Story vs setting

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

7 hours ago, Orange Knight said:

I just finished reading "The Dark City" by Chris Wraight.

The novels written by Wraight and Hayley over the last 5 years or so have now far eclipsed the old classics by Abnett in my opinion. I understand some people simply don't read, but I am also surprised at how many seem to avoid engagement with the novels.

 

This topic supposes that Story and Setting are in opposition. They are not.

The novels and stories all enhance the setting greatly, providing insight into characters, institutions and the various worlds of the Imperium. Black Library novels have all done a great job in both enhancing our understanding of events and happenings, whilst leaving things open enough to maintain the sandbox utility of the universe. Even the "meta plot" of the Dark Imperium Trilogy, the Vaults of Terra books and Watchers of the Throne series don't impact our freedom to create our own campaigns and plots within the 40k universe.

Obviously stories have a setting, but by setting I mean static setting with a specific beginning and end date, and then telling stories within that setting.

vs  the setting having progressive story telling that moves that end date back.

 

I’ve tried reading some BL novels in the last few years. DOB was pretty good, but the Mephiston and astorath books I’ve read have been trash.

I plan to pic up echoes of eternity because it sounds like it has an epic climax, but so far I haven’t read a novel that comes any where close to touching anything I’ve read by abnett. The quality of non-abnett books is the primary reason i don’t really read BL novels now. 

[Orange Knight]

Read the Vaults of Terra series, or the Watchers of the Throne.

[Karhedron]

5 hours ago, Orange Knight said:

As for things happening too quickly? I don't think that's the case. The entire Horus Heresy takes place over 9 years, for example. That spawned 100+ novels and all sorts of shenanigans.

I did not mean quickly in-universe. It makes little difference to me if DI takes place 12 years or 112 years post-Cadia. I meant that we went from 5-minutes-to-midnight to the heart of the Indomitus Crusade in about 1 year in real-time and that felt like a huge leap after over a decade of stasis.

[WARMASTER_]

5 hours ago, Orange Knight said:

@sitnam

Ahh yes, I forget about the Spears. I have read the book, and it was pretty good. It's one of those stories that ultimately has little impact on the setting or universe, and it could take place at basically any time period post Primaris. 

Agreed! Amazing book, but I actually think it only really works best at the time in which it’s set rather than at any point after the rift  

the books set about 100 years after the rift opening so it shows how just how long the spears have been alone in the dark, still fighting for the imperium while realistically no longer being apart of it!

It’s a tenacious last stand so if it’s say 10 years after that has far less weight than 100 years + of fighting for an imperium that might not be there anymore 

[ThePenitentOne]

2 hours ago, Orange Knight said:

Read the Vaults of Terra series, or the Watchers of the Throne.

I'm planning on reading Watchers.

I also might read some of Darius Hink's BSF stuff just because I want to know more about all of those characters since I'll be using some of them in the Chronicle.

But I also want to recommend Adrian Tchaikovsky's Day of Ascension. It is a quick read, and the story is simple, but the writing is strong, and it has some of the emotional resonance that I loved in Eisenhorn... Of course, being a single, short, stand-alone volume as opposed to a trilogy, it's hard to pack as much punch, but I thought it was really well done. Doesn't hurt that I LOVE GSC of course, so there might be some bias there.

[WARMASTER_]

@Inquisitor_Lensoven Chris Wraights Vaults of Terra Series is truly excellent as is the Watchers of The Throne [Hersey Wise Scars and his Leman Russ novels are great too] 

Apart from that with more modern 40K ADB is an outstanding Author Black Legion Series - Spears of The Emperor - Night Lords Series - Emperors Gift All Fantastic Reads

I really wouldn’t start the Siege with Echoes it’s waaay to deep as a Jump off, at least start with Solar War it’s a good book bit slow first half but it’s a good start off - As always if recommend skipping Gav Thorpe his book in my opinion is the only stinker so far but I do feel the siege is worth the read as a whole it’s been a mostly satisfying conclusion to the Heresy 

 

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

5 minutes ago, BladeOfVengeance said:

@Inquisitor_Lensoven Chris Wraights Vaults of Terra Series is truly excellent as is the Watchers of The Throne [Hersey Wise Scars and his Leman Russ novels are great too] 

Apart from that with more modern 40K ADB is an outstanding Author Black Legion Series - Spears of The Emperor - Night Lords Series - Emperors Gift All Fantastic Reads

I really wouldn’t start the Siege with Echoes it’s waaay to deep as a Jump off, at least start with Solar War it’s a good book bit slow first half but it’s a good start off - As always if recommend skipping Gav Thorpe his book in my opinion is the only stinker so far but I do feel the siege is worth the read as a whole it’s been a mostly satisfying conclusion to the Heresy 

 

Eh, I’m literally only interested in the big fights, not worried about much else.

[WARMASTER_]

45 minutes ago, Inquisitor_Lensoven said:

Eh, I’m literally only interested in the big fights, not worried about much else.

I feel I’m more and more in the minority because I literally have no interest in the big fights whatsoever…

I love the small stuff + Politics of 40K… The grunt Guard trooper standing his ground against the insurmountable threat …Chaos marine “X” in minor warband “Y” showing his scheming/plotting/ betrayals to become its leader, Or the power+Political dynamics between Astartes/Inquisition 

If you’re after big fights then The Emperors Gift still stands - It’s a brotherhood of grey knights taking on Demon Angron at the first war for Armageddon

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

2 hours ago, BladeOfVengeance said:

I feel I’m more and more in the minority because I literally have no interest in the big fights whatsoever…

I love the small stuff + Politics of 40K… The grunt Guard trooper standing his ground against the insurmountable threat …Chaos marine “X” in minor warband “Y” showing his scheming/plotting/ betrayals to become its leader, Or the power+Political dynamics between Astartes/Inquisition 

If you’re after big fights then The Emperors Gift still stands - It’s a brotherhood of grey knights taking on Demon Angron at the first war for Armageddon

For that specific book I’m only interested in the big fights. Sounds like sanguinius absolutely wrecks khorne’s little .

I also happen to find the generic guard stories boring. I wish more guard books had interesting and unique regiments featured

Edited September 8, 2022 by Khornestar
Language

[MegaVolt87]

The story didn't need to advance at all. There were 10k years already between 30k and 40k up to the 13th black crusade to back fill and it was not done. 

[firestorm40k]

Ok, brace yourselves Frater, because this will be a slightly epic post  (don’t worry, there’s a tl:dr version at the end) 

I’ve seen this kind of point raised on here before – I believe it was about a year ago, when GW announced ‘Seasons’ for matched play which was going to include content with a progressing narrative that would keep the setting moving.  Someone made a comment that this would spoil their gaming group’s (and by extension, their own) enjoyment of playing 40k.  On one hand, I can understand why moving the wider ‘narrative’ that shapes the ‘setting’ of 40k would be disconcerting – it had stayed the same for largely 30 years, and part of the appeal of the ‘Grim Dark’ aspect is the idea that everything is on the brink of collapse, the ‘5 minutes to midnight’ feel.  We’ve all collected and built armies that, in most cases, we want to reflect that setting.  We’ve played campaigns, and read novels/stories set in and around that. Advancing a story is risky, and if it isn’t handled correctly, it can undermine what made it special to you (and others).  Also, a moving, evolving setting takes far more effort to follow than a static one – and, with GW, this effort also correlates to expense (how many supplements have I got to buy to track the narrative..?).  The feeling is, making the setting evolve through narrative progression stops 40k from being a ‘sand box’; it diminishes it.

On the other hand, an evolving narrative doesn’t necessarily have to change how you use the setting – in terms of how you collect armies, play games, run campaigns, read novels, etc.  Although I appreciate the concerns, in my opinion progressing a wider narrative around the setting does not prevent 40k being a sand box at all.  The reason for this is because I believe there is a partial setting between narrative and setting.  Not total – it’s more like a venn diagram.  There’s the wider narrative sweeps that shape the setting, and most of these are well-known:

The Horus Heresy

The Scouring

The War of the Beast

The Age of Apostasy

The Tau Expansions

The 13th Black Crusade & Fall of Cadia

The Cicatrix Maledictum & Imperium Nihilus

Guilliman’s Return

The Indomitus Crusade

The Ultima Founding

In some cases, the details for these are confined to a handful of paragraphs in a rulebook or Codex.  In others, entire series of novels have fully fleshed out the story of each of these ‘events’.  When we come to the more recent developments, the broad strokes (and acknowledged retcon by GW) have understandably made a large number of 40k veterans raise their eyebrows (to say the least).  As others have pointed out, if a few paragraphs in a rulebook trying to explain something like the Indomitus Crusade don’t feel as well planned or executed as other parts of 40k lore, novels have come along since that have fleshed out and given convincing depth to some of the key events.

But I digress – the point I wanted to make was these wide ‘events’ that shape the setting overall do not necessarily need to change how you see or approach the setting.  This is due to the size of the setting – not least of all in a ‘physical’ sense, because (as several of the rulebooks point out) ‘the Galaxy is a big place’. Thinking about the Venn diagram analogy, say you’ve built an Imperial Guard army, and you have given them a narrative/fluff/head-cannon that they are fighting a campaign in some part of the galaxy, in the year M42.002.  So the ‘narrative’ of the 40k timeline says that’s the time of the Indomitus Crusade – Guilliman charging across the galaxy with thousands of new Primaris Marines; does that mean your Guard army is part of that?  Not necessarily.  You might decide that your army are fighting in part of the Imperium where the Crusade hasn’t even reached.  The whole ‘shift’ or ‘progression’ of 40k doesn’t necessarily have to affect the way you are collecting or playing games with your army.  It also doesn’t mean that the stories around the Crusade – as they are fleshed out and detailed in novels etc – would adversely impact on your army or games either. In the 40k background Venn diagram, the circles for narrative and setting over lap but don't completely cover each other. 

This is because the setting is still a sandbox – the galaxy is still a ‘big place’.  You’ve got the broad sweeps – the Imperium, the factions within, the threat of Chaos and Xenos, etc etc – and the ‘gaps’ in the galactic map, where planets or sectors are not established in lore (either in rulebooks, Codex or novels), give a vast canvas to do as you wish.

Perhaps it’s easy for me to say this, as I’ve never collected an ‘established’ 40k army – for example, 4th Company Ultramarines, or Creed’s Cadian Regiment.  What has always put me off doing so, even using a First Founding Chapter as the basis for an army, is that there is so much established – and continually developing – lore for these, it would inevitably contradict what I have in mind for my army.  Say, I build an Imperial Fists army, painted in the colours of the 3rd Company, and decide that it’s M41.997 and they’re fighting Orks in the Segmentum Pacificus.  Then GW releases a new rulebook, codex or supplement that firmly states that between M41.995-M41.999 the 3rd Company of the Imperial Fists were actually fighting as part of a battlegroup in the Segmentum Solar; my ‘fluff’ for my army has kind of been invalidated.

I know that GW uses the whole ‘timeline isn’t set due to warp shenanigans’ and ‘many versions of the truth’ tropes to try and counter this (“well who’s to say the 3rd Company Imperial Fists couldn’t have been fighting in both places at sometime during that period!”), but for me the narrative side of making an army is more important than how they ‘compete’ on the tabletop.  In fact, ever since the Armageddon global campaign event, I’ve always been enamoured by the idea that the armies I collect, and the games I play, might in someway (no matter how small) actually contribute to the established lore of the setting.

I took part in 2003’s Eye of Terror campaign (with some gusto!) with that in mind.  However, by the time the campaign ended, I realised it was so vast, with so many players, my results didn’t really make a lot of difference to the overall result; and even though I posted little bits of ‘fluff’ from my army’s battles in the campaign on various forums were lost in the midst of everyone else’s, let alone ‘noticed’ or acknowledged by GW themselves.  So following this, my approach to narrative in my hobby changed – I decided I would create my own.  Still set in the ‘sandbox’ of 40k, still employing the wider elements of the narrative points that shape that – but creating an original army (the Legion of Taurus) in a setting of my own (the Odothese Sector).

This decision was an absolute boon for my involvement in the 40k hobby – from the initial fluff I ‘invented’ to effectively justify why my army has its specific colour scheme and iconography, there spawned narrative that was the basis for 3 campaigns involving my local gaming group.  These in turn gave other people opportunities to add narrative and background to the armies they were collecting.  And even though I took a 4 1/2 year break from 40k, I’ve come back to this ongoing story – of the Legion of Taurus and the Odothese Sector – and have made a number of Kill Teams themed around it, and am also planning a Kill Team campaign to continue the story.

During my break, GW introduced the whole Imperium Nihilus and Primaris Marines stuff – but I didn’t have to give it too much credence initially, as I still had what was happening in Odothese (as a result of the campaigns and games myself and my friends had participated in) at the front of my mind.  But over time I came to realise that the ‘progression’ of 40k – the whole introduction of Primaris and the Cicatrix Maledictum – presented an opportunity to move forward with the story of the Legion of Taurus, their enemies, and the Odothese Sector.  Not only this, but now I have started collecting an Imperial Fists army for Horus Heresy, I have in mind potential narrative points for my army’s background that would not only link them to Odothese, but to the Ultima Founding Primaris army I want to build & paint, once the planned Kill Team campaign has determined the final fate of Odothese and the Legion of Taurus.

In the meantime, there’s all the other ‘established’, canon stuff that’s happening with 40k – Pariah Nexus, Octarius, Vigilus, etc.  It’s all part of the vast setting, but it doesn’t have to determine how anyone collects armies or plays the game – you can embrace these, or ignore them.  I’ve been able to embrace what I want to for my armies and campaigns, and don’t feel that what doesn’t interest me is of any detriment to ‘my’ narrative.

It’s for that reason I would say that there isn’t a particularly big conflict between the 40k setting and it having a ‘progressive’ narrative – and it certainly doesn’t stop it from being a ‘sandbox’ for your hobby.

Tl;dr – the 40k setting being ‘progressed’ by an evolving narrative doesn’t prevent it being a ‘sandbox’, because the big sweeps of the setting are still big enough, and leave enough space, for anyone to embrace or ignore what they want from it.  The galaxy in 40k is a big enough place for everyone to collect and play with their army however they choose – whether that’s sticking close to one particular aspect (e.g. Vigilus), or making your own narrative.

[Rik Lightstar]

@firestorm40k

Precisely this, the sandbox hasn't been reduced by moving the timeline forward it's been increased.

There's a new bunch of potential scenarios and jumping off points to use in addition to the stuff that was already there.

Rik

[Captain Idaho]

I don't agree with that, because the story keeps moving on. It's gotten to a point that the sandbox is temporary, then it doesn't matter what the results of my games were because in the next season of 40K it's overridden. 

[WARMASTER_]

5 hours ago, Captain Idaho said:

I don't agree with that, because the story keeps moving on. It's gotten to a point that the sandbox is temporary, then it doesn't matter what the results of my games were because in the next season of 40K it's overridden. 

Yes but as the story moves on, the history [so Sandbox in which to play] increases

Your games could never have an overarching effect on the lore as a whole but playing games inside of a  narrative that changes conflicts within a narrative just to you and your friends is possible and is definitely encouraged!

We all know how the Heresy ends don’t we… but it doesn’t stop us creating conflicts within the Heresy that could go either way. The myriad of stories within that time period are endless and can all mean something within your own narrative with games 

Players games have never really had a massive impact on the lore and nor should they, the tabletop game is nothing like the lore. Having a game of chance with rules that don’t really represent their factions decide what’s cannon wouldn’t be wholly wise

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

1 hour ago, BladeOfVengeance said:

Yes but as the story moves on, the history [so Sandbox in which to play] increases

Your games could never have an overarching effect on the lore as a whole but playing games inside of a  narrative that changes conflicts within a narrative just to you and your friends is possible and is definitely encouraged!

We all know how the Heresy ends don’t we… but it doesn’t stop us creating conflicts within the Heresy that could go either way. The myriad of stories within that time period are endless and can all mean something within your own narrative with games 

Players games have never really had a massive impact on the lore and nor should they, the tabletop game is nothing like the lore. Having a game of chance with rules that don’t really represent their factions decide what’s cannon wouldn’t be wholly wise

…ummm…games have had an effect on the over arching lore before. I believe it was the 3rd war for Armageddon was done as a huge community event which decided the outcome of the conflict in universe.

something like this, should be even easier in 2022 and how integrated into the internet everything is.

[Karhedron]

2 hours ago, Inquisitor_Lensoven said:

…ummm…games have had an effect on the over arching lore before. I believe it was the 3rd war for Armageddon was done as a huge community event which decided the outcome of the conflict in universe.

something like this, should be even easier in 2022 and how integrated into the internet everything is.

Armageddon 3 was over 20 years ago and a lot has changed since then. GW followed it up with the 13th Black Crusade, promising to let the players decide the outcome. Unfortunately they ended up backtracking on this. Chaos did well on the ground capturing some crucial planetary objectives but comprehensively trounced in space by the Imperial Navy. Meanwhile, the Eldar won comprehensively in the webway which should have resulted in the Thousand Sons being ejected from the Black Library so fast they feet wouldn't even have touched the floor.

Instead the fluff was written that it was a bloody stalemate while Eldrad died attacking the Blackstone Fortress. This was later retconned at the end of 7th edition to an outright Chaos win with Cadia being destroyed and the forces of Chaos opening the Great Rift. At least Eldrad got a reprieve in this new, improved history. In 2022 such an event would be even easier to run but also far easier to interfere with. I doubt GW want to risk giving narrative control over to the players.

[Inquisitor_Lensoven]

19 minutes ago, Karhedron said:

Armageddon 3 was over 20 years ago and a lot has changed since then. GW followed it up with the 13th Black Crusade, promising to let the players decide the outcome. Unfortunately they ended up backtracking on this. Chaos did well on the ground capturing some crucial planetary objectives but comprehensively trounced in space by the Imperial Navy. Meanwhile, the Eldar won comprehensively in the webway which should have resulted in the Thousand Sons being ejected from the Black Library so fast they feet wouldn't even have touched the floor.

Instead the fluff was written that it was a bloody stalemate while Eldrad died attacking the Blackstone Fortress. This was later retconned at the end of 7th edition to an outright Chaos win with Cadia being destroyed and the forces of Chaos opening the Great Rift. At least Eldrad got a reprieve in this new, improved history. In 2022 such an event would be even easier to run but also far easier to interfere with. I doubt GW want to risk giving narrative control over to the players.

Just because they screwed up the 13th black crusade doesn’t mean it can’t be done.

it should be easy for event organizers to upload results.

im just saying it shouldn’t be hard for them to go ahead and make future campaigns actually interactive.

[WARMASTER_]

27 minutes ago, Inquisitor_Lensoven said:

Just because they screwed up the 13th black crusade doesn’t mean it can’t be done.

it should be easy for event organizers to upload results.

im just saying it shouldn’t be hard for them to go ahead and make future campaigns actually interactive.

It all goes back to the point that the factions on the tabletop don’t even remotely represent the factions in the lore 

your games can be super interactive on a small level without changing the overarching narrative like in HH 

 

slight tangent… 

40K’s biggest strength [In my opinion] IS it’s scale… everyone has endless room to create whatever they want without effecting then overarching plot or worrying about making it work within the galaxy at large 

[Orange Knight]

Someone mentioned the Horus Heresy.

I think it's pretty definitive evidence that story does not interfere with the sandbox potential of the universe. 

The Horus Heresy is extremely well detailed to the point where every Legion's location is literally known on a year by year basis during the entire duration of the civil war. There are countless books focusing on characters and armies, and yet everyone is happily building their armies and playing games. 

The current 40k setting is far less detailed when it comes to story. There are no limitations placed on the players to make use of the universe as their own sandbox for playing or collecting. 

[Special Officer Doofy]

Regardless of a static or advancing setting/narrative, I don't want community gaming outcome to dictate the lore, that sounds absolutely terrible. Codex Y comes out after codex X (and thus has better rules most likely) and members of the community flock to codex Y so faction Y wins the campaign in the lore too? Yikes. Codex creep and unbalanced rules makes the game less enjoyable as is, I don't think it needs to make the lore less enjoyable too. Remember that time in the lore that marines and chaos marines constantly lost to Eldar because Eldar in the game could stack multiple minus to being hit? Or how about that time where chaos daemons and orks couldn't even harm the Tau cause they were being shot off the planet before they could even move because of some bad dice rolls on a Saturday night? Neither do I. Let's keep it that way haha.

[Captain Idaho]

Horus Heresy is not 40K. Liking one doesn't prove you like the same aspects about the other.

The setting of the Horus Heresy is well respected and doesn't change, despite the story being written for others many hobbyists like it.

40K has always been a sandbox where you play out the story yourself. But because the story isn't written and defined and at the whims of the modern writers, the direction it goes alienates people. Everyone already knows what's happening in HH so it's ok, but wildly "not 40K elements can and have been introduced in a significant proportion of the fan base's view.

Such is the danger of messing with the story frequently. 

A good analogy would be the Lord of the Rings fans. As fans, everyone loves the established lore (or else you're not a fan by definition  ) but when you introduce something new you divide the community - some people like it and some.hate it.

Doesn't mean new things shouldn't be introduced and doesn't mean what's new is bad, but since you're juggling a fanbase who know the setting intimately, careful consideration needs to be taken. With the frequency and substantial nature of the changes implemented into 40K since 8th, it is impossible to say that care has been as good as it should be even if you think it has been stuff you like. Not unless you're really saying the lore is perfect which is obviously not what you're saying.

So really, there can be change and evolution introduced into a "setting" but constantly doing it with every release? It's alienating a portion of the customer base and that is never sensible as a long term strategy.

If people would like to know what I might consider an acceptable level of change that is defined, I'd say building on things that came before in a steady manner. Make the change a singular thing, like 3rd edition introduced 2 new races, but we didn't see Marines, Orks, Eldar and Tyranids being radically changed in their source material.

Ultimately it's subjective, but somewhere along the line 40K reached a threshold where the numbers who dislike new background and can't keep up (the latter being the most critical for this 38 year old) is notable and not just a fringe element anymore. That isn't a good thing from a business perspective. 

[Orange Knight]

They absolutely are comparable.

This topic proposes that as the setting shifts into the realm of having a story, the sandbox is becoming more limited.

The Horus Heresy proves the opposite. Both exist in the same universe.

The outcome of the Horus Heresy has been known for a long time, but the details and events have been updated and added to over the last 10 years. Despite the great detail Black Library and the HH rulebooks have offered, the setting still facilitates freedom on the tabletop. 

In 40k the outcome is not known, and events are far less detailed. If anything, it works as even more liberated sandbox for people to create armies and tell stories in.

[Redcomet]

I think the way they do 40k atm is the sweet spot. The Galaxy is so huge that the players have endless freedom, but now that they are crawling the timeline forward again, there is the lure of the unknown “wonder what happens next”.

Plus it makes adding new stuff to the universe more believable than “oh that thing was there all along you just didn’t know”

[RWJP]

On 9/9/2022 at 10:50 AM, Captain Idaho said:

I don't agree with that, because the story keeps moving on. It's gotten to a point that the sandbox is temporary, then it doesn't matter what the results of my games were because in the next season of 40K it's overridden. 

Aside from a handful of very specific events run by GW, where you are not playing in "the sandbox" but within the confines of a specific narrative that GW have set out, the results of your games have never mattered, and never will matter. That's a by-product of the concept of a sandbox. It doesn't matter what your army does in your own headcanon of them fighting through whatever backwater sector they happen to be in. Because the universe sandbox is vast, and your Space Marines beating an Ork Invasion on the 9th planet of the Zark System has zero impact on anything.

If you want a sandbox, you also need to accept that your games have no meaning or impact outside of the tiny area of sandbox you're playing in. And you can make that work quite easily while still having your little area of sandbox be yours. Don't like the current plot of the Great Rift? Cool, easy to solve: Your army is fighting somewhere so far out on the Galactic Rim they have literally no idea of what's happened closer to Terra. There's been no psychic awakening in your area of the sandbox because it's so disconnected, there's been no increase in Chaos activity because they're all heading towards Terra or Baal or wherever else important. There's no Primaris Marines because no Torchbearer fleet has got anywhere close to the part of the galaxy you're fighting in. 
 

16 hours ago, Inquisitor_Lensoven said:

…ummm…games have had an effect on the over arching lore before. I believe it was the 3rd war for Armageddon was done as a huge community event which decided the outcome of the conflict in universe.

something like this, should be even easier in 2022 and how integrated into the internet everything is.

As mentioned above, if you were taking part in the 3rd War for Armageddon Campaign, or the Fall of Medusa Campaign, you weren't playing in "the sandbox", you were playing within the very narrow confines of a specific narrative event that GW had set up, so your argument is kind of moot.

I find it weird how people keep bringing up these kind of events... They're literally the exact antithesis of the concept of a sandbox! GW says "Hey, we're running a campaign, set on this planet, in this system, with these factions doing these things, and your battles will represent that". That's not a sandbox at all. That's an advancing narrative set within very specific confines. 

It seems like a lot of this thread is coming down to people saying "I want to make my own stories" but then not actually making their own stories to deal with changes GW makes! I've demonstrated quite easily how to do that above.

Edited September 10, 2022 by RWJP

[Captain Idaho]

The results of my games mattered to myself and my friends, building our own narrative. With the setting not racing ahead, that narrative could never be disproved. Now it can be done every season.

I think that's what people aren't on the same page with. No one who likes to make their own stories for one minute thought their stories and armies in 40K were canon. They just could personally enjoy them. My campaign to rid a star system of Orks and combat the Ork Empire of Charadon with Guilliman and his 1st Company is relevant to the story because it can't be disproven to happen either way.

Now that isn't the case, quite prominently. 

@Orange Knight I don't agree. I've explained why they're different but perhaps I'll use another example?

Historical wargaming vs 40K. We know how D-Day panned out, or how the Nazis were defeated but people still play WWII games. 40K is an evolving narrative now that is moving faster and faster each year. We don't know what is going to happen so everything we play is just filler until we're told the story. But that's not how it is.

Horus Heresy is fantasy reenactment gaming. 40K is supposed to be a creative sandbox setting. Saying they're the same because they're both fantastic is inaccurate, at least in my view and likely the view of many others.

Edited September 10, 2022 by Captain Idaho