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Funny for us europeans,but maybe not so nice to the rest of this little dirtball:

GW uses in 40k only myths from the north or south of europe.

No use for the other continents?
Could especially IG place their regimental fluff on ancient middle-east, asian or south-american myths?

The White Scars show Mongolian inspiration...

so 1 legion inspired by the "golden horde" vs 19 legions inspired by..... ?

well 2 were based on absolutely nothing, being expunged in the distant past...

the others I can't really see much comparison to other civilisations...

im thinking a couple reason why. 1. they themselves are European and there for use myths and history. 2. pretty much the whole background of SM (which is the GW meal ticket) is UBER gothy and again.... refer to #1. Sometimes the whole gothic deal is cool but other times its just SO over bearing. kind of like Peter Steele always singing about death, and dying and.....being....dead.... sometimes its nice and other times you just wish the guy would do it already

40k barely scratches the surface of European/Russian cultures without trying to include every culture in the world.
White Scars have a mongolian theme as do the Rough Riders, Thousand Sons have an Egyptian theme, Salamanders have an archaic Greek/north African theme, the Tallarn are basically Arabs or Berbers, the Tau are asian, the kroot are tribal types such as 19th century Africans or native Americans so I think given that 40K is a British invention they've done pretty well in representing other cultures to date.

Yet there is nothing representing the celtic peoples and apart from the name Pedro Cantor I can't think of anything that represents the Spanish peninsula either.

As for myths, I can't think of any european culture that believes a robot god resides on Mars, that the fabric between the universes is host to daemons etc (that sounds more middle eastern to me like Zoroastrianism and Cabalism) or that a great devouring entity exists at the edges of the universe waiting to eat us all.

Lastly, stop worrying about how others think about you. Who gives a stuff about whether every culture is represented in a game, you either like the game or you don't. When I used to play Shogun I certainly didn't worry about the lack of chinese or koreans in the game as it was a game about the japanese.
Stop thinking that no one wants to play a game or watch a movie because it doesn't have someone that looks like them in it, that's not only slowed but racist.

Oh, and I'll add as the OP is german, I read a similar discussion about the lack of ethnics in playmobil (ffs!) and the response given then was much the same, that geobra is a German company so obviously there is a bias towards central European culture etc in their toys, especially as most of their customers are european. It doesn't stop playmobil being popular in Japan and elsewhere.

It's easy enough to see the progression from European mythology, to Tolkien, to the various Warhammer settings (in 40K: Squats, Eldar, Ratlings, etc.). As far as the influence of mythology (as opposed to history) on 40K, yeah, it's mostly European.

cadbren wrote:Oh, and I'll add as the OP is german, I read a similar discussion about the lack of ethnics in playmobil (ffs!) and the response given then was much the same, that geobra is a German company so obviously there is a bias towards central European culture etc in their toys, especially as most of their customers are european. It doesn't stop playmobil being popular in Japan and elsewhere.

sorry, our subject in this thread is mythology not ethnology

The myths are related to culture and therefore not bound to ethnics and countries.
A good example could be the roman empire.
Different languages and gods,but some (partly greek) myths made it to become commonplace in the whole empire.

I don't know how playmobil could be related to GW,but most companys (asian/us/europe) use alot of ancient mediterranean and scandinavian myths in their games (tabletop/video or pen&paperRPG).

Where whfb uses the full range of myths, the 40k universe is lacking something like lizardmen (south america).

PS.

spain is represented by the inquisition.
celts+picts may be represented by space wolves.

I agree with Cadbren, 100%.....play the game for what it is....simple as. If you start going into where the inspiration for WH40K comes from you better pencil in a couple of days, because they've taken inspiration from a LOT of places, including the Bible.

I think its fair to say that GW doesn't want people to necessarily look for the parallels in todays or yesterdays society, but to look at WH40K as its presented to people who would live and die in that Universe....thats what fantasy is all about, the suspension of "reality".

If you want a game that does draw directly on Earth cultures and societies, then Infinity is the place to go, but then Infinity and WH40K both drive in different directions, and both are suitable for the roads they take.

The game is so open that you can include whatever themes/mythologies you like. I gues the developed mainly used european archeotypes as that is what they were most familiar with, and who their original target market would be most familiar with.

The dark angels used to have a bit of a native american theme in their recruits.

I am converting up / painting a rainbow warriors army based on Aztec themes . (not my original idea though).
I have an amazon themed sisters army who have a variety of backgrounds. (mostly African).

Something does get on my nerves though. Why is nearly everyone in 40k white? The salamanders used to look like they were of African descent but now they've been retconned to be scary looking jet black mutants with red eyes! Why did they do that?

1hadhq wrote:
Could especially IG place their regimental fluff on ancient middle-east, asian or south-american myths?

Has this question any answer here?

Delephont wrote:.....play the game for what it is....simple as

I think its fair to say that GW doesn't want people to necessarily look for the parallels in todays or yesterdays society, but to look at WH40K as its presented to people who would live and die in that Universe.

its don't think,just use the game? Fine.

Seems the efforts of companys to reduce humans into customers are a success. :S

I wouldn't let myself get to hung up on the PC quality of a game's mythology. It isn't as though 40K is being a vehicle for white power or anything along those lines.
It just has a somewhat set focus and operates within those parameters without trying to take in every thought every civilization that ever existed had on the subject of mythology. People that play the game are totally welcome to inject whatever fluff they wish into their army and as long as it isn't too extreme sexually or politically,trot it down to their FLGS and lay it out on the table. I'm sure people in my area aren't the only ones that do this.
That being said, there are those that would take offense in actuality if parts of their religion or mythology were represented in 40k, for the perceived insult or disrespect of their beliefs.
At the end of the day, it's best to remember this is just a beer and pretzels game that tells a story from a certain viewpoint, and realize it's not trying to push some political or social agenda.

Warhammer 40k exists in the grimdark far future. Even today, finding someone well versed in the mythos of extinct cultures is difficult. For as long as the Emperor has been on the Golden Throne, humanity has gone out of its way to obliterate each and every trace of a culture that does not believe in the God Emperor. That includes aliens.

It seems only right that after a hundred of thousands of year Inquisition and extermination campaign that there might be a little less cultural diversity in the Universe.

You certainly could style your Imperial guard army after whatever you like. GW has themed theirs after realistic armies from various wars. I'm sure an Imperial guard expert or a quick search of the boards would reveal exactly which one is associated with which.

Very few ancient armies translate very well to a science fiction setting. The best you can do is often to model your unit's uniforms to match your vision. If you know something about the way the culture you are modeling fought, then you may also select only units that reflect that bias.

I think there is a false impression.
My poor little innocent question was about the general concentration on european myths and if it is
viable to use different myths for IG (maybe SM too).
The last codex IG seemed to support this,because the IG recruts on hundreds of thousands worlds.
Mentioned origins (south america) would only provide myths from mostly extinct cultures,so i doubt possible offense. :S

@Kapitan Montag:

GW changed sallies to friendly scary marines. Sounds weird,but before codex armageddon you couldn't get even a paintscheme from GW.
Maybe a designer thought it would be "cool" to have marines in the look of really existing creatures.So he took the little lizards from our
planet and transferred their black color to the marines skin.
(name of 1st company of the former Legion was the same as the lizards).

I think the reason why most of WH40K appear as "white" is because, as a skin tone its the easiest to do! To paint darker skin tones is.....troublesome due to scale. I'm not saying it can't be done,its just difficult.

In fluff terms there have been countless characters of "African" decent...take the Inquisitor stories, I believe Eisenhorns Pilot and his daughter were of darker persuasion....not to mention others.

Kapitan Montag wrote: The salamanders used to look like they were of African descent but now they've been retconned to be scary looking jet black mutants with red eyes! Why did they do that?

Actually, the Salamanders started out as white, if the mid 80's to early 90's GW illustrations of them are any indication. On the cover of the board game Armageddon, it shows several Salamanders in combat, and all the guys with their helmets off are white. Also there was a picture on the cover of a GW painting guide where marines from different chapters were raising a flag, Iwo Jima style, and once again, the Salamander depicted is white.
I think it might have been in the midst of third edition that the Salamanders were rewritten as being black.

Delephont wrote:I think the reason why most of WH40K appear as "white" is because, as a skin tone its the easiest to do!

Actually, it's probably because the game is made by a bunch of white British folk. If it had been invented in Cape Town, instead of Nottingham, the game would probably be quite a bit different, culturally and color-wise.

1hadhq wrote: Seems the efforts of companys to reduce humans into customers are a success. :S

They're a company, companies sell goods and/or services to customers. We are customers, we pay good money to buy little bits of metal, plastic and resin spat out by a machine. There is no relationship beyond that. If you want more from an organisation then go and join a church.

Pariah Press wrote:

Delephont wrote:I think the reason why most of WH40K appear as "white" is because, as a skin tone its the easiest to do!

Actually, it's probably because the game is made by a bunch of white British folk. If it had been invented in Cape Town, instead of Nottingham, the game would probably be quite a bit different, culturally and color-wise.

Cape Town in the 80s would have produced a more culturally diverse game you reckon? Umm, that would be a big no. The imperium in this alternative 40K would have consisted of a single IG regiment with long beards and hard to pronounce names. The galaxy would be full of an ork like race that "amazingly" look very much like negros while off in the dark corners of space lurked the menacing Sol Tedic and their ever hungry appetites for precious metals and minerals. The only thing standing between the imperium and destruction is the arch-psyker Rensburg and the God of Man (there are actually women too but they're hard to tell pick out from the men - it's the beards).

1hadhq wrote:My poor little innocent question was about the general concentration on european myths and if it is
viable to use different myths for IG (maybe SM too).

It sounded more like whining about the lack of representation of non-european culture to me and obviously I was not alone in that opinion. As both marines and guard fans have carte blanche to do whatever they want in regards their own armies I have to assume you were going on about the official fluff and quite honestly I don't see a lot of european myths, legends etc in the fluff beyond generalised hero stories which appear in every culture. Perhaps if you had given an example instead it might have made it clearer what you were whining about.
The closest thing I can come up with is that the imperial religion is pretty much based on mediaeval christianity which at that time was mostly european though christianity of course is not actually european but an offshoot of judaism which is a middle eastern religion..

1hadhq wrote:

cadbren wrote:
spain is represented by the inquisition.
celts+picts may be represented by space wolves.

Spain is represented by the Inquisition, I actually didn;t think that more like the catholic church in general.
Space Wolves as Celts, definitely didn't get that, felt it was much more 'Norse' cold climate, etc.

But I think that's half the fun is the subtle takes on mythologies, it's really very indirect and loose.

It also allows us to add our own, Samurai Space Marines for example.

Attack_Squig wrote:

1hadhq wrote:

cadbren wrote:
spain is represented by the inquisition.
celts+picts may be represented by space wolves.

Spain is represented by the Inquisition, I actually didn;t think that more like the catholic church in general.
Space Wolves as Celts, definitely didn't get that, felt it was much more 'Norse' cold climate, etc.

But I think that's half the fun is the subtle takes on mythologies, it's really very indirect and loose.

It also allows us to add our own, Samurai Space Marines for example.

Yeh the inquisition in 40k is based far more on the popes inquisition than the spanish one, no one expects that.

And SW are celt/norse. They take a lot from scotish history.

cadbren wrote:

Pariah Press wrote:

Delephont wrote:I think the reason why most of WH40K appear as "white" is because, as a skin tone its the easiest to do!

Actually, it's probably because the game is made by a bunch of white British folk. If it had been invented in Cape Town, instead of Nottingham, the game would probably be quite a bit different, culturally and color-wise.

Cape Town in the 80s would have produced a more culturally diverse game you reckon?

That's not what I wrote. I wrote that it would be different.

The inquisition is based on Nemesis the Warlock out of 2000 AD.

Nemesis the Warlock is of course based on the Spanish Inquisition.

One of the marine chapters (Death Wing?) uses native american iconography by the way.

whatwhat wrote:

Attack_Squig wrote:

1hadhq wrote:
spain is represented by the inquisition.
celts+picts may be represented by space wolves.

Spain is represented by the Inquisition, I actually didn;t think that more like the catholic church in general.
Space Wolves as Celts, definitely didn't get that, felt it was much more 'Norse' cold climate, etc.

But I think that's half the fun is the subtle takes on mythologies, it's really very indirect and loose.

It also allows us to add our own, Samurai Space Marines for example.

Yeh the inquisition in 40k is based far more on the popes inquisition than the spanish one, no one expects that.

And SW are celt/norse. They take a lot from scotish history.

There may be no difference between spanish and vaticans Inquisition

Raven Guard are scandinavian - Odins ravens ?

Blood angels - a mix of romania (vampires) and venezia ?

Ultramarines - Rome. so which Cesar is marneus ? Marc aurel ? and sicarius is commodus?

despite the knights templar monastic theme fo dark angels, they are heavily influenced by native american culture as their recruting world or one of their main ones are a 'plains people' and before anyoen gets shrity the orignal sotry of the deathwing should be read aas it expalins in full the decision ot paint their armour its also why the models still do havve totems on the storm bolters and assault cannons

in regars to using them to them a guard armour i don't think it would be hard, using the thunderbird stuff from native american or similar version in south american. it would be difficult to us Gaulic or Celtic as they tend to be unclear and celtic tends to be very similar to North spanish mainly cause of thir area o existance. brythonic legends before roman conquest would be difficult as well because of the fact that much of it is used for the Eldar Saim Hainn and Bel'tain respectivly being the clearest examples of this.

Russian or slavic legends might be interesting to us ebut thats not my area of expertise, it might be worth looking at ethopian or similar areas of christian influence their sints stories tend to be intersting.

many other elgends from aroudn the world tend to be more coplicated or difficult to get your hands on legitamate like writings (i wouldn't trust half the net on the subjects)

I suppose it would be possible to use the Australian Dreamtime maybe the Rainbow snake representing the warp or somthing?

anyway sorry for spelling quite ill atm

personally i dont care what the myth, or background, ideals, or anything in between if we are playing against one another, im going to try and smash you into pieces and then hide the bodies in the massive craters my tanks made