Story vs setting

[Orange Knight]

Neither one is historic because both take place in a fuctional future.

The Heresy is referred to as such because it's ancient history to 40k and because a lot of the people that invest in it take great care to create armies which are true to the theme and lore of their chosen factions - which is similar to the armies built up in historical wargaming. 

There are lots of historical elements that are cemented in stone in the 40k setting also. Vandire's reign, the Macahrius Crusade, The Badab War, The War of the Beast, Armageddon, the 13th Black Crusade. This is all 40k, after all.

I see no tangible way that 40k has limited creativity and it's sandbox utility by simply creating new events such as those listed above. There was a point in time when none of those had been written by the authors, also. 

The Plague War, as an example, is simply a new addition to the list of known events that have taken place in the 40k universe. Same as the Devastation of Baal. Neither imposes any restrictions on hobbyists in any way.

[RWJP]

1 hour ago, Captain Idaho said:

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.

In which case... Your campaign to rid a star system of Orks and combat the Ork Empire of Charadon with Guilliman and his 1st Company is literally only possible as a result of GW advancing the story. You couldn't have used Guilliman until GW advanced the story and bought him back! That seems a bit hypocritical to me "I don't like GW advancing the story because it spoils my headcanon, but I'm going to use the things that GW has done to advance the story anyway." By advancing the story and bringing back Guilliman, GW have actually enhanced your ability to tell stories, because they have advanced the story in such a way that new characters are availble for you to use.

Here's a simple solution to your problem though: Don't use named characters or well known places. Of course named characters and well known places are going to get included in further lore that might break your headcanon. If you want to play in the sandbox, actually play in the sandbox. Create your own worlds and your own characters. Avoid the stuff that GW has created and written about.

Edited September 10, 2022 by RWJP

[Captain Idaho]

Lol it's not hypocritical. It's an example. I could have made the same point with Calgar. The name Guilliman was irrelevant to the point made.

The rest of my posts here about it and  I explain how elements of change and progress can be woven into the fabric of background material and not interfer with the sandbox aspect if done over time and in moderation.

Also, your simple solution is to not play with everything or make a story how my Chapter Master or favourite characters take part on this campaign or that, am I correct? Doesn't seem like a solution to me I'm afraid to say.

Regardless of that, what if I want take the 5th Company and support elements from the 1st, or my 1st Captain and the rest of his battle group, onto a series of campaigns but wait, GW has told they're busy fighting at Nu Cadia (which is Vigilus) and then moving onto the next new release engagement? So my forces shouldn't have been there?

It's not a sandbox at that point. It goes straight back to the point myself and others have raised - my games have no bearing on my 40K because the background material moves on all the time.

So each game means nothing to me bar an excuse to throw some dice. Undermining the Crusade system somewhat into the bargain, since the personal campaigns mean nothing.

@Orange Knight I'm not sure what you're saying - you're telling me the Horus Heresy game is not historical because they take part in a functional future, then go on to say there are historical elements in 40K?

Can you please elaborate on this as it's broken my brain (which is exhausted from Ameratto last night and a long week of work as it is!)

Edited September 10, 2022 by Captain Idaho

[Orange Knight]

I'm saying that if you view 30k as historical wargaming, then by extension you can view a lot of 40k as historical wargaming as well.

There is a lot more history in 40k then there is in 30k. 10k years of it!

The advancing story is not creating any limitation for your use of the setting as a sandbox. You're placing your own limitation on it.

[Captain Idaho]

I think we agree, there's plenty of historical 40K to mine. So why are GW not touching any of it with their design studio and only "advancing" the storyline? 

Players want to play 40K for the sandbox, not just historical gaming. 

[WARMASTER_]

4 hours ago, Captain Idaho said:

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.

He’s not saying that though? What he’s saying from my earlier post is the Horus Heresy is as much a sand box setting as 40K. both have overarching plot points but both also have endless possibilities for new stories with said narrative 

4 hours ago, Captain Idaho said:

Edited September 10, 2022 by BladeOfVengeance

[WARMASTER_]

2 hours ago, Captain Idaho said:

I think we agree, there's plenty of historical 40K to mine. So why are GW not touching any of it with their design studio and only "advancing" the storyline? 

Players want to play 40K for the sandbox, not just historical gaming. 

We’ve always known the major plot point of 40K though? [even before the advancement] so what you’re saying about the advancing timeline creating a smaller narrative [Sandbox] doesn’t make much sense? It’s always been done. GW + Forgeworld has released campaign books throughout most editions of the games history, which has expanded our knowledge base of certain factions histories + current actions they’re undertaking this only ever expands our narrative abilities for storytelling as we know what X factions are capable of and what’s kind of narrative device X faction can also be with the our stories 

So your faction has now be wrote into a campaign, that’s doesn’t detract from any of your storytelling devices in fact 99% of the time it will aid them. GW and Especially Forge world in their AI books always flesh out factions within campaigns new and old, giving us much better info on how they fight, what wargear they have, even combat styles and beliefs giving us loads more fuel for narrative play or story creating 

You can also simply change the date of your narrative campaign if they overlap surely? We’ve got 100+ Years of a sandbox for great rift era 40K and 10k years for before it. GW putting the ultramarines first company [Or whichever faction you want to use] in a few years worth of specifically dated actions does really nothing to your story telling potential for them 

[Captain Idaho]

So I have to play historical 40K, I can't make my own stories like a sandbox? I suspect you're not quite on the same page with what people want out of a sandbox who might disagree with you in this topic?

Anyway, I have said my piece on it and I think I've explained myself well. We don't have to agree. You might really enjoy narrative progression of 40K but I don't really like what has been done since 8th dropped. That's cool either way.

[WARMASTER_]

11 minutes ago, Captain Idaho said:

So I have to play historical 40K, I can't make my own stories like a sandbox? I suspect you're not quite on the same page with what people want out of a sandbox who might disagree with you in this topic?

 

I have at no point stated that? I’ve in fact at every point stated the exact opposite 

my point was we’ve always progressed certain story lines or got more details into campaigns even in “historic” 40K and the progressing story line aids us as it widened our scope of narrative [so makes the sand box bigger] 

im happy to leave the discussion here also I’ve also said my peace although I’m not sure you’ve entirely grasps my points, but such is life in an internet debate/discussion

hopefully you can find enjoyment in your narrative campaigns soon as for me they’re one of the best parts of the hobby 

[Karhedron]

On 9/9/2022 at 9:58 PM, 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.

Oh I am sure it could be done. My point is that the last time it happened was 6 editions ago and GW have shown no interest in repeating the exercise. Some of the people I play against now weren't even born during the 13 Black Crusade campaign! 

[Karhedron]

19 hours ago, Captain Idaho said:

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.

The results between you and your friends matter as much as they ever have. My friends and I used to run linked games with a linked narrative many moons ago and we all used to enjoy writing short stories before and after each game. I often still do it on my batreps here.

But while I enjoy tieing my games into GW's narratives, I never expect them to reciprocate and I don't regard our own game results as "binding". I lost Mephiston in one game but that didn't stop me running him again. My post-battle story had him being found by the Apothecary.

What GW writes has does not change your games any more than it did in previous editions.

[Captain Idaho]

As well as what I've already said - writing and acting a story out is great fun, with the illusion that it's our story because it's a sandbox. With the story moving so quickly and definitively we're constantly being reminded "you're wrong, your story is fan fiction" so then i just wont bother with the story element.

It's a key distinction. I understand my games don't have bearing on anyone else's games or the progression of the background material in the grand scheme of things. But by having a sandbox, no one can tell me my story isn't the correct one either.

[gideon stargreave]

I feel that a lot of this discussion stems from the fact that many years ago, GW created Black Library. When I (and a lot of others here) began playing, there were the army books and codices, the stuff that came in the rulebooks etc. and small sidebar stories in white dwarf. Then came Inferno magazine which explored small events that had little effect on the world or galaxy at large. The universe at the time seemed endless. It would have been perfectly fine to have a second legion army for example. Nobody knew much at all about the grey knights, nobody knew much at all about the Lion and Luther, nobody knew much at all about STCs, and many people were happy with that state of affairs. You could effectively head cannon anything you wanted.  It felt like the fluff gave us questions. Then came things like Darkblade or Bloodquest. These felt like "bottom up" world building, where relatively minor characters explored the universe (note, the very best Horus heresy books in my opinion still do this). Eventually came the metanarratives, which feel like GW is giving us answers and doing "top down" worldbuilding. Both of these approaches are fine, and both appeal to different people.

[Bryan Blaire]

Why did anyone ever actually think 40K was “their” sandbox and not GW’s?  That’s a fool’s thought right there.

Regardless of how the company may have written rule books, campaign materials, Codexes, and other 40K works in the past, GW has always owned the sandbox, and our presence and stories in their sandbox are just as tolerated and meaningless to their plans as they always were.

It is just as silly to view the idea of “my stories in this fictional place matter” (unless they specifically ask us for them, and even then, they’ve historically shown they will ignore results they don’t really want to deal with anyway) as valid for 40K as it is for any RPG/war game campaign written for any fictional setting/story.  No one complains and expects to be taken seriously that LucasFilms (Legion war game and RPGs), GRRM, Tolkien Estate (RPG and GW war game), Neil Gaiman, Paramount, Bethesda, UbiSoft or any other fictional setting owner doesn’t validate/acknowledge/make room for their personal campaign stories in the canon works - everyone should realize that is just not going to happen.  No, owners of IP don’t care about our personal stories or how they might get screwed up if official authors write something different.  Each of us that plays in these settings have done so knowing that we have no control over that setting/story - anyone that does anything in them is very much only ever writing fan-fiction - that’s the way it has been for 40K for almost 30 years now.

GW has messed with people’s personal campaign elements in the past when they have written in little blurbs into the Codexes about historical campaigns featuring units that players had used in other ways during those time periods - but it didn’t matter then, and it doesn’t matter now.  Each player has to decide how much they are willing to let the “official” materials ruin their fun - no one has to use it - GW has no way of requiring that.  You and your group could decide that your personal campaign is the only official one and completely ignore writings about the meta-story that GW includes in the rule book and other game elements.

So it doesn’t matter if it is a story or a setting, if you really want GW to be able to have no effect on your stories set within 40K, then your choice amounts to not using any of GW’s material except the wider 40K setting (and realize that GW can adjust that setting at their whim… it belongs to them, not you) - you can’t use any of the named Chapters or planets or sectors or campaigns, or any other material.  If you do, then you implicitly accept that you are using someone else’s toys, and the owner of those toys gets to make the rules on their use.

If you really, really want GW to be able to have no effect on your stories period, then you have to stop playing any GW products and make up your own IP.

Edited September 11, 2022 by Bryan Blaire

[Captain Idaho]

I think you've definitely misunderstood what people like me have written if you think we're being fools.

No one claimed ownership of GW. What GW has gifted us by creating a sandbox is a way to share in their universe and play in that sandbox as if it's our own, but without impacting anyone else. By removing that dynamic, moving forward frequently etc, we aren't playing in the sandbox anymore. We're reenactment players.

Sure there's a place for that. I love historical 40K events, but I go into those with a particular itch that needs scratching. When the sandbox itch needs scratching, creative juices flowing, I played modern 40K, because the story is yet to be told.

[Scribe]

Its very easy to have an advancing story, torpedo a setting. Haley seems to be setting things up for that anyway imo.

We went a very long time without advancement, and it was for the best.

Setting > Story.

[Khornestar]

I love the advancement, and think along with 9th edition and replacing old outdated sculpts with modern stuff such as primaris, they’ve been making many good moves.

As far as the setting debate etc., seems it’s based on the preferences of the individuals playing and what they see as some sort of “rules” set down by GW.

It’s fair enough, we see things differently, though the advancement of the story has allowed me to tell my own in different ways.

I hope GW continues to advance the story at a steadier pace than they have in the past.

[Bryan Blaire]

3 hours ago, Captain Idaho said:

I think you've definitely misunderstood what people like me have written if you think we're being fools.

No one claimed ownership of GW. What GW has gifted us by creating a sandbox is a way to share in their universe and play in that sandbox as if it's our own, but without impacting anyone else. By removing that dynamic, moving forward frequently etc, we aren't playing in the sandbox anymore. We're reenactment players.

Sure there's a place for that. I love historical 40K events, but I go into those with a particular itch that needs scratching. When the sandbox itch needs scratching, creative juices flowing, I played modern 40K, because the story is yet to be told.

LOL - if you personally think that I was suggesting that you, Captain Idaho, could “claim ownership of GW”, as opposed to what I actually wrote about them always owning the sandbox, then you are less understanding than I thought.

Captain Idaho did claim the 5th Company Ultramarines here in this quote though: “Regardless of that, what if I want take the 5th Company and support elements from the 1st, or my 1st Captain and the rest of his battle group, onto a series of campaigns but wait, GW has told they're busy fighting at Nu Cadia (which is Vigilus) and then moving onto the next new release engagement? So my forces shouldn't have been there?” - notice how Captain Idaho said “my” twice there?  “My” by definition (“belonging to or associated with the speaker”) indicates a claim (usually of ownership/private possession).  Since it is not Captain Idaho’s force at all, but GW’s, then there is someone clearly mistaken about who the Company belongs to and who gets to dictate how it is canonically used to the rest of us.  That they chose to with less text (a few hundred words in blobs scattered amongst many rulebooks and magazines instead of several hundred thousand in the same plus novels now) doesn’t make that any less true, or the sandbox ever anyone but GW’s.

GW did not “gift” anyone a sandbox - they sold us a product.  That product can be used as a sandbox, or it can be used as a campaign tool, or a competitive game, or many other things.  What that product (or portion of a product) can’t be done, at any point, is claimed to be “ours” while using their stuff.

The Ultramarines or any other named unit of any Company or faction aren’t “your guys” - they are GW’s.  GW’s product, that we bought, to play in GW’s sandbox.  If GW chooses to do things with their sandbox we don’t like, we only have a few choices if we want to keep playing in the 40K sandbox.  The sandbox hasn’t disappeared just because GW seems to be publishing more meta-narrative than they used to - it’s still right there if you choose to play in (it’s also still right there even if you choose to complain about it, but that’s foolish).

You and those you play with can choose to still play in the sandbox under GW’s rules if you want to tightly cleave to their material.

You and those you play with can choose to ignore it for the most part, not worrying about the meta-story, because your games at home affect no one else, especially GW, who will continue to write what they want.

You can choose something in between.

Complaining that they have taken away anything is fallacious, because we both never had the control of the sandbox to the extent we thought we did (nothing in the sandbox was ever really “ours” - except the things you made up 100% yourself, which are still derivative and solely existing within the IP, so still not really usable as is outside the sandbox) and because GW doesn’t control anything you choose to ignore for your games.

If someone wants to take the 4th Company Dark Angels and say that their force has no Primaris in them at all for their home games and that they are found in X Sector as opposed to whatever GW has written lately, that is still within their power to do so.  It’s so laughably easy that it’s even more comical that people will argue they can’t…

GW will ignore it all and keep on writing what they want regardless - as they have always done.

Thinking that GW has altered your participation in anything that they didn’t already control is also foolish.  The participation hasn’t been altered - it is the same as it was before - we all play 40K with GW’s tools, in GW’s sandbox, at GW’s whim, if you want to play absolutely canon/“official”.

You can also choose not to play at GW’s whim, as many of my friends that didn’t like GW’s changes have done before.  GW also can’t make you play their games.

Edited September 11, 2022 by Bryan Blaire

[Captain Idaho]

I don't think you understand any of the points raised by myself. So I'll duck out of the conversation now.

[Bryan Blaire]

15 minutes ago, Captain Idaho said:

I don't think you understand any of the points raised by myself. So I'll duck out of the conversation now.

Probably for the best.  

As far as the original post goes - I disagree that “a lot of people” would have been happy with a 1K+ year jump in the history of 40K, not any more than “a lot of people” are happy with what has happened now.  GW may have actually taken the opportunity to have made even more changes to the galaxy than they currently have, which would likely have actually made even more people unhappy instead.

40K is also no less of a setting than it was before - GW chooses to incorporate more overall galactic movement in it than they did previously, sure, though there’s plenty that is also still static in the game available for whatever you want to do with it - the areas that GW doesn’t talk about any are ripe for that, the same as it always was.

 

Edited September 11, 2022 by Bryan Blaire

[Rik Lightstar]

The 40k "setting" covers around 8000 years (from the Scouring to "present day") and the entire Galaxy.

Even the busiest Planets, Chapters, Sectors, Regiments, etc have at most about 1000 years of "activity" detailed. So as long as you don't want to have:

• The Dark Angels Chapter at Badab whilst Huron is having his little outburst,
• The Catachans turning up during The Second War of Armageddon,
• The Word Bearers attacking Macragge at the same time as Hive Fleet Behemoth.

Or any other combination that is explicitly contradictory you should be fine.

• The Dark Angels absolutely could be in the Maelstrom before or after though, especially as the Astral Claws were rumoured to be Dark Angel gene-stock,
• The Catachans would be fantastically suited to hunting Orks and/or Chaos in the Equatorial Jungles of Armageddon at any point between the major conflicts,
• The Word Bearers would take any chance to have another crack at Macragge.

Now, this does mean that your side story won't ever change the "face of the Galaxy", but that's very much the point of 40k. 40k is about it remaining broadly a stalemate. 

Rik

[Rusted Boltgun]

This discussion has been driving me nuts (not the fault of any contributor) to the the point where I feel that I have become Forky asking "what is sandbox?"

I've been driven to grab my copy of RT from the loft. It didn't really help other than to say something like 'here is some background, feel free to make up your own and we'll publish more  the future'. Oh, how right they were...

In then end, I came back to the initial narrative framework from the inside cover...

Forget the promise of progress and understanding, for there is no peace amongst the stars, only an eternity of carnage and slaughter and the laughter of thirsting gods.

But the universe is a big place and, whatever happens, you will not be missed...

[Lexington]

When this topic comes up anymore, I always come back to this question - is post-Gathering Storm 40K even really something with a story?

Like, I dunno, there's more than a human lifetime of words out there arguing over what a story is vs. a plot, but I'm not actually sure either of those terms really applies here. Robbot Gubberman came back, as did a few/most/all of the Traitor Primarchs, and there's been wars and campaigns and seasonal whatnot, but it's hard to say that it coheres  beyond the fact that one thing happens after another in a vague that's not particularly connected by anything besides the fact that it all uses the same corporate IP. Such analysis is not helped by the fact that so much of it is really, really, really bad.

From about 1996 to 2018, most anyone who knew the setting could tell you the story of 40K, or at least the main throughline. The Imperium, degraded and rotting, attempting to hold back the tide of threats to its existence, primary among them the return of the Chaos Space Marines under the banner of Abaddon the Despoiler. You had all the markers of a story there, an arc that was pretty basic in its Biblical/Tolkien structure, signposts like the Cadian Gate or the incipient return of Primarchs, and a definitive endpoint the setting was stuck on, just waiting for that final reckoning. Then you had the Gathering Storm, and it blew all of that up, but nothing came around to replace it. Now there's just stuff, bopping around the galaxy and getting into fights because getting into fights is what happens in Warhammer 40K. It's right there in the title.

Maybe the distinction here isn't really Story vs. Setting so much as Paused Story vs. Directionless Stuff.

Edited September 13, 2022 by Lexington

[Matcap86]

That's the big question right? Do you see the stories as narrowing or expanding the setting? I have no issue setting games in between major storybeats that expand upon the setting. There's a reason there's often 100's or 1000's of years between major events. So your dudes can show up at a 1000 other places if they want.

Do I particularly care for the more recent events? Not really, but that is due to the fluff in GW's newer campaign books usually being a pale copy of what FW did with their IA books. 

It just gives me a greater range of events/places/dates to play my games in. If you continiously want to place your dudes on the forefront of the most chronologically recent story development, you're going to have a bad time IMHO. As you're then just chasing GW's writers all over the galaxy. 

@Captain Idaho do you feel stories that take place in between the big beats that GW's puts out have less merit/value? As that would be the only reason I could see for being annoyed with the story/setting expanding beyond your chosen timeline. 

[MegaVolt87]

I'm actually a bit lost with this thread at the moment. To me, a homebrew force thats based off an official one is not invalidated when GW changes things. Why? because your force represents a snapshot in time before that change happened, its valid up until the point it changes and even then its still valid. Also calling bunkem on no sandbox in HH. I have seen people set their forces and characters to carry over right through to 40k to CSM's or unknown founding chapters from that era. A story is a passing moment in time amongst many moments. The setting is eternal. We can ignore GW's timelines/ advances/ rectons as easily as they ignore ours. I don't know why people are getting so bent out of shape, GW does stuff we hate most of the time, its how we deal that counts in the end.