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Hi! I'm interested in Black Crusade, I have the small free starter booklet for it, but I'm completely new to RPGs. The closet thing I've ever played is HeroQuest. Would the Black Crusade core book be a good buy for me? Meaning will I be able to learn as I go or should I just wait until Relic comes out? I've heard talisman is an easy system to learn, though for all I know it may be extremely different then Black Crusade.

I plan on getting Relic anyway though so I could just wait. So here's another question, is talisman a narrative game?

Any thoughts or comments?

Talisman's not an RPG. It's a board game.

Yes I know that, but I was told it has many of the same elements, like HeroQuest.

So being completely new to RPGs, would it be better to go with a watered down board game that has similar elements? Or spend 50 dollars on a book when I have no clue what I'm doing?

I'm not sure if I just want to jump right in.

The BC corebook has some examples of play and some advice for game masters (the person who runs the game through narration, basically playing everyone who is not a main character). It's as good a buy as any of the other 40k RPG books to start. And you can always ask questions here but try to ask specific questions to get the most helpful answers.


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Rotgut wrote:
So being completely new to RPGs, would it be better to go with a watered down board game that has similar elements?

IMO, there is no board game that does what RPGs do. A board game can be a dungeon crawl -- like Descent from FFG, for example -- but it's missing the narrative elements that make up the biggest part of the RPG experience. You can look up examples of actual play of RPGs on YouTube if you want a better idea of how they function.

Thanks Manchu, I might just pick up both when relic is released.

I have the free beginner booklets for all the 40k RPGs but black crusade seems to be the most interesting for me. So if they are all similar ill just go with my gut.

Aside from the obvious difference in scope and theme, the games also have notably different rules - making cross-overs somewhat of a pita. But you really do notice how the designers' idea "evolved" over time from Dark Heresy (which was still written by Black Industries) to Rogue Trader to Deathwatch to Black Crusade and finally Only War. The latter is, imho, the best of their rulesets yet, regardless of my personal criticisms about certain design decisions (then again, I have similar nitpicks for each of the games, so that should not mean too much). The comparatively free character generation just lends itself beautifully to major conversions as well as character customisation and is easily understood by new players, which is all a big plus imho. Makes me wish that they'd just redo the entire RPG line as some sort of 2nd edition with Only War rules as a basis for a new big rulebook, upon which the various themes can be added as expansion sets.

Anyhow, the free Black Crusade Beginner's Adventures should give you a good idea about the rules already, so if you liked what you saw there ... enjoy.

I'd really like to see a second edition of Dark Heresy at the least.

People would be so angry they'd just vomit blood out of their eyesockets for hours BUT one thing I'd really like is if they eventually retooled the line as a Second Edition with an "essential rules comepndium" and then branched to the various "settings" from there.

That's how I would like it as well. But I know this approach has lots of opponents.

Granted, it's different from how most your usual P&P RPGs work, but that's how it is done with the 40k Tabletop as well, and isn't it the same with the various d20 settings all requiring the basic D&D rulebook?

Some people might complain about having to pay for more books, but given how much material FFG has churned out over the years they do so already. Basic rules take up a third of each book, and right now you buy them again and again, too. Just make it two books, each of half the size and at a lower price, and it'll work out.

Oh well, we can dream. Or, thanks to Only War, we can get busy ourselves and do our own conversions now!

 Manchu wrote:
People would be so angry they'd just vomit blood out of their eyesockets for hours BUT one thing I'd really like is if they eventually retooled the line as a Second Edition with an "essential rules comepndium" and then branched to the various "settings" from there.

So we can swap all the complaints of "Why don't they just write a unified rule set!" for "Why do I have to buy two books - rule book and setting book!". That sounds like heaps of fun.

A 2nd Ed of Dark Heresy? I'd like that. A "unified rules" for 5 different product lines? No thanks.

H.B.M.C. wrote:So we can swap all the complaints of "Why don't they just write a unified rule set!" for "Why do I have to buy two books - rule book and setting book!". That sounds like heaps of fun.

But the latter question can actually be answered fairly easily.

And frankly, I also don't see anyone complaining about having to buy a Rulebook and a Codex for 40k TT.

 H.B.M.C. wrote:

 Manchu wrote:
People would be so angry they'd just vomit blood out of their eyesockets for hours BUT one thing I'd really like is if they eventually retooled the line as a Second Edition with an "essential rules comepndium" and then branched to the various "settings" from there.

So we can swap all the complaints of "Why don't they just write a unified rule set!" for "Why do I have to buy two books - rule book and setting book!". That sounds like heaps of fun.

A 2nd Ed of Dark Heresy? I'd like that. A "unified rules" for 5 different product lines? No thanks.

I remember the days when you accused other people of being incorrigible apologists.

Obviously, people will always find something to complain about.

Such a comment could only come about if you assumed that I was an FFG apologist. I write for FFG, but that doesn’t make me an apologist. Want a list of all the things that are wrong with the 40K RPG’s? Ok, we can start a list and go book-by-book if you want.

I truly wasn't aiming for the nerve I apparently hit, HBMC. The idea of printing the same or nearly the same rules over and over has slim benefits -- other than padding price, of course. The only one that really springs to mind is that designers aren't necessarily trapped by past conventions. FFG has lamentably not capitalized on that prospect. It is obvious that a corebook (in light of what development there has been) augmented by setting-specific rulebooks would be better for customers than the current ad nauseum duplication.

In fairness, it's not so much duplication in content, but rather duplication in "mass". The rules change from game to game, evolving as the designers themselves get new ideas and adapt them to whatever the current theme is. So one could say that this is a benefit compared to publishing one book which then cannot be improved later on.

But then I'm just gonna say that of course they can still be improved later on, be it by releasing an Errata (which is already done even with the current approach) or by releasing a new edition every couple years ... just like D&D and WFRP and the 40k TT do it. If the basic approach to the rules (d100) remains the same, the existing sourcebooks and their stats wouldn't even lose any validity!

 Lynata wrote:
So one could say that this is a benefit compared to publishing one book which then cannot be improved later on.

One did say that. This one called Manchu.

 Lynata wrote:
If the basic approach to the rules (d100) remains the same, the existing sourcebooks and their stats wouldn't even lose any validity!

True but I don't think we're talking about anything so generic as the bare bones d100 concept. That would take a page, not a corebook. This brings up another line of thought, however: is it a good thing that, say, a bolter works differently in a game about Space Marine PCs versus a game about Inquisitorial Henchmen PCs?

 Manchu wrote:
I truly wasn't aiming for the nerve I apparently hit, HBMC. The idea of printing the same or nearly the same rules over and over has slim benefits -- other than padding price, of course. The only one that really springs to mind is that designers aren't necessarily trapped by past conventions. FFG has lamentably not capitalized on that prospect. It is obvious that a corebook (in light of what development there has been) augmented by setting-specific rulebooks would be better for customers than the current ad nauseum duplication.

I think it’s wrong to consider each of the games as just a duplication of the previous one done simply to ‘pad’ the book out. Other than the basics (how to roll dice, how Tests work, some of the combat/injury stuff, and the universal ‘world’ rules like suffocation, swimming, lifting/pushing/carrying, etc.) each game is different.

It would be highly unfair to say that Black Crusade duplicates the character creation rules from Deathwatch, because it doesn’t. Or that just because both DH and RT use xp as the basis for buying advances that their system of character progression is the same. Yeah, a lot of the Skills/Talents have the same rules, but there are subtle differences here and there, either because there are new Talents, or because the existing ones have changed (usually due to balance reasons).

There are other reasons besides just the rules, and I think these completely trump the “One Book to Rule Them All” approach:

1. As I’ve said a dozen times, each of the 40K RPG’s is a separate game. They share the same base-line rules and mechanics, but they are different games. Their emphasis is different, their methods of play are different, their character creation/progression methods are completely different, and they each have unique factors that set them apart from one another (Renown/Requisition/Missions/Solo&Squad Modes vs Infamy/Corruption/Pacts vs Ships/Profit Factor/Endeavours and so on). It’s not one homogenous “40K RPG” where you can plug and play any aspect of it at will and have it work immediately. Can you make an RT book work in Deathwatch? Of course you can – as I said, all the games share the same base rule concepts and mechanics – but that doesn’t mean that the RT book was designed to work with DW (and nor should it be). You pick up one of the 5 Core Rulebooks and you have a game. It has all you need to play it right there. It is a package deal, so to speak.
2. The biggest aspect of 40K is the universe itself. It is a complicated and ever-expanding back drop that is simply too much to take in in one sitting, and any books that attempt to do so usually do so in a very high-level surface detail kinda way. For that reason, having a stale “these are the rules, no go buy a setting book” book would be the absolute worst way to draw in players. Instead each book is its own entity. You can pick up the Deathwatch rulebook and it has everything you need to play the Deathwatch RPG. You get everything related to that game and it’s setting, and you need nothing more. The universe is explained in the context of the Deathwatch and you go from there. This links with the ‘package deal’ thing I mentioned above. You look at the Core Rulebooks, find which one appeals to you (Investigation/Exploration/Being a Super-Soldier/Playing as a Bad Guy/Being in the Army) and that’s it. The problem of being overwhelmed by the universe is lessened for a new player because they’ve got everything in context with their chosen game in a single book.

If you look at the various 40K RPG supplements and expansions you’ll see that references to other expansions/supplements are rather rare. This is because the assumption is that the reader has the core rulebook, and that’s it. This is why each game is contained within its own book – so that you never need anything else other than what’s in the Core Rulebook. Everything after that, however useful it may be or vital we might consider it, is optional.

Manchu wrote:True but I don't think we're talking about anything so generic as the bare bones d100 concept. That would take a page, not a corebook.

Hmm, not quite what I meant - but I'll touch upon that in a moment. The core idea, however, is that when you look at all the books from all the different games of FFG's 40k line, you'll notice that equipment and NPC stats all follow the same conventions. It would be incredibly easy to just copypaste them into another game. Where this idea falls short is that, as HBMC mentioned, each of the games is a separate entity in itself, so what works nicely in one game could be completely broken for another.

This issue would not exist with a core rulebook that aims at establishing a single consistent setting, rather than lots of different "worlds" where an adventure in one game feels like a 40k version of the movie "300", and a game in another feels like "Saving Private Ryan", if you get my drift. It's one thing to present a different focus or theme, but another to go for a wholly different narrative style. Some people like that, no doubt, but I for one would rather see all the different parts of the setting coming together like a well-oiled machine.

Manchu wrote:This brings up another line of thought, however: is it a good thing that, say, a bolter works differently in a game about Space Marine PCs versus a game about Inquisitorial Henchmen PCs?

Hmm, in case of bolters it is less a difference between the games but indeed an intentional difference within the setting, at least FFG's/BI's version of it. For some reason the writers felt it necessary to invent a distinction between Astartes and "civilian" bolters. The term is no joke, this is actually what it says in the Dark Heresy rulebook. At first the difference was not actually that big, however. The first Astartes bolter in the Purge the Unclean adventure merely had 2d10 damage instead of the usual 1d10+5. The big change came when the Deathwatch RPG was released, and all Marine weapons as well as Marine power armour were buffed in order to prepare the players for the more epic adventures. Like bitchslapping entire companies of IG and Eldar or waves upon waves of 'nids with just ~4 guys, like I'm sure happens in some novels.

There are other examples, however, where indeed the very nature of a weapon was shifted depending on the game. For example, in Deathwatch, autoguns surprisingly lost their ability to actually fire in full-auto - from what I heard this was done because they would otherwise be too murderous to the PCs when used in Horde rules (which I still consider "nice idea, immensely flawed execution"). Likewise, by public demand all laspistols and lasguns in Only War gained the modular charge setting rules. So those would indeed work differently than in other games, although I suppose you could pull ye olde "it's a different pattern" excuse, as thin as it may be.

H.B.M.C. wrote:The biggest aspect of 40K is the universe itself. It is a complicated and ever-expanding back drop that is simply too much to take in in one sitting, and any books that attempt to do so usually do so in a very high-level surface detail kinda way. For that reason, having a stale “these are the rules, no go buy a setting book” book would be the absolute worst way to draw in players.

I agree - but I don't think anybody ever suggested this either. Look at the 40k rulebook. It has a setting section where every new player can learn the basics of the universe, read a little bit about everything and get a feeling about how the various factions are like. You could say that the rulebook doubles as a catalogue of the various armies, allowing you to pick whatever theme appeals the most to you.
I think that's a much better way of making new players "settle in" than just expecting them to buy their first RPG game based on what it says on the back-cover. Perhaps someone likes both investigation and exploration. How is he supposed to know what game is for him? A uniform rulebook would allow the player to get a better understanding and explore his own interests, whilst FFG's current approach would require him to either go look for information elsewhere (at which point the whole "book needs to draw in players" argument becomes moot) or buy both games and try them out.

On top of this, perhaps with a uniform "starter set", a player would learn about other facets of the setting he would not even have considered before, because he picks up some detail that he thinks is cool.

Lastly, I think a unified ruleset would also lend itself better to support immersion (too many exceptions, deviations and special rules make it feel like you'd play in a whole different world) and actually enable cross-overs between the various games. There are countless stories from both Games Workshop's own codices as well as popular novels that players might wish to recreate, but they cannot because the system would not support such characters actually mingling - or rather, shoehorning them into another game has a high chance of becoming really awkward because, as you said it yourself, that game's rules were written with a different theme in mind. It's be like throwing Captain Miller from one of the aforementioned movies into the other as one of Leonidas' companions, without giving him the benefit of the Spartans' plot armour. Yeah, let's see how much fun Miller's player is going to have once Xerxes' horde shows up.

But I suppose it is also largely a matter of preferences. I've always been someone who wished for more consistency in 40k, so seeing FFG's RPG adhere not just not to GW's material, but not even to each other is something I cannot embrace. I've no doubt that there are many players who have fun with each of the games being hand-tailored to their respective theme - but are they truly the majority? For these RPGs, is 40k really supposed to be a collection of independent cliches rather than a living, breathing world where the laws of physics do not change depending on who the protagonist is?

The 40K RPG’s do adhere to GW. It wouldn’t exist if GW didn’t want it to exist. You can call it FFG’s/BI’s “version” of 40K ‘til you’re blue in the face, doesn’t make it true.

There is only one 40K, and GW says who and what gets to be in it.

This again? We really need to settle this once and for all.

If one book says A and another says B, they are obviously not the same. Not sure how you would even try to argue around this. Gav Thorpe, Andy Hoare, ADB have all commented on there being different versions of 40k depending on which book you're looking at, so I really don't think we should continue to spread this urban myth of a "canon" when there is quite a bit of artistic licence involved. We have countless examples on how various media deviate from the studio material. In some cases due to a lack of research, in many other simply because the author/s was convinced it "had" to be done to improve the product. The end result is the same - it branches off from the original vision.

You could say that there is "only one 40k" in the same way that one could say that there is "only one colour red", but when you look closer you'll notice that there are a lot of different flavours of "red" such as crimson, scarlet or vermillion. With 40k it's the exact same thing, and "flavours" works pretty well as an analogy, because this is what it's all about. Just because GW is quite okay with there being a certain degree of variance - handwaived in a White Dwarf article as "half-truths distorted by legend" - doesn't change the facts. On the contrary, this laissez-faire policy fits well to what we've heard from the studio veterans themselves.
So explain now, how can it not be true? How can it not be different versions when you have some books that say different things?

Look, regardless of my own wishful thinking regarding a more uniform and consistent approach to the setting, I'm not trying to dismiss these different visions (anymore). I'm pragmatic, and when Gav Thorpe says that FFG's/BI's interpretation is just as right as GW's, then I have to accept this. But that doesn't change that it's still a different vision, see? Gav's blogpost is already offering you the compromise that allows you to retain your personal preference without having to feel it would somehow exist on a lower level. Separate, yet equal.

I thought I would chime in and add that even though Warhammer 40k: Space Marine is endorsed by games workshop, it is in an "alternate universe".

But that has been said officially that its not canon. With ffg I think everything they print in their RPGs has to meet a standard set by GW, so if I see something on the deathwatch rpg that contradicts something that might be said in a novel somewhere I just go with it.

I'm newer to the warhammer universe so it doesn't bother me much when something like that happens though.

Unsurprisingly, I agree with HBMC on this one. The 40k of FFG is not different that the 40k of Nottingham.

But on what grounds? I can list the differences, but I think you're already aware of them - so again, how can you just say "it's not different"?

Rotgut wrote:I thought I would chime in and add that even though Warhammer 40k: Space Marine is endorsed by games workshop, it is in an "alternate universe".
But that has been said officially that its not canon. With ffg I think everything they print in their RPGs has to meet a standard set by GW, so if I see something on the deathwatch rpg that contradicts something that might be said in a novel somewhere I just go with it.

"Officially" it has never been said that there is any sort of canon at all - people simply assume because that's how it works in other IPs like Star Wars. I rolled with it myself for years on end, until I finally read the aforementioned comments from Misters Thorpe and Hoare and now ADB, excerpts of which I have quoted here. Those three people, especially Gav and Andy as former GW designers, surely have a much better understanding of how the company treats this issue than any of us, I'd assume.

The vast majority of deviations are minor details - so unimportant that even veterans would not notice them, especially when the GW source only mentioned it once. But there are some major differences/contradictions as well. This applies not only to FFG's RPGs, but to all 40k fluff.

Because things that are different (and I mean really different, and not 'GW never said Marine Bolters differ from Guard Bolters!') aren't allowed. Deviate from what GW wants, and it doesn't go to print. It's their IP and their's alone, and they control it. It really is that simple.

And this applies to BL, FW and FFG and presumably any other outside group working with the license.

 Lynata wrote:
surely have a much better understanding of how the company treats this issue than any of us

At some point, the most important point really, it stops mattering what the company -- the agent that only really has money on the line -- sees these things.

H.B.M.C. wrote:Because things that are different (and I mean really different, and not 'GW never said Marine Bolters differ from Guard Bolters!') aren't allowed. Deviate from what GW wants, and it doesn't go to print. It's their IP and their's alone, and they control it. It really is that simple.

So you base your opinion on having an accurate insight into what GW wants? And where do you draw the line between "really different" and "just a little different"?

In regards to bolters - yes, GW actually did say that Marine bolters aren't different from Sister ones, and the Inquisitor RPG rules gave equal stats to bolt weapons for both Marines and regular humans. So there is that.

Manchu wrote:At some point, the most important point really, it stops mattering what the company -- the agent that only really has money on the line -- sees these things.

And whose position starts to matter at this point?
FFG's, who is just as much of a money-making company as GW?
Or the fans, all of us who have a different opinion on issues such as canonicity anyways?

I'm still waiting on why you cling to there being no difference. There's no problem whatsoever with preferring either of the many versions of the setting, but you can't just go and say "they're all the same" - that's kinda misleading to other readers.

 Lynata wrote:
So you base your opinion on having an accurate insight into what GW wants?

I base my insight on my own experiences getting work approved by GW in that it has to be approved by GW, or it doesn't occur. It really is that black and white.

 Lynata wrote:
In regards to bolters - yes, GW actually did say that Marine bolters aren't different from Sister ones, and the Inquisitor RPG rules gave equal stats to bolt weapons for both Marines and regular humans. So there is that.

Critically you make the mistake in thinking that they can't change their minds.

H.B.M.C. wrote:I base my insight on my own experiences getting work approved by GW in that it has to be approved by GW, or it doesn't occur. It really is that black and white.

Which is entirely in line with what I've been saying all along.
That GW is perfectly fine with there being countless "alternate visions" around, and has no problem whatsoever approving them as long as they keep the "look and feel", regardless of differences in detail.

This is based on other authors' own experiences getting their work approved or approving such works themselves.
You're basically calling Gav Thorpe, Andy Hoare and ADB a liar here. I mean, I'll assume this is just how you interpret what you were told, but it's still 3 against 1 just to for starters, with (or so I would assume, based on their history with the company) more knowledge of the subject than you have (you were/are a freelancing guest-writer for FFG, right? not the core team?). And that's not even counting Marc Gascoigne's "everything and nothing is true" line which was officially printed in an issue of WD (ADB quoted it here), in an article discussing this very topic. Or Dan Abnett's video interview here.

Consider carefully - if your position about anything that GW greenlights being a "true" representation of the setting in all its detail and depth (a notion flat-out rejected by your fellow writers), that means that every single Black Library novel, each movie and each computer game, is thus affected. That's a whole load of retcons you'd have to consider. And every single week brings another contradiction.

I think you should talk to ADB some day, maybe. I did, when he was posting here on dakka, and it was an interesting and most of all illuminating exchange.

H.B.M.C. wrote:Critically you make the mistake in thinking that they can't change their minds.

No, I don't. I simply acknowledge that changes to GW's vision of the setting do not take place until they actually show up in one of their books. Just like Gav Thorpe said it in his blogpost.

An example: FFG's "Daemon Hunter" includes some of the Grey Knights' new wargear such as the Dreadknight, yet (for better or worse) completely ignores their change in attitude towards using Warp Sorcery themselves. Likewise, the recent SoB White Dwarf Codex obviously ignores the "divine magic" idea the authors of "Blood of Martyrs" had and sticks to the theme that was already established by GW. It also ignores the "godlike hero status" that Space Marines have received in the RPG, including that ridiculous "immortal" line which was debunked by the 6E Rulebook. You even said it yourself that the different scopes and themes in FFG's various 40k RPGs affect game mechanics and thus result in a different representation of the characters involved, so FFG doesn't even represent a uniform setting themselves - which you said you actually prefer. So when there's no uniform representation between FFG's games, how can you even assume that it's supposed to fit into GW's world without any sort of complication or conflict? That's like having five different puzzle pieces and trying to hammer them all into the same open space.

Strict canon or alternate accounts/universes? This is a false dichotomy. First, we know there is no strict canon. That is not the issue. Further, the lack of a strict canon does NOT mean there are alternative versions of 40k. There is only one version of 40k, which consists in all of the most current fluff on any given issue that is in mutual agreement with all the most current fluff on any other given issue. Pieces that do not fit are mistakes. It is essential to remember that 40k is not a series of flawed accounts of a distant past.

I know that is the line being fed to us by corporate management via studio guys and freelance novelists but it's not reality. None of the BL books are written in the style of history. They are all written as ongoing action in which the reader's perspective is concurrent with the present of the narrative. The Codicies offer the only pseudo-historical accounts and no on has trouble accepting them as propaganda- and error-laden as far as it goes, which is not to say they are 100% lies. They obviously are not.

Your examples are pointless and nitpicky (Daemonhunter doesn’t cover all the ground the GK Codex does therefore they’re in opposition to one another? What? A throw-away WD Codex doesn’t contain all the stuff about faith that’s in Blood Of Martyrs, therefore BOM is an alternate universe? The 'Immortal' line? Come on... no one thinks Marines are immortal, and nothing was 'debunked' by anything), and you continue to be flat out wrong about this. Your constant appeals to authority ("You're calling ABD a liar!") don't help either.

You’re wilfully misinterpreting what’s been said on this subject and missing the whole point of ADB’s recent ‘sand box’ post on his blog. There are many sand-boxes, and they’re all part of the same 40K universe. Sometimes sand gets thrown between them, and sometimes the kids playing in the sandboxes use the same toys but in slightly different ways, but otherwise all the sand-boxes exist within the same 40K universe. It’s not the same sandbox in multiple parallel universes (unlike, say, Blood Bowl, which is an alternate Fantasy universe to regular WFB).

You recently stated that there’s a GW ‘version’ of the Deathwatch and an FFG ‘version’ of the Deathwatch. This is false as it implies that an organisation must operate in exactly the same way across the entire galaxy. ADB recently talked about the Horus Heresy lacking scope, and how, in SW, he found it hard to believe that a Bounty Hunter could become galactically famous given the scope of the universe. Now in the case of SW there is a reason for that (FTL travel is so insanely fast as is galactic communications, so their galaxy is ‘smaller’ in the same sense that our world has become ‘smaller’ with the advent of the Internet). To assume that the Deathwatch are the same everywhere ignores the scope of 40K.

There is no FFG ‘version’ of the Deathwatch. What FFG have is the Deathwatch of the Jericho Reach. If they only act that way in the Jericho Reach, then that doesn’t contradict the greater concept of the Deathwatch organisation, and nor does anything else they’ve written.

40K has inconsistencies, retcons and outright contradictions. The source of those three types of instance is irrelevant.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Lynata wrote:
Consider carefully - if your position about anything that GW greenlights being a "true" representation of the setting in all its detail and depth (a notion flat-out rejected by your fellow writers), that means that every single Black Library novel, each movie and each computer game, is thus affected. That's a whole load of retcons you'd have to consider. And every single week brings another contradiction.

And, again, take such a view ignores the idea that they might change their minds. Not only that, it assumes that if a mistake is made (and mistakes have been made) that there’s nothing that can be done about it (“Your book said Marines are actually all mutated Eldar clones? Oh well! I guess that’s canon now, nothing we can do about it!”).

I’ll use a really simple example – Marine Company Captains.

3rd Ed Codex said Cato Sicarius was the Captain of the 5th Company. 4th Ed Codex says he’s the Captain of the 2nd Company. Chaos Gate has Captain Kruger leading the 2nd Company. Space Marine has Captain Titus leading the 2nd Company.

All of these can be correct.

1. Sicarius was promoted from 5th to 2nd after the death of the 2nd Company Captain.
2. Kruger was a Captain of the 2nd Company at some stage.
3. So was Titus. We just don’t know when.

None of these things are contradictory, and none of them constitute a different ‘version’ of 40K.

Very well said. The DW point is particularly good.