What makes 40k interesting to you?

[CeaselessWatcher]

I'm curious to find out what specifically interests y'all about Warhammer 40k! I'm personally a fan of the books and lore and am really enjoying being in a rogue trader campaign. I more recently have gotten into mini painting, but I don't have any particular interest in the war game. I use the rule of cool to build my minis, so I'm sure my armies are probably going to be pretty whack points wise.

So, what keeps y'all coming back to Warhammer? 

[Xenith]

The miniatures primarily, and the wargame, but also the lore behind it, these days. I'd argue that it's the best +/- most detailed sci-fi setting around. 

[Karhedron]

I guess I find all 3 aspects appealing, the lore, the models and the game. Sometimes one aspect takes the lead and at other times others but there is always something to keep my interested, I am afraid my interest in Fantasy did not survive the destruction of the Old World. The simultaneous reset of lore, models and game system rather killed it for me. Fortunately 40K avoided the mistake with 8th edition. Primaris Marines could be fielded alongside my existing Marines. The lore progressed but was not wiped away. The reset of the game actually came as something of a relief as the "Decurion" formation bonuses in 7th edition had got unbalanced and out of hand.

[Slave to Darkness]

Tbh I dont know why I keep coming back. The price is absurd, the rules are wonky, I think its just an excuse to hang out with the lads and have a beer and a giggle, more of a social thing really, most of us dont even really care about 9th, we play 1st edition and soon 2nd. 

[Karak Norn Clansman]

Bonkers to the hilt. Historically based. Sci-fi smörgåsbord.

One of very few settings who approaches, and sometimes surpasses real historical human depravity.

Other settings eventually lose their lustre because they are not as daring and rich as Warhammer 40'000, but 40k stays eternally vibrant because it dares to be bonkers with excellence.

May it last forty thousand years!

Edited September 5, 2022 by Karak Norn Clansman

[Halandaar]

52 minutes ago, Slave to Darkness said:

Tbh I dont know why I keep coming back. The price is absurd, the rules are wonky, I think its just an excuse to hang out with the lads and have a beer and a giggle, more of a social thing really, most of us dont even really care about 9th, we play 1st edition and soon 2nd. 

I was flippantly going to suggest that the true answer for most people would probably be "nostalgia", "sunk cost fallacy" or "addiction" 

From my point of view it's a combination of things; I probably get most of my 40k enjoyment out of building and painting models, which is a great way to just switch off from all the day-to-day stuff. But the reason I choose these models rather than other wargames or scale modelling is a lot to do with the GW's visual style all the way back to those black and white drawings in old books that seem to be directly influencing miniature design these days. I guess I just love the look of GW stuff and for me, nothing else in this market comes close. Even 3rd party designers trying to make GW-compatible products frequently miss the mark, IMO. I would also say I'm very invested in the lore/setting, and consider it to be one of the best realised sci-fi settings out there. Much is made of the phrase "grimdark", but 40K as a setting is not afraid to be bleak and cynical in a way that most wouldn't dare.

As for the wargame, it's a distant last place for me, although it's not totally irrelevant. It still guides my purchases in terms of wanting to build valid armies, and informs how I assemble certain models. The fact that it's so popular means it's easy to play when/if I feel like it, but it changes so much (and so often) that I just can't bring myself to care too much about what's going on in it or balance or power creep or whatever. 

Edited September 5, 2022 by Halandaar

[Marshal Mittens]

I saw a red (Blood Angels?) Dreadnaught in the Katy mills mall like 23-25 years ago and wanted one because lit looked awesome. Still find the models awesome today, and like building the neat looking ones. 

[Valkia the Bloody]

I love the setting.

It has immense world-building and is not ashamed to present the full might of darkness and despair. It is the ultimate post-apocalypse.

I have always loved the rich and deep lore and all those great classic Black Library books, starting with Ian Watson.

I just re-read the Inquisition series by Dan Abnett, to tie in with me reading the first two Bequin books, and it just showed me again why I LOVE this setting. Abnett's world-building is impeccable. I like most of his Black Library books, but his Inquisition books have a very special place in my heart. Here, the whole horror of the daily life of normal Imperial citizens is revealed. And still, even if everything is basically going to the dogs and there is only darkness and despair, there is still place for a little hope and some heroic struggle against the inevitable. 

I also absolutely love the Night Lords trilogy. THIS is what the setting is about, at least for me.

I have been into 40k for about 25 years, and while I have taken long breaks in between, I have always come back.

I also love the art style (Blanchitsu!) and some of the wonderful grim-dark models. Some of these old sculpts are fantastic!

I am not a fan of the Primaris at all (my favorite Space Marine armor is Mark III), but I think some of the latest Chaos stuff that came out in the past few years has been fantastic.

It is great they still release some cool models that bring me right back to when I fell in love with 40k.

And here, I am not talking about the new Squat models (they look to me like an acquired taste, and I am not sure I will acquire it anytime soon). But just take some of the recent Kill Team releases. They are amazing! The detail and the fact, that after all this time, they are still able to surprise me with a new direction/ twist on some classics.

I have cut back on spending a lot (mainly because I already have a huge backlog), but the new "Into the Dark" Kill Team box just ticked all the boxes for me. The dark derelict spaceship setting, claustrophobic atmosphere, ambushes from the dark... can it get any more classic than that? Am I the only one who loved how the Imperial Fists boarded the Tyranid ship in Ian Watson's "Space Marine"? Utterly classic book by the way.

Plus, two interesting non-standard well-designed teams- one of them a re-imagined fresh look on an old classic (Kroot) and the other bringing some fresh ideas into the tired old Imperium with these deep-sea -diver space-suits of the Navy. This was the first big GW purchase for me in a year!

And the main reason was, it made me feel nostalgic, reminding me of the time when I discovered the setting and was checking out any hobby store I found for some old 1st edition metal miniatures (I am still having a watchful eye on Ebay for any rare metal finds).

I am not in this hobby for the latest Primaris quad-bike (which is not my cup of tea at all). But I am in it for the weird and wonderful and unusual and the fact that even now, they are still able to surprise someone like me. And of course I am in it for the grim dark. The darker, the better. No wonder I love my Night Lords so much.

[Slave to Darkness]

7 hours ago, Halandaar said:

I was flippantly going to suggest that the true answer for most people would probably be "nostalgia", "sunk cost fallacy" or "addiction" 

 

Tbh I thought small with my reply nd thought of 40k 'the game' not 'the setting'. 

 

I love reading the novels, Im not the only person here who loves Ian Watsons 'Space Marine', his Draco trilogy was amazing as well.

 

The setting of Necromunda I love and always have since of the 'Confrontation' days. I love what the Blanchitsu/Inq20 community do. I love looking at the old art from when I was a kid and 30 years on I still get the old tingles that I did back in the day. Bolt Thrower albums. 

 

So now I have thought about it I keep coming back because 40k is just  brutal.

[Domhnall]

Been in the setting since the mid 90's, so partly because it's what I know, but also because the setting and miniatures really tickle me in the giddy parts. I haven't played a proper game since 2nd edition, so the game itself doesn't fully interest me (though I wouldn't be against playing it tbh), so it's the setting, stories, minis, and the social aspect on this here forum and whoever posts on instagram etc. 

I have and will make/paint other figures/cars/motorbikes when time allows (like most things, they sit almost finished), but this is where I spend far far too much of my can't fullly justify spare cash. 

[Magos Takatus]

It must be the lore that inevitably drags me in too. I spend most of my days painting models now with almost no time spent reading new lore because of my inability to focus when reading currently. However what lore does permeate through that obstacle inspires me pretty much indefinitely. There's a large part of me that if fuelled by the nostalgia of years past and the doomed nobility of the Blood Angels and the tenacity of the Crimson Fists but it was the introduction of the Adeptus Mechanicus army that really set me off. They have always been creeping about in the artwork and the lore but they never got the chance to really flex their muscles. The alien mindset and the freakish body horror fascinate me and the models really inspire me. I think the Sydonian Dragoon is peak Mechanicus. The grafted servitor acting as the steed for the cyborg warrior perched commandingly atop it. From the moment I saw that model I decided that army was going to be mine. I also love the Forge World Mechanicum range but without the 40k rules to justify the purchases I've more or less avoided buying those for now.

I do have other fascinations in 40k, the Aeldari have long been in my wheelhouse, with me collecting quite a few Avatar of Khaine models just because I think it looks cool. I also like the simplicity of Ork thinking and that's lead to another army rearing it's green head.

I'd say pretty much every army has a hook that could get me interested, well, I'm not fond of Chaos Daemons but pretty much everything else has something that could become a dangerously expensive investment if I ever let my pile of shame spill over into another army.

There is so much to the setting that you could immerse yourself fully into it and always have something new to uncover.

[ThePenitentOne]

This will explain a bit about why I like 9th so much too:

For me, the art of gaming is the symbiosis between rules and stories. Each system has unique rules that influence the way stories can be told- I think of things like the merits and flaws of classic Whitewolf RPG's (First ed World of Darkness), or the mental balance stat in Kult, or the management of short term (victory/ loss) medium term (Agendas) and Long Term Goals (story driven achievements like Sainthood, Machine Creation, Territorial Dominance, Planetary Conquest, etc) in Crusade.

The interactions of these three types of goals are what make Crusade special and radically differentiate it from the core game, whose goal is only ever to win. These three types of goals exist in a state of dynamic tension- achieving one might come at the cost of achieving the others. Priorities shift depending upon where you stand in a campaign: in the beginning, when you can only pursue a single agenda due to game size and the end game is far in the future, winning will be your bread and butter. 

As your Order of Battle grows, and the army begins to pursue specific battlefield objectives, winning a battle may not be enough to ensure victory in the war. Different detachments, or even different units may be pulled from the order of battle to achieve critical agendas that provide an edge in future games if not victory in the current battle.

Finally, as you approach the final showdown, it may be crucial to achieve that long-term goal in order bring the best force to battle that can be assembled- the Living Saint or Ascended Archon commanding the force as a supreme exemplar of prowess and an indomitable campaigner.

The detachment system, ally rules, Agent rules... All of this contributes to 40K's storytelling elements as well.  

For me, the rules are necessary to the art form. Simply SAYING "These troops are Bloody Rose" doesn't actually mean anything unless there are rules that give this decision an actual, mechanical impact on the game. It's part of the medium. 

[Dr. Clock]

Jes Goodwin. Rule of Cool. The slow adventure of collecting and personalizing.

Gaming is important, but I use my Sigmar figures for DnD more often than for actual AoS.

I definitely do love the game experience, and it helps for hobby motivation, but my entire sense of design/artistic excellence is tightly bound to Jes Goodwin and the absolute genius of putting laser beams on your face 'cause it helps you kill the eldritch mutant goat people faster.

Cheers,

The Good Doctor.

[Scribe]

The setting, from 3rd, to the current date.

I cannot be sure it will continue, but as long as it holds true to itself, there is something to return to 40K for.

[sitnam]

It’s all about the lore and setting for me, although since I got back into painting 3 years ago that has invested me more heavily into the setting. I wish I could get the gaming in more, but my hobby group prefer board games over tabletop. That said, BSF is great as it allows me to actually play with my toys lol.

 What really attaches me to the lore is the sheer vastness of the setting. You can tell your own stories in your own locales with your own factions, and it can fit into the setting perfectly. I think this might be the reason HH and WHFB haven’t kept my attention as much, their scale is a bit more limited for creative freedom. I particularly like the opening of the Great Rift and the presence of Imperium Nihilus, as the Dark Imperium serves as a great place for grim stories 

[mughi3]

The lore (before primaris), as for the game-epic thematic battles in the 41st millennium, which is why i went back to playing older editions of 40K after 8th ed dropped. 

[Antarius]

I've absolutely no interest in playing full-scale 40K anymore. I'm not sure a new edition will be able to tempt me back either (if I ever wanted to play 40K again, I would probably play 4th or something like that anyway). But I still love the setting and all the smaller games within that setting, as well as creating co-op "RP light" scenarios and campaings in the 40K universe.

[tychobi]

40k is fun.  Matched play is silly due to active lack of balance but I do so enjoy pushing models about and killing my friends models. The lore was super strong but has been watered down a bit with primarysuemarines.  Hopefully a nice Imperial civil war can up the proof on the lore soon.  Dice tell stories and 40k is a fun playground for those stories. 

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

Largely the mix of different cultures/mythologies, fantasy and sci-fi tropes.

 

 

[dees]

Hmmm...the vast majority of my time is spent building, converting and painting so the creative art aspect of the hobby is what holds me to 40K and GW in general.  The game systems from GW have their flaws that are well covered, but I really do enjoy sitting across from live person and playing when I get the time and chance.  

In the area I live in Warmachine and Hordes became very popular when GW was killing off WFB and making 6th & 7th 40K less than stealer to play.  So for a few years I played them and painted up some models there.  PP games can be fun, but around here the player base doesn't make it fun oddly.  In that regard the game is very important because despite the GW models always being better the PP IMO if I don't have the community then I wont buy the models.  

So I guess in a way its the community that keeps me painting and playing GW.  There is something to be said about getting to the figs painted and on the table to kinda show them off.  

[Captain Caine 24th]

Open lore. I can make the models how I want. Sometimes historical gaming is good and precision is a goal in its own right. (WW2, railroads, and even Badab and Heresy can certainly be fun in their own right).  I however like the idea of developing my own setting. This "my" army. And this is especially an issue with expensive models. Far and away, most other science fiction is extremely limited. 40k can take place in the Ghoul Stars, on a ship in a Retribution fleet, a jungle planet, outside the material universe, 7000 years ago, 4000 years from now, etc. 

Modifiable Lore. Sometimes I really don't like a new direction. But, the idea of 'cannon' in 40k is very interesting in depth and breadth. Somebody always knows more. Often others have references to really esoteric and obscure tidbits.  On the other hand, 'cannon' is constrictive to justifiable revision and expansion. The idea that this is a setting not a story is attractive in allowing 40k to become more than it is, and continue to develop into more in the future.  Classics by Herodotus or Shakespeare (heresy!) might very well have developed upon the retelling hundreds of times, with samplings from all over history. This setting is better with more authors. Though I will absolutely agree that mystery can absolutely fuel hobby interest, and theory-crafting in a very beautiful way--sometimes things are best left undeveloped. 

Expansive lore. The idea of a million words (and I think it should be far more) really opens up a sandbox of opportunity for the player to modify armies and models to whatever extreme weirdness feels appropriate. It's not just factions, but factions within factions. It's huge. 

Models. Some lines/armies really don't interest me. I don't mention them specifically because who am I to say what one shouldn't enjoy? Other models have grown on me. And yet others aren't nearly as cool as I remember (my old baal predator is really showing its age). But overall without the models I doubt I'd stay interested. 

Conversions/kitbashing. This might be my favorite. I love seeing all the inspiration around the internet and white dwarf, and in tournaments. People do outrageous things, and you can catch a glint of madness in their eye as they describe the process they went about to create their project. 

Overall the creativity and engagement keeps me in 40k or brings me back. The game itself is a means for me to engage and is important in that way. But the game has also probably been the thing to cause me to set aside the hobby the most. It's various evolutions and iterations are balanced and fun to some while decidedly dry, hyper-technical, or sterilized to others, and even then this will vary as game philosophies or lead designers come and go. 

[Sugarlessllama]

What keeps me with 40K? That is a good question. Thinking about it, I think it is might be a bit of a call back to 80's and 90's SF. The SF of that time still had a lot of the "golden age" feel of the 50's but there was a strong satirical rebuke to the Regan/Thatcher 80's. There was just something special about that time. There was still optimism I think. Now... I don't know things feel different. 

However, in many ways Warhammer 40,000 still has that tone. It still acknowledges that Fascism is still a heartbeat away and that it will lead to something awful if we let it. But still a fun read with a minor thread of hope. 

There is also the visuals. I love the look of Warhammer 40,000. That over the top style grim pulp imagery just makes me happy. I can honestly say that I just love the art.

And I really like the game. Not really the rules per se. But the act of playing the game. I love being able to meet up with friends at my FLGS and throw dice with them. If it weren't for the game, (one that I haven't really played in three years.) then I wouldn't really leave my house (which I haven't, but that is another conversation.). Something about being able to play a game in real space with friends is something that I can really look forward to.

That's what keeps me in the hobby.

[gideon stargreave]

Captain Cain said it better than I could, but what i like about 40k is how open it is. I can make a crusade fleet in the 37th millenium, or a bunch of prospectors on some tiny outpost dealing with a strange cult, or pre fall eldar dragon hunters or whatever. I like 40k despite the literature, not because of it, the artwork for me is what sells it

[Orange Knight]

14 hours ago, Sugarlessllama said:

What keeps me with 40K? That is a good question. Thinking about it, I think it is might be a bit of a call back to 80's and 90's SF. The SF of that time still had a lot of the "golden age" feel of the 50's but there was a strong satirical rebuke to the Regan/Thatcher 80's. There was just something special about that time. There was still optimism I think. Now... I don't know things feel different. 

However, in many ways Warhammer 40,000 still has that tone. It still acknowledges that Fascism is still a heartbeat away and that it will lead to something awful if we let it. But still a fun read with a minor thread of hope. 

 

I think these themes were definitely a large part of the setting when it acted as a AD2000 style satire, but it has since morphed into something very different.

There are two layers to the lore now. The shallow layer is the basic faction identity and history, and the basic details of why the galaxy is at war. The deeper layers are found when you dive into the novels that really examine how thing function within the universe.

If you really examine the Imperium in detail, as it functions in 40k, it's not even a fascist empire. Individual planets that fit the criteria definitely exist, but it's organised as a lose confederacy of planets that resembles Feudal Japan, within individual planetary lords who pay tribute to the Shogun... I mean Emperor! Sprinkle some techno-religious themes hijacked from Dune for good effect.

Going back to the topic - Why is 40k interesting to me? 

Lore >>> Collecting >>> Playing

Over the years many franchises that I held dear to my heart have been damaged by their custodians, often beyond repair. Star Trek and Star Wars feel like imposters are wearing the skin of old favourites (SNW was good at least). 40k maintains an impeccable universe that has been expanded with a lot of quality lore (and some less impressive stuff too). 30 years into Warhammer 40k, we are getting some of the absolute best stories involving this universe - The Vaults of Terra, Devastation of Baal, The Great Work, Watchers of the Throne, etc. are all recent additions to the Black Library, and in my eyes have eclipsed the old favourites such as Eisenhorn.

How many other pulp entertainment IPs are pumping out their best stories 30 years into their lifetime, without re-setting their universe?

[Grotsmasha]

The table top wargame hasn't held any interest for me since 2nd Ed, but I do enjoy the smaller, quicker boxed games, Space Marine Adventures, Lost Patrol, Space Hulk. For a long, long, long time I bought and read every BL novel that came out (still have most of them, some I've upgraded from singles to omnibus'), these days though it's really only the Heresy / Siege novels are on my buy list. Primarily though, it's building, converting, kit bashing, painting side of the hobby that has kept my attention all these years. I've quite a few models I've bought and painted because it looked cool, rather than it belongs to my faction.

Last year I started commission painting, and I've put paint on models almost everyday since March last year, and am still really enjoying it. I get to paint models I could/would never buy for myself, in schemes I wouldn't choose.