Cthonia’s Reckoning

[aa.logan]

Up for pre-order next week: to quote WarCom it’s available as “Special edition/Hardback/eBook/MP3”.

 

Their blurb “This anthology contains seven all-new short stories from some of the stalwarts of Black Library – Sons of Cthonia by John French, To the Last by Michael F Haspil, The Gangs Beneath by Gary Kloster, The Flesh Harvest by Nicholas Wolf, Traitor’s Faith by Noah Van Nguyen, For Hate’s Sake by Gav Thorpe, and Postulant by Chris Forrester. It’s the perfect complement to the game, going deeper into some of the setting’s key players and factions, and it’ll be available in four formats – hardback novel, eBook, MP3, and a luxury collector’s edition with a leather-effect cover.”

 

Personally, I’m well excited for this- some really promising writers and Heresy-as-setting is what I’ve been waiting for. Really intrigued as to what the Special Edition entails; presumably not signed but no mention of numbering or additional content might be enough for me to finally end my HH fancy edition collection.

[Ubiquitous1984]

I wasn’t aware that any legion attacked that world.  Is this new lore or something from the black books?  I hope it’s not just Bolter porn as tie-in books sometime tend to be.   

[Knockagh]

Looking forward to this too. I can’t see too much bolted porn in it. We haven’t seen much of that recently. I do think everything that will be released will be a nightmare to get. Next Saturday the internet will burn at 10am

[Roomsky]

Cthonia's Reckoning - Various (Audiobook)

I was already sort of excited for this just for the novelty of it. Not only are we getting some Sons of Horus focus the whole series has been largely deprived of, it's also covering a full engagement just through shorts. And by golly, I think it really paid off here.

By being a series of shorts, the book dodges the issue of "how do we capture the scope of an engagement without writing either a battle report or a very confused narrative?" The answer is you write a series of tiny narratives which drip-feed you information about the various aspects of the war, apparently. We get marines on the ground, we get void warfare, we get how the war is affecting the civilians, and we get the attention of an additional faction right at the end. Better yet, each short is able to be character motivation-focused while still tackling its effect on the wider war. I love the focus on the 16th's feelings of loyalty to their brothers, and the weird contrast of Cthonian Fists vs Sons of Horus recruited from distant worlds.

Not every story here is a winner, but I think it's greater than the sum of its parts and successful proof of concept for this format. It can happily bounce from topic to topic without being messy and still has plenty of room for interesting premises.

Now BL please get on Isstvan 3's Reckoning, Isstvan 5's Reckoning, and Beta-Garmon's Reckoning so I can get some more comprehensive accounts of those wars.

[lansalt]

I found Cthonia's Reckoning really underwhelming. The short tales do not give Cthonia more worldbuilding or information about its culture. There's no proper narrative about the siege or its resolution beyond the initial space battle. The praetors in the cover do not appear at all (!), and the Son of Horus are barely in it, appearing only as enemies for the Fists (!), who are most of the protagonists. Almost all tales take place in endless non-descript tunnels, with shallow characters and shallow firefights with little or no consequences.

Another missing opportunity for fleshing out the SoH and making them the protagonists of the war named after their primarch. It's baffling that they're the least developed legion in the fluff compared to the others.

As a tie-in book for new miniature releases this is not good. The short stories about the Calth praetors from the BaC box set, the Cassius Kill Team members, or the books about the Space Marine Heroes series 1 & 2 were much better.

 

[System Sound]

Surprisingly good anthology. Some of them could even be expanded upon further with novelas. Especially the ship captain.

37 minutes ago, Roomsky said:

 

Now BL please get on Isstvan 3's Reckoning, Isstvan 5's Reckoning, and Beta-Garmon's Reckoning so I can get some more comprehensive accounts of those wars.

Add Tallarn to that list too. Hell why not Prospero too. I really hope they expand on this format.

[aa.logan]

Loved this, it’s exactly what I want from the Heresy going forward. I’d have preferred more from the Sons’ perspective, but loved the fact that it *wasn’t* detailing the contents of the box set.

Noah Van Nguyen’s story is the stand-out to me, instantly one of my favourite ever Heresy shorts, but the quality is great throughout- French and Wolf are excellent too.

 

Somewhat surprised that the fancy version is *still* available, but I’m still staying strong and resisting it.

[Moonreaper666]

It's insane that while the Siege is going on Hundreds of Marines are fighting and killing each other in Cthonia. And it's not all Imperial Fists or Sons of Horus.

It wouldn't surprise me if the majority of Black Legion Marines still have Horus' geneseed

The Horus Heresy is the last time Loyalist mass-produce Marines while present day the Traitors produce Heretic Astartes like AK-47s

[Moonreaper666]

Spoiler

It's crazy that one decision could have lead to Cthonia becoming a Daemon World for the Word Bearers

 

Cthonia's Geneseed and Geneseed Factory use to make thousands of Word Bearer Marines yearly! BILLIONS of Cultist armed with advanced weapons!!!

 

[System Sound]

On 8/21/2022 at 5:51 AM, Moonreaper666 said:

It's insane that while the Siege is going on Hundreds of Marines are fighting and killing each other in Cthonia. And it's not all Imperial Fists or Sons of Horus.

It wouldn't surprise me if the majority of Black Legion Marines still have Horus' geneseed

The Horus Heresy is the last time Loyalist mass-produce Marines while present day the Traitors produce Heretic Astartes like AK-47s

Wasn't it stated in Talon/Black Legion that the rest of the legions hunted Sons of Horus almost to extinction after the siege failed?

[Sothalor]

Shh, Moonreaper doesn't do anything as silly as read the books.

[System Sound]

1 hour ago, A Melancholic Sanguinity said:

Shh, Moonreaper doesn't do anything as silly as read the books.

Oh I'm well aware of the Chief Headcannonist.

[Moonreaper666]

18 hours ago, System Sound said:

Wasn't it stated in Talon/Black Legion that the rest of the legions hunted Sons of Horus almost to extinction after the siege failed?

Talking about ADB. He acknowledged that the HH novels killed more Traitors that the actual size of the Traitor Legions a few times over

As the Heresy continued to its second half both sides recklessly mass-produce Astartes. Even the Blackshields multiplied in number, stability be damned

Word Bearers went from 150k to 165k Marines by the end of the Heresy despite the losses they've incured. Used geneseed from the Drop Site Massacre to bolster their numbers.

Many Sons of Horus warbands make up the Black Legion. Others are the Thrice-Cursed Traitors whom are still alive. When Abaddon became Warmaster there were still tens of thousands of authentic Sons of Horus, though many were not HH vets.

After the Scouring MASSIVE restrictions were put on the Loyalists which greatly limits how fast they can make new geneseed and restrict potential neophytes. This was done to reduce mutation, quality degredation and chance of Chaos corruption

The Traitors don't have these post-Heresy limitations. They have much more options in mass-replicating their geneseed stock and the potential recruits

 

The Blood Gorgons defected because of weird quirks in their geneseed. Lamenters are half of the time useless because of their unlucky geneseed.

Haarkon Worldclaimer currently has tens of thousands of Black Legionnaires in his personal campaign

[DarkChaplain]

I'm once more amazed by your obsession with (wildly inflated) numbers, buzzwords and randomly thrown around names that don't even relate to the subject at hand.

[cheywood]

Not to distract from this episode of Moonreaper’s Musings, but I’m sticking with the tried and true approach of talking about books only after reading them.
 

Just finished this up. It’s largely fine, better than I expected given the authors involved. I think the first four stories hold up as being well written and suitably varied in subject matter, but the last three fall into the old pattern of Marines shooting and slashing at each other a bunch. The connectivity between stories is a cool idea and helps give the narrative a sense of progression even if the connections themselves are rather minor. I look forward to seeing how The Vorbis Conspiracy does with the connected anthology concept, hopefully the threads between stories are more developed. Overall 5.5/10

[Ubiquitous1984]

I finally finished this.  I was certainly put off at first by the confusion with Imperial Fists born on Cthonia.  I felt like I had missed some important information elsewhere that I needed to catch up on!

Once I got over that, the stories were relatively enjoyable.  I would say the SoH characters were the stars of the show and it was good to read some more about their home world, albeit we didn’t learn all that much new information.  

This format is a good opportunity for new authors to dip their toe into the setting.  Let’s hope we see more books like this in the near future dealing with other parts of the conflict.  

[Moonreaper666]

Once again a matyr's sacrifice saves the Imperium from destruction

Had Ikharios pledged himself to the Dark Apostle the planet Cthonia becomes a Daemon World and recruiting center for the Word Bearers

The facilities and gene-seed banks use to produce Traitor Astartes, by the thousands, as well as Advanced weapons to armed Marines and Cultists (Billions), making them very dangerous.

The Word Bearers would have the numbers, location and technology to cripple the Imperium

[Ubiquitous1984]

10 hours ago, Moonreaper666 said:

Once again a matyr's sacrifice saves the Imperium from destruction

 

  Hide contents

Had Ikharios pledged himself to the Dark Apostle the planet Cthonia becomes a Daemon World and recruiting center for the Word Bearers

The facilities and gene-seed banks use to produce Traitor Astartes, by the thousands, as well as Advanced weapons to armed Marines and Cultists (Billions), making them very dangerous.

The Word Bearers would have the numbers, location and technology to cripple the Imperium

 

Wizzle wozzle?

Edited September 5, 2022 by Ubiquitous1984

[System Sound]

16 hours ago, Moonreaper666 said:

Once again a matyr's sacrifice saves the Imperium from destruction

 

  Reveal hidden contents

Had Ikharios pledged himself to the Dark Apostle the planet Cthonia becomes a Daemon World and recruiting center for the Word Bearers

The facilities and gene-seed banks use to produce Traitor Astartes, by the thousands, as well as Advanced weapons to armed Marines and Cultists (Billions), making them very dangerous.

The Word Bearers would have the numbers, location and technology to cripple the Imperium

 

I'm pretty sure theres plenty of fanfiction forums that would take your fantasies. But this ain't it brother...