Unsolved mysteries of the Warhammer 40k universe with loremaster Dan Abnett
arstechnica.com
arstechnica.com
I got into 40k in middle school because the lore and toys were awesome, ditched it in high school as girls suddenly became more interesting than space marines (and seemed mutually exclusive), and in the past few years got back into historical wargaming. Spent most of quarantine painting opposing French and Austrian divisions for the war of 1809, among some other projects.
One thing I’ve really enjoyed about historical games , at least with the groups I’ve been playing with, is the focus on process over result. Winning is nice, but the narrative and choices that develop over the course of the game are really what everyone’s there for.
Edit: totally forgot to add! HN’s favorite Bret Devereux recently appeared on a 40k podcast, where he talked historical precedent for the imperium of man. Great listen! https://www.frontlinegaming.org/2021/02/15/chapter-tactics-1...
I've played 40k since 1987 and WH Fantasy since 1990. I used to play fantasy tournaments along with the Orange County Choppas, usually with a high elf army. Played for the US national championship in 'Ard Boyz twice, but never won it. Back in 2014 I had to quit the tournament scene, as I was working on a startup and I just couldn't keep it all in my head.
The local WH Fantasy scene here in Central Florida kind of dried up after Age of Sigmar, so I haven't had a good game in ages.
I always wanted to play fantasy (Age of Sigmar now I guess), but it has never been that popular at the places I play.
I’m 45 - they still do. I’ve had geeky hobbies as an adult and knew one woman who was into miniatures, but over time I’ve come to value female friendships more than my mutually exclusive geeky hobbies. Somehow I seem to have gone from introverted to full on extrovert in the last 30+ years, I’m still not sure how it happened, but at this point in my life social connections are really at the heart of who I am, and solitary pursuits are much less consuming. No real point in making this comment other than self reflection, and perhaps curiosity as to how many others made such a transition. Maybe it is typical, I just did not see it until it had already happened. Video games became boring. Ah, I just don’t have enough time! Nope, turns out I’m just really not that interested any more. Fascinating.
The hobby community is heavily male because of marketing and a community that was actively hostile to women (similar to many male dominated hobbies). But nothing about the actual activity should be gendered. Don’t let shitty culture control your decisions. Be the change!
But I think what you’re talking about. I went through a similar transition, when hobbies went from a way to occupy time to a way to meet people. Once you hit 30, people’s lives diverge to such a degree you actually have to put yourself out in the world if you want to have friends. If you don’t have kids you have to seek out other child-free people (no knock on parents; it’s just not for me). I got back into video games over the pandemic because the situation called for occupying time in solitude, but totally leaving that all behind now that gatherings are a thing again.
Personally I think it’s a bit of a mid-life crisis: the term has a negative meaning in the west as a stereotype where someone will go out and buy a sports car and get a younger boyfriend/girlfriend, but for many people it’s just a bit of feeling your own mortality and carving out a life that makes you happy now that you’re old enough to understand what drives you.
For years I mostly painted without playing (it is a great source of calmness for me), but during the pandemic, my brother got himself a capable 3D printer and we started printing models (there is a huge amount of great and affordable ones out there) and I started building an army (beastmen) to play. We all are interested in fluff and storytelling, so that usually makes a long game go by quite quickly (and makes for great and very weird conversation pieces, even years later).
I also seem to have been lucky with the girls/women in my life, never seemed mutually exclusive (one of them actually taught me how to paint in a somewhat proper way).
If you are looking to get started I would recommend the Eisenhorn trilogy, The Original Blood Angels Omnibus, or The Emperor's Gift. Dan Abnett, Aaron Dembski-Bowden, and Graham McNeil produce consistently enjoyable 40k books.
Seriously hoping for more Rogal Dorn lore in the upcoming books set around the siege of terra.
The transcript--
>>https://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2021/05/bdcfb...
The Gaunt’s Ghosts series in particular is a jewel.
Very engaging speaker.
The amount of lore this universe creates (there is about a core group of 8 writers) is just insane so I am mainly a fan of the 30K Horus Heresy era.
I don't play the tabletop game or paint or game but just read/listen to the novels , it reminds me of how I discovered D&D by reading the Dragonlance novels by Margaret Weis & Tracy Hickman.
Why would playing the Space Nazies be any worse than the Space Communists, or the Space Bdsm Rapists, or the Space Super Spreaders, or the Space Insects That Only Like You For Your Biomass, or the Space Cockneys That Only Want To Fight, or the Space Zombies That Sort Of Kind Of Still Worship Undead Gods They Toppled?
It is absolutely stupid, or at least extremely naive, to believe that anything is ever "just a game" or "just a book" or "just a movie". You can't build a wall through your own brain.
>Why would playing the Space Nazies be any worse than the Space Communists, or the Space Bdsm Rapists, or the Space Super Spreaders, or the Space Insects That Only Like You For Your Biomass, or the Space Cockneys That Only Want To Fight, or the Space Zombies That Sort Of Kind Of Still Worship Undead Gods They Toppled?
You are making my point for me here. In a world where the only choice is between Hitler and Cthulhu, I'd go with Hitler, but I real life I'd much rather prefer to not be making this choice at all. But Warhammer 40k is not real life, and so the question is who and why would want to role play in an imaginary world where you have to make that choice.
LMAO. Ok then. I guess all of every fiction is now invalid. Not sure how to argue against this idea, because it's just blatantly untrue IME.
> You are making my point for me here. In a world where the only choice is between Hitler and Cthulhu, I'd go with Hitler, but I real life I'd much rather prefer to not be making this choice at all.
My point is that it doesn't matter which one you choose because you're fucked anyhow, and the way in which you're fucked doesn't really matter. Furthermore, it's not real life, so you don't have to make that choice.
> But Warhammer 40k is not real life, and so the question is who and why would want to role play in an imaginary world where you have to make that choice.
Because it's fun to roleplay. It's fun to paint small plastic mans with cool aesthetics. I can think something's cool without agreeing with it.
So no wonder fiction also enrages believers in societal fiction.
Only rather particular approaches to religion. Given the popularity of religion throughout history, fiction would basically be nonexistent if it had that effect on the religious generally.
> Cause if tolkien could create LOTR
Tolkien was religious.
See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_Prodigal_Son https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parables_of_Jesus https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable
> Tolkien was religious.
More precisely, Tolkien was a devout Catholic (as was his less-subtle-about-it friend and fellow world-builder CS Lewis), and his mythos reflects that:
[x] The one true God who is good created all things including evil and gave humans the "gift of mortality."
[x] The most powerful angel rebels against God, and this great enemy seeks to corrupt the world and its creatures.
[x] A partially human hero is the first to return from beyond and by doing so overthrows the great enemy.
I also find it interesting that while the Orcs in Tolkien's world are evil, he wouldn't go so far as calling them irredeemable.
Lewis was Anglican, not Catholic.
You are (I presume, since you're using the internet) buying stuff every day from countries that torture their citizens, from materials mined in abhorrent conditions. Most of the humanity does live in W40k-like conditions right now.
All I want to say, criticizing W40k with the sole argument that it's worse than reality is...undefendable.
Don't put words I didn't say into my mouth, please.
>All I want to say, criticizing W40k with the sole argument that it's worse than reality is...undefendable.
I'm criticizing it for being a vehicle for thoughtless Space Nazi roleplay.
Instead of criticizing something that helped people endure that time, maybe you should ask yourself why its popularity ebbs and flows but is still so attractive to so many. Maybe we do have to choose between following equally-terrible people, every day? Maybe we still feel powerless to stop never-ending conflicts? And maybe we just like doing cool shit for the hell of it.
Well, okay, but there are a lot of games where you can choose between good and bad sides. You know, like most of DnD. It's Warhammer 40k specifically that forces you to choose between bad, worse and worst.
There are plenty of movies and books without “good guys”, so it’s reasonable there should be games too. After all, this situation is often closer to reality than the manichean “one side is Right” mindset, and actually spurs critical analysis of everyday situations more than the usual mindless “kill the Nazis”.
There are very few, and fewer with any success (though, to be fair, not quite none), that don’t have any not irredeemably evil guys, which seems to be the issue people raise with WH40K.
It doesn’t help that the mirror faction in AoS is just a good faction in a sea of evil.
I do wish that GW would just lean in and drop the fascist iconography and let marines be good. That way we wouldn’t need this weird ramp from “these are the good guys” to “actually, if you read the lore it is trying to be satire”.
No it hasn't.
Starship Troopers (also about space marines, hmm…) has had the same critique.
Maybe they need to go in the other direction and make the satire even less subtle. Relatedly, there may be some value in discovering exactly which form of awful you gravitate toward.
I'm just a casual observer of WH40K but I thought the whole point was that every group is bad in some special way, morals like compassion and honor are fleeting in the face of an actively hostile universe, and within that grim dark sandbox everyone's inner edgelord can play on maximum "rule of cool" mode.
GW could make the satire much less subtle. But I think it would sell more poorly.
You are correct that the actual universe, if you really dig, portrays the imperium as truly terrible (and everybody else). But if you look at the minis, the rules, the boxes, and the art it really seems like the imperium are good guys resisting evil.
There was one novel, by Robert A. Heinlein. I once declared to a circle of fellow Warhammer players that it's one of my favourite Sci Fi books ever and someone accused me of being a fascist (and Ted). Years later I related the story on HN and I was taken to task by an HN user who accused me of lying about how much I like Starship Troopers because I misremembered a detail in it, I think about voting rights.
Morale of the story: sometimes I think the internet is stupid.
In comparison, the popular consumable representation of the imperium is just straight up good guys. You have to dig into the novels (which only a small number of people read) before you find any of the satire.
Edit: on the matter of satire I don't absolutely disagree with you. I don't think the Astartes are presented as heroic good guys, but I also don't find lots of satirical intent in the fluff. What it's always reminded me of is UK comic books of the '90s (I think) like 2000AD with Judge Dredd and all that, so more cynicism and black humour than satire. And also a bit of the Mad Max kind of heavy metal aesthetic sensibilities (yes, I know) found in various science fiction graphical works of art I've caught sight of here and there. There was an entire comics magazine called Heavy Metal that had nothing to do with the music genre but which I think was pretty much 100% the 40K aesthetic.
And the fluff has changed quite a bit over the years, as have the minis. I've seen older genestealers and they look nothing like today's slick plastic models.
And then there was a whole race called the Squats, i.e. space Dwarfs, that got lost in space and time (their entire line was discontinued). I think -but that was before my time- the reason was that they didn't fit in with the grimdark theme.
Last thing: in 40K I had Tau. I loved the models, especially the Kroot; exactly because they were such a departure from the grimdark Astartes and their enemies and fri... other enemies. I distinctly remember reading that they were supposed to be like the foil of all the other races, straight up good guys who genuinely fought for the Common Good, honest to gods. But the people who make those decisions in GW decided they didn't like that and gave them a dark secret, although at the point I stopped buying the rulebooks it was only hinted at and never really made clear. I had an idea of modifying some Tau with Chaos and Tyranid bits but I never got around to it. Anyway yeah, they were supposed to be the actual good guys, but that got zilched so that everyone could be bad.
Beep bop I'm your friendly translation bot (no I'm not).
Space Communists --> T'au Empire
Space BDSM Rapists --> Emperor's Children (devoted to Slaanesh)
Space Super Spreaders --> Death Guard (devoted to Nurgle)
Space Insects That Only Like You For Your Biomass --> Tyranids (Shoot the big ones first)
Space Cockneys That Only Want(s) To Fight --> Orks
Space Zombies That Sort Of Kind Of Still Worship Undead Gods They Toppled --> Necrons
Aren't we missing someone? What happened to the Space Manowar Fans (World Eaters) or the Space New Age Goth Hippies (Thousand Sons)? Personally I rather dig the Space Sisters of Mercy Please No Not the Flagellum (Sisters of Battle). Or the Space Boris Johnsons (Harlequins) etc etc.
Thinking machines rebellion became the Dark Age of Technology.
No form of AI allowed - no mentats but workarounds such as servitors and machine spirits.
The Tleilaxu/Space Guild became the Mechanicum of Mars - they control all the technology.
Definitely 40K fans who made it :).
It is kind of true of life in general.
In the end, the whole Games Workshop lore is a mixture of “heavy metal” aesthetic, Tolkien tropes, and the “nihilism with a smile” reaction to Thatcher’s England that also gave us Dredd and “British Invasion” comic writers: if you take it too seriously, you become part of the joke.
The last great crisis due to our exponential consumption nature is barely 80 years in the past. And baring some "miracle" class science breath throughs, its bound to return.
Not saying the future will contain catholic-nazi-space-marines, but life might become brutal and short again, if there are no major breakthroughs in energy production.
Engaging with that expected future brutishness is basically just fitness signalizing at this point.