IronSam]

I finished last night. Enjoyed it. But felt some of it was a little bit of a filler. 

Don't know how to do the spoiler thing so not going to talk about anything yet. 

[Kelborn]

It works like this:

 

[ spoiler ] text [/ spoiler ] without the blanks. :)

Edited February 1, 2021 by Kelborn

[SkimaskMohawk]

@lord_caerolion I feel like we're just not going to agree on how the chaos gods distribute blessings and what people can do to resist them. The most common instance is a follower of chaos doing stuff with the intent to please the gods.

 

Then we have stuff like the traitor legions slow-mutating in the Eye; they get some low level natural mutation and if they accept the gods as a fact of life then it tends to increase dramatically.

 

The biggest factor is psychic saturation, especially in the cases of the 4 God specific primarchs. There needs to be a massive psychic buildup or saturation in the environment to trigger it. But there also needs to be accepting acknowledgement of the gods as well; because fabius spent thousands of years in the eye actively being an atheist, while amputating any low level stuff. He's loved by the gods, but they can't just elevate him with stuff.

 

So bringing this back to perturabos ascension, unless there was big ol psychic trauma caused in the iron cage and he at least accepted the chaos gods, he wouldn't just be popped into a daemon. Iirc the old fluff had him actively sacrifice the geneseed to the gods, putting him squarely in category 1 of "intent to please" .

[Fedor]

angron didn't have a clue about the gods when Lorgar ascended him with his ritual. I don't think genuine awareness/seeking power is always necessary, it's just rarer for things to happen without it and more likely to have you turned into a spawn/acquire low tier stuff like a stomach mouth than become a daemon prince.

[Kelborn]

Maybe he doesn't turn into a daemon primarch at all and they'll change that? *shruggs*

 

Guess we'll have to wait.

Edited February 1, 2021 by Kelborn

[SkimaskMohawk]

angron didn't have a clue about the gods when Lorgar ascended him with his ritual. I don't think genuine awareness/seeking power is always necessary, it's just rarer for things to happen without it and more likely to have you turned into a spawn/acquire low tier stuff like a stomach mouth than become a daemon prince.

Ya, but lorgar sure did and assembled a huge ritual to pull it off. He was the conduit of belief and offering.

[aa.logan]

I’ve read it.

 

I can’t say I was disappointed, exactly, but it is a rare example of me being underwhelmed.

 

I’ve long resigned myself to not ‘getting’ French’s prose- many other BL authors can write screeds of incidental detail about absolute minutiae and I’ll be in raptures, hanging on every word, but even when French is covering massive and significant plot points, the words just wash over me, and I have to go back a page or two and start again; I’m not saying he’s a *bad* writer, far from it, he just never really does it for me.

 

Mortis was a lot of that; I’d get to the end of a section, thrilled and enthused, but the next one would wash over me and I’d have to start it again.

 

It’s not the lack of Legion focus, but I don’t feel all that much happened in this book, especially when you consider the pagecount. The Katsihuru arc is great, and I’m a big fan of the Perpetual storyline, and this is handled really well, but to be honest the Titan stuff just didn’t resonate with me. What I liked about the First Wall is that the focus shifted to the ordinary grunts, Saturnine had a cast of thousands and did stuff with them and the first two books were very Marine heavy whereas this ‘just’ seems to exist to set things up for the closing books of the series.

 

French does the metaphysical well, but the book is almost wholly from the viewpoint of the defenders, and, as a consequence, however clever (and it is!), it left me a little hollow.

[Noserenda]

angron didn't have a clue about the gods when Lorgar ascended him with his ritual. I don't think genuine awareness/seeking power is always necessary, it's just rarer for things to happen without it and more likely to have you turned into a spawn/acquire low tier stuff like a stomach mouth than become a daemon prince.

Exactly this, the gods tend to toss around "rewards" like candy and even exposure to "warp stuff" will eventually ambiently mutate and derange subjects but if you want to become a Daemon Prince you need to walk the Path to Glory, consciously or not Angron for example was making Khorne extremely happy, but if Lorgar hadnt stepped in he would eventually have ended up a spawn even if the nails/loyalists didnt kill him.

 

 

With the Iron Warriors, i can see why they did the thing, the majority of their characters are in dead ends so narratively doing something like that makes a lot of sense to change things up.

[aa.logan]

With regards the IV Legion...

 

Horus set Perterabo a task- bring down the walls, break the Siege. He was flattered, and left autonomous- in this he refers to it not being the kind of work he *wanted* to do, but that he’s good at. He clearly had a plan for each wall, for each stage of the Siege. In stepping in and saying that it would be done the new, ‘Chaos’ way Horus takes away the freedom and the sense of purpose his brother had, rendering him no better than the Emperor. This is the line that is crossed, not an aversion to daemonic pacts and gribblies.

Edited February 1, 2021 by aa.logan

[b1soul]

@ a.a.logan

 

Good points...I think it's 1 and 2 below

 

1. Bringing in Chaos undercuts the type of victory Perturabo covets against Dorn and the other Loyalists

 

2. Bringing in Chaos is Horus imposing his will upon Perturabo

[Taliesin]

Can anyone who has the book post the Primarch portraits?

Or are they posted somewhere else online already?

[Ingo Pech]

Can anyone who has the book post the Primarch portraits?

Or are they posted somewhere else online already?

Mauro Belfiore has posted all of them on his Insta- and Artstation-profile.

[Vazzy]

Boy these spoilers sure do have me excited to read my Limited Edition! I can’t wait to have it in hand!

 

*Cries in no shipping notification*

 

You know, when GW said 17 days, really didn’t think it would actually be that long.

[Blood-worm's Master]

My copy is still being held by UPS in German warehouse, so quick question to the "lucky few":

Is depiction of Vyronii scions in line with beautiful passages by Andy Hoare from Conquest?
"(...) noted for their uniquely sorrowful mien, a manner born of the knowledge that their ancestors five thousand year vigil against the terrors of Old Night might be rendered utterly meaningless or obliterated entirely at the hands of a warrior who was at one time the Emperor's most beloved son", "always maintaining a respectful and honourable distance born of countless years of isolation", "(...) reputation for melancholy and withdrawn reserve"

Edited February 3, 2021 by Blood-worm's Master

[Preliminary Bombardment]

Just finished this last night, and unfortunately I was a little disappointed. While I like French's writing and things got off to a good start, there was probably 100 odd pages that didn't need to be there.

 

The good:

- I actually quite liked the Titan battle, felt weighty and intense.

- Iron Warriors quitting the siege, to me this made perfect sense. Perturabo was the most reliable general Horus had, and was named as Lord Marshall I believe. However he was increasingly seeing that this war wasn't his any more, with the final straw being Horus asking him to enter the assault personally and leave command to Mortarion. His pride and bleak nihilism couldn't face that so of course he walked away. This also swings things slightly more in the loyalists favour. Perturabo and Horus were written well here.

- Shiban, though again could have been half the length.

 

Not as good

- I noticed myself skim reading much of the perpetual stuff, there was some good stuff there but too much wandering aimlessly around and chaos confusion.

- Euphrati Keeler / Imperial faith stuff, seriously I thought we were done with that. Honestly couldn't care less about this character, and I was even bored of Sinderman in this one.

Edited February 3, 2021 by Preliminary Bombardment

[Marshal Rohr]

Americans, I got my dispatch notice tonight so hopefully it will arrive by Saturday!

[Medjugorje]

TFW no Abaddon

and no Sigismund... 

 

 

I think it will be a hard fight for me to read this book.

I dont like Mortarion ( he is boring imo), I dont like Titans and Knight houses and my favourite fighters are not even shown in the "dramatis personae"...

 

only hope is the huge part of the Dark Angels. I ever wanted to hear more about Corswain.

edit´: and shiban khan... still a bit disappointed about the fast kill of jubal khan. I would have loved to see him killing a bit more really good champions before he died.

Edited February 5, 2021 by Medjugorje

[Knockagh]

Look what just arrived! Buzzing I got issue 3!

 

 

Aaaaaaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhh I hate you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[b1soul]

@ Medjugorje

 

Seconded about Jubal, but at least...

 

Shiban wasn't abruptly offed in Saturnine

[Marshal Rohr]

My copy finally arrived. No idea how the hell to read this thing without ruining it but it is gorgeous.

[Vazzy]

My copy finally arrived. No idea how the hell to read this thing without ruining it but it is gorgeous.

Carefully lol.

[Marshal Rohr]

Mine was number 2499. Last out the door on that one.

[Lord Lorne Walkier]

Lord Lorne Walkier and Blood-worms Master:

 

 

Unknown who the baby is, just appears to be a random infant that Cole the army officer rescued

 

The House Vyronii Knights focused on it the book start off patrolling beyond the mercury walls at the horizon watching for incoming enemy, and then are in combat in support of the Legio Solaria Warhound pack under the command of Abhani Lus Mohana.  There is a Castigator and its 3 armiger attendants.  There is some conflict between the Knight and his Armiger pilot half sister, which appears to be coming to a head at the end of the book.

 

 

 

Did that kid get a name?

[Marshal Rohr]

 

 

Lord Lorne Walkier and Blood-worms Master:

 

 

Unknown who the baby is, just appears to be a random infant that Cole the army officer rescued

 

The House Vyronii Knights focused on it the book start off patrolling beyond the mercury walls at the horizon watching for incoming enemy, and then are in combat in support of the Legio Solaria Warhound pack under the command of Abhani Lus Mohana. There is a Castigator and its 3 armiger attendants. There is some conflict between the Knight and his Armiger pilot half sister, which appears to be coming to a head at the end of the book.

 

 

Did that kid get a name?

Janus