What's your headcanon?

[BrainFireBob]

Trouble editing.

 

There were approximately 1k- a bit more- 1K Sons when Magnus made his deal with Tzeentch to protect them from the change. He's still a Cyclops.

 

This is why the Blood Ravens don't turn into chaos spawn.

[Gamiel]

Most Imperial transports are promethium / battery hybrids and can function without liquid fuel but then only at lower speed. You need the promethium for flying starts and to get at higher speeds, driving with the liquid fuel engine also recharges the batteries.

[FormelyKnownAsSmashyPants]

A small piece of head cannon I’ve come up with is that the Ork philosophy of ‘Red Onez Go Fasta’ comes from early encounters with either Saim Hann Jetbikers or BA Legiones Rhinos.

Edited July 28, 2022 by Captain Smashy Pants

[Evil Eye]

On the note of Orks- as someone who prefers the "the psychic field does exist but Ork technology fundamentally just works, they have engineering coded into their DNA" approach, I like the idea that if for some insane reason Ork mekboyz and the Mechanicus were to work together (without accusing anyone of heresy or starting a fight) they'd be capable of producing legitimate technological wonders- the Orks' inherent understanding of technology and willingness to improve combined with the Mechanicus' higher standards of science, when combined, would be incredible. "Roight, so dat'z a good plasma shoota ya got dere, but da tank needs suspenshun! Also yer koolin' system needs better radiators!" "Thank you, greenskin, you've been very helpful!"

In fact the idea of a rogue forge world recruiting Blood Axe meks to help "test" their weapons and accidentally starting a weird (if genuinely amicable) partnership would be hilarious and strangely plausible. Renegade Mechanicus who don't fall to Chaos and are using Xenos tech...but it's ORK tech.

[TheVoidDragon]

58 minutes ago, Evil Eye said:

On the note of Orks- as someone who prefers the "the psychic field does exist but Ork technology fundamentally just works, they have engineering coded into their DNA" approach

This isn't just a preference though? It's what the lore actually says about it. The whole "belief" thing is in-universe speculation from the Mechanicus that conjecture and memes have turned into claiming it's actually a thing even though that's never stated outside of that speculation from less-than-relaible sources.

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

My head canon is that anything from BL not supported by the BRB, codex, campaign book, etc isn’t truly canon.

 

the novels say whatever they want to make the story feel compelling. Whether that’s a termagaunt killing a terminator, or a commissar killing a chaos marine, or a tactical marine soloing a hive tyrant.

 

[Osteoclast]

Completely contrary to canon as written, but Grey Knights as loyalist/refounded Word Bearers. It ties in well with the banishment knowledge of the Anchorite, a better intended trajectory for Lorgar, and it makes the “Can we fall?” angst discussed in The Emperor’s Gift absolutely hilarious. Plus I think that the Emperor’s gene-seed is a dumb idea. 
 

Most regiments serve for a single planetary thing before being disbanded. Particularly with infantry regiments, going on continued campaigns means that local troops are raised up and put under the banner of a far away planet because attrition is a thing and far more than GW writers seem to get. 
 

For the most part, Grey Knights don’t actually purge Imperial forces they fight alongside, they just tell and mind wipe them into thinking that they’re a different Chapter and who is gonna know better? That’s why chapters seemingly have contingents across the galaxy or moving far faster than should be possible. 
 

Most IF successors are by way of Black Templar crusades which have detailed a portion or entirety of their forces to holding and defending the now conquered territory. It’s why they like to build all those keeps on conquered worlds and why nobody cares about them being larger than Codex sized, cuz they’ll metastasize as needs be and have demonstrated that they don’t do the internal empire building that is the reason for the rule. 
 

Most of the liquidated psykers, and much of Terra’s industrial export, are turned into servitor type machinery. Wanna weld some adamantium? Pick up an aetheric welder which is a psyker brain in a box and the welding tube is a covered up arm. Do not use during warp transit. 
 

Most of the initial Indomitus Crusade forces involved reactivating legit every mothballed ship Terra could find and the wholesale impressment and conscription of hives across the solar system to refit and man them and Imperial Guard forces. Going off BFG, this also means Indomitus Crusade ship composition looks suspiciously like the Chaos fleets they’re combatting and this has led to issues when encountering loyal worlds who are justifiably suspicious. 

[slitth]

1. That primarchs gain more power for each son that die in their service.

Because they are just a small fragment in the warp that add to the essence of the primarch when they die.

 

2. Become a demon-primarch is actually only a powerboost in the short run.

If they primarchs gain power from  each son that die in their service, then none demon-primarch might become more powerfull in the long run.

 

3. Alpharius and Omegon seen more that the Cabal did in the Acuity, and hade to make the choice to doom humanity to the long suffering, because they have seen a way to win if the future.

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

Sigmar is one of the lost primarchs, his return to the old world/end times happened after whatever it is that resulted in him and his legion being fully redacted from imperial history, and stormcasts are just his legion.

maybe he was redacted due to the worship from the empire growing him to strong making him a minor warp god or something like that

edit

his name and legion were redacted to prevent further worship and further empowerment.

Sigmar then used his powers to make his legion something between a rubric marine and a demon creating the stormcast as we know them in AoS today.

Edited September 22, 2022 by Inquisitor_Lensoven

[Gamiel]

The Cabal was lying to Alpharius. Killing of humanity would only weaken Chaos in a short run before another species would take their place, not stop it in any way. It was more of a "two birds with the same stone" thinking from them, humanity was a threat to the members of the Cabal so by taking out humanity they would take out a threat and at least for a time weaken Chaos.

[Pacific81]

@Inquisitor_Lensoven, that was actually a borderline actual canon in the old days. There were loads of hints in the fluff that Sigmar was a Primarch - the falling star, his strength and upbringing just like the Primarch background. I am sure someone can give a more detailed explanation (I did once read a whole thesis on it that stated all the points and it was pretty convincing!)

Then you had things like chaos warriors with bolt guns, one of the fantasy chaos army book covers had some art that featured a daemon engine in the background - basically inferring that the WHFB old world was a world within the 40k universe. Of course there will never be an 'official' line on this, in the same way there wont be for the lost legions, but this head canon is one that is shared by many! Someone needs to ask Rick Priestley or Jervis Johnson if that was ever a tongue in cheek intent with the hints etc, they would probably be truthful and answer it.

 

Edited September 23, 2022 by Pacific81

[Karhedron]

The link between 40K and FB persisted until at least the early 2000s. The Albion campaign in 2001 concluded with some races getting 40K-ish artefacts, even a suit of Power Star Armour.

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

2 hours ago, Pacific81 said:

@Inquisitor_Lensoven, that was actually a borderline actual canon in the old days. There were loads of hints in the fluff that Sigmar was a Primarch - the falling star, his strength and upbringing just like the Primarch background. I am sure someone can give a more detailed explanation (I did once read a whole thesis on it that stated all the points and it was pretty convincing!)

Then you had things like chaos warriors with bolt guns, one of the fantasy chaos army book covers had some art that featured a daemon engine in the background - basically inferring that the WHFB old world was a world within the 40k universe. Of course there will never be an 'official' line on this, in the same way there wont be for the lost legions, but this head canon is one that is shared by many! Someone needs to ask Rick Priestley or Jervis Johnson if that was ever a tongue in cheek intent with the hints etc, they would probably be truthful and answer it.

 

Yep, I’m aware of the old links, and that’s why I slightly updated it.

I think the bit about sigmar being worshipped and becoming a god adds a good explanation for why records of him and his legion were destroyed/redacted

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

1 hour ago, Karhedron said:

The link between 40K and FB persisted until at least the early 2000s. The Albion campaign in 2001 concluded with some races getting 40K-ish artefacts, even a suit of Power Star Armour.

Someone found a picture of eldar wraith guard attacking a castle occupied by orcs from a looong time ago.

[Slave to Darkness]

8 minutes ago, Inquisitor_Lensoven said:

Someone found a picture of eldar wraith guard attacking a castle occupied by orcs from a looong time ago.

I believe that was from 3rd ed Fantasy Siege book. The smoke drifting across the picture was from one of the studio guys cigars.

[Mechanicus Tech-Support]

God that was such a good book, the pictures alone inspired so much when I was a wee lad (sad reminiscing noises) 

[Evil Eye]

I mentioned it in another thread but I like the idea Ghazghkull has such a genuine level of respect for Yarrick that should the Old Man of Armageddon die he's going to give the man a full funeral and raise a monument to him, as "Da Greatest, Orkiest 'Umie Wot Evva Lived".

Some other headcanons:

>The FW Night Spinner and plastic Night Spinner fill two totally different roles despite using the same basic weapon system. The FW one is long-distance bombardment (the monofilament webs simply drifting to the ground and dissecting anything underneath) whilst the plastic one is a short-ranged assault gun that employs the same ammo/gun but using direct fire, giving the webs greater impact and thus meaning even Terminator armour will be shredded.

>Likewise, the Type 1 and Type 2 of the Cobra and Scorpion tanks are names given by the Imperium based on the ones they saw first; both have existed concurrently from different Craftworlds, with the same basic role being approached differently based on the particular culture/doctrine of that Craftworld.

>Whatever nonsense with the Cabal never happened and is simple misdirection spread by the Alpha Legion. The entire point of their existence is we have no bloody clue what they're doing or why, but if there is any explanation, it is simply that the Twins did what close siblings do best- misbehaved. Their entire motivation was simply to screw over the Emperor's grand plan out of a desire to serve no masters but themselves, and Chaos seemed like the best way to do that. Whether this was Chaotic temptation causing them to do this or they planned it long before and when the Dark Gods reached out to them they just thought "Screw it why not" and have their own plans to screw them over too is unknown and unimportant. Likewise, whether Alpharius and/or his brother are still alive, dead or somewhere in between is also completely unimportant, because the lesson they taught the Alpha Legion was "What we stand for- independence and freedom from any one master- are what matter. We as individuals are meaningless. If we die, it means nothing to the Legion as a whole. You have ten thousand heads and yet also none. You are all Alpharius." and trying to give them a clear motive that they were trying to steer their legion towards totally undermines the themes of the Alpha Legion. Notably that they answer to nobody, are controlled by nothing and basically don't give a toss.

>The whole "The Tau are actually just as bad as the Imperium guys!" thing is Imperial propaganda. They are by no means perfect, but on the whole their treatment of their own people and allies is MUCH better than more or less any other major race in the galaxy. The problem being that they're still a tiny force who have mostly survived by evading notice, and are also prone to hilarious naivety (a friend told me how in a book they killed some minor Slaaneshi warlord and thought they'd killed Slaanesh himself!) which could well be their undoing. If they do survive to reach any great size, this naivety and "niceness" will have been majorly eroded.

>The old XV-88 Broadside (the Crisis with new arms, guns and feet) is actually a field modification of Crisis suits and exists as a forerunner of the current "bespoke" model. For a long time Broadsides existed as simple Crisis variants until it was decided to give them their own unique design to better suit their role.

>The structure being guarded by Hive Fleet Tiamat is effectively a synapse node of such gargantuan size that when fully matured, the Shadow in the Warp, and indeed the influence of the Hive Mind itself, will be permanently shrouding a VAST area of space around it; effectively rendering planets in its vicinity utterly helpless before the Tyranids (synapse creatures not even being necessary to deploy due to the entire world essentially being in synapse range).

[Jamafore]

Mine is that the only parts of the codex that Guilliman cared about the legions abiding was the splitting up and the slower creation parts. His feeling being, "I don't care how you organize, fight, do whatever, but you can't do it in 100,000 man forces anymore," and the whole organization parts of the codex was a suggestion. Kind of like, "If you are unsure of how to start, here's a good template that works." 

Reasoning - Guilliman is not stupid, he would have realized that all the legions were organized according to how his brothers preferred and would have been extremely resistant to those kinds of changes, especially the ones with their primarchs still alive.

 

He might've not even cared about the strictly 1,000 marines part, they just needed to be smaller than the legions, so 1,500-2,000 marine chapters were acceptable. It was just what the chapters in the Ultramarines were so everyone glommed on to that. After that it spiraled into what it is today. 

Reasoning - There is enough ambiguity in the wording that there cannot have ever been a hard and fast cap on size.

 

The reason Dorn was so against it was that it was right after the siege and he probably had a good idea of the casualty lists and was going, "I BARELY defended the palace with 300,000 marines, and you expect me to have done it with only a 100th of that?" Which then snowballed until Dorn figured out that Guilliman was just saying only 1,000 Fistys, not 1,000 sons of Dorn.

Reasoning - Dorn was known to have been stubborn and as said had just gotten out of the siege, so those circumstances would have heavily colored his reactions/reasonings.

 

That this "Last Wall Protocol" didn't exist. It was stated to be a contingency plan in case Terra was ever threatened like in the siege. But let's face it, if that happened, protocol or not, every chapter that could possibly get there would be there. Nobody would be sitting back saying, "Meh. That's on Terra, not here. Not my problem." Mind you that last bit I haven't read all of the Beast series

 

Dorn was actually trying to be friendly with Perturabo, and impressed with his architecture and engineering work. But tried to offer suggestions to improve it, which Perturabo took out of context and believed that he was telling him he was doing it wrong. After that Dorn just kind of stayed away from Perturabo as he knew that there were issues there.

Reasoning - This one's a little more shaky and relying on intuition than the others, but Dorn is written like he would have been intersted in the same kind of areas Perturabo was, but also would have offered his opinion on areas that needed work, while also not one to perty up words to save feelings. Given how Perturabo is written, I can easily see him seeing such opinions as an attack and not the helpful suggestions Dorn might've intended

 

Edited October 6, 2022 by Jamafore
Explanations on the reasoning

[Magos Takatus]

On 9/24/2022 at 1:03 AM, Evil Eye said:

The FW Night Spinner and plastic Night Spinner fill two totally different roles despite using the same basic weapon system. The FW one is long-distance bombardment (the monofilament webs simply drifting to the ground and dissecting anything underneath) whilst the plastic one is a short-ranged assault gun that employs the same ammo/gun but using direct fire, giving the webs greater impact and thus meaning even Terminator armour will be shredded.

 

I also thought that the plastic Night Spinner doesn't look capable of being an artillery piece. I bought one of the Forge World Night Spinner kits just before they discontinued it for that reason. I never got around to building that tank but one day it will pass out of the pile of shame and at that point everyone that looks at it will not recognise it and think it is weird. I don't even dislike the plastic version, I think it's fine but the entire vehicle would have to pitch upwards to fire it over the enemies' heads.

[Evil Eye]

On 10/6/2022 at 4:18 PM, Magos Takatus said:

I also thought that the plastic Night Spinner doesn't look capable of being an artillery piece. I bought one of the Forge World Night Spinner kits just before they discontinued it for that reason. I never got around to building that tank but one day it will pass out of the pile of shame and at that point everyone that looks at it will not recognise it and think it is weird. I don't even dislike the plastic version, I think it's fine but the entire vehicle would have to pitch upwards to fire it over the enemies' heads.

I was going to say "no time like the present" but I'd be a massive hypocrite to do so... It is a lovely thing though, as all those FW Eldar models are. Still kinda sad the old Firestorm has been all but forgotten.

Also another headcanon, relating to the Alpha Legion- Alpharius' catalyst for turning traitor was witnessing Malcador psychically strangle Horus when they and the Khan confronted the Sigilite over the cancellation of memorials to the Lost Primarchs. Given Alpharius and Horus were quite close (IIRC), and the whole "independence/we have no master" theme of the Alpha Legion, the double whammy of being told "You're not allowed to commemorate your lost brothers" by a shady douchebag with your father's approval, and one of his closest friends being choked out by said same shady douchebag would probably have been enough to make up his mind.

[Reldn]

I've a few things I've tried to headcanon:

The Flesh Eaters are a second founding chapter.

 

The Blood Drinkers are controlling their flaws through sheer willpower and by embracing the thirst. Not this stupid Chaos trick that it became. The Rite of Holos doesn't exist and is merely propaganda meant to discredit an honorable chapter. The "Because Chaos!" trope is getting old, if the Blood Drinkers are to be damned and fall, then let it be by their own hands and bloody methods. A Tzeentchian trick not needed.

 

The Imperial Fists did not get completely wiped out. Brought to critically low numbers, perhaps, but never extinct. Actually, I've headcanoned away most of "The Beast Arises" series.

 

...Blood Ravens are a loyalist splinter of the Thousand Sons. To me, they always have been, and they always will be! *laughs*

[Cpt_Reaper]

Sorry for the threadomancy.

 

The ye olde Epic Space Marine Lander is, to me, the Warhawk IV Stormbird. Or rather, a transport variant much like the Thunderhawk Transporter was a variant of the Thunderhawk. I envision the base model has an enclosed hull, maybe with turrets along the side like the Sokar.

[de Selby]

My headcanon:

 

1. Space marines come in different sizes, varying by chapter, era, batch number, and personal sensitivity to the effects of the astartes organs. Thus all scales and fluff are correct and a marine can be anywhere from 6 to 10 feet tall. They are all astartes and any astartes can kill any other astartes.

 

2. The tyranid hive mind functions in a similar way to a chaos god of hunger (cf. that Tigurius quote). As long as the tyranids are eating they can draw power from the warp, which explains why they suck up whole oceans and atmospheres which have no calorific value.

 

3. A new idea that I recently heard on the internet: the STC system actually functioned in much the same way as current AI image creation, combining and averaging a bunch of archive design elements according to keywords input by the user, rather than actually designing to solve a problem. This explains why the known STC designs look thematically correct but aren't really super functional.

[Gamiel]

18 hours ago, de Selby said:

1. Space marines come in different sizes, varying by chapter, era, batch number, and personal sensitivity to the effects of the astartes organs. Thus all scales and fluff are correct and a marine can be anywhere from 6 to 10 feet tall. 

This is at least semi-canon since we have Marines like Pasanius Lysane of the Um, Seydon of the Iron Snakes, and Haegr the Mountain of the Space Wolves, who all are noted for being unusually large.

 

And we have at least one Dark Angel Fallen that was able to pass for a standard human (when unarmoured) without a Space Wolf (a younger Ragnar Blackmane) realising that he was a Astartes.

[Pacific81]

Yes it stands to reason they would be of different height, as the people that get the implants all have varied genes and physiology.

Otherwise you would have to have something that says "grow to 7ft 1 inch and stop", which seems a bit odd.