Did anyone read the back of the latest WD weekly?

It sounded like a joke, but then...was it?

Do you think GW will bring a Primarch back into 40k?

WD 4, page 74 - Gaze of the Inquisition

I think that was just theorising, it's a commonly-discussed topic amongst hobbyists and the text in the codex is deliberately ambiguous. GW will never confirm or deny, as that would advance the storyline.

Care to give us a synopsis?

Robot Girlyman isn't dead. He's just in stasis after suffering life-threatening wounds. Bringing him back in a super-Dreadnought or super-CenturionKnightMarineMarine wouldn't be against GW's modus nowadays.

After all, he's a Space Marine, he's a special character, and he's something exploitable from 40k's past. It's the perfect mixture for GW to bring back.

Basically the WD team discuss, well mention some aspects of the fluff.

One guy on the team thinks big Ro is on the mend and will be fighting for the IoM in short order. It's implied that the rest of the team think that's actually quite a cool idea. That's about it really.

Next week in WD
Supplement; Guilliman Rising

 BrookM wrote:
Care to give us a synopsis?

The WD teams talks about how the legion of the damned codex has the WD team talking about 40k mysteries. One of them is the condition of Guilliman and whether he is healing from his wounds.

One of the team members is adamant that Guilliman is healing and that no one on the team is mocking his rumor, because frankly they all hope it's true.

No. I don't think it would happen. Just because if they brought Guilliman back, Then there is no good reason for Johnson to come back, Or Russ, Or Vulkan.....

It would just snowball from there and soon all the primarchs would be back, including the "Dead" ones.

Don't make fun, when he wakes up he's going to first knock on Abbadons door and pick him up from his pony tail. Then shove a power fist down his throat and flip the on switch.

I think it would make Lorgar do stuff again.

Ralis wrote:
It would just snowball from there and soon all the primarchs would be back, including the "Dead" ones.

How is that a problem ?
On the other hand, I am pretty sure Alicia Dominica is not coming back .

I'm pretty okay with any Primarch coming back. Except Russ. Feth that piece of gak donkey-cave.




Space wolves suck.

Well if they ever advance the fluff then I see this happening especially with the 13th Black Crusade at the door of Terra pretty much. There are rumors of multiple primarchs that could come back. After all they would need something to fight those daemon prince primarchs right? I could see them advanced the fluff sometime in the next decade and doing this. Heck I wouldn't put it past them to do it in 7th edition. The fluff changes alone would get a lot of people to buy a too soon rulebook.

Well, they already have 30k profiles for Primarchs. There's really no reason to not lift them up to 40k, as it doesn't actually change anything in the setting, except for some minor fluff. So the Imperium has a Primarch now, big deal. Chaos has a bunch and it did them no good so far.

You do know that it's not the Emperor on the Golden Throne and that they swapped his body with Robute's?

On a more serious note, I don't see GW bringing back the Primarchs at this point in time. If it were me I would let FW do their Horus Heresy thing and milk that for all it is worth and then after the Heresy series is finished move on the storyline and bring some Primarchs back in the 13th Crusade. Let Abaddon launch his ships and go to war on an unprecedented scale and then as he leaves the eye all the poor souls of humanity turn to the Emperor and give bith to a new god which destroys the Eye of Terra in a similar way to how Slanesh was born and in the now dead space that was the Eye the missing Primarchs appear.

That way GW get to sell us the 'original' Primarchs through FW. Then the altered Primarchs at the climax of the Heresy through FW and then a third time when they return in 40k. Why blow it all in 5 years when you can spin it out for 15?

 Hybrid Son Of Oxayotl wrote:

Ralis wrote:
It would just snowball from there and soon all the primarchs would be back, including the "Dead" ones.

How is that a problem ?
On the other hand, I am pretty sure Alicia Dominica is not coming back .

& I'm sure Friends is coming back too!

Yeah, expect the next SM dex to have an OP character called the Guillinor...

Well I think FW has shown how Primarchs can work in 40k games, so to that end I don't have anything against it. I just wouldn't want to see GW think they can do things too differently or deviate too much from what FW has done.

I would LOVE this. What Escalation is lacking is Primarchs. There's a few that could come back, Jaghatai Khan [followed some Dark Eldar into the webway or something even though 'Scars' suggests that Mortarion is going to BF him in the future]. Leman Russ [who got emo at a feast and left his chapter]. Really hope we get primarchs in games of 40k, just like they have in 30k.

Wouldn't surprise me. I mean with titans on the field why not? People bought the 30k figures, they should be allowed to use them in games. That's the philosophy right?

 His Master's Voice wrote:
Well, they already have 30k profiles for Primarchs. There's really no reason to not lift them up to 40k, as it doesn't actually change anything in the setting, except for some minor fluff. So the Imperium has a Primarch now, big deal. Chaos has a bunch and it did them no good so far.

I think it would kind of underwhelm the 'ten minutes to midnight' feel that has been the foundation of the 40k setting, rather than it being just a minor fluff change.

We have always read about the 'end times', of when the greatest heroes from both sides would square off against each other in the end of everything. Russ disappearing into the eye of terror etc. and the other Primarchs coming back, Guilliman's 'mortal wound' (because that's how it has always been described) gradually healing in time for this battle, despite such a thing being impossible within the stasis field.

Guilliman coming back wouldn't be ridiculous from a game/rules perspective perhaps, certainly not these days when you already have giant robot pie-plate guns wiping out $100 worth of miniatures on a 2+, but it would un-hinge the atmosphere and character of the setting in terms of background.

On the other hand, it might sell a few plastic kits so I could totally believe the GW of 2014 would do something like it, if one is to view some of the options on the allies chart as a prelude.

Guilliman has been 'healing' since the 2nd Ed Ultramarine Codex. It's just part of the fluff. Bringing him back would be advancing the story, and GW doesn't do that.

Quite.

He is merely 18 months away from making a full recovery.

Unfortunately the setting is permanently at 11.59 on the last day of the last year of the millennium (or something similar) so game wise it will never happen.

Until next year when the figures are down again and they haven't got another Knight to pull out from under their kilts and 8th isn't ready.

Plastic models of ferrus manus with magnetic head to pull off and on. He'll be able to throw his head at opponents and will bounce off them and return to his neck just like captain America's shield.

I'd love it if it finally came to pass, in game, and the story moved forward.

It would be fantastic!

 Absolutionis wrote:
Robot Girlyman isn't dead. He's just in stasis after suffering life-threatening wounds. Bringing him back in a super-Dreadnought or super-CenturionKnightMarineMarine wouldn't be against GW's modus nowadays.

After all, he's a Space Marine, he's a special character, and he's something exploitable from 40k's past. It's the perfect mixture for GW to bring back.

Clearly he will be brought back as a $90 finecast upgrade to turn a Knight titan into a Primarch sized dreadnaught.

GW has always left open the possibility of the majority of primarchs returning. The narrative is VERY clear on this.

However, I don't expect them to bring any primarchs into 40k until the Horus Heresy series is finished (since otherwise they'll be competing with themselves)

TiamatRoar wrote:
GW has always left open the possibility of the majority of primarchs returning. The narrative is VERY clear on this.

However, I don't expect them to bring any primarchs into 40k until the Horus Heresy series is finished (since otherwise they'll be competing with themselves)

*looks at Imperial Knight that was just released.*

umm....

This would signal an interesting turn of events. With the more recent down-swing in profit/share prices, GW is inevitably going to act to try to resolve this situation.

It would seem that, if this rumor is true and the storyline for 40k advances, then GW believes that the route to boosting sales is directly through building hype. The knights are a great example of this, they have really excited quite a few hobbyists on dakka alone. Bringing back guilliman and advancing the story would also generate excitement and, in GW's predictions (presumably), more sales.

The question I would have then would be on the sustainability of this approach. And if I am correct in the hypothesis, I am curious what other sorts of craziness we will be seeing in the future.

Wasn't there a pseudo-once-upon-a-time-quote about how GW would only ever detail the Horus Heresy and/or introduce Primarchs into the game when they were truly desperate and needing a Hail Mary?

 timetowaste85 wrote:
I'm pretty okay with any Primarch coming back. Except Russ. Feth that piece of gak donkey-cave.




Space wolves suck.

You trying to pick a fight with a founding chapter youngster?
OT rowboat coming back is interesting but Alph wants it to be Alpharious or Omegon on the throne.

It's interesting to notice that in the last DA codex Jonson is fully healed from the scars of his battle with Luther and that Cypher is very near to Terra...

My idea is that in 7th or 8th edition, after FW has pulled out all primarch models that primarchs can make return to 40k too...

The problem is not if the primarchs will return to 40k but how...

For example the DA issue is about the fallen and the BA issue is about the red thirst... with the return of Jonson and/or Sanguinius there will be the problem of dealing with these dramas that shaped the BG of 40k...

in the 90s or in the early 2000s there were people like andy chambers dealing with 40k but now we have charlatans like Ward that could destroy totally the setting...

this is why i hope we will never see the return of the primarchs in 40k...

master sheol wrote:
It's interesting to notice that in the last DA codex Jonson is fully healed from the scars of his battle with Luther and that Cypher is very near to Terra...

My idea is that in 7th or 8th edition, after FW has pulled out all primarch models that primarchs can make return to 40k too...

The problem is not if the primarchs will return to 40k but how...

For example the DA issue is about the fallen and the BA issue is about the red thirst... with the return of Jonson and/or Sanguinius there will be the problem of dealing with these dramas that shaped the BG of 40k...

in the 90s or in the early 2000s there were people like andy chambers dealing with 40k but now we have charlatans like Ward that could destroy totally the setting...

this is why i hope we will never see the return of the primarchs in 40k...

I think that piece of fluff with the Lion has been around for quite sometime.

GW's unwilling to advance the plot, for some asinine reason, but they're not unwilling to cram more events into 999M41.

I mean, heck, the Riptide is, what, 20 days old by the "end" of the 41st millenium, the Storm Potato is a few centuries old, the Centurion sillyness is a few millenia.

Just no one noticed.

I could very well see them re-introducing Guilliman and Jonson (the two most likely, arguably, to return and heavily hinted at in the "current" fluff), but have it occur so late in the timeline that the ramifications would be left unknown.

Then they can sell the models, throw a little bit of fluff in about their immediate impact/mental state, and let the fans wonder what they'll get up to in that mythical M42.

At least until someone other than the current GW is at the helm and actually realizes slight plot advancement would not be apocalyptic. Let's end Armageddon and the 13th Black Crusade, shake up the universe a little bit, and craft something new to focus on.

 Sasori wrote:

I think that piece of fluff with the Lion has been around for quite sometime.

Guilliman healing and the Lion waking up are both very old fluff, dating back to 2nd edition at least.

My buddies and I have often talked about GW doing an "end of days" supplement, where the Imperium does finally fall, and all the things that are supposed to happen at that fabled hour do happen. Cypher reaching Terra, Dante defending the Golden Throne, primarchs coming back, etc.

Over the years, there's been rumors of pretty much all of them coming back for the end times. The only ones I doubt we'd see are Horus, Ferrus, and poor, poor Sanguinius.

End of days? Bah. Next chapter!

As a ig fan of the Boys in Blue, I would love to see Big G return, but if he does, it needs to be the next arc, or, well, next series of arcs, really.

It starts with Day 1 of M42, where he walks into the throne room of MacCragge and says, "I've been away for a very long time. What have I missed?" From there, we get a gathering of Ultramarine foundings, each wanting to see for themselves the scion of the line. He gathers up his chapters and launches a grand crusade at Cadia, intending on pushing Chaos back. We get a nice year long campaign, and at the end, Abadon (who, let's be honest, has lost his oomph as a character) is killed and Chaos is pushed back.

The Imperium goes wild!

In the aftermath, we see a small gathering of shadowy figures who discuss his return worriedly.

We get a short burst of Big G acting as a sort of regent, putting his rebuilding plans into action and moving things forward like only a Primarch can. The Space Wolves, ever ornery, tell him to frag off, while the Dark Angels continue a wait and see policy. U-Marines make up roughly half of all chapters, however, so they're mostly falling in line.

EVentually, we get to the second phase of the plan, where the Wolves and Dark Angels form the core of a ... I don't want to say rebellion, but holding to the Emperor's throne instead of G's rule. They think G's not fully healed, or that something's happened to his mind (The poisoned blade might have lingering effects, for instance) and want him to stand down. Year two gives us a nice in game reason for the classic Marine vs Marine matchups, giving us a nice struggle.

Year three, I don't have mapped out yet, and obviously there needs to be something happening fo rthe other forces (Tyranid, Tau, Necrons, ELdar, etc) so that the Imperium doesn't get *all* the airtime, but, you know.

There's potential if you want to tap it.

Wakshaani wrote:
End of days? Bah. Next chapter!

As a ig fan of the Boys in Blue, I would love to see Big G return, but if he does, it needs to be the next arc, or, well, next series of arcs, really.

It starts with Day 1 of M42, where he walks into the throne room of MacCragge and says, "I've been away for a very long time. What have I missed?" From there, we get a gathering of Ultramarine foundings, each wanting to see for themselves the scion of the line. He gathers up his chapters and launches a grand crusade at Cadia, intending on pushing Chaos back. We get a nice year long campaign, and at the end, Abadon (who, let's be honest, has lost his oomph as a character) is killed and Chaos is pushed back.

The Imperium goes wild!

In the aftermath, we see a small gathering of shadowy figures who discuss his return worriedly.

We get a short burst of Big G acting as a sort of regent, putting his rebuilding plans into action and moving things forward like only a Primarch can. The Space Wolves, ever ornery, tell him to frag off, while the Dark Angels continue a wait and see policy. U-Marines make up roughly half of all chapters, however, so they're mostly falling in line.

EVentually, we get to the second phase of the plan, where the Wolves and Dark Angels form the core of a ... I don't want to say rebellion, but holding to the Emperor's throne instead of G's rule. They think G's not fully healed, or that something's happened to his mind (The poisoned blade might have lingering effects, for instance) and want him to stand down. Year two gives us a nice in game reason for the classic Marine vs Marine matchups, giving us a nice struggle.

Year three, I don't have mapped out yet, and obviously there needs to be something happening fo rthe other forces (Tyranid, Tau, Necrons, ELdar, etc) so that the Imperium doesn't get *all* the airtime, but, you know.

There's potential if you want to tap it.

Sounds fun, and that is why GW wouldn't ever do it.

I really like those ideas, and big g coming back would be the best scenario as the ultramarines are the chapter in the thick of everything. You have them taking the brunt of the hive fleets, right in the tau back yard, and necrons waking up. The orcs are everywhere too, not sure about eldar and dark eldar, but revisions can be made .

I haven't read I remembered empire from black library, but wasn't he trying to set up a second empire where sanguinuis would rule? If so with his brother and father dead I could see him say "I'm in charge little 's, get in line or else".

I would also see dorn's boys being against big g being in charge and all the imperial fist chapters fortify terra. Then we would find out just how many black Templar marines are out there, which has always been hinted as being well beyond codex numbers.

This would be very Kirby-esque, after all under his reign we've gotten marines, marines, and more marines. My only hope is if this came about that GW would produce the mark xiv armor.

I really hope this doesn't happen. I would utterly ruin 40K for me. A big part of appeal of the 40K is the Imperium being a crumbling dystopia and Primarchs mere barely remembered legends. People can already play Primarchs in HH, let them stay there.

They should just introduce rumours of them fighting on the field. Huge space marines swooping in to save the day at the last hour. No names, no understanding of who they are, not yet anyway, just missed or half cut rumours, chinese whispers even.

That's all I'd want, no rules. Sort of like what they've done with the traiter primarch's in the 13th dark crusade.

They could move the fluff on through a series of yearly campaign books that introduce new units and characters, kill off a few older characters. The way Wizards tells a story in their releases of mtg cards, the story does inch along a little each time, and you get a little jump when they return to a previous world when doing a new set. Even though they destroyed the hugely popular Mirroden in the second set there, the gaming world didn't fall in.

Certainly GW could release books each year or two based around a campaign drawing heavily upon the codex releases for that year, and which that introduce a few new units and characters and moves the story on a little. The fact that nothing has happened in 20 years of publishing makes the game quite stale. Of course, this requires longer term investment and GW would have to shake off the current approach which is that they recycle the game every few years as an excuse to re-release all the rules and codices for people to buy all over again, and do nothing to actually improve the game. Proposing a 7th edition of 40K after 25 years shows how they're not invested in making this game work or taking it places.

They clearly want to introduce new units and write out older ones, doing this but not moving the fluff at the same time makes it seem more artificial. eg. They've had Space Marine Centurions for centuries, we've never heard of them just because. Now that could have been a campaign over a year or so. Instead of re-releasing the same material, write a book creating some fluff about recovering an STC, bring in a few units for armies and give them special characters and campaign specific army options. Then release a second book later on with the story set after the STC has been recovered and use that to introduce the miniatures. You could release codicies in a way to move the story and make it all joined up. Instead of rehashing the same old stuff about the horus heresy, a chaos codex could be about attacking a forge world, the next book could be a Ad Mech codex about the defence. This way people buy the books because a story is being told in each one. Orrr you could just tell us about the Heresy again.

Awesome they should bring him back in a megadreadnoguht that's like 10 times bigger than a normal dreadnought and can fly into space and kill all the tyranids.

I'm gonna buy 3 of him to use in my games.

Well, I've done the math. HH started on a 9:9 score. Horus and Curze definitely and irrevocably were killed, Alpharius/Omegon/random legionaire maybe, bringing the Chaos Score down to 6/7 Primarchs, 6 of which are Demons now, so short of big E rising from the Throne and killing them with hiss psycho-awesomeness they will stay in the fluff forever.
On the loyalist side we have Sanguinus and Dorn who definitely are out of action. Russ, Corax and Khan are doing a recreational voyage through warp or webway to pass the time and El Johnson and Rowboat are in stasis until someone actually comes up with the idea of applying bandages and stitching their wounds. I'm not sure what the current opinion on Vulkan is, whether he just takes his time being reformed or whatever or whether he got killed of for good, so the score is 5/6 here.
Assuming that alpharius IS dead which I really hope he is not and vulkan lives which I don't really care about this would lead to a 6v6 scenario, allowing for a stalemate (yay, GW can add something without moving the story) and another power-creep (hey, the primarchs are back, we can bring a crapton of archeotech back because they remembered how to produce this stuff).

Gw would be better of just doing a fluff spin and say imperial scientists now can clone new primearch-ish warriors,
and just put out a generic primearc kit similar to damonprinces. That way they could make you buy multiple primearchs for an army without shame.

Those vulgar big-kits and escalation dont sound so bad now, does it?

 Fayric wrote:
Gw would be better of just doing a fluff spin and say imperial scientists now can clone new primearch-ish warriors,
and just put out a generic primearc kit similar to damonprinces. That way they could make you buy multiple primearchs for an army without shame.

Those vulgar big-kits and escalation dont sound so bad now, does it?

...thus making anything below S8 T7 obsolete? Thanks, I pass... besides, we allready have something like mini-primarchs, we call them space marines.

 Alpharius wrote:
Wasn't there a pseudo-once-upon-a-time-quote about how GW would only ever detail the Horus Heresy and/or introduce Primarchs into the game when they were truly desperate and needing a Hail Mary?

Citation needed.

Given all the books and the fact that FW has been allowed to do models/fiction for the Heresy, I'd say you're either misremembering something or the supposed quote was more snark than anything else.

Ralis wrote:
No. I don't think it would happen. Just because if they brought Guilliman back, Then there is no good reason for Johnson to come back, Or Russ, Or Vulkan.....

It would just snowball from there and soon all the primarchs would be back, including the "Dead" ones.

...and that would be a problem why exactly?

Bring back all the living Primarchs and all the Chaos Daemon Primarchs. It's a chance to bring incredible models into the game and advance the storyline into full blown rhana dandra mode. Points costs can balance anything. The game already has gargantuan Daemon Princes, C'tan of the normal and trancendent variety, and 2000 point superheavies, so in that setting Primarchs shouldn't be offensive to anyone else except fluff purists.

As a comparison, Warhammer has always had the leaders of the entire races as playable special characters. Malekith, Tyrion and Archaon are really the equivalent of for example the Emperor, Horus and Sanguinius being playable special characters, and it was always normal that a special lord choice with a monstrous mount costs half of your army's total points.

 Therion wrote:

Ralis wrote:
No. I don't think it would happen. Just because if they brought Guilliman back, Then there is no good reason for Johnson to come back, Or Russ, Or Vulkan.....

It would just snowball from there and soon all the primarchs would be back, including the "Dead" ones.

...and that would be a problem why exactly?

Bring back all the living Primarchs and all the Chaos Daemon Primarchs. It's a chance to bring incredible models into the game and advance the storyline into full blown rhana dandra mode.

And that's why it's a problem. I like 40K as a setting, I'm not interested in playing Warhammer 41K. There are 10,000 years of history to play in, almost none of it detailed extensively, and now the Primarch fetishists have the whole Heresy series on top of that. The only reasons to want to advance the storyline are because you're bored of 999.M41 in which case you have nobody to blame but yourself given the previous sentence, or because you don't like 40K as it exists in which case why are you playing it at all now there are half a dozen viable and widely played alternative games out there?

Well, Primarchs being around doesn't necessitate advancing the storyline by a lot. It could still be Warhammer 40K.

In many ways, the story has already advanced. They have just done it without actually admitting that 40K has progressed. They retcon everything.

The game has and continues to go up in scale. I'd love it if it wasn't for the standard gaming table size being too small for large models and flyers.

Adding Primarchs is just adding megaheroes to fight alongside the Titans and monsters. I'm not saying anyone or the game actually needs Primarchs to be in it, but I'm not getting the upset over the idea either.

 Yodhrin wrote:

And that's why it's a problem. I like 40K as a setting, I'm not interested in playing Warhammer 41K. There are 10,000 years of history to play in, almost none of it detailed extensively, and now the Primarch fetishists have the whole Heresy series on top of that. The only reasons to want to advance the storyline are because you're bored of 999.M41 in which case you have nobody to blame but yourself given the previous sentence, or because you don't like 40K as it exists in which case why are you playing it at all now there are half a dozen viable and widely played alternative games out there?

Exactly this. And Primarchs would change the setting. It would be all 'Imperium rejuvenated' and 'new hope' and all such crap. I wan't the Imperium be in decline and legends of the glorius past to remain as legends. The only way I'd be okay with a Primarch returning would be if the Inquisition would instantly assassinate him and then cover up it ever happened (come to think of it, that may have already happened.)

Daemon Primarchs are naturally a completely different thing, and I'm not opposed to giving them rules and models.

So far Angron has been the only Primark with playable rules be it in apoc 1 but still in the 41 mil

 Crimson wrote:
It would be all 'Imperium rejuvenated' and 'new hope' and all such crap.

Nope.

Imperium was crippled because of the Emperor's death. As long as he's stuck on the Golden Throne, nothing will change, no matter how many Primarchs show up to the party. No "rejuvenation", no "new hope".

People forget the Primarchs were made as commanders for the crusade, not saviours to the human race. Imperium has plenty of brilliant commanders as it is.

Aw heck, I wouldn't even give him stats for the first year or two; Big G's running the show from MacRagge, being all strategic and general-ish, not running around the table and punching stuff. He's just a story prop.

New Supplement, Primarchs return.


All the Primarchs and Daemon Primarchs come back for one final bash at the end of time. Yes even the dead ones come back for one final bash.

I'd prefer the Emperor to awaken, take one look at the disastrous mess the Space Marines have made of his dreams and have the lot of them put down

(he's clearly not adverse to binning his mistakes)

This lets GW bring out a whole massive new range of something different

I would rather have Primarchs return herald the fall of the Imperium and a total rewrite and plot advance of 40k:

The Golden Throne fails at last, and the Imperium erupts into civil war, eventually coming into a stalemate whereby several planetary systems declare independence and the High Lords, too busy trying to hold onto their own dominions, can't organize a second Crusade to unite again.

This could let them split off some chapters and allow for fluff reasons for Marines vs. Marines, as independent chapters might claim worlds and clash with the remnants of the Imperium, other chapters, loyal chapters, etc. without them being renegades. Same for IG, you could have planetary systems that pay lip service to the Imperium but do their own thing, and clash with each other. For instance the Ultramarines and some of their successors could form the Dominion of Ultramar and act like a renewed Legion. Space Wolves would likely split off and maybe expand to where they are raiders like their Viking heritage. Dark Angels and maybe Blood Angels would likely stay loyal and act as the true "Angels of Death" of the Imperium, heralding the doom of their enemies, etc.

 Breotan wrote:

 Alpharius wrote:
Wasn't there a pseudo-once-upon-a-time-quote about how GW would only ever detail the Horus Heresy and/or introduce Primarchs into the game when they were truly desperate and needing a Hail Mary?

Citation needed.

Given all the books and the fact that FW has been allowed to do models/fiction for the Heresy, I'd say you're either misremembering something or the supposed quote was more snark than anything else.

Some years ago (probably getting on 7-8 now) some pre-heresy plastics were designed and tooled. They were going to be released, but in the end upper management decided that they didn't want to split the game universe, and those pre-heresy elements (helmets/armour) were split up and ended up being used for some of the Battle for Macragge marines in the 4th edition starter set, and also the Blood Angel sprues that came a few years later.

I don't have any citation unfortunately, just what I heard from someone who had been in a senior position within the company at the time.

I think the growth of FW and the HH range has been very much an organic thing. The Collected Visions card game and then books were responsible for catching part of the 40k fanbase's imagination, and a rather small but dedicated fan-base (with a dis-proportional internet presence) then started to make conversions based on those images. I think the number of 3rd party bits sites (inc. Max Mini and Chapterhouse) as well as high sales of a certain FW kit (the Red Scorpion MK4 veterans pack), followed by the release of the HH books, then I think made the ball start to roll properly and Pre-Heresy started to move from the periphery into the more mainstream 40k gamers conciousness.

I believe there was a conscious decision not to make a 'warhammer 30,000', main GW game release some time ago. But, I think the Horus Heresy books, the high sales of certain parts of the FW range (before they actually labelled stuff as 'pre-heresy') and, I like to think, a very tenacious and extremely dedicated but small fan base who helped to promote it, and well... it's extremely evocative, more '40k' than '40k' has become from a background perspective (if that makes any sense?!)

They've got some really talented and creative guys making stuff that they want to make, away from someone in a suit saying "nope, don't think that's going to make 200% profit margin on that sprue, try again". It's no surprise to me at all that the FW range continues to grow and prosper. Certainly, I know a fair number of people who wouldn't touch something like the Stormraven, Centurions or Skull-mower with a barge-pole, but continue to collect the 40k FW pre-heresy range. I hope things continue as they are, because at present FW have been very clever in positioning themselves away from the 'toy' image that 40k has moved towards, and instead appeals to the veteran collector.

 Yodhrin wrote:
And that's why it's a problem. I like 40K as a setting, I'm not interested in playing Warhammer 41K. There are 10,000 years of history to play in, almost none of it detailed extensively, and now the Primarch fetishists have the whole Heresy series on top of that. The only reasons to want to advance the storyline are because you're bored of 999.M41 in which case you have nobody to blame but yourself given the previous sentence, or because you don't like 40K as it exists in which case why are you playing it at all now there are half a dozen viable and widely played alternative games out there?

Hasn't 40k as a setting been in the last 10 years of the millenium pretty much forever? Some books happen earlier and stuff, but at least for the past four editions, it's been in the verge of the 13th Black Crusade, or during it for a very short period.

Crimson wrote:Exactly this. And Primarchs would change the setting. It would be all 'Imperium rejuvenated' and 'new hope' and all such crap. I wan't the Imperium be in decline and legends of the glorius past to remain as legends. The only way I'd be okay with a Primarch returning would be if the Inquisition would instantly assassinate him and then cover up it ever happened (come to think of it, that may have already happened.)

Daemon Primarchs are naturally a completely different thing, and I'm not opposed to giving them rules and models.

If they wrote it as Imperium rejuvenated, it would be dumb, but if something happened and the Imperium slipped (eg, Abbadon gains a foothold in Cadia as some other races tie up and/or break down various points of infrastructure), then the primarchs returning makes sense fluffwise as a desperate ploy to keep the Imperium alive. What if instead of Guilliman being healed, it's merely that he healed enough that he can return to fight for a time, but with his death being a foregone conclusion because of it? He returns for one last ride to try to right the ship before his body fails.

One Primarch returning fatefully lines up with others returning, and the daemon primarchs manifesting, and you have Warhammer 40k: End Times. Several primarchs already had fluff of returning for the end of days, so it's not even much of a stretch.

I've been reading through all the Dan Abnett Sabbat World books lately, and have discovered a recurring pattern.
In the Ravenor vs Eisenhorn book Pariah. The mysterious all controlling evil is the Golden King, which given the inclusion of Word Bearers operating on the planet dicking about and what-not, could be Lorgar (Golden etc). Then, now re-reading the Gaunts Ghosts Series, the Archon, the lead villain, is obsessed with 'his word' drowning out all others. Its even his forces standard greeting (The Archon, Whose Voice Drowns Out All Others).
What I'm getting at is, Lorgar has been missing, presumed holed up in his big old cathedral procrastinating for ten thousand years, and all of a sudden one of, if not THE, biggest black library authors has been hinting that the Word Bearers and their Golden King are actively getting involved in the Sabbat Worlds. If any Black Library writer could take a liberty with GW fluff and bring a primarch back, its Dan Abnett, and if on the small chance Lorgar does turn up, then How far from rationality is it that Gulliman would wake up?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
(And one more thing, in this latest generation of fluff and story Kaldor Draigo carved his name into Mortarions Heart... don't lie, ninety percent of us just ignore that it ever happened)

I wouldn't mind it if they came out with a Warhammer 41K supplement, with rules for all the primarchs (Chaos and Loyalist). All they need to do is set it up as a "what if?" scenario and run a global campaign out of it.

Not only that, but the return of the Primarchs would not necessarily mean an Imperium Ascendant. The High Lords aren't necessarily going to just give up all their power because a Primarch appears. The Inquisition isn't just going to give up its authority. The AdMech isn't just going to roll over. There will be a civil war, make no mistake, and with the Tyranids, Chaos, Necrons, Orks, and Tau all waiting at the gates, well, it would make for a very interesting campaign.

Besides, it wouldn't bother me one bit if GW decided to actually advance the fluff. Other game companies have no problems doing so (I actually like that PP has different versions of some characters based on the timeline).

 Tannhauser42 wrote:
I wouldn't mind it if they came out with a Warhammer 41K supplement, with rules for all the primarchs (Chaos and Loyalist). All they need to do is set it up as a "what if?" scenario and run a global campaign out of it.

Not only that, but the return of the Primarchs would not necessarily mean an Imperium Ascendant. The High Lords aren't necessarily going to just give up all their power because a Primarch appears. The Inquisition isn't just going to give up its authority. The AdMech isn't just going to roll over. There will be a civil war, make no mistake, and with the Tyranids, Chaos, Necrons, Orks, and Tau all waiting at the gates, well, it would make for a very interesting campaign.

I can't see a Primarch or two appearing leading to a civil war at all. You're imagining a scenario where for example Leman Russ comes from the Eye of Terror, boards a Space Wolf Battle Barge and rides it to Terra and demands to be the new master of mankind. To me it seems the Primarchs would likely keep to their chapters, working alongside the chapter master as an iconic legend of old, and leaving Terra to the High Lords. The Primarchs were never politicians or leaders of humanity. They lead Space Marine Legions, and that's it. Most of them didn't have any ambition towards politics or administrative tasks. Guilliman wouldn't do anything different than Calgar is already doing. Russ would be a pretty stock Wolf Lord. Dorn would likely want to fortify Terra's defences more but he wouldn't ask to rule. And so on.

 Therion wrote:
The Primarchs were never politicians or leaders of humanity.

Except Guilliman did exactly that...

The problem is the Primarchs knew the Emperor, and knew what he wanted (or at least what he told them he wanted)

The Empire they would return to is NOT what they left and not what the Emperor wanted so I think they'd almost be forced to take over in order to set things to rights

now whether they could work together in this? probably some could (or at least delay arguments with bolters) but I'd lay favourable odds that at least some would not be able to wait and you'd end up with a Todays Imperium vs Marine Chaper(s) working to fix things vs Marine Chapter(s) working to fix things differently

decker_cky wrote:

 Yodhrin wrote:
And that's why it's a problem. I like 40K as a setting, I'm not interested in playing Warhammer 41K. There are 10,000 years of history to play in, almost none of it detailed extensively, and now the Primarch fetishists have the whole Heresy series on top of that. The only reasons to want to advance the storyline are because you're bored of 999.M41 in which case you have nobody to blame but yourself given the previous sentence, or because you don't like 40K as it exists in which case why are you playing it at all now there are half a dozen viable and widely played alternative games out there?

Hasn't 40k as a setting been in the last 10 years of the millenium pretty much forever? Some books happen earlier and stuff, but at least for the past four editions, it's been in the verge of the 13th Black Crusade, or during it for a very short period.

No, the majority of GW's official material for the game has been set in late M41 for pretty much forever, the setting itself is completely available to players, if they can muster the initiative to actually utilise it. When my old group of gaming buddies all lived in proximity and we got together every other week, we ran Inquisitor campaigns set during Vandire's Reign of Blood, 40K campaigns set during the Great Crusade and The Scouring, we'd pick a time period and put together the details of some random subsector then play a campaign set in it and limit our unit choices accordingly. My current 40K projects are all interconnected by a storyline that spans four millennia with most of the convergence happening in the 7th century M40.

You're only limited to the very end of M41 if you choose to be.

I think it could be interesting if Guilliman reacted with horror to the state of the Imperium.

Otherwise it's just for the sake of

 Tannhauser42 wrote:

 Therion wrote:
The Primarchs were never politicians or leaders of humanity.

Except Guilliman did exactly that...

Just like Marneus Calgar or any of the previous masters of Macragge. Basically there's no meaningful difference.

Don't you think there might be a little trouble when the Primachs want their Legions back? Only to be told, "Sorry, just 1000 warriors per leader. Next!"

Leo_the_Rat wrote:
Don't you think there might be a little trouble when the Primachs want their Legions back? Only to be told, "Sorry, just 1000 warriors per leader. Next!"

The Primarchs were still around when the Legions were broken into chapters. It was their idea.

Leo_the_Rat wrote:
Don't you think there might be a little trouble when the Primachs want their Legions back? Only to be told, "Sorry, just 1000 warriors per leader. Next!"

More reason why it would be a good way to advance the meta and shake things up. If Guilliman returned, what if the Ultramarine successor chapters all decided to serve under him like the legions of old (each chapter being a different part of the Legion, so they retain some autonomy)? Guilliman broke the legions up into chapters (it was mostly his idea, and he nearly started a civil war with Rogal Dorn over it because Dorn didn't want to lose his legion, but finally relented because it would have destroyed the Imperium) but seeing how the Imperium has become what if he changed his mind?

Honestly I think the Ultramarines and their successors should play out like in the fanfiction alternate history "Dornian Heresy" (alternate universe where most of the now-loyal chapters turned traitor and most of the now-traitor legions stayed loyal, with Dorn betraying instead of Horus), where they basically declared Ultramar as independent from the Imperium.

GW has probably learned a lot from the HH series. They are most definitely having discussions about what's next... you know, after they've milked all they can from HH models and books etc. Advancing the story isn't out of the question if they can sell new models and books.

The Primarchs returning would only "rejuvenate" the Imperium in a "just in time to save it from utter destruction" sense, likely to cancel out the daemon primarchs (who actually ARE canonically taking a much larger role with the advent of the 13th Black Crusade)

At most, the loyalist primarhs returning will likely cancel out the Daemon Primarchs coming to the forefront. Thus GW would have a way of advancing the setting without changing it at all.

I doubt there'll be a civil war either. Roboute was the one who set up the High Lords of Terra in the first place. He isn't going to demand to take charge and tear down that system when he was the one that created it (not unless he's a big giant hypocrite). At most, he MIGHT ask for his Master of the Administratum position back, but he probably won't cause he'll probably come back just as the Imperium is buried under a tide of Black Crusading Chaos marines and be'll be too busy sending power fists into Chaos Space Marine stomach to take back his Administratum seat.

Rogal Dom was with the Imperium the longest after the Heresy and if he didn't start a civil war about what it was becoming then, I doubt he'll start now. If anything, he's already shown that should a civil war threaten to break out, he'll do whatever he can to stop it, even if it means surrendering his own opinion (after all, he stopped opposing the Codex Astartes when civil war threatened to break out)

Leman Russ, Vulkan, Jaghatai, Sanguinus (though even the Blood Angels are sure he won't be back), and Ferrus Manus (yea, some Fists think he'll come back, those silly guys) never wanted to lead the Imperium in the first place. Only the Lion really had any ambition to do so (well, to be Warmaster, at least). The Lion is stated to wake when the Emperor calls and I doubt Emps will call the Lion if Emps thinks he'll start a civil war (unless Emps WANTS a civil war, of course).

I'm happier if Primarchs stay FW. FW is better at making good looking models and something as awesome and unique as a Primarch, I trust FW far more than I trust GW.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:
I'm happier if Primarchs stay FW. FW is better at making good looking models and something as awesome and unique as a Primarch, I trust FW far more than I trust GW.

That may be a distinction without a difference shortly.
Can't imagine them making a primarch plastic kit. (Magnetize to swap between Horus and Leman Russ on the fly!)
So then it really has to be resin. I think GW could be on the cusp of something pretty cool whether it involves Primarchs or not. I don't think they understand what a big hole not having a skirmish game in their lineup leaves, especially as 40k gets bigger and bigger in scope.

Adding the Primarchs to the main game is something GW can do to have a boost in sales to stabilize their financial report.s Short-term sporadic gains with long-term negative effects is the name of the game for GW

It'll happen, and probably soon.

What's the long term negative effect exactly?
Are you concerned about the narrative direction or gameplay?

I think 40k has sorely needed a narrative direction for far, far too long. It seems the tone of the fluff in the 6E imperium books so far that the veil is being peeled further and further back on the fates of the Primarchs, and the possibilities of their returns in a more concrete way rather than simple hushed legends.

There's no real reason they couldn't bring Primachs back, Forge World is producing models for some of them, at least the ones from the Chaos Legions.

No reason they can't or won't bring back the others. At least the ones we know for sure aren't dead.

TiamatRoar wrote:


Rogal Dom was with the Imperium the longest after the Heresy and if he didn't start a civil war about what it was becoming then, I doubt he'll start now. If anything, he's already shown that should a civil war threaten to break out, he'll do whatever he can to stop it, even if it means surrendering his own opinion (after all, he stopped opposing the Codex Astartes when civil war threatened to break out)

Dorn is most certainly dead and buried, at least f they haven't retconned it in the new Heresy books that I haven't read.

Why.. is this in news and rumors? This entire thread is because of misreading a random little blurb in the current WD issue. There are tons of threads about primarchs in general 40k..

Seriously.. the article in question was simply GW employees talking about "mysteries" in the universe.. the sentence says "As for Gulliman, Glenn is adamant that the Ultramarines Primarch is in fact healing from his fatal wounds....Nobody is willing to mock him too hard, because we rather like that idea".

It's clearly just some guy named Glenn musing over possible scenarios. It's not news, it's just conversation between players. Then again people post threads when a single page on the GW webpage doesn't work.

Is Dorn actually dead? Current fluff have the fists finding his uh... skeletal fist and thats it. They retconned the old stuff where they found his skeleton (?).

The 40k mythos essentially has all the primarchs ready to go for the end times. Most of them have some legend about their return. Its part of the mystery that fires the imagination that attracted so many of us to 40k in the first place.

I think primarch returns are a mistake as it would shatter that mystery. It would also mean the end times are on and that GW would need to craft a fitting end narrative to their setting which is problematic...

Ps. isnt one of the primarchs in a dark eldar prison and another in the necron collector dudes museum?
Pps. i agree that this is probably just a chat between white dwarf staffers, much like chats amongst fans. so wishlisting. chalk it up to the 24hr rumour cycle for this to be news.

coolmandool wrote:Is Dorn actually dead? Current fluff have the fists finding his uh... skeletal fist and thats it. They retconned the old stuff where they found his

IIRC the only part of him found was his hand, with the bones of it now enshrined in the fists chapter-house.

Kirasu wrote:Why.. is this in news and rumors? This entire thread is because of misreading a random little blurb in the current WD issue. There are tons of threads about primarchs in general 40k..

Seriously.. the article in question was simply GW employees talking about "mysteries" in the universe.. the sentence says "As for Gulliman, Glenn is adamant that the Ultramarines Primarch is in fact healing from his fatal wounds....Nobody is willing to mock him too hard, because we rather like that idea".

It's clearly just some guy named Glenn musing over possible scenarios. It's not news, it's just conversation between players. Then again people post threads when a single page on the GW webpage doesn't work.

Guilliman slowly healing from his wounds (which has the form in the narrative of 'some say that...') has been part of the established background since at least the Index Astartes articles.

And yes, not really news or rumour!

I think the hail Mary, would be to reveal and bring back the 2 missing primarch's from the 20

 Therion wrote:
Just like Marneus Calgar or any of the previous masters of Macragge. Basically there's no meaningful difference.

Except there is. Gilliman ruled the Imperium after the Horus Heresy, putting in place the structures that kept it together during the period directly after the Siege of Terra.

The timeline creeps forward like a polar icecap. What was the last advance? Eye of Terror campaign, where it was determined that Cadia fought to a stand off?

If they want to bring Primearchs into Warhammer 40k, they could always do a summer prequel campaign. Pre Horus Heresy. I'd actually like that! and it wouldn't advance the timeline.

 Phydox wrote:
The timeline creeps forward like a polar icecap. What was the last advance? Eye of Terror campaign, where it was determined that Cadia fought to a stand off?

If they want to bring Primearchs into Warhammer 40k, they could always do a summer prequel campaign. Pre Horus Heresy. I'd actually like that! and it wouldn't advance the timeline.

There was one campaign after that which was officially set in M42. Fall of Medusa VII or something like that? I don't recall exactly. Minor planetary campaign with all the factions involved, rather than the clusterfeth that was the 13th Black Crusade.

Nope. Gw just wants people to stop emailing them with those questions.

 Pacific wrote:

coolmandool wrote:Is Dorn actually dead? Current fluff have the fists finding his uh... skeletal fist and thats it. They retconned the old stuff where they found his

IIRC the only part of him found was his hand, with the bones of it now enshrined in the fists chapter-house.

They found all of him. His fists are enshrined in different places and successive chapter masters scrimshaw their names onto them. His body is encased in clear amber and is kept within a chapel. This fluff was from Index Astartes II.

With the rapid releases and flood of little money grabs lately combined with rumors of a sell of the company, I wouldn't be surprised at all. They would almost be dumb not to advance the plot so that all the living/lost loyal Primarchs could come back. That is guaranteed millions in the bank.

 MajorStoffer wrote:
GW's unwilling to advance the plot, for some asinine reason, but they're not unwilling to cram more events into 999M41.

I mean, heck, the Riptide is, what, 20 days old by the "end" of the 41st millenium, the Storm Potato is a few centuries old, the Centurion sillyness is a few millenia.

Just no one noticed.

I could very well see them re-introducing Guilliman and Jonson (the two most likely, arguably, to return and heavily hinted at in the "current" fluff), but have it occur so late in the timeline that the ramifications would be left unknown.

Then they can sell the models, throw a little bit of fluff in about their immediate impact/mental state, and let the fans wonder what they'll get up to in that mythical M42.

At least until someone other than the current GW is at the helm and actually realizes slight plot advancement would not be apocalyptic. Let's end Armageddon and the 13th Black Crusade, shake up the universe a little bit, and craft something new to focus on.

This, really this. It wouldn't hurt at all to advance the plot by a thousand years, if not make GW even more money. Time creeps forward, the Cadian Gate is broken and Chaos is just about to spill over the entire galaxy when out of the corners of the galaxy, the loyalist Primarchs return. Sanguinius and Manus may be dead, But Vulkan, Russ, Guilliman, Corax, Khan, Dorn, and the Lion all return to lead the counter-attack on advancing forces of Chaos and grind them down into a war of planetary attrition. Guilliman takes over managing the Imperium as the Emperor's proxy (he's the most fit for the job). Then the Chaos Primarchs return to battle the loyalists, with Lorgar rallying all the Chaos forces together as their spiritual leader as Mortarion, Angron, Fulgrim, Perturabo, and Omegon all charge out of the Eye of Terror to marshal the forces of Chaos against the loyalist primarchs. The Alpha Legion splits, with Alpharius leading the loyalist parts of the Legion to the Emperor's side, possibly after any loyalist primarch bests him in combat to find that he is untainted by chaos. Omegon meanwhile remains on the side of Chaos, corrupted. Magnus however should stay in character, apathetic, and refrain from engaging in combat.

Also, it wouldn't be the end of times, considering the now fairly equal forces would likely stalemate each other, similar to 40k, ensuring it never ends. Primarchs allow for pure, original Astartes to be produced, but Chaos could now create more daemonic chaos astartes from the Daemon Primarchs.

It's not a plot. It's a background. If you want to know what happens next, play games and create your own narratives.

And if you want Primarchs, there are rules and models being produced. Use them.

 gorgon wrote:
It's not a plot. It's a background. If you want to know what happens next, play games and create your own narratives.

And if you want Primarchs, there are rules and models being produced. Use them.

Except personal narratives are simply irrelevent, as is headcanon. And the plot has been advancing, albeit at a snail's pace, and largely through retroactive canon. The Black Library has also been slowly crawling forward. And the rulesets only represent Primarchs during the Horus Heresy, and not those rendered Daemon Princes, or post the Horus Heresy.

 Wyzilla wrote:

 gorgon wrote:
It's not a plot. It's a background. If you want to know what happens next, play games and create your own narratives.

And if you want Primarchs, there are rules and models being produced. Use them.

Except personal narratives are simply irrelevent, as is headcanon. And the plot has been advancing, albeit at a snail's pace, and largely through retroactive canon. The Black Library has also been slowly crawling forward. And the rulesets only represent Primarchs during the Horus Heresy, and not those rendered Daemon Princes, or post the Horus Heresy.

Again, it's not a plot, it's a setting. It's there to create a universe for you to set your own stories in. Your stories are irrelevant on the world stage, but that's just like someones custom DnD campaign.

As for advancing, it's not. It's expanding. Mostly sideways, with a few small stories set after m40, but most set during or before.

 -Loki- wrote:

 Wyzilla wrote:

 gorgon wrote:
It's not a plot. It's a background. If you want to know what happens next, play games and create your own narratives.

And if you want Primarchs, there are rules and models being produced. Use them.

Except personal narratives are simply irrelevent, as is headcanon. And the plot has been advancing, albeit at a snail's pace, and largely through retroactive canon. The Black Library has also been slowly crawling forward. And the rulesets only represent Primarchs during the Horus Heresy, and not those rendered Daemon Princes, or post the Horus Heresy.

Again, it's not a plot, it's a setting. It's there to create a universe for you to set your own stories in. Your stories are irrelevant on the world stage, but that's just like someones custom DnD campaign.

As for advancing, it's not. It's expanding. Mostly sideways, with a few small stories set after m40, but most set during or before.

See, I agree with the sentiment in broad strokes, but the setting isn't really expanding.

There's two "settings" given attention; M41, particularly the latter half, especially 999M41, and the Horus Heresy.

Everything else is vacant. GW keeps cramming more stuff into these two polar ends, with little more than a few paragraphs for the Age of Apostasy, the Macharian Crusade, this "Nova Terra Interregnum" and so on. We know virtually nothing about the intervening setting.

The immediate reaction by most people to GW not really doing anything with the setting. People naturally want developement; yes, it's a setting, one with lots of unexplore nooks and crannies, but they aren't being explored. More stuff keeps getting crammed into 999M41 or the Horus Heresy, making these periods of time feel extremely crowded and immersion-breaking.

DnD and Pathfinder have done a solid job of creating a setting which doesn't often "advance," but Pathfinder in particular have done a superb job expanding the settings, focusing on specific regions, time-periods and so on which give their players an enormous breadth of area to operate. GW doesn't do that; you've got the Horus Heresy and 999M41 as developed settings, that's basically it, and that's all they focus on or provide for.

Sure, you and a mate can decide you want to run a few battles representing the fight against Hive Fleet Behemoth or whatever, but there's not enough in the game to make that easy.

I admit, I'd like the setting to move forwards at some small pace; let's see what the 13th Black Crusade looks like in full force, post-Cadia, whether Chaos wins or loses that battle and run with it. Go 10 years into M42, shake things up a little bit, nothing dramatic. Failing that, why not do something like an Era system?

Choose a few hinted at areas of the fluff, and expand the info on them and provide some rules which tweak the game for that era. Make some units unavailable, introduce new ones available for that era with some way to use them, in limited numbers, in other eras (See Forgeworld's Chapter Relic rule). Introduce new characters which you can sell to old and new players alike, even whole factions if you're feeling audacious. Frateris Militia for the Reign of Blood? The advanced human empire Macharius defeated whose name escapes me?

GW could diversify their product and rules portfolio (Emperor knows they love setting hardcover books, just these might actually have some bloody content!), they could strengthen their IP, which is the biggest asset they've got, and build no small amount of customer good-will and enthusiasm (New, major plot developments, whether historical or "present" generate buzz, look at the Horus Heresy books sale and discussion before the plot ground own to glacial speeds!). And they could do this all without fear of Warhammer 40k not being 40k if the in-universe calender ticked over to 41,001.

 -Loki- wrote:

 Wyzilla wrote:

 gorgon wrote:
It's not a plot. It's a background. If you want to know what happens next, play games and create your own narratives.

And if you want Primarchs, there are rules and models being produced. Use them.

Except personal narratives are simply irrelevent, as is headcanon. And the plot has been advancing, albeit at a snail's pace, and largely through retroactive canon. The Black Library has also been slowly crawling forward. And the rulesets only represent Primarchs during the Horus Heresy, and not those rendered Daemon Princes, or post the Horus Heresy.

Again, it's not a plot, it's a setting. It's there to create a universe for you to set your own stories in. Your stories are irrelevant on the world stage, but that's just like someones custom DnD campaign.

As for advancing, it's not. It's expanding. Mostly sideways, with a few small stories set after m40, but most set during or before.

Which are building up to 41k, just that GW refuses to advance it forward. The Horus Heresy in particular is building up the story for seeming advancement, especially with Nick Kyme's work on the Salamanders. The "it's a setting" excuse only works when you ignore that the HH books, which creates a plot and makes actual, full characters of the Primarchs is a thing. It's simply the main characters taking a ten thousand year long break.

 -Loki- wrote:


Again, it's not a plot, it's a setting. It's there to create a universe for you to set your own stories in. Your stories are irrelevant on the world stage, but that's just like someones custom DnD campaign.

As for advancing, it's not. It's expanding. Mostly sideways, with a few small stories set after m40, but most set during or before.

D&D is a bad example of what you're getting at because every last major D&D setting has had an advancing plot. Forgotten Realms has had major geo-political shifts since AD&D times to today's world. Eberron? Same. The "default" D&D universe of Greyhawk? Same.

Does anybody remember the scene at the end of the movie 'Clear and present danger,' when Harrison Ford's character threatens to expose the President's dodgy dealings?

The president tells Ford to save that information for a rainy day.

Bringing back the Primarchs is Tom Kirby's red button, the doomsday scenario for when rival companies overtake GW, and GW are down to their last store in Nottingham, and pots of skull white are selling for £10 a pot, and we're getting a new version of 40k every six months!

GW will release a new race before they ever release the primarchs.

Evidence? The last time there were rumblings of brining back them back, we got the Tau instead.

As far as the calendar goes, I've always thought it would be neat to have it track the current calendar exactly, only 38k years into the future.

So, when it's 2014, all events in the 40kverse are occurring at M40 014.

It would allow a wonderful year-by-year narrative to be developed, yearly campaign events that happen in real-time with new background, minis and characters.

I don't see why going past the year 40,000 would be a problem, the game is call Warhammer 40,000, as long as the date is 40,XXX in that format it doesn't mess with the name, and a year-by-year progression of the date would mean it wouldn't be a problem for another 1086 years.

 Kirasu wrote:
Why.. is this in news and rumors? This entire thread is because of misreading a random little blurb in the current WD issue. There are tons of threads about primarchs in general 40k..

Seriously.. the article in question was simply GW employees talking about "mysteries" in the universe.. the sentence says "As for Gulliman, Glenn is adamant that the Ultramarines Primarch is in fact healing from his fatal wounds....Nobody is willing to mock him too hard, because we rather like that idea".

It's clearly just some guy named Glenn musing over possible scenarios. It's not news, it's just conversation between players. Then again people post threads when a single page on the GW webpage doesn't work.

Quite.

No need for this in News/Rumour

Did everyone get a different white dwarf than i did? Mine only goes up to page 32 Is this in the new visions issue?

EDIT: Had a change of opinion - realised that my reasons for desiring the return of the Primarchs in 40k were outweighed by my reasons against.

I have been out of the game for some time, but forwarding the story line might just be enough to peak my interest again. GW could easily have multiple eras going at one time. Battletech has done this for decades. You can play the early years of their history clear up to hundreds of years in to the future at the most recent time line. Flames of War does the same thing with early, mid and late war eras. Nothing says anyone has to play any one segment.

Primarchs would never make a comeback as it's against GW ethics. The point that so much time has past since the fall of the emperor during the Horus heresy and that marines still have much love for their beloved primarchs who are either list, in stasis or dead it would pretty much ruin the whole wh40k world if not heavily disrupt it. You can't have a primarch coming back in one chapter and not the others as it's about fairness and balance end of the day. Marines who are waiting for a return will continue to wait and primarchs lost will still be as any intro to these guts again will cause heavy riots in the space marines world

What would honestly be cool is if they super dreaded him, then he just bolted off-world apparently at the sight of the imperium. As a data-slate he is usable by both chaos and loyalist. I.e. give some reasonable doubt if it is guilleman or Alpharius/omegon. But that's just me, and I'm biased towards chaos...

 kerikhaos wrote:
Primarchs would never make a comeback as it's against GW ethics.

Sorry, couldn't get past this line. You are joking, right?

 kerikhaos wrote:
. You can't have a primarch coming back in one chapter and not the others as it's about fairness and balance end of the day.

Read the rest of it and you are. Good work

I have absolutely no interest in an "advancement" of the "plot." You can't go forward in time and have any meaningful developments without destroying the "all factions are powerful and are about to do serious work" nature of the setting. If you do somehow advance X years in time and manage some convoluted reason as to why you are still at this precipice its not an advancement at all and won't satisfy you for very long. In fact you might as well just write that event into the past it makes no difference if the end setting is similar.

If this were a story arc you'd be at the point right before the major conflicts happen; where you want to be for a war game. If you advance in anyway, (other than the meaningless oops-back-where-we-started scenario above) you canonize the conflict itself in which case there will be some resolution that logically follows and your setting is destroyed.

Also, isn't Guilliman's 'healing' like immeasurably slow? Couldn't they have like taken a picture when people started to think he was healing and compare to his current status to measure any wound healing? This healing is likely just to be more legend and hearsay. All the primarchs are gone for good, they just sprinkled in some but-maybe-nots here and there to get people interested.

All that being said, a what-if scenario where Guilliman comes back as the only loyal primarch and is disgusted at the empire. He could be driven mad by a lack of a superior/equals to be loyal to and lashes out in purging rampages across the galaxy. With his legion turned to superstitious monks, the empire a mockery, the emperor a corpse, and aliens threatening to end humanity any moment, chaos starts to sound pretty tempting to ol rowboat. That'd be worth a read imo, knock those goody-good ultras down a few pegs.