Fall of Cadia by Robert Rath

[DukeLeto69]

1 hour ago, Nagashsnee said:

I have had time to mull it over and i want to go over my favorite thing about the book, and my least favorite and why i think they are both wider BL issues. 

 

 

  Hide contents

Ok so good first. I loved the fact the book got the Imperiums military right. I dont mean power levels or unit description. But in essence its feudal nature and absolutely broken chain of command. 

Creed is the top of the Imperial guard command structure on cadia, de facto head of the defence of the most important battleground in the galaxy and burdened with incredible authority. But the moment you step outside the Imperial Guard he really is just some bloke with a cigar to a marine. I LOVED that the book got the balance between 'legally you have nothing on me' and 'gotta at least PRETEND to be a team player' with the marines right. I also loved how different chapters showed different levels of willingness to work as part of a unified plan.  You have the Raven Guard chap doing his best to work his forced as part of a unified battle plan. And the Space Wolfs just showing up to tell everyone what they have already decided to do. And they are both 100% within their rights to do it.  Then of course you have everyone's favorite crack addicted cousin the templars, who have one again locked themselves in the downstairs bathroom, everyone knows its just not worth the effort and to just leave them to it. 

 

The same goes with the sisters of battle, sure the sisters have to talk to the cardinal, he is the cardinal. Creed? Dont see him on the church payroll who is this Creed to tell us we have to use our very elite power armored forces logically and where they will have the maximum effect.  Does he not know that we protect the toilet seat of saint lazarus the lactose intolerant?  Whats that Belisarius Cawl showed up and his got a power point in a language no one here speaks but is 100% crucial to the war effort? Etc etc.

 

The book makes the Imperium of a million worlds FEEL like it. Its absolutely bonkers separation of powers and Empires within Empires come out naturally. The actors act logically to their own organizations and belief systems and make things hard for Creed not because its the only way the author knows how to create tension but because that's how a intergalactic/feudal/atheist/theocracies who are actually two separate states welded together would work. If it was a comedy they would just constantly scream 'YOUR NOT MY SUPERVIRSOR' to each other and i am here for it.  Too often this side of the Imperium get overlooked or just ignored outright. 

 

I also loved the regimental name drops here and there and wish there was more of them. Every time i read 'walked passed a group of drunk Vostroyans' i got a smile. It would have been easy to have the fall of cadia hyper focused on the cadians. 

 

 

If you dont care about Battle Fleet Gothic and 40k space ship lore stop here.  The author has no idea about how spaceships work in 40k, ship classes and weapons. And it  irks me. It irks me a great deal. Right from the start when the Black legion pop up i was Irk. Firstly Admiral Quarren dies. Who the heck is Admiral Quarren you ask? Well he was the head of the Imperial navy during the 13th black crusade, or he use to be, now he is not and he dies so the new guy who is in charge keeps going. But why? Why alter this? Why have him die just to invent some new dude? Just have new dude die and let the 10 people who know who Quarren is enjoy themselves and he leads his counter attack. 

 

Then we get to his ship and the irksome nature gets upgrade to full on annoyance. Its an Emperors class battle ship ( hey they got the flagship class right!), which the dear admiral orders to prep torpedoes and its nova cannon...my dudes Emperor class ships are very very very famous for 2 things. Spamming attack craft wings, and not having an armored prow. Indeed they get a bonus to leadership as their prow (which on most imperial ships is armored) is made up of sensors and c&c for its many spammed attack wings of fighters and bombers and whatever else have you. They cannot have nova cannons, and torpedoes would mean the ship specifically made to act as c&c loses the specific thing that makes it good at c&c. 

 

Now you say, dude chill its a custom model/retrofit/etc. But why? Your retconning him into death anyhow why not have him on a Retribution class which DOES have those things.  Why specifically pick a class that is famous for NOT having the things you want it to have? 

 

And its not just this, the book gets ship wrong allot, dictators become battle cruisers, their not, their just cruisers, the mars class is the battle cruiser hull carrier. Etc etc.

 

And i have noticed this trend ALLOT in recent years, BL  editorial and most of the newer authors do not care about BFG/40k space lore.  They will do the bare minimum ( briefly search up some names and general details) and no more.

 

And while i know 90% of the people reading BL books many not care 1 iota if the Lunar class cruiser Lord Daros was built over the feral world of Unloth by tricking the locals into mining and offering ore in 'sky temples'. But as sad as it is i do. BFG remains my favorite game GW has ever made and its lore is great!  And i believe if you are a BL author/editor and you want to name your Lunar class cruiser something and find the Lord Daros having existed in the lore and decide to use it YOU SHOULD CARE/KNOW. 

The book remains top notch. 

Not read it yet. I will read it based on reviews. Yep the BFG thing would really irk me too! These things do matter. GW/BL really need a new Alan (Merrit or Bligh)!

[DarkChaplain]

14 hours ago, DukeLeto69 said:

Not read it yet. I will read it based on reviews. Yep the BFG thing would really irk me too! These things do matter. GW/BL really need a new Alan (Merrit or Bligh)!

 

Go for it. I'm only a quarter or so through but it's fascinating stuff so far. In many ways, it's already presenting something that I sorta wished the Siege could have been more like.

 

 

[lightinfa]

Any idea if this will get a paperback release? Found a place that still had the hardcover in stock so debating if I should just bite that bullet.

Edited November 9, 2023 by lightinfa

[cheywood]

47 minutes ago, lightinfa said:

Any idea if this will get a paperback release? Found a place that still had the hardcover in stock so debating if I should just bite that bullet.

BL releases just about everything in paperback eventually, at least when it comes to novels. But the paperback likely won’t be out until sometime next year, so maybe grab the hardcover if you’re in a rush to read it.

[Urauloth]

I've been busy and therefore slow reading this, but I'm halfway through it now and really liking it. I've gotten to some of the heavy-duty battles scenes now, and they're well-plotted and visceral. The atmosphere of tragic futility is perfect for a novel about the death of a planet, but there are enough twists, reversals and tactical insights that it's constantly engaging.

The scene where

the Cadians knock out a renegade Demolisher by rushing it with a bomb

reminded me of one of my favourite fights in Gaunt's Ghosts, which was a nice shot of nostalgia as well.

 

Following up on my earlier comment of how much I like the depiction of Abaddon and his warlords: Man, this keeps getting better. Urkanthos in particular. For all that he's an inhumanly powerful millennia-old warlord, his obsessions have also reduced him to an unbelievably petty maniac who's barely capable of fulfilling his role. His tantrum against the Blood God is hilarious, and in general he's a good illustration of how much cat-herding Abaddon has to do in order to get anything done in spite of how vast his fleets and armies are.

 

Can't wait to read more of it.

[grailkeeper]

My favourite part was when:

 

Spoiler

The racketeering gangster hits Creed, then explains why, immediately followed by Creed using the same point in a propaganda speech. That was what I meant in an earlier post about Rath's flashes of genius.

 

 

One thing that Rath is excellent at is twists. I dont think there were any in this. Normally most twists in media you can see coming. The good guy who was secretly a bad guy is usually telegraphed from miles away. These days if a famous actor dies early on, its a bigger surprise if they dont come back in the third act than if they do. When Rath has a twist I genuinely am surprised. He's the only author whose used the same twist twice, with the same character,  and gotten me both times. 

Edited November 11, 2023 by grailkeeper

[theSpirea]

Late to the party, I'm just starting the book today. The first two parts are excellent and already a strong contender for my Black Library book of the year. Rath has been absolutely killing it since his very short BL story (The Garden of Mortal Delights which was my favorite BL story in 2019).

This is everything I expected from the Dawn of Fire series. Rath did more in 100 pages than DoF in 6 books. He has already introduced so many characters yet I care about all of them.

[theSpirea]

I finished it, and what a ride! I've never read the campaign books, so I can't comment on how faithful it is to them. This also means I can't appreciate or tell if one ship is called Gloriana Indorita but should, in fact, be Gloriana Daria, or if this and that unit is wearing a cross instead of a square on their right shoulder pad and should be iridescent silver or light greige. These things are lost on me and are not the reason I read BL novels, but I understand they are important to those who engage with other parts of the hobby as well, not just the BL fiction.

It's non-stop action but doesn't read like your generic BL bolter porn:

In the dimly lit expanse of the desolate alien landscape, Captain Steele, clad in standard-issue power armor, advanced with a determined stride. The air hung heavy with the scent of stale predictability as the alien horde emerged from the shadows. With a mechanical precision, Steele raised his bolter, a sleek and millennia old piece of machinery, its cold metallic sheen reflecting the monotonous nature of the impending battle. 

 

There are so many characters, and I honestly want to know more about all of them, especially Hellsker, Ghent, and the early times of Glave. There are all Imperium factions, but it's mainly about regular humans, and I loved that. SMs showed up only briefly, but their limited time was impactful.

Spoiler

SWs saving Keztral was probably my favorite part

 

Things I loved the most:

• Pacing. This is the longest BL book, and on top of that, it's almost non-stop action, yet it doesn't read like it. All action scenes serve their purpose to develop characters and move the plot forward.
• Main focus on regular infantry
• Depiction of Creed
• Urkanthos

Things I think could have been better

• Can't blame Rath for almost deus-ex Cawl/Celestine intervention. From what I understand, that's the original material, but I'm still not a big fan of the rather rushed/convenient ending.
• Would appreciate a bit more time spend with traitors

So far, along with Godeater's Son, my favorite BL book from 2023. I might need a short break from WH, but I hope to catch up on Ashes of Cadia before the end of the year.

Edited November 17, 2023 by theSpirea

[Colman]

Just finished the audiobook, and it was much more fun than I was expecting. I’m not normally a big fan of lore backfilling but the characterisation made it worthwhile. Carefully chosen PoV characters to show what was going on.

I’d quite like a book backfilling the Great Smurf’s return and the Terran Crusade if it was done in that style.

[Ubiquitous1984]

On 10/28/2023 at 8:49 PM, DarkChaplain said:

The e- and audiobook are finally out. Looks like the audiobook's got a surprise: The afterword is included, unlike with the general release ebook edition.

It’s taken me a good while, but I’ve finally finished the audiobook.   The author narrates the afterword, which is even cooler!  I really hope this becomes a regular thing in future BL audiobooks.  

 

This was a really good BL book.  I’m not a fan of Bolter porn, and this book is so action focused - but it’s all quality action, and the characters make you actually care about them.  

 

It was a hard book to follow though.  So many characters to try to remember!

[Felix Antipodes]

I’ve been holding back on reading this due to its size but I’m glad I got to it sooner rather than later.  A great read and strong contender for BL book of the year.

 

Yes, there are a lot of characters (and action scenes) but imho there isn’t any dead weight.  I can’t think of a single one I thought could be cut.  Never a fan of bolter porn but I believe Rath got the balance right there as well.  The only sour note for me was Inquisitor Greyfax(?), who I had a hard time recalling her backstory, and found tedious and boring for some reason.

 

I hope they have Rath already working on the return of Robby G - or anything for that matter.

[Felix Antipodes]

Sorry for the double post but I remembered something else I thought was strange but interesting - the matter of fact way the Cadian High Command reacted to the presence of the Legion of the Damned Chapter without any ‘who them?’ Stuff.  Creed didn’t even react much when they started winking out of existence due to Cawl activating the pylon system.

Seemed to me that the hierarchy of the Imperium know a lot more about some of the weirder aspects of the galaxy than they admit.  Or it was a slight stumble by Rath.

Thoughts?

[Nagashsnee]

7 hours ago, Felix Antipodes said:

Sorry for the double post but I remembered something else I thought was strange but interesting - the matter of fact way the Cadian High Command reacted to the presence of the Legion of the Damned Chapter without any ‘who them?’ Stuff.  Creed didn’t even react much when they started winking out of existence due to Cawl activating the pylon system.

Seemed to me that the hierarchy of the Imperium know a lot more about some of the weirder aspects of the galaxy than they admit.  Or it was a slight stumble by Rath.

Thoughts?

 

I know its a cop out but, the Imperium is too big for any sort of general consistency in pretty much anything including knowledge.   Even saying imperial Hierachy assumes a unified and formal chain of command.   But a lord militant from segmentum obscurus and a lord militant from segmentum tempestus will have wildly different knowledge pools to drawn on. 

 

One of my favorite 40k lore nuggets came from BFG, in it the navy had many lists, each representing a major segmentum battlefleet, each and their own naval theory, traditions, preferred ship types, etc etc.  Theoretically they would represent the Imperium top naval hierarchy, but between them they will vary, sometimes vastly.  One of the BIGGEST naval defections in the Imperium history came about after the navy fought a civil war over different schools of naval doctrine. 

 

Back to the book, Creed is a senior commander of Cadia, center of the Cadia system, centre of the Cadian defence zone/line/sector. ANYTHING to do with chaos/warp/spooky things that happen often when dealing with wars fought in said sector would be something he would be briefed on, either officially or under the table.

 

Does he know precisely what the legion of the damned is? Who knows? Does the Cadian high command have a file and maybe a mix gender pair of agents in some basement office  who explore and create files on unexplained phenomena and which gets cross referenced to see what happens often/during certain external effects? Probably. After all the stuff that has gone down on cadia would the legion of the damned have a big file? 100%. 

 

One of the things that has always saved BL/GW is the nature of the universe can be used to explain away ALLOT of mistakes.  Did the author mess up, i would say 90% yes. Would Creed know a basic amount or  have seen much much stranger then mysterious flamey semi ghost marines, thus making his non plus response at the time make perfect sense? 100% .

 

Now if creed knew what a tau looked like THAT WOULD BE WEIRD.

[Felix Antipodes]

The fact that Creed is such an out and out bull:cuss:ter, especially as portrayed in the book, means that he may have been going ‘what the hell’ internally while treating it as ‘business as usual’ for the benefit of those around him.

 

I also loved the BFG game and its attendant lore.  It should be mandatory reading/research for any BL author going anywhere near the Navis Imperialis in their stories.

[Ubiquitous1984]

I agree that towards the last third of the book, when things were getting weird (due to the source material) certain events didn't feel like they were getting treated with the gravity required.  A saint arriving?  A chapter of SM ghosts? (I assume that's what the LOTD are - I've never read about them before) a random Inquisitor from the past (I don't know why she is, I must have missed some previous book where Greyfax was mentioned).

 

But I guess the book was already super long, so word count concerns were creeping in.

 

Perhaps this book should have been longer, but split into two volumes?

[Nagashsnee]

17 hours ago, Ubiquitous1984 said:

I agree that towards the last third of the book, when things were getting weird (due to the source material) certain events didn't feel like they were getting treated with the gravity required.  A saint arriving?  A chapter of SM ghosts? (I assume that's what the LOTD are - I've never read about them before) a random Inquisitor from the past (I don't know why she is, I must have missed some previous book where Greyfax was mentioned).

 

But I guess the book was already super long, so word count concerns were creeping in.

 

Perhaps this book should have been longer, but split into two volumes?

I go between your view above, and realizing that for Creed the Cadians this all really was within the span of a couple of days. After the 5th impossible thing today i would probably stop giving them any gravitas too. But that is the way the campaign book wrote it.  Just impossible/magical/mythical thing after thing after thing in rapid rapid succession. So even in a second book, how much gravity can you give these events? They all happen to fast and one right after the other. So many many named characters just popping up and doing their things, and it doesnt stop. How do you give gravity to a Necron throwing pokeballs that exploded into special characters who have minis and backstories now ( as far as i know that is literally how Greyfax was introduced, you did not miss anything)?  Would it not devolved into chapter after chapter of 'and then XXX arived'. 

 

This book was about the fall of cadia, so i get why the author kept the focus there and the characters who resolve around the cadians/cadia. 

Edited December 12, 2023 by Nagashsnee

[DukeLeto69]

It does make me question the quality of the studio background/lore writers. I can almost see them playing table football as they brainstorm saying “wouldn’t it be cool if X appeared”

[Felix Antipodes]

There was a detectable speed up towards the end of the book so that all of the source material was used.  This, imho, was why it seemed crammed and possibly needed a two part release.  Thank god they didn’t go down that path or we may have ended up with something longer than The End & The Death!  

 

Considering the source material though, I still think Rath did a great job adapting it and am willing to overlook the more onerous bits that leaked across.

[Roomsky]

Fall of Cadia - Robert Rath

 

Isn't it fun when the paperback release cycle delays further discussion this much?

 

This book is good. Like, 7.5/10 good, which is impressive because I have a couple of really big issues with it. Let's do those first:

 

Issue the first: Creed

Creed is done so dirty by this book. I don't think I've ever read a worse depiction of the man. There's no reason why the guy given temporary command of every arm of Cadia's military should be doing things like deploying every available aircraft at once against the wishes of his chief aeronautica officer. Creed does nothing tactically or strategically competent in this book, he gets besieged and tells his forces to go where there's lots of enemies. Wow! He almost causes a riot because he doesn't consider that his public-address words will have consequences. The only particularely intelligent thing he does is create contingency plans. He's also comitted to being down on the front lines with the men, while generally being annoyed he needs to wear a refractor field. Why is this man Lord Castellan? Why didn't he do some reading on the rest of the military when he was appointed Lord Castellan? He's a Sergeant Rock inexplicably in the highest possible position. The planet only held as long as it did because 1: Kell is a good handler, 2: Trazyn, and 3: The Phalanx.

 

Now, I get that Rath is trying to take the shine off the Creed memes and humanize him properly, but the balance is way off; basically all his virtues are told and never shown. He also only shows Creed through other characters' eyes, mostly Kell's. This is a device you use to make a character feel more mythical, not less. 

 

Issue the second: Scale

You know those annoying "fragments" chapters from TEATD? While perhaps overdone, they are very effective at communicating the sheer size of that conflict, and at that point it's just describing the Siege of the inner palace. TEATD's conflcit read as significantly larger than this war for an entire world, and the space around it. Rath uses a lot of POVs to try and show how large the conflict is, but many of these undermine that idea. Characters deployed across the entire warzone frequently cross paths by coincidence, a big deal is made of a single daemon prince on Abaddon's staff (I dunno man, I feel like he's got a lot of those,) a single skilled conman manages to destroy all of Abaddon's described saboteurs, and almost every POV in command acts like they're one officer in command of about a hundred people. Books like Cadia Stands, or the 13th Black Crusade sections of Lords of Silence really made this event feel enormous. Fall of Cadia often feels like a skirmish.

 

Pretty damning, huh? How, then, does it get a 7.5/10? Well, everything else is damn near flawless.

 

This is 650 pages dedicated to a single battle. And I was not bored for a single second of it. Rath, somehow, wrote the best darn battle book I've ever read from the studio, even the legendary Helsreach got tedious at points. For what the book lacks in scale, it often makes up for in intimacy and intensely personal conflicts. Every character I either wanted to succeed, or was just super invested in what they were going to do next. Even the Creed sections, while occasionally frustrating, were riveting (and there is something admittedly compelling about a guy in way over his head forced into command of the Imperial battle, I just wish he wasn't named Creed.) Morkath is a great idea for a character, and the ending of her story gave me some genuine feels. I love any Abaddon that's not a slavering maniac, so I give him top points (and he kills a Custodian with no effort; this pleases me.) The Battle Sisters could probably used a little more pagetime, but Rath does a TON with very few chapters. The Black Templars are zealous idiots, and I love that (more in a bit.) Keztral's journey from underdog to combat pilot is lovely, and while he's a bit of a Sue, I can't help but love Salvar Ghent's constant bastardry. Trazyn is Trazyn without being over the top, and therefor amazing.

 

What's more, Rath pulls no punches in showing how dysfunctional the Imperium is. The Black Templars hold a strategically useless fortification for days because it has the word "Martyr" in its name. Don't @ me with your "the most religious hypno-indoctrinated warrior monks should be more sensible" heresy. That was perfect. The Inquisition is at odds with itself and is the kind of self-righteous bloodthirsty it should be. A soldier infatuated with the idea of a glorious last stand dies pointlessly and ignobly. A major point of defence is destroyed because no one in the Imperium wants to check with head office. Creed's contingencies are undermined at every turn because everyone assumes they're just grabs for power. And Cadia would have been lost immediately if not for xenos intervention. God, it's glorious. Rath, that guy gets it.

 

And the ending, man, what a great ending. The last hundred pages or so totally deliver, despite the weight of expectations. Both of my issues are made moot: it's the last gasp of the defence, so scale isn't an issue, and Creed isn't in a position to be organizing strategy beyond cramped, tunnel-fighting chaos. There is no Imperial triumph here beyond the occasional "we survived," and yet those few survivals mean everything at this point. Morkath's final conversation with Abaddon is amazing. Trazyn and Cawl's interactions are generally golden, and are the only note of even *very mild* levity amongst the melancholy. But it's pitch-perfect. Couldn't ask for a better climax to The Fall of Cadia.

 

This book has great stuff. The great stuff is so great, the book's still a banger despite issues that would cripple most other works. 7.5/10 and probably still a Must Read. Fracture of Biel-Tan next, Mr. Rath?

 

Note: Even the issue of scale (and to a degree, Creed's competence) is solved if you just read Cadia Stands as a supplemental piece. What that book lacks in context, it definitely makes up for in scale, and Creed's few appearances in it are great.

 

 

 

[darkhorse0607]

I'm slowly working my way through this but can I just say I'm grateful for Rath actually making Abbadon scary. Just past the point where he teleports onto the Space Wolves ship with some havocs and that is genuinely the first time I've read a book with him that gave me a genuine "oh no, these guys need to go, like right now"

 

It was refreshing to see that encounter

[DarkChaplain]

I actually have to agree with that: That boarding scene was grim. I listened to it while on the bus home from family, and I was completely absorbed by just how powerful and in control Abaddon came across there, and how they were running to their certain doom. Looking back on it now, I also struggle to find an example of Abaddon being equally as scary.

 

ADB made him very relatable, and Dunn made him do some terrible things in Pandorax, albeit off the battlefield. He's had other 40k showings (iirc in the Khârn serialization, even?) and he's been in Dawn of Fire for a little bit. But I can't think of a moment that rivals this one.

 

In fact, I'd go one step further and say: It's the closest Abaddon has been to giving me the looooong forgotten sense of awe I would get from the very early Heresy's Primarchs entering the stage. The legend has arrived, and there is no way anybody involved could be prepared for it.

 

 

Also re: Urkanthos as Daemon Prince on Abaddon's council: It's not really so much that Abaddon has a lack of them, really. It's more that Urkanthos is tipping the scales and destabilizing the status quo of the powers under his direct command. Keeping him around would lead to favoritism, some of it by force, and cause friction among the pantheon as well. Plus, letting that much Chaos into the bloke makes him difficult to keep under control, he and his warband become unpredictable. And we've seen how bad it can get with Angron or Fulgrim, the latter of which at least maintained his personality to a larger degree than a base marine would be able to.

 

Having Urkanthos around is all manner of bad. Having daemon princess in the ranks below the command staff works much more easily, by comparison. But removing Urkanthos by force? Oh boy, Khorne ain't gonna like that one bit, even if you'd be able to fill the power vacuum with another Khornebloke immediately.

 

It's a risk Abaddon wouldn't want to have to take when he's about to bring the 13th Black Crusade to a climax, and then lock up Terra with Blackstone Pylons in the aftermath of Cadia.

Edited August 12 by DarkChaplain

[Roomsky]

Intellectually, I get the point of his destabalizing Abaddon's inner circle (though that one guy is the Khorne rep also makes it feel a bit small, IMO.) But ascended Urkanthos then goes on to cut a pretty huge gash in the defenders, and most loyalists act like he's an especially unique presence on the battlefield. Obviously the Black Legion doesn't have as much affinity for ascension as other traitors, but again this is the 13th Black Crusade. There should be many, many Urkanthos-es on the battlefield.

[darkhorse0607]

 

\In fact, I'd go one step further and say: It's the closest Abaddon has been to giving me the looooong forgotten sense of awe I would get from the very early Heresy's Primarchs entering the stage. The legend has arrived, and there is no way anybody involved could be prepared for it.

 

 

It's the first time in a while I've sat back after reading it and thought "That's why he's the Warmaster"

 

Don't get me wrong, I enjoy the Black Legion books quite a bit and they're obviously from an earlier time period, but I think in GW's style of "tell, don't show," it's nice to have an example of "show, don't tell" 

[grailkeeper]

 

Fall of Cadia - Robert Rath

 

 

 

When you have to press "respectfully disagree"

on a roomsky post 

 

(I'll accept its his weakest novel, but even his weakest novel is a 10 for me).

[Roomsky]

I appreciate the hesitation, though.