Reposting from over at B&C. Enjoy This will spoil the plot in detail, so be warned!

Ok, just finished reading the fluff and WOW. I think this is really it, BIG THINGS are happening. Obviously SPOILERS AHOY. Long posts incoming too lol.

Thee book starts off with probably the coolest thing I've read in 40k - some prose about a Dreamer Awakening in a World That Is Not A World, and her wearily being called back to War. It's probably the coolest thing I've read about Celestine, and it doesn't even mention her by name


The first chapter of the book picks up immediately following the first wave of the assault on Cadia. It is beaten back by the genius of Creed (after he assumes command following the treacherous slaughter of the existing Cadian High Command). He sets about rebuilding the shattered defences for the second wave he knows is incoming - Abaddon will make a point of pride to make Cadia fall. Making up the shattered defences are:

* Creed and the Cadian 8th, holding the last major fortress on Cadia - Kasr Kraf
* Black Templars of the Cruxis Crusade, led by Marshal Marius Amalrich. They are standing on the southern defences of Kasr Kraf
* Dark Angels 4th Company, led by Company Master Korahael (they are making their stand at the wreckage of their fallen Strike Cruiser to the North of Kasr Kraf, its guns still operational)
* Space Wolves of the Ironwolves Great Company, led by Wolf Lord Orven Highfell. They are initially garrisoning a ruined Kasr between the Dark Angel Strike Cruiser and Kasr Kraf, but you know Space Wolves and standing still...
* Space Wolves of the Firehowlers Great Company, led by Sven Bloodhowl. They have the only remaining Imperial Ship still under power in orbit, the Battle Barge Firemane's Fang
* Knights of House Raven, led by Baroness Vardus
* Battle Sisters of the Order of Our Martyred Lady, led by the twin sister Canonesses Eleanor and Genevieve. They are holding the Shrine of Saint Morrican across the valley from Kasr Kraf
* Numerous other Cadian regiments and shattered Space Marine Chapters

Things look pretty grim when a scout ship reports that the Black Fleet of Abaddon is inbound to finish of Cadia, with a Blackstone Fortress called the Will of Eternity at its heart. It has the power to destroy a planet with a single shot, but the Imperium had prepared a special defence for it. Unfortunately the first assault left it it ruins - Cadia is doomed. Sven Bloodhowl and the Firehowlers, along with a host of Battle Brothers from shattered Chapters and even alongside some Cadian regiments, gather on the Firemane's Fang to lead a desperate assault on the Will of Eternity to delay it before it reaches Cadia ("you're telling me we're some kind of Suicide Squad?") whilst the Mechanicum frantically try to repair the anti-planet killer shields. The battle-cry goes up amongst the Cadian Defenders - "Cadia Stands!"


Elsewhere! Belasirus Cawl has been having some shady conversations with a Harlequin Shadowseer. She tells him to check out some backwater planet, long since abandoned by the Imperium in after the 4th Black Crusade swept by it in M34. On it, Cawl discovers evidence of massive orbital bombardments. Apparently the 4th Black Crusade didn't randomly sweep by this planet - Abaddon had been trying to destroy something on it. Fighting of some random Orks looking for a fight, Cawl discover something amazing - this planet has Pylons on it, just like the Cadian Pylons and it seems Abaddon was trying to destroy them! The Shadowseer tells him to go to Cadia


Elsewhere! Trazyn the Infinite is chilling in Solemnance when one of his treasures, the Bell of Saint Gerstahl, suddenly starts ringing and causing all sorts of havoc on each chime. After the bell kills 5 of his bodies, causes Solemance to send all his warriors into stasis-sleep, destroys a number of his priceless artefacts it stops after the 13th Chime. Trazyn is all wth? and goes to the Celstial Orrery (a perfect reflection of the galaxy) to try and figure out whats going on. He notices a lot of 'crimson stain' pulsing in intricate webs out of one place in particular. The Necrons have a ton of data on the place, but Trazyn deliberately ignores that. The Imperium calls it Cadia. Trazyn wonders whether he might try being the Saviour of the Galaxy for once. At the very least, there should be something shiny to steal on Cadia.


Elsewhere! Specifically, the orbit of Terra!! Even more specifically, aboard the Phalanx!!! Be'lakor has decided to trump Abaddon and launch an attack directly at Terra - no stuffing around at Cadia for him. With the help of the Iron Warriors Warsmith Shon'tu, he creates a warp rift right in the middle of the Phalanx, with the intent to board and capture it and turn it against Terra. On board are... not much. Most of the Imperial Fists are elsewhere. All that remains to repel the chaos forces are the newly reconstituted 3rd Company, led by Captain Tor Garadon (ironically stationed there because they are inexperienced) and 30odd marines from the 1st Company. They are massively outnumbered by the combined Demon and Iron Warrior assault, are getting overrun and are losing control of the Phalanx to machine viruses from the Iron Warriors. In desperation, Garadon turns the guns of the Phalanx on itself in order to 'cut away the disease like a chirurgeon'. It costs the Phalanx a full 10th of its mass, but it stops the machine virus from taking hold and also takes out most of the Iron Warriors. As soon as control is back, Garadon orders a blind jump into the Warp in order to remove the potential for the Phalanx to be turned against Terra. Be'lakor is kinda pissed his plan has basically failed, but since they are now in the warp all his Demon forces are powered up and at least they can destroy the Phalanx. So he gets cocky and throws his Demons carelessly into the fray, victory is inevitable. At least it was inevitable until the Legion of the Dammed turn up to kick his arse. Better luck next time Be'lakor! (should have cast Invisibility). Curiously, the Legion of the Dammed have stuck around though, and Garadon has no idea why. He makes to return to Mars for urgent repairs, however a distress call is picked up - Cadia is real trouble. Garadon decides that the defence of Cadia is the most important, so he turns around and makes for Cadia. The Legion of the Dammed Sergeant gives him a ghostly bro-nod.


Back on Cadia! The Imperial defenders look on with horror as the Will of Eternity appears in orbit. The Mechiancum are no-where near finished repairs to the shields. The Will of Eternity fires..... and the beam is stopped in the clouds! Huzzah! It worked! But how?!?! Says the Magos in charge, looking around at all the slain tech-priests at the shield generator. Looking closer he notices all sorts of filthy Xenos technology integrated into the Mechanicus technology..........


Oh well, time for a conventional assault then. The Black Fleet commences orbital Bombardment of the defences, Void Shield generators straining, Drop Pods and Landing Craft coming down the thousands etc. Long story short, lots of fighting and pew pew pew. Battle Sisters kick arse. Defenders are forced back, traitor Titans of Legio Vulcanam are advancing (despite a Valkyrie kamikaze into the lead Warlord Titan, A-Wing vs Super Star Destroyer style). The Demon Prince Urkanthos, Abaddons second in command, drops in to lead the final assault. Final Gate goes down, Urkanthos shrugs off everything the Cadians can throw at him as heads straight for the shield generator protecting against the Planet Killer only to find the Battle Sisters in his way. The twin Cannoness Genevieve and Eleanor duel with him, but he kills them both (not before Genevieve headbutts him right between the eyes as her dying act of defiance though! Fkn Badass! And Eleanor stick her sword right through his chest, doing the only real wound to him). Urkanthos proceeds down to destroy the shield generator. A Chaos Baneblade is wrecking havoc amongst the Cadians, and the Black Templars rally to try and stop it and just as it swings its guns around to blow them away it suddenly freezes... and turns around and starts shooting the Chaos Forces... no-one notices a sneaky Necron Lord lurking about.... Creed uses the distraction as a last ditch effort to run his forces over to protect the shield generator, but upon seeing the dead Battle Sisters who tried to stop the Demon Prince he knows that Cadia is lost. So he goes to order a rally in one last stand, when he notices his officers holding devotional icons and uttering "The Emperor Protects". Not really one for faith, he gets kinda angry at this, but as he turns he can't help a "Well I'll be dammed"

Saint Celestine had answered their prayers.

Celestine emerging from the Heavens and slaughtering all the Demons before her re-energises all the Imperial Forces present, like a shot in the arm. Only the Adeptus Astartes are unaffected (Black Templars feel it though). The tide turns for a moment, the Defenders rallying to Celestine. But then the Traitor Legionnaires crash back into the defences. But no biggie, Celestine has that under control too - behind her, landing ships drop out of the sky and drop fresh ranks of Battle Sisters onto the field, their Battle Hymns sounding. Apparently she found a transport floating dead through the Warp, carrying 5 full companies of Battle Sisters from the Order of Our Martyred Lady lost some 1400 years ago. She hooked a Sister up and led them to another Ship en-route to Cadia. Urkanthos comes back from destroying the shield generator, looking to make his escape before the planet blows up, but runs straight into Celestine. Celestine is like "you're dead" and Urkanthos is like "lol, you can't fight me alone I'm like favoured of Khorne and Right Hand of Abaddon and stuff" and Celestine is like "HEROES NEVER DIE!" and gets a clutch rez on Genevieve and Eleanor and all 3 proceed to soundly kick his arse. What about the Blackstone Fortress about to blow up Cadia? Oh yeah btw, that ship Celestine hooked the Sisters up with was the Phalanx and it just suddenly jumped in amongst the Black Fleet.



The Phalanx bears straight down on the Will of Eternity. It's taking on the entire Black Fleet by itself but, hell, its a fleet in of itself. Garadon knows he's gotta kill the Blackstone Fortress, so he saves all his firepower for the opportune moment... and a section of the Will of Eternity's shields go down! Turns out Sven Bloodhowl's Suicide Squad made it aboard after all and they managed to sabotage the shields! Taking the shot, the Phalanx pours all its firepower into the Blackstone Fortress and blows it the hell up (along with like a third of the Black Fleet), the wreckage breaking into a few large chunks that sit in orbit like moons. The Black Fleet, having just been sucker punched hard by the Phalanx, pulls away to regroup. Down on the planet, Kell replants the Standard of the Cadian 8th atop the Kriegan Gates as the Battle Sisters and Cadians route the attacking Chaos Forces. Creed breathes a sigh of relief, but knows it's only a fleeting victory.


Aboard the Vengeful Spirit, Abaddon looks out over another failure. No more though - Cadia has defied him for far too long. Abaddon gathers his forces for and will lead the next assault himself. This time its personal.


The Imperial Forces consolidate. A trickle of re-enforcements arrive; The Crimson Fists 5th Company led by Captain Ruis Tracinto, Knights from House Taranis, tanks from the Cadian Armoured 51st and finally Belisarius Cawl's Mechanicus fleet. Whilst most of his Skitarri were depleted fighting those Orks, his fleet is still relatively strong. It takes up position with the Phalanx in orbit over Kasr Kraf. A Council of War is held, and Cawl outlines his discoveries about the Pylons and Abaddons intentions with them - it seems the Pylons are literally holding back the flood of the Immaterium into the galaxy. This explains the rising darkness of the last 10,000 years, and the increasing prevalence of warp storms - as Abaddon's Black Crusades have ran on the number of Pylons they've destroyed as gone up and the Warp leaks faster into realspace. Turns out Abaddon's Black Crusades haven't been failures after all, just a series of plays in a very, very long game! Creed, who'd been thinking about retreating from Cadia to preserve forces, realises that's no longer an option. The Cadian Pylons can't be allowed to fall. Cadia must stand!


Cawl gets a strange visitor... at first he thinks it's the Harlequin, but turns out its Trazyn! Trazyn offers his assistance in figuring out the secrets of the Pylons. Cawl is distrustful, but Trazyn points out that he has no desire to see Chaos rule the galaxy. Cawl realises that he's hopelessly lost in the Pylon technology anyway, so accepts his help and quickly figures out the Pylons. He's got a plan now!


Abaddon launches the next assault. Long story short again, lots of fighting, lots of pew pew pew. Battle Sisters, now led by Saint Celestine and the Twin Gemini, continue to kick all sorts of arse. The Battle Sisters get a pretty good showing in this book imo. Anyway, Abaddons forces eventually close the circle around the Imperial Defence, and its capped off by Abaddon teleporting into Creed's Command Centre to cut the head off the command. It's only by Kell's last heroic effort that he's able to push Creed onto a Valkyrie to escape, before Abaddon cuts Kell down. With the Cadian Command in tatters, the Imperial Defence begins to fall and get overrun. The Cadian 8th fall back into the underground catacombs where the Pylons and Cawl are, pursued by Abaddon and his Terminators. On the surface, only the Battle Sisters have managed to push back the attacks.


Down in the tunnels, the Cadians and the remaining Skitarri desperately try to hold Abaddon back. Cawl is furiously trying to finish his work on the Pylons, and Trazyn is lurking about watching with interest. He can see that the Abaddon is going to overrun them quickly, and he umms and ahhs about whether to be a Saviour or just steal something and knick off. Deciding that there's probably better loot the longer he stays at the battle, he decides to help out throws out a tesseract labyrinth. What's in the labyrinth? Why just a cheeky collection of Imperial forces Trazyn's collected over the millennia is all! It pops out right in front of Abaddon's forces - suddenly there is a just post-Heresy era Ultramarine force in his face (Contemptor Dreadnaughts and all), a regiment of Vostroyan, snipers from the long dead Tanith, Salamanders though lost during the Klovian disaster and even a Custode! Everyone is confused as hell, but the immediate facts are pretty clear - they are Imperials and there are Chaos baddies in front of them! Attack! One other force came out of the tesseract too.. Inquisitor Katarinya Greyfax of the Ordo Hereticus and her bodyguard. Not one to act rashly, for rashness leads to Heresy, she surveys the battlefield..


Trazyn's Pokeball has given Cawl enough time to finish his adjustments to the Pylon. It just needs to power up now. It's chaos killing time! Noticing Cawl over by the pylon has given Abaddon pause though - has his plan over the last 10,000 years finally been figured out? Had he made a mistake by dallying around trying to crush Cadia in a show of strength rather than just blowing it out of the sky and moving on? Horus made similar mistakes, by falling to his pride, and is Abaddon now following suit? When in doubt.... summon demons!


The chaos forces begin to overpower the Imperials. The last of the Heresy-era Ultramarines goes down, Demonettes rip through the Vostroyan ranks, Legion of the Dammed (who had come down from the Phalanx) spit hot soulfire, but its not looking good for the Imperials. But then the Space Wolves arrive. Or rather, the Wulfen arrive. The Ironwolves have been mostly lost to the curse fighting up on the surface, but now they've come down to fight their last breathes for Russ and the Allfather. A massive section of the ceiling caves in atop the Cadians, and Abaddon's forces use it drive into them heading straight for the man at the centre of it - Creed. But Celestine intervenes, using the hole in the roof to join the battle, blasting Demons aside as she beelines straight for Abaddon. 1v1 she might struggle against Abaddon, but her two Gemini are at her side. The Challenge is on.


Greyfax stand off the side, watching with revulsion. What the hell is with all this Heresy in Her Imperium? Battle Sisters idolising a clearly heretical saint? Astartes revelling in their own mutations? FLAMING SPIRITS SHOOTING MAGIC BULLET GUNS??!? Then she notices Trazyn lurking off to the side, and she's had enough - she goes to shoot the filthy Xenos in the face, but he flicks his hands and paralyses her. Mindshackle Scarab. Greyfax is furious he's "corrupted her, as he did Valeria". Trazyn points out that maybe Greyfax should be more concerned about the Chaos forces...


Cawl watches as the Pylon powers up. Has he done the right thing? Trazyn gave him all this info, but he doesn't really understand it. Is the Necron deceiving him? No, the massive problem of Chaos takes precedence. Lets see what happens. The Pylon starts pulsing, louder and louder soon echoing across the battlefield. Warriors from both sides fall to their knees, Psykers lose their minds (literally) as their connection to the Immaterium fades away. A beam of black light shoots out of the Pylon into the sky, narrowly missing the Phalanx, and spears right into the Eye of Terror.... and the Eye of Terror beings to shrink!!!!! The demons in the battle to blink out of existence, demon-fused traiters find half their bodies being ripped out of them and Psykers are dropping dead everywhere (Greyfax is one of the few with the strong-will to resist it). Even Abaddon stumbles. But so too do the Imperial suffer - The Legion of the Dammed fade away and most disconcertingly the light of Celestine begins to fade, and with that the valour that was inspiring the mortal Guardsmen. Not a problem for the mortal legionaries of the Black Legion though, all they see is the light of the hated Corpse-God fading away. Abaddon recovers from his stumble, and now the challenge has swung decisively his way. What was evenly matched is now anything but as Celestine falters. Even without the Dark Gods blessing, Abaddon is still one of the greatest Astartes ever known. Her bodyguard are forced away, and Abaddon wounds her forcing to the ground. Creed watches the only hope of the Imperial Forces fall to the ground, and charges the Cadian 8th in a desperate attempt to save Celestine as Abaddon raises Drach'nyen for the final blow.....


...but recoils away in agony as he gets mind blasted by Inquisitor Greyfax, channeling all her anger at the state of the battle into tapping into the fading warp and unleashing a psychic assault on Abaddon. She's realised that yes, that's Heresy but the immediate needs of the Imperium come first. Kill Abaddon now, deal with Celestine, the Wulfen etc later. The Cadian 8th throw themselves on Abaddon, desperate to save Celestine by buying her time with their lives. The remaining Vostroyan are cut down, but Greyfax rallies her bodyguard and starts laying volley fire into the chaos forces (her bodyguard are more afraid of her than of the the Chaos warriors lol). Creed leads another charge into Abaddon, pops a terminator with his hot-shot laspistol but suddenly Abaddon is in his face, the Talon of Horus taking his arm off as Abaddon lifts him off his feet by his neck. "Cadia is dead!" he taunts him, "No, Cadia stands whilst even one of its soldiers does!" Creed replies. "Celestine is dead, the will of Cadia is broken and the Imperium will follow. I've already set this world's fate in motion, even before I landed," Abaddon growls. Creed feels the life being chocked out of him, the humiliation of Cadia - which has stood for 10 millennia, falling under his watch catching up with him when a cry of agony brings him back. Celestine stands, her sword ran through Abaddon. "The Emperor Protects," she breathes.


Abaddon lurches away, wounded like no wound he's felt in millennia. Revenge!!! But he realises his time is up - the Pylon continues to pulse, and the presence of the Warp has all but faded. If he wants to get away, he has to go know otherwise he won't be able to teleport out. It's time to go, and he and the surviving Black Legion teleport away. A small part of him even manages to acknowledge the achievement of the Cadian defense. They'd actually won. But still still lost Trazyn watches him ago, fingering a tesseract labyrinth. I'll get you next time Ezekyle!


Creed remembers what Abaddon had said to him "I've already set this world's fate in motion, even before I landed". Uh-oh. Greyfax falters under the pressure of not losing her mind to the absence of the warp. A hand steadies her shoulder - Celestine. "Get away from me witch," Greyfax spits. "If I am a witch, then why did you save me?" Celestine smiles. "I didn't save you, I shot Abaddon. There's a difference." Greyfax falters again, and Celestine smiles and steadies her again. Not gonna lie, I 'ship it.


Up in orbit, Abaddon gives the signal as the Black Fleet hauls arse away. Remember those fragments of the Blackstone Fortress? Well turns out there's engines attached to them, and they light up and drive the moon-sized chunks of debris straight at Cadia. The Phalanx realises whats going on and tries to shoot them down, but its no use. They barely get a warning off before the massive meteors slam into Cadia. 'Luckily' it impacts on the far side of Cadia. The planet begins to split apart. As the planet begins its death spasms, the Pylons start to fall. The push of the Pylons against the Warp fades, and the Eye of Terror bursts back out. Demons begin manifesting, draw in by warp rifts opening up all over Cadia. But as the Warp returns, so too does the Golden Light of Celestine. She stops the panic, and leads the Imperial forces up to the surface, only to see seas of molten lava everywhere as the planet's core is bursting apart. Creed falls to despair - they won, only to lose! Greyfax takes command and issues an evacuation order. Slowly, ships begin to land and evacuate the forces. Not all of its orderly though, and officers are forced to fire on their troops to prevent riots. Demons are harassing the evacuation too - the Imperial Fists aboard from the Phalanx are trying to provide cover, but they are few in number. Creed eventually snaps out of it, and orders the Cadian 8th with him. They will hold the perimeter for the evacuation. The Battle Sisters and Black Templars are the last to evacuate on Cawl's Arkship along with Greyfax and the Knights of House Taranis. The Cadian 8th, with Creed, are still holding the landing site. As they lift off, Greyfax swears she hears a voice bellow out over the winds - Cadia Stands!

The Imperial Fleet limps away from Cadia, Phalanx at the head and the Mechanicum ships holding the rear. Or the remains of Cadia anyway. It's being dragged into the warp... soon to become a Demon World? Time will tell. The Black Fleet harasses the evacuation fleet, but without much effort. Of the 850 million souls that stood on Cadia at the beginning of the attack, barely 2.5 million made it off the surface. Abaddon is content to let them survivors run and spread word of the defeat... until one of his Sorcerors reveals a vision. There is an artefact onboard Cawl's arkship. What is it? I'll quote this next part directly, because it seems pretty huge. Speculation please!


"[the Sorcerer] spoke a name. One Abaddon had put from his thoughts long ago. It seemed impossible, but such words had as much currency now as they had when Horus first set foot on Davin."


Whatever the name was, it spurs Abaddon on to capture Cawl's ship. The Evacuation fleet has just about made it to the edge of the system to jump into the Warp, when the Vengeful Spirit catches up. The Phalanx and the other Imperial Ships are too far into their jump countdown to abort and escape into the Warp. The Mechanicus ships, holding the rear, are not so lucky. Cawl tries to outrun the Chaos ships, using the rest of his ships as a sacrifice. The Vengeful Spirit burns straight through them. Celestine reveals a vision she has - head for the outer planet. Our Salvation is there. Greyfax is not at all keen on it, but has no other real choice. Cawl believes Celestine speaks as the voice of the Omnissiah so he's for it (and maybe he realises that's why that Harlequin sent to him to Cadia in the first place.... not to study the Pylons but to meet up with Celestine). Marshal Alamaric is also on board with whatever Celestine is up to.


They land on the planet, and begin a trek up its mountains with Cawl carrying the artefact on a Triaros Conveyor. Battle Sisters, Black Templars, House Taranis Knights, Greyfax's Militarum Tempestus bodyguard, Cawl, Greyfax and Marshal Amalrich are following Celestine as she leads them... somewhere. They initially manage to avoid the Black Legion forces searching for them, but soon run into patrols which eventually starts bringing masses of forces to them. Half of the Black Templars, led by the Crusade's Emperor's Champion, hold back in a sacrifice to buy them time. It doesn't seem like much, as the Black Legion hounds them up the mountains. But Celestine leads them on... right into an Eldar trap. For the Black Legion. Eldar forces burst out between the Imperials and the Black Legion, covering the Imperial Forces and laying waste to the Black Legion. It's too much - unprepared for fighting Eldar, the Black Legion fall back. Abaddon tries to push forward twice, and is twice beaten back by Eldar. Which Eldar forces do you ask? There's an "Ulthwe Strike Force, alongside Wyches of Commorragh, Warriors of Biel-Tan and a number of other craftworlds". Eldrad is there, as noticed by Cawl, who is surprised at all the disparate Eldar factions fighting together.


The Harlequin Shadowseer that Cawl had prior dealings with is there too. "What is this?" asks Cawl. "Into the light of a new dawn," the Shadowseer answers. Up ahead Cawl can see Celestine hovering above the opening of a Webway Portal, guiding the Imperials through. "The ending has passed.", says the Harlequin, "It is time for a new beginning. There is a parley to be struck, if you have the courage."


And thats it Except for this little edit I forgot about...


Creed stands alone on the ruined surface of Cadia, and watches as the last Mechanicum ship lifts off into the sky. Cadia was now little more than a graveyard. He felt his strength ebbing away, as his wounds finally caught up with him. The storm parts before him, but not a Demon stands before him. A metal giant in a scaled cloak. Creed's panicked shot goes wide as iridescent polygons flicker on the figures upraised palm, "Ursarkar E. Creed. This need not be your end. Eternity awaits." The giant's laughter follows Creed into darkness....

Well, there's a thing.

A new dawn?

Seems like abbadon could have saved quite a bit of trouble by just shooting giant meteors at cadia to start with.

 Kap'n Krump wrote:
Seems like abbadon could have saved quite a bit of trouble by just shooting giant meteors at cadia to start with.

Almost assuredly. His initial plan seemed to be to use the Blackstone Fortress to blow Cadia away, since the first attack (which happens pre-book) has basically wrecked the special shield generator thingy that the Imperium was going to use to defend against a Blackstone. But as the Blackstone Fortress fires, it turns out some sneaky Xenos (Trayzn presumably) has repaired the shield generator. Creed is certain that Abaddon will make it a point of pride to make Cadia fall, rather than simply just bypass it, which is why he goes to such efforts to construct a defence in the face of the overwhelming odds. Abaddon himself realises that he might have dun goofed in trying to make a show of strength in making Cadia fall, realising that Horus made similar mistakes with his pride during the Heresy. Especially when notices that Cawl may have figured out what's going on with the Pylons. That's when he bails, forfeiting his duel with Celestine, and rams the wreckage of the Blackstone fortress into Cadia.

Someone at GW does not know their BFG material. Unless there is something written about Chaos having added on shields, activated Blackstone Fortresses do not have shields.

I already said it in another thread, but God bless Trazyn and his shenanigans.

I have a hunch and if it's right then DAMN that Shadowseer is getting around. She has a bargin with Vect that's keeping him on the throne, she instructed Yriel to take up the spear of Twilight, she co-ordinated Lady Malys to take up the Crystal heart and also played a part in the defence of Cadia. I mean I quite like the idea of the Harlequins manipulating everything and having a big part in the end times but gotta share the Ex Machina out a little bit.

The dream part in the very beginning could just as likely be about the fragment of a god Eldrad created in the Deathwatch book rather than Celestine. Just something to note.

Also sounds like Creed might be becoming a saint?

I'm gonna guess that what Abbadon wanted so bad at the end was a stasis Primarch, but it's just a gut-guess.

Trazyn throwing poke balls full of imperial soldiers is officially the best piece of fluff ever.

 ALEXisAWESOME wrote:
I have a hunch and if it's right then DAMN that Shadowseer is getting around. She has a bargin with Vect that's keeping him on the throne, she instructed Yriel to take up the spear of Twilight, she co-ordinated Lady Malys to take up the Crystal heart and also played a part in the defence of Cadia. I mean I quite like the idea of the Harlequins manipulating everything and having a big part in the end times but gotta share the Ex Machina out a little bit.

In the Harlequin special boxed set release, it is hinted/implied that Sylandri Veilwalker might be a character role (like the Dread Pirate Roberts) rather than a single individual.

Holy crap this is awesome. Looks like the Eldar and Imperials are gonna be friends now

 TheLumberJack wrote:
Holy crap this is awesome. Looks like the Eldar and Imperials are gonna be friends now

Well, until they inevitably screw it all up/betray each other at the worst possible moment

 TheLumberJack wrote:
Holy crap this is awesome. Looks like the Eldar and Imperials are gonna be friends now

A new Edition and three new Imperial factions.

I know its too early to call, but I'm on board for this human-eldar Battle Buddy hype-train. Maybe becoming an Imperial sub-faction will finally get Eldar some plastic Aspect Warriors.

For real though, I don't feel like GW will strongly commit to the idea of Eldar and Humans working together long term.

If you think that's crazy this was quasy predicted by those old natka rumors about upcoming campaigns. They even knew sisters would be in it and not get a new army model (for the release or at all is not known), Necrons, and eldar would be in it.

It's likely that people look at that rumor at think the story was set in hard stone like a fixed timeline but it's clear GW has made the end times releases a little flexible depending on what they feel will be most dramatic and get the most sales.

While those two rumors had some stuff a little off or wrong they also have some stuff right. If so then there are two or three more general plots kicking around in gw's head and we don't know what they are going to do next.

1. Something in involving nids, orks, and a small amount of Imperials and a little bit of necron/s at the end.
2. Some sort of war int he webway campaign with its own releases. Who knows par two of this Fall of Cadia could easily fit.
3. Tau vs IoM but later Chaos and dark eldar and some Necrons later on in a story. They want to have either shadowsun or farsight take on Imotek. The Tau one is also likely to touch on or advance the plot of the need to develop warp travel or some sort of ftl travel, tau itself is close to IoM and easy to be bombed/might be bombed, the ethereal problem because of Aun'Va death and more people getting friendly with Farsight is likely to be the basis for the two books.

This should all be taken with some heavy salt since the rumor has gotten a good chunk right but a decent chunk wrong and even says some things are subject to change by GW as they plan this out.

http://natfka.blogspot.ca/2016/07/40k-8th-edition-campaigns-exciting-look.html

http://natfka.blogspot.ca/2016/08/40k-future-campaigns-part-2.html

Iracundus wrote:Someone at GW does not know their BFG material. Unless there is something written about Chaos having added on shields, activated Blackstone Fortresses do not have shields.

I don't know much about the the particulars of Blackstone Fortresses, but for what its worth there's a over a week of fighting on Cadia between the Will of Eternity firing it's initial deflected shot and the Phalanx arriving to destroy it.

Audustum wrote:The dream part in the very beginning could just as likely be about the fragment of a god Eldrad created in the Deathwatch book rather than Celestine. Just something to note.

Hmm, unlikely. The rest of the text at the start makes it pretty clear its about Celestine imo - talk of her once being mortal, losing a little piece of her each time she has to venture out and having no-one else to shoulder the burden with.

 GoonBandito wrote:

Iracundus wrote:Someone at GW does not know their BFG material. Unless there is something written about Chaos having added on shields, activated Blackstone Fortresses do not have shields.

I don't know much about the the particulars of Blackstone Fortresses, but for what its worth there's a over a week of fighting on Cadia between the Will of Eternity firing it's initial deflected shot and the Phalanx arriving to destroy it.

Activated Blackstone Fortress stats showing Shields = 0 are in the main BFG rulebook, so it is hardly obscure information especially if one is working at GW where there would presumably be a copy of the rulebook. This just sounds like sloppy work.

Well you saved me 50 dollars. I thank you. More of the same from the big GW.

For the record I like where the plot is going.

 Gamgee wrote:
For the record I like where the plot is going.

Same. This is actual plot progression. And it makes sense too. Chaos players finally got the ending to the 13th Black Crusade they always wanted and it seems the Eldar and Imperium are finally realizing they'd be better off working together.

wait wait wait, what happened to the firehowlers???

As the main Great Company I play, I will be pretty angry to get screwed over again.

I like the fact that they are advancing the story though, not as bad as I thought.

 TheCustomLime wrote:

 Gamgee wrote:
For the record I like where the plot is going.

Same. This is actual plot progression. And it makes sense too. Chaos players finally got the ending to the 13th Black Crusade they always wanted and it seems the Eldar and Imperium are finally realizing they'd be better off working together.

Yea looks like this is going all grand alliance. I imagine there being 3. Lawful, Chaos, and Destruction. Unless plot forces us into an IoM, Chaos, Xenos, and Destruction grand alliances. I mean it's only January and allegedly every major faction is going to get something this year if the hype is to be believed. I honestly think that's pushing it a little bit much. How much can GW make? I'll be thankful to be proven wrong if all my fav's get new models. I wonder if that means DW is included lol. All hail new GW and my wallet is saaaad.

40k end times and doing mix matched forces.

Sounds like 40k is about to get AoS'd

So who was the scaled warrior at the end....hmmm at first I think Vulkan? but the laughing at someone on deaths door step doesnt really fit him.

 Vulkan Fran'cis wrote:
So who was the scaled warrior at the end....hmmm at first I think Vulkan? but the laughing at someone on deaths door step doesnt really fit him.

Trazyn.

 Vulkan Fran'cis wrote:
So who was the scaled warrior at the end....hmmm at first I think Vulkan? but the laughing at someone on deaths door step doesnt really fit him.

Trazyn surely? Capturing Creed for his collection.

Buttt that might just be what we are meant to think.

The Beast Arises spoiler ahead:



In a way I'm glad that we got this as a pay-off for something that might otherwise have been something GW could have ignored. However by the same token I could totally see the IoM/Eldar rapprochement going the way of the brief High Elves/Dwarf alliance they had over Aliathra in Warhammer Fantasy somewhere down the line. Also curious how this jives with the terribad Death Masque narrative.

I'm also digging this Shadowseer character (whom I presume is Sylandri Veilwalker from the Valedor book) whom through guile and foresight is making moves that seem to promise to have huge consequences. Well, as long as she isn't using those powers just to punk her fellow Eldar like Eldrad does (she is a Harlequin, after all).

I have just double checked and confirmed that Veilwalker is more like a title or character role, and Sylandri may just be an assumed name:

The Veiled Path's machinations extend throughout the realms of the Eldar. It was they, for example, who sent one of their number - under the assumed name of Sylandri Veilwalker - to manoeuvre Prince Yriel into taking up the Spear of Twilight.

p. 34, Codex: Harlequins

In the midst of Craftworld Iyanden's most desperate battle for survival, Prince Yriel takes up the cursed Spear of Twilight. He is compelled to seize his destiny in this way by a Shadowseer of the Masque of the Veiled Path. The enigmatic seer vanishes soon after, Iyanden's fate assured and the role of the Veilwalker played to its conclusion.

p. 50, Codex: Harlequins

Good read, thanks

The mysterious character in a scaled cloak is... Omegon

You know, when I first heard that Cadia fell, I was pretty annoyed. But after reading that. I'm just proud. (Proud of fictional characters. What has my life become?)

This does sound interesting, but I'll wait with the final verdict, after GW releases the last book. I don't mind Cadia go boom-boom (and I'm a Guard player first and foremost), but I certainly hope that we'll see some more answers. Because right now there are more questions than answers, and I want to know what the hell Cawl has in his possession.

 Kap'n Krump wrote:
Seems like abbadon could have saved quite a bit of trouble by just shooting giant meteors at cadia to start with.

See thats why orks will rule the galaxy. When it comes to krumping, just throw some rocks.

I don't know, the fluff summary feels a bit fanboyish-too many twists and turns.


Welcome back 2nd ed, RT. My farseer commander leading guard / marines returns!

 Snake Tortoise wrote:
Good read, thanks

The mysterious character in a scaled cloak is... Omegon

No....Im alpharious.

But let it be know, that Cadia broke before the guard did.

Press F to pay respects to the guard.

Anyone know what's happening with the rest of the cadia system and surrounding systems all was being battlefields as part of the old crusade, have they all just been sucked in to the Eye of terror?

What do you think Cawl's artifact, in the triaros, is ?

Iracundus wrote:
I have just double checked and confirmed that Veilwalker is more like a title or character role, and Sylandri may just be an assumed name

For some reason that reminded me of this scene from Auralnauts' hilarious Star Wars gag dub:

https://youtu.be/oOmyuweolqY?t=28m14s

 godardc wrote:
What do you think Cawl's artifact, in the triaros, is ?

Davin, horus, Anathame

 Formosa wrote:

 godardc wrote:
What do you think Cawl's artifact, in the triaros, is ?

Davin, horus, Anathame

Wasn't that taken by Fulgrim and Lucius?

Edit: So, taken by Fulgrim, fuzziness happens, Erebus somehow ends up with it at Macragge. Breaks off 8 shards which are powerful. Then Fulgrim retrieves it, takes it to a planet and uses it to become a Demon in Angel Exterminatus. After that, nothing

I thought Lucius was given the Blade of Laer, not the Anathame.

Thinking back to one of the Horus Heresy books (the one where everyone's running around trying to get ahold of the fulgurite), Eldrad makes an apperance and decides to dick with the Cabal's because in his visions for the future, Vulkan needed to be alive to guard something. I'm wondering if the giant in the scaled cloak is Vulkan?

Iracundus wrote:

 GoonBandito wrote:

Iracundus wrote:Someone at GW does not know their BFG material. Unless there is something written about Chaos having added on shields, activated Blackstone Fortresses do not have shields.

I don't know much about the the particulars of Blackstone Fortresses, but for what its worth there's a over a week of fighting on Cadia between the Will of Eternity firing it's initial deflected shot and the Phalanx arriving to destroy it.

Activated Blackstone Fortress stats showing Shields = 0 are in the main BFG rulebook, so it is hardly obscure information especially if one is working at GW where there would presumably be a copy of the rulebook. This just sounds like sloppy work.

but this one is Abby's special Blackstone fortress that he has tinkered with over the last 850 years. Maybe he has found a way to shield it.

So, my disparate thoughts:

Abaddon goes down like a punk. Seriously, he doesn't feel at all like a credible threat. He could have fired the meteor rocket things into Cadia to start with. He doesn't feel powerful at all.

Celestine's cool. Nice to see the Sisters getting a good showing. Nice if they could have some plastic kits too?

Is that ALL that was defending Cadia? Jeez, I'd expect to see more Astartes Chapters and Guard regiments at least, and more than just First/Second Founders.

The long dead Tanith? The Tanith Regiment was destroyed? When/where? Do we know any details about this?

Greyfax is an idiot. Lawful stupid if I ever saw one.

Trazyn's a good sight to see - assuming he kidnaps Creed at the end? Seems a worthy trade of some of his collection for the Old Man himself.

Humans using the Webway? Eldar/Human alliance? I'm apprehensive.

Feels very fanfiction-y overall (PLOT TWEEEEEEST), but I'm interested to see where it goes.

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:
So, my disparate thoughts:

Abaddon goes down like a punk. Seriously, he doesn't feel at all like a credible threat. He could have fired the meteor rocket things into Cadia to start with. He doesn't feel powerful at all.

Celestine's cool. Nice to see the Sisters getting a good showing. Nice if they could have some plastic kits too?

Is that ALL that was defending Cadia? Jeez, I'd expect to see more Astartes Chapters and Guard regiments at least, and more than just First/Second Founders.

The long dead Tanith? The Tanith Regiment was destroyed? When/where? Do we know any details about this?

Greyfax is an idiot. Lawful stupid if I ever saw one.

Trazyn's a good sight to see - assuming he kidnaps Creed at the end? Seems a worthy trade of some of his collection for the Old Man himself.

Humans using the Webway? Eldar/Human alliance? I'm apprehensive.

Feels very fanfiction-y overall (PLOT TWEEEEEEST), but I'm interested to see where it goes.

Heres why :

Hive Fleet problems

Ghoul Stars,

Red Corsairs

Armaggedon

Ullanor Campagin

Battle of Ultramar (Ultramarines cannot help as they are also destroying an entire tombworld)

Blood Angels dealing with an invasion of the BAAL system.

Dark Angels are dealing with many things

Space Wolves & Salamanders are currently deployed on Armaggedon

Black Templars main force is located on armaggedon (estimated at least 3k)

Raven Guard are dealing with the tau.

Imperial Guard Regiments are trying to slow the advance of the tau, Red Corsairs, Eldar, Tyranids, and necrons.


So far I agree it is at least good progression, I actually hope we have some resolution, as they next one they will be tackling is the war of armaggedon.

Is it also possible that the Shadowseer Cawl speaks with is...



Granted _most_ Eldar have a lifespan of a thousand years give or take and that storyline took place *ahem* over nine thousand years ago, but particularly powerful psykers like Eldrad can live for far longer than that, and time probably passes differently in the Webway and someone could step into it and come out after centuries have passed and look like they haven't aged a day.


*EDIT* Never mind, a teaser image from GW seems to confirm that was in fact Sylandri Veilwalker. She's rapidly turning into the G-Man of the 40K universe:

Iracundus wrote:Someone at GW does not know their BFG material. Unless there is something written about Chaos having added on shields, activated Blackstone Fortresses do not have shields.

Blackstone fortresses also do not have engines. They 'glide' through space with some sort of inertialess propulsion. So Chaos clearly added something.

I find it hard to believe there was only one Cadian regiment defending Cadia. Don't they have hundreds of Cadian regiments?

I reread it... and i'm glad to see things happening! that is good!

But the story also kind of feels like the kinds of stories my sisters and cousins and I would make up while playing with lego when I was ten. And maybe that's all right? Because that's really what this is all about, when you get down to it.

Just waiting for the entire setting to be wiped out by a big old dog wandering through, looking for his water dish.

Sorry for asking the same question twice, but what happened to the Firehowlers? Are they like all gone? If so, I understand how Tomb Kings players felt (sorta)

Also, is there any merit in assuming that maybe creed wasn't captured by Trazyn? I don't believe so, but it is an important question.

What relic does Crawl have?

 Asherian Command wrote:

Heres why :

Hive Fleet problems

Behemoth is reduced, Leviathan is trying down just the Blood Angels and some of their successors, and Kraken is mainly going for Eldar.

Ghoul Stars,

No active threats. Just sentries, who could easily send aid to Cadia.

Red Corsairs

Assaulting Chogoris. The White Scars are dealing with them.

Armaggedon

Fair. But there shouldn't be more soldiers at Armageddon than Cadia, surely?

Ullanor Campagin

What Ullanor Campaign? There's no Ullanor Campaign in 999.M41.

Battle of Ultramar (Ultramarines cannot help as they are also destroying an entire tombworld)

Invasion of Ultramar occurred far before this (both the Tyranid invasion and the Bloodborn invasion), and the Return to Damnos only comprised of the 2nd, 3rd, 5th, and 6th companies, with support elements of the 10th. That's half the Ultramarines on Damnos at 999.M41. Easily enough for the other companies to send representatives to the mother of all fights.

Blood Angels dealing with an invasion of the BAAL system.

Not actually invaded yet, and the Cryptus Incident was in 998.M41.

Dark Angels are dealing with many things

Yet have a company here.

Space Wolves & Salamanders are currently deployed on Armaggedon

Only 3 Great Companies. Not to mention the Wolves have representatives at Cadia. The Salamanders have six companies, leaving one to deploy at Cadia perhaps.

Black Templars main force is located on armaggedon (estimated at least 3k)

And ALSO have elements at Cadia.

Raven Guard are dealing with the tau.

Not any more. They are, however defending their homeworld from Orks.
Again, I haven't got a problem with many Chapter being absent. But the Thousand Chapters of the Imperium, and there's what, three who show up to Cadia? Not asking for full Chapters, but even representatives, a taskforce, a company? Nothing - not even for Cadia. No mention of the Chapters specifically located around the Eye for this EXACT situation, as well as the Ultramarine Honour Company (a mini-Deathwatch for Ultramarine successors) or the masses of Cadian regiments other than the 8th. I'm starting to think that if Terra was invaded, only the First Founders would show up.

Imperial Guard Regiments are trying to slow the advance of the tau (already ceased, due to the Damocles Gulf being set alight), Red Corsairs (attacking Chogoris, so not a threat to the wider Imperium, barring the White Scars), Eldar, Tyranids, and necrons.

No, some Imperial Guard regiments are slowing the advance of the other threats. Some more should be expected to be deployed to the Eye of Terror - not just Cadians.

This is one of the largest single warzones in Imperial record - if Armageddon has more men defending it than Cadia, something's wrong. There should be entire Chapters deploying here, streams of Guardsmen, and yet we see three taskforces (not even Chapters) of Space Marines and some Cadians and Sisters? GW scale is stupid, but Cadia? This is ridiculous.

True, but remember Armagedon has more firepower or atleast the means to produce more firepower quickly.

This is one of the largest single warzones in Imperial record - if Armageddon has more men defending it than Cadia, something's wrong. There should be entire Chapters deploying here, streams of Guardsmen, and yet we see three taskforces (not even Chapters) of Space Marines and some Cadians and Sisters? GW scale is stupid, but Cadia? This is ridiculous.

GW doesn't get the idea of numbers. They forget that the imperium is pretty huge and the idea of losing Cadia is a huge one but I blame terrible writers and inconsistencies.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 gummyofallbears wrote:
Sorry for asking the same question twice, but what happened to the Firehowlers? Are they like all gone? If so, I understand how Tomb Kings players felt (sorta)

Also, is there any merit in assuming that maybe creed wasn't captured by Trazyn? I don't believe so, but it is an important question.

What relic does Crawl have?

*shrug*

I have no idea.

 Backspacehacker wrote:
True, but remember Armagedon has more firepower or atleast the means to produce more firepower quickly.

And Cadia is holding open/defending against a tear in reality from the most feared threat to the Imperium.

No reason it should be defended by such meagre defences.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Asherian Command wrote:

This is one of the largest single warzones in Imperial record - if Armageddon has more men defending it than Cadia, something's wrong. There should be entire Chapters deploying here, streams of Guardsmen, and yet we see three taskforces (not even Chapters) of Space Marines and some Cadians and Sisters? GW scale is stupid, but Cadia? This is ridiculous.

GW doesn't get the idea of numbers. They forget that the imperium is pretty huge and the idea of losing Cadia is a huge one but I blame terrible writers and inconsistencies.

Unfortunately, this seems true.

Cadia's population is given as 850 million. If 1% of those are actual frontline combat troops (with the rest being admin, logistics, staffing the factories), and using 8,000 (Creed's Cadian 8th) as a benchmark, that is still 1062 regiments of infantry like the Creed's regiment.

The old 13th Black Crusade book and campaign gave a somewhat picture of scale. This newest Fall of Cadia makes it seem like the only Cadians that matter are Creed's 8,000.

Who defended Cadia?


- Black Templars, lead by Marshal Amalrich
- Imperial Fists
- Crimson Fists
- Dark Angles lead by Master Korahael
- Angels of Absolution
- Consecrators
- Angels of Redemption
- Space Wolves
- Doom Eagles
- Exorcists
- Angels Sanguine
- Angels of Vigilance
- Blood Angels
- Hawk Lords
- Aurora Chapter
- Iron Knights
- Marines Exemplar
- Black Guard
- Revilers
- Subjugators
- Storm Warriors
- White Consuls
- Destroyers
- Iron Hands Clan Raukaan
- Raven Guard
- Salamanders, released from the stasis vaults of Solemnace
- White Scars
- Iron Snakes
- Sons of Orar
- Novamarines
- Genesis Chapter
- Brazen Claws
- Death Spectres
- Storm Lords
- Howling Griffons
- Ultramarines (2nd Company)

- The Legion of the Damned

- Deathwatch

- Mechanicum Forces of Mars
- Mechanicum Forces of Lucius
- Mechanicum Forces of Stygies VIII
- Mechanicum Forces of Ryza
- Knights of House Raven
- Knights of House Taranis

- Imperial Guard and Militarum Tempestus, including Vostroyans

and many, many more

 loki old fart wrote:

Who defended Cadia?


- Black Templars, lead by Marshal Amalrich
- Imperial Fists
- Crimson Fists
- Dark Angles lead by Master Korahael
- Angels of Absolution
- Consecrators
- Angels of Redemption
- Space Wolves
- Doom Eagles
- Exorcists
- Angels Sanguine
- Angels of Vigilance
- Blood Angels
- Hawk Lords
- Aurora Chapter
- Iron Knights
- Marines Exemplar
- Black Guard
- Revilers
- Subjugators
- Storm Warriors
- White Consuls
- Destroyers
- Iron Hands Clan Raukaan
- Raven Guard
- Salamanders, released from the stasis vaults of Solemnace
- White Scars
- Iron Snakes
- Sons of Orar
- Novamarines
- Genesis Chapter
- Brazen Claws
- Death Spectres
- Storm Lords
- Howling Griffons
- Ultramarines (2nd Company)

- The Legion of the Damned

- Deathwatch

- Mechanicum Forces of Mars
- Mechanicum Forces of Lucius
- Mechanicum Forces of Stygies VIII
- Mechanicum Forces of Ryza
- Knights of House Raven
- Knights of House Taranis

- Imperial Guard and Militarum Tempestus, including Vostroyans

and many, many more

This is what SHOULD have been there. But according to the latest stuff by GW, there's a few companies of Space Marines, some Skitarii, Tempestus, Sororitas, and the Cadian 8th regiment.

This makes the battle feel more desperate from a writers prespective I get why, but just sounds like a writer forgot about the history and lore and forgot to remember "Well I could have more chapters and all that, but that would make the story bloated."

But they literally have to say the other chapters and forces are dealing with majority of the Black Crusade across multiple fronts and didn't expect them to break through as quickly as they had. Or talk about how many chapters kept arriving and the millions of guardsmen were fighting millions of chaos forces.

Sorta like the battle of Istavaan III or Istavaan V.

So imperium kicks massive ass against overwhelming odds with fanfic plottwists,
chaos gets to feel they atleast did something.

yea pritty standart stuff.

Maybe thats all thats left after the rest of the planets been totaled. As this fluff seems to represent the last (semi functioning) city on a desolate warzone of a world which has already been though the grinder with no other settlements left.
This background (from the op) is the end game not the whole thing.

Iracundus wrote:
Cadia's population is given as 850 million. If 1% of those are actual frontline combat troops (with the rest being admin, logistics, staffing the factories), and using 8,000 (Creed's Cadian 8th) as a benchmark, that is still 1062 regiments of infantry like the Creed's regiment.

The old 13th Black Crusade book and campaign gave a somewhat picture of scale. This newest Fall of Cadia makes it seem like the only Cadians that matter are Creed's 8,000.

Cadia is supposed to be a fortress planet with virtually everyone conscripted to fight. Like North Korea on steriods. It should be at least 10% front line troops, perhaps 25%.


Still in a galaxy size war, 200 million infantry would be nothing. There would be weapons capable of killing 200 million infantry in one shot.

It should also have a population of 20-50 billion with every nook and crany devoted to baracks/fortifications, and artillery.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Skullhammer wrote:
Maybe thats all thats left after the rest of the planets been totaled. As this fluff seems to represent the last (semi functioning) city on a desolate warzone of a world which has already been though the grinder with no other settlements left.
This background (from the op) is the end game not the whole thing.

yes, if the entire black fleet is in orbit shelling the planet it, one would expect 90% of the troops on the ground would be vaproized. Then the black legion, all it's allies(including a titan legion) making planet fall... You would need billions of troops on Cadia to have any realistic chance of holding it.

 gummyofallbears wrote:
wait wait wait, what happened to the firehowlers???

As the main Great Company I play, I will be pretty angry to get screwed over again.

I like the fact that they are advancing the story though, not as bad as I thought.

Good news as they had an important mission and part in the story and succeeded.


The bad news is it was a suicide mission.... My condolences on joining Tomb Kings,Squats and good rules/fluff.

So, I read that there is a big 5 book story upcoming, is this the synopsis for the first book, or the entire series?

In either case, any thoughts on if they're continuing? Because abbadon destroying cadia and routing the imperial army/navy is a pretty big deal, despite the losses he took.

Sounds quite like I expected it... Abaddon wins but with excessive losses. Just like in Traitors Hate and basically every Crusade... As a Chaos player I must admit I had hoped for a bit more. Abby doesn't seem that strong.

And what's up with Belakor + Iron Warriors not being able to kill a handful of Imperial Fist recruits?! That part sounds pretty bad, they should have died, all of them. It's okay that they defend against Chaos a bit, but they should have died nevertheless.

That recap was the best thing I've read all day. Thank you for that.

Sgt. Cortez wrote:
Sounds quite like I expected it... Abaddon wins but with excessive losses. Just like in Traitors Hate and basically every Crusade... As a Chaos player I must admit I had hoped for a bit more. Abby doesn't seem that strong.

And what's up with Belakor + Iron Warriors not being able to kill a handful of Imperial Fist recruits?! That part sounds pretty bad, they should have died, all of them. It's okay that they defend against Chaos a bit, but they should have died nevertheless.

The fists are hardcore, but not /that/ hardcore.

I love me some IF but that was completely garbage, I understand that Be'lakor got a bit antsy and his hubris exceeded its allowance, but that was too much.

I was expecting Abby to kill his way to mars in this book honestly. I'm kinda happy that it didn't alter the story in an irreversible way, but it wasn't nearly as brutal as I was expecing

I guess they realised that having the fists die to a man was getting kind of old and went a bit too far the other way.

This excites me. Especially the idea that we're likely getting an Eldar-heavy book next.

Agiel wrote:*EDIT* Never mind, a teaser image from GW seems to confirm that was in fact Sylandri Veilwalker. She's rapidly turning into the G-Man of the 40K universe:

Yeah, the Harlequin is Veilwalker. Apparently she's been in touch with Cawl for some time now too.

Also, now I imagine her popping up in the Stasis Chamber - "Rise and shine... Mr. Guillliman... Rise and shine...."

CREEEEEEEEED wrote:I find it hard to believe there was only one Cadian regiment defending Cadia. Don't they have hundreds of Cadian regiments?

There are a heap of different Cadian Regiments mentioned throughout the battle scenes. I;ve only skimmed over the battles in my summary.

gummyofallbears wrote:Sorry for asking the same question twice, but what happened to the Firehowlers? Are they like all gone? If so, I understand how Tomb Kings players felt (sorta)

They went with glory for the Allfather and Russ, on a suicide mission sabotage the Blackstone Fortress to lower its defences. They're implied KIA when the Phalanx blows it up, though you know the saying "If you don't see a body...."

Great summary, thanks GoonBandito, very enjoyable.

I get a bit confused with all the fluff, but I thought Eldrad was dead? (Or at least, presumed dead?)

Does anyone think the rumoured return of one of the Loyalist Primarchs might happen in the next book? Or perhaps things have to get much worse first.

With the Eldar involved, maybe Abaddon can get his butt kicked by the Avatar next (seems appropriate, Imperial Saint, followed by the Eldar equivalent, sorta). Alternatively, Ghazghkull has to return from his pilgrimage at some point, right? Perhaps the Fall of Armageddon is next? (And Abaddon can get his butt kicked by a suped-up Gorkanaut?)

Eldrad is not dead in current continuity. Yes he dies in the original campaign, but it appears they have backtracked us behind that point and started over, and so at the moment he is alive. But, I would hope that in the future of this campaign he dies again, preferably when Slaanesh eventually gets a GD kit and rules.

jifel wrote: Eldrad is not dead in current continuity. Yes he dies in the original campaign, but it appears they have backtracked us behind that point and started over, and so at the moment he is alive. But, I would hope that in the future of this campaign he dies again, preferably when Slaanesh eventually gets a GD kit and rules.

Awesome, thanks. Since the Blackstone Fortress is in tiny pieces, I guess his death/disappearance will take a different route, which is, I always feel, the best path for a retcon to take.

EDIT: Although, I guess Abaddon does have two of them...

"[the Sorcerer] spoke a name. One Abaddon had put from his thoughts long ago. It seemed impossible, but such words had as much currency now as they had when Horus first set foot on Davin."

The reference to Davin, and a name Abaddon hadn't heard in a long, long time...

Isn't there also a prophecy somewhere about Abaddon being killed by one of hie lieutenants or something like that?


Is there any way the thing in Cawl's box... is Loken?

stainawarjar wrote:

Is there any way the thing in Cawl's box... is Loken?

I don't think so; surely it's an artefact not a person?

But still, it would be amazing if Abaddon's final fall came at the hands of Loken, somehow.

 gummyofallbears wrote:

Sgt. Cortez wrote:
Sounds quite like I expected it... Abaddon wins but with excessive losses. Just like in Traitors Hate and basically every Crusade... As a Chaos player I must admit I had hoped for a bit more. Abby doesn't seem that strong.

And what's up with Belakor + Iron Warriors not being able to kill a handful of Imperial Fist recruits?! That part sounds pretty bad, they should have died, all of them. It's okay that they defend against Chaos a bit, but they should have died nevertheless.

The fists are hardcore, but not /that/ hardcore.

I love me some IF but that was completely garbage, I understand that Be'lakor got a bit antsy and his hubris exceeded its allowance, but that was too much.

I was expecting Abby to kill his way to mars in this book honestly. I'm kinda happy that it didn't alter the story in an irreversible way, but it wasn't nearly as brutal as I was expecing

But the IF didn't beat back Belakor and the Iron Warriors alone. The Legion of the Damned show up and we all know how OP they are. When the Emperor's own daemons show up chaos is gonna have a bad time.

Thanks for the read. I'm happy to see the story going somewhere...though it's not a particularly intriguing somewhere.

Typical GW where the story magically includes far too many known characters/armies...but my expectations are pretty low so it was expected.

 Sersi wrote:

 gummyofallbears wrote:

Sgt. Cortez wrote:
Sounds quite like I expected it... Abaddon wins but with excessive losses. Just like in Traitors Hate and basically every Crusade... As a Chaos player I must admit I had hoped for a bit more. Abby doesn't seem that strong.

And what's up with Belakor + Iron Warriors not being able to kill a handful of Imperial Fist recruits?! That part sounds pretty bad, they should have died, all of them. It's okay that they defend against Chaos a bit, but they should have died nevertheless.

The fists are hardcore, but not /that/ hardcore.

I love me some IF but that was completely garbage, I understand that Be'lakor got a bit antsy and his hubris exceeded its allowance, but that was too much.

I was expecting Abby to kill his way to mars in this book honestly. I'm kinda happy that it didn't alter the story in an irreversible way, but it wasn't nearly as brutal as I was expecing

But the IF didn't beat back Belakor and the Iron Warriors alone. The Legion of the Damned show up and we all know how OP they are. When the Emperor's own daemons show up chaos is gonna have a bad time.

Ah yes, that is my bad by simply forgetting that they showed up.

Lord Flasheart wrote:

jifel wrote: Eldrad is not dead in current continuity. Yes he dies in the original campaign, but it appears they have backtracked us behind that point and started over, and so at the moment he is alive. But, I would hope that in the future of this campaign he dies again, preferably when Slaanesh eventually gets a GD kit and rules.

Awesome, thanks. Since the Blackstone Fortress is in tiny pieces, I guess his death/disappearance will take a different route, which is, I always feel, the best path for a retcon to take.

EDIT: Although, I guess Abaddon does have two of them...

At least 2

Makes you wonder why he didnt bring both though. When you want to destroy a planet, it certainly helps.

 Exergy wrote:

Lord Flasheart wrote:

jifel wrote: Eldrad is not dead in current continuity. Yes he dies in the original campaign, but it appears they have backtracked us behind that point and started over, and so at the moment he is alive. But, I would hope that in the future of this campaign he dies again, preferably when Slaanesh eventually gets a GD kit and rules.

Awesome, thanks. Since the Blackstone Fortress is in tiny pieces, I guess his death/disappearance will take a different route, which is, I always feel, the best path for a retcon to take.

EDIT: Although, I guess Abaddon does have two of them...

At least 2

Makes you wonder why he didnt bring both though. When you want to destroy a planet, it certainly helps.

I suspect other books will tell us.

BrianDavion wrote:

 Exergy wrote:

Lord Flasheart wrote:

jifel wrote: Eldrad is not dead in current continuity. Yes he dies in the original campaign, but it appears they have backtracked us behind that point and started over, and so at the moment he is alive. But, I would hope that in the future of this campaign he dies again, preferably when Slaanesh eventually gets a GD kit and rules.

Awesome, thanks. Since the Blackstone Fortress is in tiny pieces, I guess his death/disappearance will take a different route, which is, I always feel, the best path for a retcon to take.

EDIT: Although, I guess Abaddon does have two of them...

At least 2

Makes you wonder why he didnt bring both though. When you want to destroy a planet, it certainly helps.

I suspect other books will tell us.

It's almost like they want us to keep buying their books...

Great read. First impressions:

* There were only 850 million people defending Cadia? Can we all pause and consider how absolutely ridiculous that number is? The most fortified planet outside of Terra, at the Eye of Terror has 850 million defenders? GW would have been better not citing any number at all. At the very least, Cadia would have had tens of billions. Fact. Again, not to be a dick but where are all the defenders on Cadia? Armageddon has like x10 the number of people involved in the 2nd War of Armageddon and somehow Cadia the best defended planet next to Terra has like...no one? I think the most irritating part of this is I barely know most of the lore, yet this seems like pretty common sense stuff that should not have been overlooked.

* Cadia finally falls. Good. Hoping GW will finally release some new IG regiments or support some of the older regiments in plastic. Anyone who was interested in the Cadian aesthetic has made their investment. Shame Kell died, but he did save Creed so that is cool. I'm sure this isn't the last we have seen of him.

* Sisters and Celestine finally get some love. Its been a long time coming. Happy for SoB players.

* Not impressed with Greyfax. Comes off as a lawful good c*nt who needs to step off her pedestal, look around and see the Imperium beset on all sides backed into a corner.

* Not sure how I feel about Eldar/Imperial alliance. I'll wait to make any judgements.

* What is Trazyn's stake in all this? Isn't the necrons like primary objective to wipe out all life in the galaxy? Why the hell does he care? Chaos cannot exist without life. If there is no one alive suffering, depressed, lustful etcetera then Chaos ceases to exist. He has pokeballs with people in stasis? Interesting.

* What is in Cawl's possession?

Don't be too harsh on Greyfax - she's been displaced in time by Trazyn and suddenly popped out in the middle of a pitched battle featuring a 'witch being worshipped by Imperial Soldiers', 'mutated Astartes running around freely' and 'ghost warriors shooting soulfire fighting for the Imperium'. She's a hardline, puritan Ordo Hereticus Inquisitor - she absolutely should be losing her gak at the state of affairs she's witnessing. And she does set aside her Heresy concerns in the moment to concentrates her attacks on the Chaos Forces, so its not like she's going around purging heresy in the middle of a battle.

There is also scene towards the end of the book though where she has a slight softening towards Celestine, so she might be coming around a bit. We'll have to see where her story goes in the next book.

Is it possible the mysterious character at the end is Trazyn (Or it's a Primarch, but that would be lame) taking Creed as part of his collection as payment for his help? Also I'm going to take a shot in the dark and guess that the artefact onboard Cawl's ship is Garviel Loken, somehow kept alive all this time (or its a Primarch, but that would be LAME! Seriously everything these days is Primarch this, Primarch that; we need a bit more diversity here GW).

Commissar Benny wrote:
Great read. First impressions:

* There were only 850 million people defending Cadia? Can we all pause and consider how absolutely ridiculous that number is? The most fortified planet outside of Terra, at the Eye of Terror has 850 million defenders? GW would have been better not citing any number at all. At the very least, Cadia would have had tens of billions. Fact. Again, not to be a dick but where are all the defenders on Cadia? Armageddon has like x10 the number of people involved in the 2nd War of Armageddon and somehow Cadia the best defended planet next to Terra has like...no one? I think the most irritating part of this is I barely know most of the lore, yet this seems like pretty common sense stuff that should not have been overlooked.

GW has never been good with numbers. However at least the old Codex Eye of Terror made an attempt. It listed Cadia as 71.75% under arms (though then inexplicably gave the population as 250 million rather than 850 million like the 3.5 edition Codex: CSM). Assuming that was a typo and the population is 850 million, that means 609.875 million under arms, or something like 76, 234 regiments if the Cadian 8th's 8,000 is used as a benchmark (as it is given as a typical infantry regiment).

Codex: Eye of Terror gave a partial listing of forces in the 13th Black Crusade. On the Imperial side for Cadians alone, it listed 612 Cadian regiments, 16 Regional Commands of Cadian Youth Army (I'm guessing Whiteshields), and 486 companies of Kaskin. There were many other forces listed from elsewhere.

Now it seems Fall of Cadia is more concerned with characters and "forging a narrative" rather than trying to represent a large war, so it seems to only list characters without even bothering to try and pretend the rank and file units matter.

 GoonBandito wrote:
Don't be too harsh on Greyfax - she's been displaced in time by Trazyn and suddenly popped out in the middle of a pitched battle featuring a 'witch being worshipped by Imperial Soldiers', 'mutated Astartes running around freely' and 'ghost warriors shooting soulfire fighting for the Imperium'. She's a hardline, puritan Ordo Hereticus Inquisitor - she absolutely should be losing her gak at the state of affairs she's witnessing. And she does set aside her Heresy concerns in the moment to concentrates her attacks on the Chaos Forces, so its not like she's going around purging heresy in the middle of a battle.

There is also scene towards the end of the book though where she has a slight softening towards Celestine, so she might be coming around a bit. We'll have to see where her story goes in the next book.

Do we know from what time she is from? Like is it possible she is the oldest inquisitor currently alive? The Ordo Hereticus inquisition was formed after the Heresy correct? Why is she referred to as the "Eye of the Emperor"? Did the emperor himself bestow that title upon her?

 WE Drake Man wrote:
Is it possible the mysterious character at the end is Trazyn (Or it's a Primarch, but that would be lame) taking Creed as part of his collection as payment for his help? Also I'm going to take a shot in the dark and guess that the artefact onboard Cawl's ship is Garviel Loken, somehow kept alive all this time (or its a Primarch, but that would be LAME! Seriously everything these days is Primarch this, Primarch that; we need a bit more diversity here GW).

Yeah, kind of hoping Trazyn puts Creed in status and has greater plans for him. Like perhaps he will be needed for the defense of Terra?

Iracundus wrote:

Commissar Benny wrote:
Great read. First impressions:

* There were only 850 million people defending Cadia? Can we all pause and consider how absolutely ridiculous that number is? The most fortified planet outside of Terra, at the Eye of Terror has 850 million defenders? GW would have been better not citing any number at all. At the very least, Cadia would have had tens of billions. Fact. Again, not to be a dick but where are all the defenders on Cadia? Armageddon has like x10 the number of people involved in the 2nd War of Armageddon and somehow Cadia the best defended planet next to Terra has like...no one? I think the most irritating part of this is I barely know most of the lore, yet this seems like pretty common sense stuff that should not have been overlooked.

GW has never been good with numbers. However at least the old Codex Eye of Terror made an attempt. It listed Cadia as 71.75% under arms (though then inexplicably gave the population as 250 million rather than 850 million like the 3.5 edition Codex: CSM). Assuming that was a typo and the population is 850 million, that means 609.875 million under arms, or something like 76, 234 regiments if the Cadian 8th's 8,000 is used as a benchmark (as it is given as a typical infantry regiment).

Codex: Eye of Terror gave a partial listing of forces in the 13th Black Crusade. On the Imperial side for Cadians alone, it listed 612 Cadian regiments, 16 Regional Commands of Cadian Youth Army (I'm guessing Whiteshields), and 486 companies of Kaskin. There were many other forces listed from elsewhere.

Now it seems Fall of Cadia is more concerned with characters and "forging a narrative" rather than trying to represent a large war, so it seems to only list characters without even bothering to try and pretend the rank and file units matter.

It just seems kind of like something that would be difficult to overlook. If we are to take this new lore at face value than that means Cadia has 7 times less defenders than present day earth? Yet it is the 2nd most defensive planet in all of the Imperium and the IG is reknown for its greatest resource being body count but Cadia can't even muster the population of earth? I love the direction they are headed with the character development, but stuff like this really breaks immersion and makes it difficult to really gage with any real accuracy how massive these wars really are.

The Cadia system consisted of multiple planets. The names though not the populations for these were given out in the past.

Going out from the sun in the star system:

Prosan - Hostile environment training world
Korolis - Promethian weapons grade atomic materials produced here
Kasr Sonnen - Fortress world
Cadia - lynchpin fortress world of sector
Kasr Holn - Fortress world
Macharia - Militarised hive world
Vigilatum - Naval training world
Kasr Partox - Fortress world
St. Josmane's Hope - Military prison
Solar Mariatus - Source of much war materiel


In the old Eye of Terror campaign, Macharia was destroyed by the Planet Killer and St. Josmane's Hope was destroyed by an Inquisition mission after it fell to a combination of Chaos attack and prison uprising. The destruction of St. Josmane's Hope seems to have been canonized (though the exact circumstances may have been altered) as there has been a reference to its destruction on p.17 Codex Skitarii under the entry for Agripinaa forge world.

I don't like how it looks like there's going to be an alliance between imperials and xenos.

What happened to "in the grim darkness of the far future, there is only war"? Stop trying to make 40k noblebright, GW.

SeanDrake wrote:

 gummyofallbears wrote:
wait wait wait, what happened to the firehowlers???

As the main Great Company I play, I will be pretty angry to get screwed over again.

I like the fact that they are advancing the story though, not as bad as I thought.

Good news as they had an important mission and part in the story and succeeded.


The bad news is it was a suicide mission.... My condolences on joining Tomb Kings,Squats and good rules/fluff.

Only that tomb kings are still a thing in AoS. The crimson kings of the obsidian dynasty is basically tomb kings by another name.



There's other mentions of them though a few more books.

That may be the worst piece of fiction I have witnessed.

Sure, this is a recap, so missing some fleshing out, what we have is the bare bones of the story. That being said it is dreadful, and reeks of bad fan-fiction.

Maybe that 850 million is all that's left of the defenders as the story starts? Considering as they stated they were literally defending the last area of the planet, could be that they only gave the number of people left from the years that Cadia has been under assault?

Definitely Trazyn who took Creed towards the end there, potentially have him restored with Cybernetics to assist in the defence of Terra with legions of the lost Pariahs!!!! (Yeah never going to happen but meh)

KalexKurosaki wrote:
Maybe that 850 million is all that's left of the defenders as the story starts? Considering as they stated they were literally defending the last area of the planet, could be that they only gave the number of people left from the years that Cadia has been under assault?

Definitely Trazyn who took Creed towards the end there, potentially have him restored with Cybernetics to assist in the defence of Terra with legions of the lost Pariahs!!!! (Yeah never going to happen but meh)

Necron Cyborg Creed better have the ability to summon Baneblades anywhere on the table. He is a Tactical Genius after all.

Sgt. Cortez wrote:

And what's up with Belakor + Iron Warriors not being able to kill a handful of Imperial Fist recruits?! That part sounds pretty bad, they should have died, all of them. It's okay that they defend against Chaos a bit, but they should have died nevertheless.

But isn't Belakor literally cursed to never succeed now? Once the favored of all 4 chaos gods, now spurned by all 4?

 Vulkan Fran'cis wrote:
So who was the scaled warrior at the end....hmmm at first I think Vulkan? but the laughing at someone on deaths door step doesnt really fit him.

Wasn't that what happened to Settra?

is Baroness Varda the first named female Knight commander in a codex (rather than BL?)

re the plot - fun read of the synopsis - thanks much to the OP and good to hear that the Sororitas were kicking ass.

I like Trazyn - a lot more than Eldread who seems to more and more like End Times Teclis - who was a complete tool.

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
I don't like how it looks like there's going to be an alliance between imperials and xenos.

What happened to "in the grim darkness of the far future, there is only war"? Stop trying to make 40k noblebright, GW.

An alliance isn't Noble bright, it's common sense now that the eye is three times bigger and the imperium can't contain it alone. Continuing to fight wouldn't be grimdark, it would just be more face palm stupidity. Personally I've been waiting for this for ages. And it's not like the alliance means no more fighting, they're still bigoted towards each Other and there are still pirates. There is still only war in the grim darkness of the 41st millenium, the Eldar and imperium are simply focusing on other threats at the moment.

Commissar Benny wrote:
* What is Trazyn's stake in all this? Isn't the necrons like primary objective to wipe out all life in the galaxy? Why the hell does he care? Chaos cannot exist without life. If there is no one alive suffering, depressed, lustful etcetera then Chaos ceases to exist. He has pokeballs with people in stasis? Interesting.

That's oldcrons, newcrons have their lords having their own little quirks and stuff and they do what they want with their dynasty of mindless skelebots. Trazyn's thing is he goes around the universe stealing things to add to his great museum. So his motivation is a mix of "they're breaking my stuff", "I felt like it today" and "I could get new shinies, I love new shinies".

 n0t_u wrote:

Commissar Benny wrote:
* What is Trazyn's stake in all this? Isn't the necrons like primary objective to wipe out all life in the galaxy? Why the hell does he care? Chaos cannot exist without life. If there is no one alive suffering, depressed, lustful etcetera then Chaos ceases to exist. He has pokeballs with people in stasis? Interesting.

That's oldcrons, newcrons have their lords having their own little quirks and stuff and they do what they want with their dynasty of mindless skelebots. Trazyn's thing is he goes around the universe stealing things to add to his great museum. So his motivation is a mix of "they're breaking my stuff", "I felt like it today" and "I could get new shinies, I love new shinies".

That, and technically Chaos's goal was never to wipe out all life, imo. It was more to merge the Immaterium with the Materium, thus giving their gods an even greater realm as well as direct access to souls.
Necrons hate that. Both the old and the new. The old hated it because their gods can't exist in the warp, and as super lawful evil robots, chaos makes them angry.
The new hates it because that would really screw up their yard, and those damn chaos brats should learn to keep off of it.

For the record, it couldn't have been anyone but Trazyn capturing Creed. It was a metal hand and a scaled cloak. Who else would fit that description?

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
I don't like how it looks like there's going to be an alliance between imperials and xenos.

What happened to "in the grim darkness of the far future, there is only war"? Stop trying to make 40k noblebright, GW.

I'm pretty sure you're getting 'grimdark' confused with 'making pants-on-head-stupid decisions and getting yourself killed.'

If grimdark can only come about through every single person on the order side being just the dumbest mouthbreathers to ever walk the materium, you can keep it.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 stonehorse wrote:
That may be the worst piece of fiction I have witnessed.

Sure, this is a recap, so missing some fleshing out, what we have is the bare bones of the story. That being said it is dreadful, and reeks of bad fan-fiction.

I don't know, making snap judgements of fluff I also haven't read I'd say it was way better than all the fluff from 2nd ed all the way up through early 6th.

ERJAK wrote:

 CthuluIsSpy wrote:
I don't like how it looks like there's going to be an alliance between imperials and xenos.

What happened to "in the grim darkness of the far future, there is only war"? Stop trying to make 40k noblebright, GW.

I'm pretty sure you're getting 'grimdark' confused with 'making pants-on-head-stupid decisions and getting yourself killed.'

If grimdark can only come about through every single person on the order side being just the dumbest mouthbreathers to ever walk the materium, you can keep it.

That was exactly what happened though with that last Eldar/Deathwatch release. When given the choice between working with the Eldar or letting Chaos take over the galaxy, the Deathwatch member chose the latter and shot the Eldar.

Of course that kind of facepalming stupidity is probably also why the Eldar don't think humans can be trusted to handle the truth and instead have to be manipulated.

Gotta say, even though this is a just a plot summary, and thus not indicative of the writing quality as a whole... this sounds awful.

Like... Naruto-First Story-Slash Fic-Highschool AU-fanfic bad.

I... don't think I'll be picking this one up, at least not based on this thread.

 TheoreticalFish wrote:

 Formosa wrote:

 godardc wrote:
What do you think Cawl's artifact, in the triaros, is ?

Davin, horus, Anathame

Wasn't that taken by Fulgrim and Lucius?

Edit: So, taken by Fulgrim, fuzziness happens, Erebus somehow ends up with it at Macragge. Breaks off 8 shards which are powerful. Then Fulgrim retrieves it, takes it to a planet and uses it to become a Demon in Angel Exterminatus. After that, nothing

The Murder Sword relic in the CSM codex is implied to be the Anathame.

Commissar Benny wrote:
* What is Trazyn's stake in all this? Isn't the necrons like primary objective to wipe out all life in the galaxy? Why the hell does he care? Chaos cannot exist without life. If there is no one alive suffering, depressed, lustful etcetera then Chaos ceases to exist. He has pokeballs with people in stasis? Interesting.

* What is in Cawl's possession?

As covered a bit above, Necrons were retcon’d by Ward a couple of codex ago. Lore is now, “Back in the old days, they were working for the C’tan, who wanted to eat all the souls. But then they turned on their masters, shattered them into less powerful fragments of their former godlike selves, and captured them in tesseract pokeballs. After gaining their independence, Necrons are now mostly concerned with reconquering all their old worlds they lost when they went into hibernation 64 million years ago.”
That being said, there ARE still Necron worlds out there whose central programing has been corrupted and they still think they're working for the C'tan harvesting souls and cleansing all life from the Galaxy. Trazyn is not one of those guys. He's pretty neutral, compared to most Necrons (even if he is kind of a troll). Mostly he just likes collecting rare things in his stasis tesseract pokeballs (even if those things are entire imperial regiments). It's rumored that he has a primarch in his collection… that could be what Cawl got.

Regardless,

-Metal giant
-Scaled cloak
-Doesn’t want Creed to die/wants to keep him around for eternity
-Laughing

… Yep, sounds like Trazyn to me!
(Would have made a fine addition to his collection)

01000111 01101111 01110100 01100011 01101000 01100001 00100001 00100000 01000011 01010010 01000101 01000101 01000100 00100000 01110111 01100001 01110011 00100000 01100011 01100001 01110101 01100111 01101000 01110100 00100001

snipers from the long dead Tanith

HA, Tanith Boys are back in the game! Sadly, they are just a honorable mention :(

Anyone got their hands on a copy yet?

Love the summary and its wittiness. Not sure if its great fluff but I have never been one to take the 40k fluff seriously so I'm ok with cheesy abridged summaries and not needing the super serious fluff.

I am concerned though with how things will go in terms of factions "teaming up". Primarily I want the Orks involved with things more than just being some backdrop mooks but I also don't want them to end up being some other faction's puppet or teaming up (for more than a few minutes). All this fighting has got to draw the attention of some Warbosses or perhaps even some Freebootas *hint* *hint* *hint* (GW get on this) who want to show up for some good times, loot. and maybe the opportunity to kick in teef of some of the more insufferable gitz in the galaxy.

 n0t_u wrote:

Commissar Benny wrote:
* What is Trazyn's stake in all this? Isn't the necrons like primary objective to wipe out all life in the galaxy? Why the hell does he care? Chaos cannot exist without life. If there is no one alive suffering, depressed, lustful etcetera then Chaos ceases to exist. He has pokeballs with people in stasis? Interesting.

That's oldcrons, newcrons have their lords having their own little quirks and stuff and they do what they want with their dynasty of mindless skelebots. Trazyn's thing is he goes around the universe stealing things to add to his great museum. So his motivation is a mix of "they're breaking my stuff", "I felt like it today" and "I could get new shinies, I love new shinies".

This made me laugh alot more than it should

All these people thinking that Loken is the "Artifact"... I wouldn't count on that.

Abaddon has heard Loken's name a bunch of times since Davin. Like, hundreds of times probably. They still were Luna Wolves for a few campaigns after Davin, and Mournival brothers besides. Then Loken came back in the Horus Heresy book "Vengeful Spirit" and confronted Horus and the Mournival again as a Knight Errant (which is believed to be the basis for the Grey Knights) so it seems very unlikely to be Loken.

I can't begin to guess what the Artifact is, but I can certainly guess what it isn't.

Just finished. That was pretty damned superb if you ask me!

Wait,

A Chaos Baneblade is wrecking havoc amongst the Cadians, and the Black Templars rally to try and stop it and just as it swings its guns around to blow them away it suddenly freezes... and turns around and starts shooting the Chaos Forces... no-one notices a sneaky Necron Lord lurking about....

Was that supposed to be Trazyn controlling the Baneblade?
Because that ability sounds like Mind In The Machine.
But Trazyn doesn't have that ability. That's one of Anrakyr's abilities.
Surely it's not suggesting he was there, too, right?
(Trazyn I can easily see helping other races. But Anrakyr? Not a chance).

 skoffs wrote:
Wait,

A Chaos Baneblade is wrecking havoc amongst the Cadians, and the Black Templars rally to try and stop it and just as it swings its guns around to blow them away it suddenly freezes... and turns around and starts shooting the Chaos Forces... no-one notices a sneaky Necron Lord lurking about....

Was that supposed to be Trazyn controlling the Baneblade?
Because that ability sounds like Mind In The Machine.
But Trazyn doesn't have that ability. That's one of Anrakyr's abilities.
Surely it's not suggesting he was there, too, right?
(Trazyn I can easily see helping other races. But Anrakyr? Not a chance).

I can easily see Trazyn nicking off Anrakyr's skill.

 skoffs wrote:
Wait,

A Chaos Baneblade is wrecking havoc amongst the Cadians, and the Black Templars rally to try and stop it and just as it swings its guns around to blow them away it suddenly freezes... and turns around and starts shooting the Chaos Forces... no-one notices a sneaky Necron Lord lurking about....

Was that supposed to be Trazyn controlling the Baneblade?
Because that ability sounds like Mind In The Machine.
But Trazyn doesn't have that ability. That's one of Anrakyr's abilities.
Surely it's not suggesting he was there, too, right?
(Trazyn I can easily see helping other races. But Anrakyr? Not a chance).

Definitely Trazyn.

But not Mind In The Machine it would seem....but Mind Shackle Scarabs.

 jifel wrote:
Eldrad is not dead in current continuity. Yes he dies in the original campaign, but it appears they have backtracked us behind that point and started over, and so at the moment he is alive. But, I would hope that in the future of this campaign he dies again, preferably when Slaanesh eventually gets a GD kit and rules.

Its a complete redo of the eye of terror campaign.

As usual Wards retcon necron dex fethed up the entire story so crashing the black stone fortress into Cadia gets them out of the way for future stories. Plus if you're not being made into a plastic model you will get phased out. Kell and Creed is such an example. Eldrad however is in plastic so he'll keep going until they blow up the universe and set the clock back in 8th ed and start over/ for some reason have bubbles of reality bumping into each other like AoS.

The signs are there, Imperials getting lumped together in a very orderly fashion, a grand alliance if you will.

 TheIronCrow wrote:

 jifel wrote:
Eldrad is not dead in current continuity. Yes he dies in the original campaign, but it appears they have backtracked us behind that point and started over, and so at the moment he is alive. But, I would hope that in the future of this campaign he dies again, preferably when Slaanesh eventually gets a GD kit and rules.

Its a complete redo of the eye of terror campaign.

As usual Wards retcon necron dex fethed up the entire story so crashing the black stone fortress into Cadia gets them out of the way for future stories. Plus if you're not being made into a plastic model you will get phased out. Kell and Creed is such an example. Eldrad however is in plastic so he'll keep going until they blow up the universe and set the clock back in 8th ed and start over/ for some reason have bubbles of reality bumping into each other like AoS.

The signs are there, Imperials getting lumped together in a very orderly fashion, a grand alliance if you will.

Except, you know, those bubbles are called "planets" (bigger even than the Old World but they have been confirmed to be planets for quite a while). Creed may very well come back, though.

So Cadia is not totally destroyed? I mean the planet it still there? And Creed lives?

Agiel wrote:
Is it also possible that the Shadowseer Cawl speaks with is...

Spoiler:

Lhaerial Rey from the Beast Arises? The last book has half a paragraph explaining that Weinand freed her from the Inquisitorial Fortress, hoping that someday she and the Eldar would return the favour.

Granted _most_ Eldar have a lifespan of a thousand years give or take and that storyline took place *ahem* over nine thousand years ago, but particularly powerful psykers like Eldrad can live for far longer than that, and time probably passes differently in the Webway and someone could step into it and come out after centuries have passed and look like they haven't aged a day.


*EDIT* Never mind, a teaser image from GW seems to confirm that was in fact Sylandri Veilwalker. She's rapidly turning into the G-Man of the 40K universe:

Orven Highfell Wolf Lord of the Ironwolves...when did Edgil Ironwolf buy the farm?

 Dakka Wolf wrote:

Agiel wrote:
Is it also possible that the Shadowseer Cawl speaks with is...

Spoiler:

Lhaerial Rey from the Beast Arises? The last book has half a paragraph explaining that Weinand freed her from the Inquisitorial Fortress, hoping that someday she and the Eldar would return the favour.

Granted _most_ Eldar have a lifespan of a thousand years give or take and that storyline took place *ahem* over nine thousand years ago, but particularly powerful psykers like Eldrad can live for far longer than that, and time probably passes differently in the Webway and someone could step into it and come out after centuries have passed and look like they haven't aged a day.


*EDIT* Never mind, a teaser image from GW seems to confirm that was in fact Sylandri Veilwalker. She's rapidly turning into the G-Man of the 40K universe:

Orven Highfell Wolf Lord of the Ironwolves...when did Edgil Ironwolf buy the farm?

When does the assault on Fenris take place in regards to this? Because Egil was on Midgardia at the time.

Typo? Wolf Guard Battle Leader?

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

 skoffs wrote:
Wait,

A Chaos Baneblade is wrecking havoc amongst the Cadians, and the Black Templars rally to try and stop it and just as it swings its guns around to blow them away it suddenly freezes... and turns around and starts shooting the Chaos Forces... no-one notices a sneaky Necron Lord lurking about....

Was that supposed to be Trazyn controlling the Baneblade?
Because that ability sounds like Mind In The Machine.
But Trazyn doesn't have that ability. That's one of Anrakyr's abilities.
Surely it's not suggesting he was there, too, right?
(Trazyn I can easily see helping other races. But Anrakyr? Not a chance).

Definitely Trazyn.

But not Mind In The Machine it would seem....but Mind Shackle Scarabs.

I guess...
(he does have that wargear)
Though I really wish they would have showcased some of his abilities more. Particularly Empathetic Obliterator (whacks one daemon, suddenly all the other daemons around it die, too. Everyone looks at him like "...wtf was THAT?!")

Spoilers about Egil:

 Matt.Kingsley wrote:
Spoilers about Egil:

Spoiler:

He dies in the events of Wrath of Magnus. He basically takes an attack from Magnus that was meant for Logan, losing his life to protect his leader.

Must have forgotten that. Busy laughing at Grimnar getting backhanded.

I'd almost forgotten it too tbh, though for a different reason (Logan using a Khorne-empowered daemon weapon in front of the GK and the =][= and not even getting a slap on the wrist for it).

 Matt.Kingsley wrote:
I'd almost forgotten it too tbh, though for a different reason (Logan using a Khorne-empowered daemon weapon in front of the GK and the =][= and not even getting a slap on the wrist for it).

Take your pick of distractions - like the Cadian distress call.

One thing I haven't seen discussed much is the "robed" pre-Heresy Astartes attacking the Skitarii on Agripinaa (p.68)...is this supposed to be a shout-out to Cypher?

 GoonBandito wrote:
Creed stands alone on the ruined surface of Cadia, and watches as the last Mechanicum ship lifts off into the sky. Cadia was now little more than a graveyard. He felt his strength ebbing away, as his wounds finally caught up with him. The storm parts before him, but not a Demon stands before him. A metal giant in a scaled cloak. Creed's panicked shot goes wide as iridescent polygons flicker on the figures upraised palm, "Ursarkar E. Creed. This need not be your end. Eternity awaits." The giant's laughter follows Creed into darkness....

Who might this be?

Lionheart713 wrote:

 GoonBandito wrote:
Creed stands alone on the ruined surface of Cadia, and watches as the last Mechanicum ship lifts off into the sky. Cadia was now little more than a graveyard. He felt his strength ebbing away, as his wounds finally caught up with him. The storm parts before him, but not a Demon stands before him. A metal giant in a scaled cloak. Creed's panicked shot goes wide as iridescent polygons flicker on the figures upraised palm, "Ursarkar E. Creed. This need not be your end. Eternity awaits." The giant's laughter follows Creed into darkness....

Who might this be?

-Metal giant
-Scaled cloak
-Doesn’t want Creed to die/wants to keep him around for eternity
-Laughing

Trazyn.

Actually, looking through that link, it seems he's been pretty busy in other armies books.
Hadn't been aware of this.
What else has he been up to lately?
(I know he's known for disguising himself as people from other races and using Mindshackle Scarabs on people around the galaxy just to be able to score his loot, but I never realized he was supposed to be making cameos in other books as much as he apparently has. He's now the best thing Ward did to the 'Crons, imo)

So what I've learned, is that this really isn't the retcon of Eye of Terror many feared/claimed.

If anything, the outcome is far worse for the Imperium. Cadia is gone (its ambiguous whether it's about to become a new Daemon World, or if it didn't survive its cataclysm?). Abdaddon is ascendant. The Phalanx needs a lot of shop time. The Eye is expanding (and seemingly, has a corridor all the way to Terra, thanks to the preceding 12 Black Crusades)

And that's something interesting, it seems the Pylons aren't just on Cadia, and indeed never have been. Instead they may be dotted about the Galaxy as a whiole, preventing warp breaches from occurring, or at least spreading.

Which raises some interesting questions. How big can a warp breach become without their influence? Is Abaddon barking up the wrong tree with this, taking it purely on faith that The Eye will spread a tendril all the way to Holy Terra? How much does it actually matter to his wider goal?

And is it possible for new Pylons to be erected? Seems it's well beyond the Mechanicus - but Eldar and Necron? Who knows? Can they be shipped in from other planets to reinforce key areas?

Really looking forward to the next instalment,


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 buddha wrote:
Trazyn throwing poke balls full of imperial soldiers is officially the best piece of fluff ever.

Yup! I really enjoyed that bit. Plus, it's given me a new angle on my planned birthday Apocalypse game in June (which we'll be playing at Warhammer World, because Birthday).

Originally planned as a Heresy event, Trazyn's shenanigans have now laid a seed for a potential 30k/40k mashup, especially as my Heresy force is a Loyalist Iron Warrior Garrison. All I need add to their description is 'that mysteriously disappeared, with no trace of their fate'

Is there any guess what the hell is in in the Ad Mec stasis chamber that is making Abbaddon so crazy about it?

Iracundus wrote:
That was exactly what happened though with that last Eldar/Deathwatch release. When given the choice between working with the Eldar or letting Chaos take over the galaxy, the Deathwatch member chose the latter and shot the Eldar.

Of course that kind of facepalming stupidity is probably also why the Eldar don't think humans can be trusted to handle the truth and instead have to be manipulated.

Brainwashed super soldier who has spent decades hunting and killing Xenos, doesn't trust a member of a species notorious for deception, when its allies are currently killing the local human population as a distraction for what ever warp spawned witchcraft they are up to? I is shocked

 DalinCriid wrote:
Is there any guess what the hell is in in the Ad Mec stasis chamber that is making Abbaddon so crazy about it?

All we know is that its a name that he hasn't heard since Davin.

So far the guesses are Anathame, Loken, or something we haven't heard of.

 DalinCriid wrote:
Is there any guess what the hell is in in the Ad Mec stasis chamber that is making Abbaddon so crazy about it?

Dildos. Lots of thick and black dildos.

 TheIronCrow wrote:

 DalinCriid wrote:
Is there any guess what the hell is in in the Ad Mec stasis chamber that is making Abbaddon so crazy about it?

All we know is that its a name that he hasn't heard since Davin.

So far the guesses are Anathame, Loken, or something we haven't heard of.

My first thoughts were back to the events in False Gods, and I was racking my brain trying to figure out what it could be (hence why I asked for speculation ). But then I realised, that wasn't when Horus "first stepped foot on Davin". Davin was originally brought to compliance in the 143rd year of the Great Crusade (60 years before Horus was struck down by the Anathame Blade on Davin's Moon) by the Luna Wolves and the Imperial Heralds, led by Horus himself - that's when he would have first stepped foot on Davin. This is where the concept of the Warrior Lodges (aka the Davinite Lodges) came from - being a key part of the tribes of Davin's cultures, and Horus being impressed with their courage in the face of a vastly superior foe. Davin was then left in the hands of the Imperial Heralds for re-education into the Imperial Truth, and clearly in the years between the XVIIth Legion - now known as the Word Bearers - had cultivated a following of the Primordial Truth amongst its tribes instead.

Now admittedly that's a rather obscure piece of fluff, but perhaps Abaddon is thinking back to something/someone to do with the original Warrior Lodges or the Word Bearers involvement in them that led to the path to Chaos?

 GoonBandito wrote:

 TheIronCrow wrote:

 DalinCriid wrote:
Is there any guess what the hell is in in the Ad Mec stasis chamber that is making Abbaddon so crazy about it?

All we know is that its a name that he hasn't heard since Davin.

So far the guesses are Anathame, Loken, or something we haven't heard of.

My first thoughts were back to the events in False Gods, and I was racking my brain trying to figure out what it could be (hence why I asked for speculation ). But then I realised, that wasn't when Horus "first stepped foot on Davin". Davin was originally brought to compliance in the 143rd year of the Great Crusade (60 years before Horus was struck down by the Anathame Blade on Davin's Moon) by the Luna Wolves and the Imperial Heralds, led by Horus himself - that's when he would have first stepped foot on Davin. This is where the concept of the Warrior Lodges (aka the Davinite Lodges) came from - being a key part of the tribes of Davin's cultures, and Horus being impressed with their courage in the face of a vastly superior foe. Davin was then left in the hands of the Imperial Heralds for re-education into the Imperial Truth, and clearly in the years between the XVIIth Legion - now known as the Word Bearers - had cultivated a following of the Primordial Truth amongst its tribes instead.

Now admittedly that's a rather obscure piece of fluff, but perhaps Abaddon is thinking back to something/someone to do with the original Warrior Lodges or the Word Bearers involvement in them that led to the path to Chaos?

Sooo Eerebus? He was one of the architects of the betrayal... but arent he on the same side as Abby?

Also why would Erebus be in stasis and in the hands of the Admec? If anyone in the know (in the imperium) got their hands on that corrupted git, there would be some serious purging happening one would think.

 gummyofallbears wrote:
wait wait wait, what happened to the firehowlers???

As the main Great Company I play, I will be pretty angry to get screwed over again.

I like the fact that they are advancing the story though, not as bad as I thought.

All wulfin. Pretty much wrecked/dead.

 chalkobob wrote:
Also why would Erebus be in stasis and in the hands of the Admec? If anyone in the know (in the imperium) got their hands on that corrupted git, there would be some serious purging happening one would think.

Then why it would be Loken? From an audio book it is known that Garo find him on Istvaan III and make him part of Deathwatch. Could it be Roboute Guilliman if GW plan to bring him back, but then I cannot recall Abbadon to have any personal agenda with him. Ultramarines have their official hate to the Word Bearers... I am actually thinking of Euphrati Keeler here. She is the first Saint of the Imperium and what happens to her is uknown after she joins the sisters of silence on the Moon of Earth.

 DalinCriid wrote:

 chalkobob wrote:
Also why would Erebus be in stasis and in the hands of the Admec? If anyone in the know (in the imperium) got their hands on that corrupted git, there would be some serious purging happening one would think.

Then why it would be Loken? From an audio book it is known that Garo find him on Istvaan III and make him part of Deathwatch. Could it be Roboute Guilliman if GW plan to bring him back, but then I cannot recall Abbadon to have any personal agenda with him. Ultramarines have their official hate to the Word Bearers... I am actually thinking of Euphrati Keeler here. She is the first Saint of the Imperium and what happens to her is uknown after she joins the sisters of silence on the Moon of Earth.

Guilliman has been in Ultramar for a very long time in his stasis field. That one is guaranteed not to be in Crawl's vault.

More than whatever Crawl is carrying, I'm dying of curiosity concerning the new Eldar: That red armored one, a mix between Eldar and Dark Eldar, uuhh, I want to know more, so very, very badly.

I know everyone is saying Yriel, but i'm hoping it's some kind of ancient pre-fall Eldar warrior that was awoken from a slumber somewhere. Unlikely though, still I can hope.

P.S I really don't like Yriel

 TheDraconicLord wrote:

 DalinCriid wrote:

 chalkobob wrote:
Also why would Erebus be in stasis and in the hands of the Admec? If anyone in the know (in the imperium) got their hands on that corrupted git, there would be some serious purging happening one would think.

Then why it would be Loken? From an audio book it is known that Garo find him on Istvaan III and make him part of Deathwatch. Could it be Roboute Guilliman if GW plan to bring him back, but then I cannot recall Abbadon to have any personal agenda with him. Ultramarines have their official hate to the Word Bearers... I am actually thinking of Euphrati Keeler here. She is the first Saint of the Imperium and what happens to her is uknown after she joins the sisters of silence on the Moon of Earth.

Guilliman has been in Ultramar for a very long time in his stasis field. That one is guaranteed not to be in Crawl's vault.

More than whatever Crawl is carrying, I'm dying of curiosity concerning the new Eldar: That red armored one, a mix between Eldar and Dark Eldar, uuhh, I want to know more, so very, very badly.

I think it (plus the hint on the Warhammer channel) it's implying that he's an Exodite.

Thanks a lot for the summary, GoonBandito!

I don't know what to think of the possibility of Great Alliances in 40K. I always liked the "yes, the 'not that bad' factions could possibly defeat chaos if they weren't too narrow-minded and/or arrogant to team-up." feeling. It just alludes to my sometimes misanthropic point of view. To have an Order Alliance or something like that doesn't fit to a dystopian fiction.

Could'nt that metal giant with a scaled cloak be a Alpha Legion Marine? Yes, Trazyn seems obvious, but why give us such an obvious hint? Seems to easy...

 Octavius Vorrak wrote:

Could'nt that metal giant with a scaled cloak be a Alpha Legion Marine? Yes, Trazyn seems obvious, but why give us such an obvious hint? Seems to easy...

Leading up to it, the book describes Trazyn as being hunting for a person to bring home from the battle directly before this happens, handling a Tesseract Labyrinth, and uses almost the exact words verbatim to describe him/the Labyrinth earlier in the book as it does in this passage with the scaled cloak bits.

HuskyWarhammer wrote:

 TheDraconicLord wrote:

 DalinCriid wrote:

 chalkobob wrote:
Also why would Erebus be in stasis and in the hands of the Admec? If anyone in the know (in the imperium) got their hands on that corrupted git, there would be some serious purging happening one would think.

Then why it would be Loken? From an audio book it is known that Garo find him on Istvaan III and make him part of Deathwatch. Could it be Roboute Guilliman if GW plan to bring him back, but then I cannot recall Abbadon to have any personal agenda with him. Ultramarines have their official hate to the Word Bearers... I am actually thinking of Euphrati Keeler here. She is the first Saint of the Imperium and what happens to her is uknown after she joins the sisters of silence on the Moon of Earth.

Guilliman has been in Ultramar for a very long time in his stasis field. That one is guaranteed not to be in Crawl's vault.

More than whatever Crawl is carrying, I'm dying of curiosity concerning the new Eldar: That red armored one, a mix between Eldar and Dark Eldar, uuhh, I want to know more, so very, very badly.

I think it (plus the hint on the Warhammer channel) it's implying that he's an Exodite.

Well I wish they could go im depth why Eldar and Dark Eldar are teaming up to aid the Imperials... What is driving them to do that? What kind of negotiations they've been tru with Commorgah, how they convised Vect to join them. etc etc. Now I can see Necron logic. They want the eye of terror shut so the Psychic races like Eldar and Humans can be weakened aldo Tarzyn want's to capture Abbaddon.

 DalinCriid wrote:

HuskyWarhammer wrote:

 TheDraconicLord wrote:

 DalinCriid wrote:

 chalkobob wrote:
Also why would Erebus be in stasis and in the hands of the Admec? If anyone in the know (in the imperium) got their hands on that corrupted git, there would be some serious purging happening one would think.

Then why it would be Loken? From an audio book it is known that Garo find him on Istvaan III and make him part of Deathwatch. Could it be Roboute Guilliman if GW plan to bring him back, but then I cannot recall Abbadon to have any personal agenda with him. Ultramarines have their official hate to the Word Bearers... I am actually thinking of Euphrati Keeler here. She is the first Saint of the Imperium and what happens to her is uknown after she joins the sisters of silence on the Moon of Earth.

Guilliman has been in Ultramar for a very long time in his stasis field. That one is guaranteed not to be in Crawl's vault.

More than whatever Crawl is carrying, I'm dying of curiosity concerning the new Eldar: That red armored one, a mix between Eldar and Dark Eldar, uuhh, I want to know more, so very, very badly.

I think it (plus the hint on the Warhammer channel) it's implying that he's an Exodite.

Well I wish they could go im depth why Eldar and Dark Eldar are teaming up to aid the Imperials... What is driving them to do that? What kind of negotiations they've been tru with Commorgah, how they convised Vect to join them. etc etc. Now I can see Necron logic. They want the eye of terror shut so the Psychic races like Eldar and Humans can be weakened aldo Tarzyn want's to capture Abbaddon.

I don't see how the Eye of Terror closing weakens anyone who isn't Chaos.

pm713 wrote:

 DalinCriid wrote:

HuskyWarhammer wrote:

 TheDraconicLord wrote:

 DalinCriid wrote:

 chalkobob wrote:
Also why would Erebus be in stasis and in the hands of the Admec? If anyone in the know (in the imperium) got their hands on that corrupted git, there would be some serious purging happening one would think.

Then why it would be Loken? From an audio book it is known that Garo find him on Istvaan III and make him part of Deathwatch. Could it be Roboute Guilliman if GW plan to bring him back, but then I cannot recall Abbadon to have any personal agenda with him. Ultramarines have their official hate to the Word Bearers... I am actually thinking of Euphrati Keeler here. She is the first Saint of the Imperium and what happens to her is uknown after she joins the sisters of silence on the Moon of Earth.

Guilliman has been in Ultramar for a very long time in his stasis field. That one is guaranteed not to be in Crawl's vault.

More than whatever Crawl is carrying, I'm dying of curiosity concerning the new Eldar: That red armored one, a mix between Eldar and Dark Eldar, uuhh, I want to know more, so very, very badly.

I think it (plus the hint on the Warhammer channel) it's implying that he's an Exodite.

Well I wish they could go im depth why Eldar and Dark Eldar are teaming up to aid the Imperials... What is driving them to do that? What kind of negotiations they've been tru with Commorgah, how they convised Vect to join them. etc etc. Now I can see Necron logic. They want the eye of terror shut so the Psychic races like Eldar and Humans can be weakened aldo Tarzyn want's to capture Abbaddon.

I don't see how the Eye of Terror closing weakens anyone who isn't Chaos.

Closing the Eye would only screw with Chaos.... but if enough Cadian Pylons were placed around and activated---- all warp powers could be shut down. So the Necrons would win the long war with the Eldar (without their powers they are nothing in comparison), and the Imperium suffers massively due to lack of functional Astropaths etc.

 Otto Weston wrote:

pm713 wrote:

 DalinCriid wrote:

HuskyWarhammer wrote:

 TheDraconicLord wrote:

 DalinCriid wrote:

 chalkobob wrote:
Also why would Erebus be in stasis and in the hands of the Admec? If anyone in the know (in the imperium) got their hands on that corrupted git, there would be some serious purging happening one would think.

Then why it would be Loken? From an audio book it is known that Garo find him on Istvaan III and make him part of Deathwatch. Could it be Roboute Guilliman if GW plan to bring him back, but then I cannot recall Abbadon to have any personal agenda with him. Ultramarines have their official hate to the Word Bearers... I am actually thinking of Euphrati Keeler here. She is the first Saint of the Imperium and what happens to her is uknown after she joins the sisters of silence on the Moon of Earth.

Guilliman has been in Ultramar for a very long time in his stasis field. That one is guaranteed not to be in Crawl's vault.

More than whatever Crawl is carrying, I'm dying of curiosity concerning the new Eldar: That red armored one, a mix between Eldar and Dark Eldar, uuhh, I want to know more, so very, very badly.

I think it (plus the hint on the Warhammer channel) it's implying that he's an Exodite.

Well I wish they could go im depth why Eldar and Dark Eldar are teaming up to aid the Imperials... What is driving them to do that? What kind of negotiations they've been tru with Commorgah, how they convised Vect to join them. etc etc. Now I can see Necron logic. They want the eye of terror shut so the Psychic races like Eldar and Humans can be weakened aldo Tarzyn want's to capture Abbaddon.

I don't see how the Eye of Terror closing weakens anyone who isn't Chaos.

Closing the Eye would only screw with Chaos.... but if enough Cadian Pylons were placed around and activated---- all warp powers could be shut down. So the Necrons would win the long war with the Eldar (without their powers they are nothing in comparison), and the Imperium suffers massively due to lack of functional Astropaths etc.

You'd have to place them all over the Galaxy for that so it's a pretty long shot. It's like saying if the Eldar place enough Firehearts they'll be the only faction left.

 DalinCriid wrote:

HuskyWarhammer wrote:

 TheDraconicLord wrote:

 DalinCriid wrote:

 chalkobob wrote:
Also why would Erebus be in stasis and in the hands of the Admec? If anyone in the know (in the imperium) got their hands on that corrupted git, there would be some serious purging happening one would think.

Then why it would be Loken? From an audio book it is known that Garo find him on Istvaan III and make him part of Deathwatch. Could it be Roboute Guilliman if GW plan to bring him back, but then I cannot recall Abbadon to have any personal agenda with him. Ultramarines have their official hate to the Word Bearers... I am actually thinking of Euphrati Keeler here. She is the first Saint of the Imperium and what happens to her is uknown after she joins the sisters of silence on the Moon of Earth.

Guilliman has been in Ultramar for a very long time in his stasis field. That one is guaranteed not to be in Crawl's vault.

More than whatever Crawl is carrying, I'm dying of curiosity concerning the new Eldar: That red armored one, a mix between Eldar and Dark Eldar, uuhh, I want to know more, so very, very badly.

I think it (plus the hint on the Warhammer channel) it's implying that he's an Exodite.

Well I wish they could go im depth why Eldar and Dark Eldar are teaming up to aid the Imperials... What is driving them to do that? What kind of negotiations they've been tru with Commorgah, how they convised Vect to join them. etc etc. Now I can see Necron logic. They want the eye of terror shut so the Psychic races like Eldar and Humans can be weakened aldo Tarzyn want's to capture Abbaddon.

Well, in the book Valedor, where prince Yriel teams up with the crafworlds AND Dark Eldar to destroy hive fleet Leviathan before they merge with the remnants of HF Kraken, creating "super-tyranids" that'd devour the galaxy, there's a vision of a giant battlefield, with Eldar from all craftworlds, exodites, Dark Eldar, MANKIND and other races standing united. Gods, long thought dead walking, all against legions of demons: The Rhana Dandra, the Final Battle.

Heck, it's Veilwalker who shows Yiriel this. Veilwalker has been working her ass off!

Which sword did Fulgrim use to drop Guilliman?

Cause if it was in fact the Anathame, the Harlequins might have the cure for its effects.

pm713 wrote:

 Otto Weston wrote:

pm713 wrote:

 DalinCriid wrote:

HuskyWarhammer wrote:

 TheDraconicLord wrote:

 DalinCriid wrote:

 chalkobob wrote:
Also why would Erebus be in stasis and in the hands of the Admec? If anyone in the know (in the imperium) got their hands on that corrupted git, there would be some serious purging happening one would think.

Then why it would be Loken? From an audio book it is known that Garo find him on Istvaan III and make him part of Deathwatch. Could it be Roboute Guilliman if GW plan to bring him back, but then I cannot recall Abbadon to have any personal agenda with him. Ultramarines have their official hate to the Word Bearers... I am actually thinking of Euphrati Keeler here. She is the first Saint of the Imperium and what happens to her is uknown after she joins the sisters of silence on the Moon of Earth.

Guilliman has been in Ultramar for a very long time in his stasis field. That one is guaranteed not to be in Crawl's vault.

More than whatever Crawl is carrying, I'm dying of curiosity concerning the new Eldar: That red armored one, a mix between Eldar and Dark Eldar, uuhh, I want to know more, so very, very badly.

I think it (plus the hint on the Warhammer channel) it's implying that he's an Exodite.

Well I wish they could go im depth why Eldar and Dark Eldar are teaming up to aid the Imperials... What is driving them to do that? What kind of negotiations they've been tru with Commorgah, how they convised Vect to join them. etc etc. Now I can see Necron logic. They want the eye of terror shut so the Psychic races like Eldar and Humans can be weakened aldo Tarzyn want's to capture Abbaddon.

I don't see how the Eye of Terror closing weakens anyone who isn't Chaos.

Closing the Eye would only screw with Chaos.... but if enough Cadian Pylons were placed around and activated---- all warp powers could be shut down. So the Necrons would win the long war with the Eldar (without their powers they are nothing in comparison), and the Imperium suffers massively due to lack of functional Astropaths etc.

You'd have to place them all over the Galaxy for that so it's a pretty long shot. It's like saying if the Eldar place enough Firehearts they'll be the only faction left.

We already know there WAS at least a chain of them stretching from Cadia towards Earth (Abaddon's plan being to spread the eye down this channel of destroyed pylon planets to Terra). Considering that the Eye didn't exist back when the Pylons were built by the Necrons and Terra wasn't even a backwater planet to them --- the existence of this chain means that the Pylons likely do exist across most of the Galaxy.

Potentially they only require proper activation --- like when Trazyn actually started shrinking the Eye and drove Psykers mad due to the lack of Warp presence on Cadia (in the new book).

Last I checked the Pylons were only on Cadia.

 TheDraconicLord wrote:

 DalinCriid wrote:

HuskyWarhammer wrote:

 TheDraconicLord wrote:

 DalinCriid wrote:

 chalkobob wrote:
Also why would Erebus be in stasis and in the hands of the Admec? If anyone in the know (in the imperium) got their hands on that corrupted git, there would be some serious purging happening one would think.

Then why it would be Loken? From an audio book it is known that Garo find him on Istvaan III and make him part of Deathwatch. Could it be Roboute Guilliman if GW plan to bring him back, but then I cannot recall Abbadon to have any personal agenda with him. Ultramarines have their official hate to the Word Bearers... I am actually thinking of Euphrati Keeler here. She is the first Saint of the Imperium and what happens to her is uknown after she joins the sisters of silence on the Moon of Earth.

Guilliman has been in Ultramar for a very long time in his stasis field. That one is guaranteed not to be in Crawl's vault.

More than whatever Crawl is carrying, I'm dying of curiosity concerning the new Eldar: That red armored one, a mix between Eldar and Dark Eldar, uuhh, I want to know more, so very, very badly.

I think it (plus the hint on the Warhammer channel) it's implying that he's an Exodite.

Well I wish they could go im depth why Eldar and Dark Eldar are teaming up to aid the Imperials... What is driving them to do that? What kind of negotiations they've been tru with Commorgah, how they convised Vect to join them. etc etc. Now I can see Necron logic. They want the eye of terror shut so the Psychic races like Eldar and Humans can be weakened aldo Tarzyn want's to capture Abbaddon.

Well, in the book Valedor, where prince Yriel teams up with the crafworlds AND Dark Eldar to destroy hive fleet Leviathan before they merge with the remnants of HF Kraken, creating "super-tyranids" that'd devour the galaxy, there's a vision of a giant battlefield, with Eldar from all craftworlds, exodites, Dark Eldar, MANKIND and other races standing united. Gods, long thought dead walking, all against legions of demons: The Rhana Dandra, the Final Battle.

Heck, it's Veilwalker who shows Yiriel this. Veilwalker has been working her ass off!

In the Harlequin codex, it references several times how they're the neutral/diplomatic Eldar faction and how they've arranged Craftworld/Dark alliances in the past, so it's not unheard of.

Fall of Cadia says that more planets have them and that each Crusade Abaddon has been destroying some of them. Apparently Cadia was the only world with functioning Pylons left.

pm713 wrote:
Last I checked the Pylons were only on Cadia.

Did you miss the part where Cawl was shown them on the other planet? (With the fight with the Orks?)

Still a better story than... Actually no. That's godawful even compared to sparkling vampires.

HuskyWarhammer wrote:

 TheDraconicLord wrote:

 DalinCriid wrote:

HuskyWarhammer wrote:

 TheDraconicLord wrote:

 DalinCriid wrote:

 chalkobob wrote:
Also why would Erebus be in stasis and in the hands of the Admec? If anyone in the know (in the imperium) got their hands on that corrupted git, there would be some serious purging happening one would think.

Then why it would be Loken? From an audio book it is known that Garo find him on Istvaan III and make him part of Deathwatch. Could it be Roboute Guilliman if GW plan to bring him back, but then I cannot recall Abbadon to have any personal agenda with him. Ultramarines have their official hate to the Word Bearers... I am actually thinking of Euphrati Keeler here. She is the first Saint of the Imperium and what happens to her is uknown after she joins the sisters of silence on the Moon of Earth.

Guilliman has been in Ultramar for a very long time in his stasis field. That one is guaranteed not to be in Crawl's vault.

More than whatever Crawl is carrying, I'm dying of curiosity concerning the new Eldar: That red armored one, a mix between Eldar and Dark Eldar, uuhh, I want to know more, so very, very badly.

I think it (plus the hint on the Warhammer channel) it's implying that he's an Exodite.

Well I wish they could go im depth why Eldar and Dark Eldar are teaming up to aid the Imperials... What is driving them to do that? What kind of negotiations they've been tru with Commorgah, how they convised Vect to join them. etc etc. Now I can see Necron logic. They want the eye of terror shut so the Psychic races like Eldar and Humans can be weakened aldo Tarzyn want's to capture Abbaddon.

Well, in the book Valedor, where prince Yriel teams up with the crafworlds AND Dark Eldar to destroy hive fleet Leviathan before they merge with the remnants of HF Kraken, creating "super-tyranids" that'd devour the galaxy, there's a vision of a giant battlefield, with Eldar from all craftworlds, exodites, Dark Eldar, MANKIND and other races standing united. Gods, long thought dead walking, all against legions of demons: The Rhana Dandra, the Final Battle.

Heck, it's Veilwalker who shows Yiriel this. Veilwalker has been working her ass off!

In the Harlequin codex, it references several times how they're the neutral/diplomatic Eldar faction and how they've arranged Craftworld/Dark alliances in the past, so it's not unheard of.

Oh, yeah, Emperor socks! I should have known that this is explained in some book released previously or 10 years ago

 skoffs wrote:

pm713 wrote:
Last I checked the Pylons were only on Cadia.

Did you miss the part where Cawl was shown them on the other planet? (With the fight with the Orks?)

Yeah, Crawl connects the dots and understand Abaddon's "failures" were several surgical strikes across the millenia that destroyed the Pylons in the other planets.
Crawl (and we) have no idea if Cadia's were the last ones, but considering how the Eye of Terror began expanding as soon as they were destroyed, we can assume they were at least the last active ones.

pm713 wrote:
Last I checked the Pylons were only on Cadia.

As far as I can recall there was one other Planet in the Eye of Terror Codex that had Pylons on. I'll have a look when I get in.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/392010.page

Look for "Sentinel Worlds" in that thread. There are pylons there.

40k story has continued past 13th Black Crusade, even when Creed fall into chaos in the end. at least when Cadia got Exterminatus from Chaos, Creed escapes instead of stay on Cadia with Warp Jump and he(along Cadian 8th) got one way ticket to the future where 40k universe got eaten by Kingdom hearts' Heartless

 CREEEEEEEEED wrote:
You know, when I first heard that Cadia fell, I was pretty annoyed. But after reading that. I'm just proud. (Proud of fictional characters. What has my life become?)

Creed's Pride did what Guardsmen do: They died STANDING. And they held the line with epic balls of steel. Imperial Guard fans have a reason to be proud. I know I am.


As for the Tactical Genius himself, I suspect that Trollzyn is saving him for a part to play later on in this little drama.

 oldravenman3025 wrote:
As for the Tactical Genius himself, I suspect that Trollzyn is saving him for a part to play later on in this little drama.

Or he could just be saving him for himself.
I'm sure he'd love nothing better than to proudly display the greatest tactical mind the imperium has ever had.
(and I'm sure he'd love to rub it in Zahndrekh's face... if the old coot were capable of comprehending what he was looking at).

 oldravenman3025 wrote:
As for the Tactical Genius himself, I suspect that Trollzyn is saving him for a part to play later on in this little drama.

Is Trazyn going to pull a tactical genius with the tactical genius?

https://regimental-standard.com/2017/01/18/cadia-another-imperial-victory/

Satire aside I quite enjoyed all of this and am delighted to see my beloved sisters have a role that isn't just punching bag. Have a tough time seeing sisters buddying it up with xenos in future though.

I quite enjoyed the story (Just finished it), but one question kept nagging at me:
Aren't Abaddon's resources starting to flagg just as much as the Imperiums?
Like, yeah, he started with a full Legion and not just a Company, (So, 10,000 marines, right? Or was it 20,000?) And presumably gets new recruits whenever other chapters fall to Chaos, but it still seems like he should be running out of resources considering how carelessly he spends them.

As a quick summary, here's what he loses:
An important general
One of the most powerful ships in the universe
An exceedingly high number of Marines
A Warlord Titan, and several Reavers and Warhounds

It's possible that the Titans could be salvaged with enough time, I'll admit, but that seems unlikely after the planet took an Orbital Bombardment on steroids.
It's also unclear exactly how many Chaos Space Marines die, but it's *at least* one for every loyalist, and the way it reads, it was probably a lot more. (For example, they get hit by full squads of Raptors, kill all of the attacks, and take 2-3 casualties, implying that they're dealing closer to 3:1 casualties, not including the losses inflicted by Guardsmen and Skitarii.)

In fact, based off of the written details, it really seems like Abaddon's asdault on Cadia cost him *at least* several thousand CSM. There were something like 800 Loyalist marines from the various chapters, (precise numbers are hard to come by,) and every scene featuring them included 2:1 or 3:1 losses at worst and 5:1 or more if you read it with an imperialist bias. Once you add in casualties from all the other sources, you've got a minimum of a couple thousand CSM dying, more likely to be 5,000 or so, and if we're estimating high then it could be as many as 10k.

Even if Abbadon has something ludicrous like 50,000 CSM, that's some really major losses. Maybe Cadia was worth it, but it really seems like that level of attrition wouldn't be sustainable.

Legion was in numbers of 6 digits. And also it's not like they don't make new ones...

Waaaghpower wrote:

As a quick summary, here's what he loses:
An important general
One of the most powerful ships in the universe
An exceedingly high number of Marines
A Warlord Titan, and several Reavers and Warhounds

The Daemon Prince? Can't he be resummoned?
The loss of the Blackstone Fortress is a significant blow.
I wouldn't assume that Chaos lost a lot more Marines than the Loyalists. There's often a perspective imbalance.
Not that many Titans for one of the most fortified worlds in the Imperium.

Also, Abaddon will likely be able to call on the services of the other Chaos forces now. Even if he doesn't directly command all of them they'll likely attack the Imperium anyway now that the Cadian Gate is broken open.

tneva82 wrote:
Legion was in numbers of 6 digits. And also it's not like they don't make new ones...

Okay, so I googled this - The sources are conflicting, but some do say upwards of 150-200k. Even so, that was pre-heresy - Nobody came out of that with their whole army intact. In fact, they would have taken the brunt of the casualties.

And yeah, CSM can theoretically make new marines, but not any more quickly than Astartes can. Those massive, massive casualties aren't going to disappear overnight.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

SomeRandomEvilGuy wrote:

Waaaghpower wrote:

As a quick summary, here's what he loses:
An important general
One of the most powerful ships in the universe
An exceedingly high number of Marines
A Warlord Titan, and several Reavers and Warhounds

The Daemon Prince? Can't he be resummoned?
The loss of the Blackstone Fortress is a significant blow.
I wouldn't be so quick to assume Chaos lost a lot more Marines than the Loyalists. There's often a perspective imbalance.
Not that many Titans for one of the most fortified worlds in the Imperium.

Also, Abaddon will likely be able to call on the services of the other Chaos forces now. Even if he doesn't directly command all of them they'll likely attack the Imperium anyway now that the Cadian Gate is broken open.

The Daemon Prince can probably be resummoned, but he just got his ass handed to him while Khorne was juicing him with every boon he could throw at him. He's a disappointment to his patron. That Prince isn't going to be an asset going forward.
And... I'd call it a perspective imbalance if it wasn't for the fact that we get told about pretty much every loyalist's death, (in general terms, if not specific,) and it's always accompanied by mentions of the tons of casualties they inflicted.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also keeping in mind that this happened just after the other events of the rest of the 13th Crusade - An exact time is not given, but it can't be more than a year or two, tops, given the events that take place. Abbadon has NOT had the time to replenish his forces from the prior events of the Crusade.

Has anyone mentioned in the thread that the mysterious eldar at the end could in fact be one of the Eldar from before the fall?

That there might be time travel afoot in the next book

 oldravenman3025 wrote:

 CREEEEEEEEED wrote:
You know, when I first heard that Cadia fell, I was pretty annoyed. But after reading that. I'm just proud. (Proud of fictional characters. What has my life become?)

Creed's Pride did what Guardsmen do: They died STANDING. And they held the line with epic balls of steel. Imperial Guard fans have a reason to be proud. I know I am.


As for the Tactical Genius himself, I suspect that Trollzyn is saving him for a part to play later on in this little drama.

Trollzyn is all about recreating major historical events. Trollzyn cares less about saving the imperium then he does preserving the moment. And no imperial represents cadia more then creed. Trollzyn likely kept what was left of the 8th and creed and a bunch of CSM black legion in a stasis room in mock battle and poor trollzyn is just missing his abaddon action figure to finish his set.

Wait, does that mean Trazyn is a wargamer? What if this some sort of necron pass time, and Trazyn is a TFG who goes out of the way to get the more powerful people he can find so he can win every game?

 Latro_ wrote:
That there might be time travel afoot in the next book

Doubtful. The only thing close to time travel (outside Black Library stuff) is skipping over years due to being in the Eye/Warp.

Check out the Ordo Chronos...

SomeRandomEvilGuy wrote:

Waaaghpower wrote:

As a quick summary, here's what he loses:
An important general
One of the most powerful ships in the universe
An exceedingly high number of Marines
A Warlord Titan, and several Reavers and Warhounds

The Daemon Prince? Can't he be resummoned?
The loss of the Blackstone Fortress is a significant blow.
I wouldn't assume that Chaos lost a lot more Marines than the Loyalists. There's often a perspective imbalance.
Not that many Titans for one of the most fortified worlds in the Imperium.

Also, Abaddon will likely be able to call on the services of the other Chaos forces now. Even if he doesn't directly command all of them they'll likely attack the Imperium anyway now that the Cadian Gate is broken open.

Marines knocked out doesnt not mean marines killed. With Chaos winning and having control of the skies, many of those marines that were knocked out can be brought back.
The IoM wounded were left on the planet and died.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Waaaghpower wrote:

tneva82 wrote:
Legion was in numbers of 6 digits. And also it's not like they don't make new ones...

Okay, so I googled this - The sources are conflicting, but some do say upwards of 150-200k. Even so, that was pre-heresy - Nobody came out of that with their whole army intact. In fact, they would have taken the brunt of the casualties.

And yeah, CSM can theoretically make new marines, but not any more quickly than Astartes can. Those massive, massive casualties aren't going to disappear overnight.

Hon'sou and Fabulous bill can make new marines in hours. Abby might not be able to match that, but replacing losses isnt necessarily slower than the IoM.

His point still stands. If the next couple world's put up even half as much of fight as Cadia then Abbadon's got nowhere near enough to contest the Imperium long term.

That said, this was probably just author indulgence and Abby will have as much as he needs for the plot.

Audustum wrote:
His point still stands. If the next couple world's put up even half as much of fight as Cadia then Abbadon's got nowhere near enough to contest the Imperium long term.

That said, this was probably just author indulgence and Abby will have as much as he needs for the plot.

Could easily be made up for by including a few other parts of the crusade.

Cadia is a system, of which Cadia Prime is the key defense work that protects several other fortress planets. It is what was just destroyed, and with it gone the rest of the worlds could fall to Chaos very easily.

Similarly with the Cadian gate now open, Chaos can pour into lightly defended sectors of the galaxy very easily and inflict substantial losses on the IoM without much risk to their own. They could also raid and pillage some forge or hive worlds gaining valuable supplies.

Now they probably wont write about it, but we should probably assume that Cadia falling wasnt the only losses the IoM suffered.

@Exergy:
I have a hard time believing that a Black Templar or Space Wolf clubbed a Legionairre over the head, knocked him out, and walked away. Both because that wouldn't hurt a Space Marine, and because the weapons being used were explosives and chainsaws. They didn'y get shot in the head, they had a small grenade blow up inside their skull. They didn't get stabbed, they got eviscerated.

Waaaghpower wrote:

The Daemon Prince can probably be resummoned, but he just got his ass handed to him while Khorne was juicing him with every boon he could throw at him. He's a disappointment to his patron. That Prince isn't going to be an asset going forward.
And... I'd call it a perspective imbalance if it wasn't for the fact that we get told about pretty much every loyalist's death, (in general terms, if not specific,) and it's always accompanied by mentions of the tons of casualties they inflicted.

Wasn't he beaten by Saint Celestine? Khorne doesn't seem that harsh on those who fail him actually. An'ggrath the Unbound died to an Inquisitor on Vraks and is seemingly still top dog.
Maybe Chaos did take a lot more casualties than the Loyalists. They were still assaulting a fortress world and have thrown the gates wide open to vast Chaos incursions. Plus Cadia can't be retaken.

Breotan wrote:Doubtful. The only thing close to time travel (outside Black Library stuff) is skipping over years due to being in the Eye/Warp.

One Necron in particular is very good at time travel. Orikan the Diviner. It tends to lead to unexpected problems though. Plus he can see the future.

Waaaghpower wrote:I have a hard time believing that a Black Templar or Space Wolf clubbed a Legionairre over the head, knocked him out, and walked away. Both because that wouldn't hurt a Space Marine, and because the weapons being used were explosives and chainsaws. They didn'y get shot in the head, they had a small grenade blow up inside their skull. They didn't get stabbed, they got eviscerated.

Space Marines are renowned for going into coma-like states when severely wounded, being recovered and becoming combat ready again after medical treatment.

SomeRandomEvilGuy wrote:

Waaaghpower wrote:I have a hard time believing that a Black Templar or Space Wolf clubbed a Legionairre over the head, knocked him out, and walked away. Both because that wouldn't hurt a Space Marine, and because the weapons being used were explosives and chainsaws. They didn'y get shot in the head, they had a small grenade blow up inside their skull. They didn't get stabbed, they got eviscerated.

Space Marines are renowned for going into coma-like states when severely wounded, being recovered and becoming combat ready again after medical treatment.

Space marines are heartier than anything in the galaxy not a necron. Of course some of them are going to be dead dead, but more often than not their wounds are recoverable.

On the positive the only thing that really mattered was the Chaos fleets swept the lanes and then defeated the Phalanx. Land stuff is irrelevant when you can bomb the planet from orbit. Abaddon could have saved a lot of chaos lives...kind of like the other Spazz Emprah and the death stars.

 Exergy wrote:

SomeRandomEvilGuy wrote:

Waaaghpower wrote:I have a hard time believing that a Black Templar or Space Wolf clubbed a Legionairre over the head, knocked him out, and walked away. Both because that wouldn't hurt a Space Marine, and because the weapons being used were explosives and chainsaws. They didn'y get shot in the head, they had a small grenade blow up inside their skull. They didn't get stabbed, they got eviscerated.

Space Marines are renowned for going into coma-like states when severely wounded, being recovered and becoming combat ready again after medical treatment.

Space marines are heartier than anything in the galaxy not a necron. Of course some of them are going to be dead dead, but more often than not their wounds are recoverable.

I don't buy this excuse. This applies to things like lasgun shots and stab wounds, not being ripped apart by a chainsword or having your head melted off by plasma. Even if we disregard all casualties inflicted by the guardsmen, that's still a couple thousand dead CSM - Loyalist Space Marines would have the knowledge and discipline to double tap.

(Also: Within the story itself, it is very explicit about Space Marines dying on both sides. It sometimes uses Purple Prose, but more often than not the language is very clear - Those CSM are dead, dead, dead.)

This also isn't counting any CSM who were on the Blackspear, who are certainly dead now.

So unless Abbadon has thousands of viable subjects sitting around, and the skill of Fabulous Billy at making new Marines, this and the last assault a couple years earlier mean his stock of CSM should be running very, very thin.

To be fair if you don't really care about mutations it's likely quicker and easier to make a chaos marine using thier geneseed than making an imperial marine. I have a feeling chaos standards are a lot less taxing than imperial standards.

gungo wrote:
To be fair if you don't really care about mutations it's likely quicker and easier to make a chaos marine using thier geneseed than making an imperial marine. I have a feeling chaos standards are a lot less taxing than imperial standards.

You still want someone incredibly strong and talented, though. Otherwise you're just wasting your time and limited genr-seed on sub-par chaff.

 Breotan wrote:

 Latro_ wrote:
That there might be time travel afoot in the next book

Doubtful. The only thing close to time travel (outside Black Library stuff) is skipping over years due to being in the Eye/Warp.

There was fluff that the Harlequins knew all the paths of the webway, some of which led to different place in time.. older fluff but still ...

i think the amour might be from the Eldar Empire era, reclaimed by someone as a relic.

Waaaghpower wrote:
This applies to things like lasgun shots and stab wounds, not being ripped apart by a chainsword or having your head melted off by plasma. Even if we disregard all casualties inflicted by the guardsmen,

To be fair those wounds can still be lethal and guardsmen pack more than enough guns to turn large targets into tiny meat chunks.

I love the fact that if we say there was 100,000 Chaos Marines attacking cadia, and say that they were supported by 50 million cultists, they racked up an impressive kill death ratio.

So 850 million humies on cadia
Half we could say were killed by fleet bombardments and titans, artillery, all the fun stuff.
Being generous and say it was one for one by the cultists
So the 100,000 chaos marines are left with 375 million dudes to kill. Roughly leaving each marine killing half the cadian 8th by themselves (iirc The 8th were 8000 strong)

In terms of the writing on how the black legion were killed in droves, its an imperial biased book (so bloody biased) so of cousre the imperials will be written as heroically killing evil mooks while ignoring their failures and deaths.

Me, i choose not to drink the emprah's kool aid.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
And that ratio doesnt account for the chaos force attacking one of the most heavily defended and fortified planets/system in the galaxy.

What's the source of the Chaos numbers? It sounds like you came up with them

Yep, pulled them out my ass. But i dont think Abby had more then 100000 marines, hell he may have had 500 million cultists.

Still attacking a well prepared and fortified position is extremely costly to the attacker. The Black Legion rolled over the cadians and their marine buddies with minimal losses in comparion. In an imperial centric book, you dont see those battles, just a line or two at best

If someone can come up with more accurate numbers it would be awesome.

SomeRandomEvilGuy wrote:
One Necron in particular is very good at time travel. Orikan the Diviner. It tends to lead to unexpected problems though. Plus he can see the future.

He's also only ever used it to serve his own purposes (he's got his own agenda), so I'd be amazed if he came into play in this story.

Casti wrote:
Yep, pulled them out my ass. But i dont think Abby had more then 100000 marines, hell he may have had 500 million cultists.

Still attacking a well prepared and fortified position is extremely costly to the attacker. The Black Legion rolled over the cadians and their marine buddies with minimal losses in comparion. In an imperial centric book, you dont see those battles, just a line or two at best

If someone can come up with more accurate numbers it would be awesome.

So he could equally have 3 millions SM and about ten billion cultists and it could have been an extremely costly battle. I guess it depends on the flavor of koll aid you drink

Well i believe i am in the ball park (with the chaos marines) with my estimations. 3 million astartes would conquer the galaxy. But if your kool aid tells you thats what it is, more power to you

 Bobthehero wrote:
What's the source of the Chaos numbers? It sounds like you came up with them

He's saying "if we say there was..." so it's conjecture.

Casti wrote:
Well i believe i am in the ball park (with the chaos marines) with my estimations. 3 million astartes would conquer the galaxy.

Took about 100 million if I remember well, along with all the support of the Imperial Army

The largest legions at the height of the great crusade (just before the heresy began) stood around 200-250 thousand, Ultramarines, Wordbearers and Iron Warriors iirc. Thats the highest 3 of 18 legions.

Casti wrote:
The largest legions at the height of the great crusade (just before the heresy began) stood around 200-250 thousand, Ultramarines, Wordbearers and Iron Warriors iirc. Thats the highest 3 of 18 legions.

Word Bearers were at 200k and Ultramarines at 250k, and they were the two largest, as you say. The other large legions were around 160k (IW was 180k ish, right?), with many lower than that (some significantly so, like Raven Guard, Salamanders and Thousand Sons). The Alpha Legion's numbers were completely unknown, but they were unlikely to be significantly more numerous than the Ultramarines.

Uh, I guess I was wrong

Just going to point this out:
Cadia didn't have impressive fortifications. It had two barely-standing fortresses, a crashed ship, and improvised trenches and tunnels. It's hard The Fang.

Waaaghpower wrote:
Just going to point this out:
Cadia didn't have impressive fortifications. It had two barely-standing fortresses, a crashed ship, and improvised trenches and tunnels. It's hard The Fang.

So what happened to the impressive fortifications?

gungo wrote:
To be fair if you don't really care about mutations it's likely quicker and easier to make a chaos marine using thier geneseed than making an imperial marine. I have a feeling chaos standards are a lot less taxing than imperial standards.

Yeah I reckon Chaos can make Marines quicker than the IoM can. Fabulous Bill is the leading authority on human genetic engineering, and it's not as if Chaos has qualms about completely depleting a planet to turn them into Marines.

If Cadia was 850 million. Lets say 7/8 people died. That leaves a little over 1 million captives to implant with however much geneseed is recoverable from the fallen loyalist (and chaotic) Astartes.

Perhaps that was a motivation for attacking Cadia. He knew it would draw in marine chapters from all over. Kill them all, harvest their geneseed and double the numbers of the Black Legion...

Casti wrote:
Well i believe i am in the ball park (with the chaos marines) with my estimations. 3 million astartes would conquer the galaxy. But if your kool aid tells you thats what it is, more power to you

The issue is one of GW's appreciation for numbers. Realistically, 3 million Astartes would conquer jack sh*t in a galactic-scale war. Drop in the ocean.

However, because it's a lot more compelling to write about lower-scale conflicts where heroes might actually be able to make a difference, you get 1000-strong Marine chapters conquering worlds. Realistically, 1000 Marines wouldn't be able to conquer and hold a continent through sheer logistics. They can't be everywhere all the time, and 1000 people spreads out very, very thinly indeed.

 Ashiraya wrote:

Casti wrote:
The largest legions at the height of the great crusade (just before the heresy began) stood around 200-250 thousand, Ultramarines, Wordbearers and Iron Warriors iirc. Thats the highest 3 of 18 legions.

Word Bearers were at 200k and Ultramarines at 250k, and they were the two largest, as you say. The other large legions were around 160k (IW was 180k ish, right?), with many lower than that (some significantly so, like Raven Guard, Salamanders and Thousand Sons). The Alpha Legion's numbers were completely unknown, but they were unlikely to be significantly more numerous than the Ultramarines.

The Sons of Horus were less than 200k...10,000 years ago. That's a hell of a long time to build your numbers up from captured geneseed, loyalists turning traitor and recruits from other legions.

pm713 wrote:

Waaaghpower wrote:
Just going to point this out:
Cadia didn't have impressive fortifications. It had two barely-standing fortresses, a crashed ship, and improvised trenches and tunnels. It's hard The Fang.

So what happened to the impressive fortifications?

Destroyed in Round 1. It says at the start this isn't "round 1", the book is Round 2: Abaddon already attacked the planet and after much, much MUCH strife, Cadia managed to repel him. Creed didn't think it was over because there has been no sign of Abaddon so far. He was right: The first attack that weakened Cadia so much was only the Vanguard.

And yes Abaddon knows he could have just blown the planet to smithereens and moved on, he even wonders "mid-game" if he screwed up like Horus did, all because of the same reason: pride.

On the subject of replacing losses....

A lot of that, rather unhelpfully, depends.

Sure, Fabius Bile seems capable of mass-conversion. Except, one imagines he'd want paying after some fashion. As with any would-be Astartes, you then have natural attrition as some reject the implants or go all monstrous. One would argue that given their much higher than average levels of corruption, the Chaos forces would find that a significant factor.

But, even if Fabius Bile is the sole answer (and he may not be....you need viable Geneseed after all, and the Black Legion appears to have left plenty of that behind on Cadia), having Astartes is simply not enough.

You need to train, arm and outfit them to get the most out of them.

So let's say that Fabius can conceivably, and geneseed stocks allowing, produce a thousand Astartes at once (and at an accelerated rate. Not only does he seem less caring as the end result, he's not bogged down in the same mysticism as Loyalists). Where does their armour come from? The Bolters? When is the required training done, if at all?

Indeed, I'd wager that mass production isn't really in Abaddon's favour - it's a lot of resources to expend just to get ultimately inferior, and quite possibly unstable equivalents. Far better to just send in the millions of Cultists to tie up the guns, then do surgical strikes to take the head of the enemy.

So it all comes down to feasible supply and demand. Here, the Imperium arguably has the upper hand. They have well established stockpiles and supply chains. The Forgeworlds are constantly churning out war materiel, and don't need paying in the traditional sense. Dark Mechanicus? Got to bribe them, and hope they don't renege and give your goodies to a higher bidder.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:

So let's say that Fabius can conceivably, and geneseed stocks allowing, produce a thousand Astartes at once (and at an accelerated rate. Not only does he seem less caring as the end result, he's not bogged down in the same mysticism as Loyalists). Where does their armour come from? The Bolters? When is the required training done, if at all?

Are there not a fair few background references to daemonforge worls in the EoT?

I event remember a story from 'into the malestrom'? from years ago that spoke of this thing in the EoT just spewing out guns int space forever.

Indeed, but unlike The Imperium, you have to deal with those Daemon Forgeworlds, and whatever they're asking, the price won't be cheap.

So whilst new equipment is available, I very much question the practicality of obtaining on a large scale.

I know I should just go read the OP, but does Abaddon just abandon Cadia after he's invaded? Seems like there'd be ample supplied of geneseed and salvageable equipment down on the surface to re-stock on the fly.

Erm....I don't think you'd want to go bin-diving on Cadia right now.

Essentially, it's cracked in half, mostly covered in red-hot-liquid-mag-ma, and well on it's way to being a Daemon World....

So the red-hot-liquid-mag-ma will have ruined much of what was left anyway, and any remainder is at real risk of being corrupted beyond use (though exactly how Chaos guys, let alone Fabius Bile would define corrupted beyond use is anyone's guess!)

Ah I see. Gonna have to go raiding on a couple of undefended worlds near Cadia then

Would have made much more sense for him to be collecting geneseed as he goes. It's what I'd do if I was a Chaos Lord. Take the Tyranid approach to building numbers and go harvest some loyalists...

Does anyone know when Chaos tends to reap the geneseed?

Army list wise, they don't seem to take the necessary tools with them, as opposed to Loyalist, who would likely have an Apothecary on hand, if not actually on the field?

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Does anyone know when Chaos tends to reap the geneseed?

Army list wise, they don't seem to take the necessary tools with them, as opposed to Loyalist, who would likely have an Apothecary on hand, if not actually on the field?

"Fabius Bile: Primogenitor" book offers quite an interesting insight about this: There are almost no Apothecaries in the Chaos side because being one requires actual hard-work, study, skill and focus, all qualities that are increasingly rare in the Chaos side because the vast majority threw self-restraint out of the window and act on base impulses alone.

Most Apothecaries seem to be hired to perform specific jobs and that's it, they move on, they aren't like their Loyalist brothers.

Oh, and the book is in M34, so if they were that rare back then, I can't even imagine "now".

Hmmm, see it's things like that that make me question how well thought out this sort of stuff is. If apothecaries are so rare, how can they ever hope to wage war on a galactic scale? They'd be wiped out with hilarious ease by the unending pink tide of the Guard.

Seems to me that they're going for the 'they're all insaaaane' school of villainy, rather than making them a genuine, intelligent, organised credible threat.

Contrast that to how it's portrayed with the World Eaters during the Heresy. Due to their combat doctrine resulting in heavy casualties, the World Eaters had a large number of top-class Apothecaries to ensure that their numbers remained up to strength.

Well thought out. Makes them seem in the least bit intelligent. Makes them more of a threat.

Reckon I'll be picking up a copy of that.

Love a bit of Fabulous Billy.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Ynneadwraith wrote:
Hmmm, see it's things like that that make me question how well thought out this sort of stuff is. If apothecaries are so rare, how can they ever hope to wage war on a galactic scale? They'd be wiped out with hilarious ease by the unending pink tide of the Guard.

Seems to me that they're going for the 'they're all insaaaane' school of villainy, rather than making them a genuine, intelligent, organised credible threat.

Contrast that to how it's portrayed with the World Eaters during the Heresy. Due to their combat doctrine resulting in heavy casualties, the World Eaters had a large number of top-class Apothecaries to ensure that their numbers remained up to strength.

Well thought out. Makes them seem in the least bit intelligent. Makes them more of a threat.

Then the World Eaters went completely beyond ape-poop bonkers mental. I'm talking the full hatstand, both by Khorne's growing influence on them, and their internal Deely Boppers, which if memory serves, were ultimately forced on the entire Legion, so one would assume that includes the Apothecaries.

Why? Because Chaos is insanity. Look at their history since Horus' failure. The Legions literally tore themselves apart, devolving into Warbands. If not Daemonhood, Abaddon certainly deserves all the 'Mr Cat-Herder Of The Year' awards and titles since M31!

Haha! That should definitely be Abaddon's title

Yeah I get the World Eaters going full-Angron so they'd probably make poor students. They'd be the ones at the back of the class setting fire to the test and trying to hit the marine next to them with the table-leg they've just ripped off.

The issue really is one of differing visions for what Chaos/CSM are.

For me, I really find the 'Chaos is all maaaaad' trope pretty unimaginative. Not much you can do with that really. They're evil because they're evil.

However, if you say that they turned to the Chaos Gods out of desperation, it's got a lot more legs.

Suddenly, CSM aren't barmy chaos-worshipping lunatics running around with their pants on their heads revving their chainswords. They're intelligent, nuanced villains who have struck a terrible Faustian bargain with eldritch creatures to win the Long War they've been fighting for 10,000 years.

In order to have survived as a major power for 10,000 years (nearly twice as long as present-day written history) they would have to be at least a little bit organised.

If they've pretty much run out of Apothecaries by M34 then the Imperium's already won. Literally all it has to do is wait. It makes CSM into a non-threat.

Plus, even if they are all insane, equating 'insane' with 'stupid' is probably a mistake that many Imperial Generals have come to regret very swiftly indeed...

Believe it or not, one of the top Fabius' student and AWESOME character is a World Eater. I recommend that book because it shows a chaos side that isn't just raving madness, but a calm and collected and intellectual "villain". I was actually rooting for the big F for a long while. His humour is impeccable too (stealing this from a thread in bolter & chainsword)



Also, Chaos can create new troops, it just isn't the honoured process of the loyalist. There's a cool short story where the Alpha Legion destroys an entire chapter and steals their entire gene-seed stock. The same also happened in a particular Dark Angels fortress. Heck, Red Tithe, they mention how there are some very new Night Lords amongst their ranks AND they in the planet to collect humans to turn into Night Lords.

Sounds right up my street then anything that makes chaos more than just a bunch of raving lunatics is good by me

Also, that description of the Night Lords has given me a cool idea for a Night Lords warband with a load of loyal cultists in the style of WFB Vampire Counts

Oohhh, you really have to read Red Tithe, because they do have a cultist army with them, the "Black Hands". They perform the tasks they can't be bothered to do too

 skoffs wrote:

He's also only ever used it to serve his own purposes (he's got his own agenda), so I'd be amazed if he came into play in this story.

True but it's still presumably non-Warp time travel. Plus if Chaos is being put into the threat to end all threats category Orikan could intervene. That said the Warp tends to baffle his predictions so he may not be of that great a use.

TheDraconicLord wrote:And yes Abaddon knows he could have just blown the planet to smithereens and moved on, he even wonders "mid-game" if he screwed up like Horus did, all because of the same reason: pride.

He was seemingly counting on the Blackstone Fortress to destroy the planet in any case though and with the defences in place it wouldn't have worked.


It's worth noting that if Abaddon starts creating his Crimson Path from the Eye of Terror then attrition swings in his favour. No faction would be able to reclaim those worlds so he has a relatively safe haven to strike from as well as being able to summon Daemonic forces further into the Imperium.

Has Abaddon successfully surpassed Horus?

LightKing wrote:
Has Abaddon successfully surpassed Horus?

only if he finishes big E off.

or gets half of the IoM to turn traitor.

He's not dead...so there's that.

Yes, but Horus had both arms, so...

 GoonBandito wrote:
A metal giant in a scaled cloak. Creed's panicked shot goes wide as iridescent polygons flicker on the figures upraised palm, "Ursarkar E. Creed. This need not be your end. Eternity awaits." The giant's laughter follows Creed into darkness....

Alpharius Omegon?

 BlackNid wrote:

 GoonBandito wrote:
A metal giant in a scaled cloak. Creed's panicked shot goes wide as iridescent polygons flicker on the figures upraised palm, "Ursarkar E. Creed. This need not be your end. Eternity awaits." The giant's laughter follows Creed into darkness....

Alpharius Omegon?

Pretty sure its a reference to Trazyn capturing Creed as part of his collection since he lost the chance to try and poke-ball Abbadon.

Oh! Yeah, missed that.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Why does the chaos marines not having apothecaries mean they cant get geneseed? You would need some skill to implant them sure, but removing on organ is much simpler. Failing that, just take the body whole! Also, there are stories where they steal geneseed from loyalist chapters, Fall of Vilamus for example. http://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Fall_of_Vilamus

With Cadia gone who will fill that void of imperial guard? The elite base model guard.

On top of that will GW change guard themes and switch the Cadian theme guard armies for a different theme?

I think it'll still be Cadians, but something like a Cadian diaspora. So many regiments out in the stars, and so many neo-Cadias from where those regiments have settled. Could easily just replace the existing models with like-for-like.

saying that, I've hoped they'd bring the grimdark cyberpunk feel to Guard for a long time now. Krieg are a step in the right direction I'd love to see more

Well if he was going to blow up Cadia why did he land troops in the first place? Thats like landing marines on the Shokaku in WWII and then dive bombing it...derp derp derp.

My personal headcanon is that he did it to draw in marine chapters from all over the imperium, butcher them, steal their geneseed and forcibly implant it into captured Cadians to double the size of his Black Legion

 Frazzled wrote:
Well if he was going to blow up Cadia why did he land troops in the first place? Thats like landing marines on the Shokaku in WWII and then dive bombing it...derp derp derp.

Pride. he didn't want Cadia just destroyed, he wanted it broken out of pure pride. Abbaddon basicly admits it, and admits that "............ truthfully I was actually kinda stupid there. need to be careful not to fall into the 'Horus trap' again"

 Frazzled wrote:
Well if he was going to blow up Cadia why did he land troops in the first place? Thats like landing marines on the Shokaku in WWII and then dive bombing it...derp derp derp.

Had to disable the defences. The Imperium had a specific plan for dealing with the Blackstone Fortress and possibly other methods of Exterminatus.

BrianDavion wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
Well if he was going to blow up Cadia why did he land troops in the first place? Thats like landing marines on the Shokaku in WWII and then dive bombing it...derp derp derp.

Pride. he didn't want Cadia just destroyed, he wanted it broken out of pure pride. Abbaddon basicly admits it, and admits that "............ truthfully I was actually kinda stupid there. need to be careful not to fall into the 'Horus trap' again"

Kind of stupid? THats epic stupid. Actually, thats illogically stupid to the extent in contravenes fluff gone before. If he could just bomb it then there was no need to fortify it in the first place (outside of anti-fleet defenses).


Automatically Appended Next Post:

SomeRandomEvilGuy wrote:

 Frazzled wrote:
Well if he was going to blow up Cadia why did he land troops in the first place? Thats like landing marines on the Shokaku in WWII and then dive bombing it...derp derp derp.

Had to disable the defences. The Imperium had a specific plan for dealing with the Blackstone Fortress and possibly other methods of Exterminatus.

Now here's a better point-kind of ESBish.

Yup.

Abaddon admitting his hubris was a big pleaser for me, and bodes ill for the Imperium...