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 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

Maximus Bitch wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

Maximus Bitch wrote:
Jeezus Smudge, you're sounding like a broken record.

Keep asking things that I've already replied to.

I'm gonna address all your concerns and please don't repeat.


And those social dynamics don't even bother you. You're just bothered that different factions could've different accents.

Its a cool idea if the characters are portrayed well and not one-dimensionally with a childish good vs evil narrative.

I'm sounding like a broken record because you're not addressing my points. Why avoid focusing on the biggest form of accent difference in the galaxy?
How has the Imperial accent changed, but Chaos has not? The Imperium is notoriously stagnant, and Chaos have just as much chance to change accent.
Why do you ignore the more likely cause of accent difference across the galaxy, and focus purely on one's allegiance?

Changing one's accent doesn't mean a character is portrayed well. I don't see how giving one faction X accent and another faction Y accent makes a difference to their characterisation.
I am all for characters being portrayed well. I don't see how an accent (which I might add, you're only adding to show that they're different in religion) would affect that.

You say social dynamics, but I don't see how my choice of god affects my accent. What I see by accent difference is location and geography - how a Nostraman would speak compared to a Calibanite. You don't address that in your proposal of accents, and deal with people's alliances and treat the Imperium and forces of Chaos as two single entities. They are not.

I did say some stuff but then you asked again without quoting some prior comments.

I've quoted everything I address. However, all my points tend to come back to an essential element - why does Chaos and the Imperium have an accent gap, why isn't the larger and more targetable culture gap addressed, and why is it necessary to have a different accent?

Eh, I'm not talking about the accent affecting the portrayal. I'm saying my idea would work well if the characters are portrayed well. C'mon, you gotta read more carefully

This is what you say: "Its a cool idea if the characters are portrayed well and not one-dimensionally with a childish good vs evil narrative." I address this with "I don't see how an accent would affect that." Why did you even bring up a character's portrayal then if you don't think it has anything to do with accents? A good character is a good character, accent or not.

The crux of the issue is why is the accent so important? Why is it needed? You've said yourself, you're not bothered about it being correct - only that it represents a difference. Yet you don't think that the larger factor or different planets and cultures warrants representation.

Can I restart this thread? Then you and I can just PM each other. I'm afraid this thread has become too cluttered with our conversation.

The conversation is still on topic. Anyone can comment and critic the OP, my points, or anyone's points. I 'm not sure if restarting it would be conducive to the subforum.

I mean, you didn't quote some stuff that you should've been quoting.

Obviously, I wish to highlight the ideological battles and divide.

I'm not so concerned about culture, more concerned about the ideological battles.

In case you think that this whole accent split idea might be ruined by poor portrayals? I mean, that's why you oppose this right?

You bring up so many points. but what's your motivation for opposing this?

Our conversation has gotten too long and it will be daunting for other visitors

Maximus Bitch wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

Maximus Bitch wrote:

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

Maximus Bitch wrote:
Jeezus Smudge, you're sounding like a broken record.

Keep asking things that I've already replied to.

I'm gonna address all your concerns and please don't repeat.


And those social dynamics don't even bother you. You're just bothered that different factions could've different accents.

Its a cool idea if the characters are portrayed well and not one-dimensionally with a childish good vs evil narrative.

I'm sounding like a broken record because you're not addressing my points. Why avoid focusing on the biggest form of accent difference in the galaxy?
How has the Imperial accent changed, but Chaos has not? The Imperium is notoriously stagnant, and Chaos have just as much chance to change accent.
Why do you ignore the more likely cause of accent difference across the galaxy, and focus purely on one's allegiance?

Changing one's accent doesn't mean a character is portrayed well. I don't see how giving one faction X accent and another faction Y accent makes a difference to their characterisation.
I am all for characters being portrayed well. I don't see how an accent (which I might add, you're only adding to show that they're different in religion) would affect that.

You say social dynamics, but I don't see how my choice of god affects my accent. What I see by accent difference is location and geography - how a Nostraman would speak compared to a Calibanite. You don't address that in your proposal of accents, and deal with people's alliances and treat the Imperium and forces of Chaos as two single entities. They are not.

I did say some stuff but then you asked again without quoting some prior comments.

I've quoted everything I address. However, all my points tend to come back to an essential element - why does Chaos and the Imperium have an accent gap, why isn't the larger and more targetable culture gap addressed, and why is it necessary to have a different accent?

Eh, I'm not talking about the accent affecting the portrayal. I'm saying my idea would work well if the characters are portrayed well. C'mon, you gotta read more carefully

This is what you say: "Its a cool idea if the characters are portrayed well and not one-dimensionally with a childish good vs evil narrative." I address this with "I don't see how an accent would affect that." Why did you even bring up a character's portrayal then if you don't think it has anything to do with accents? A good character is a good character, accent or not.

The crux of the issue is why is the accent so important? Why is it needed? You've said yourself, you're not bothered about it being correct - only that it represents a difference. Yet you don't think that the larger factor or different planets and cultures warrants representation.

Can I restart this thread? Then you and I can just PM each other. I'm afraid this thread has become too cluttered with our conversation.

The conversation is still on topic. Anyone can comment and critic the OP, my points, or anyone's points. I 'm not sure if restarting it would be conducive to the subforum.

I mean, you didn't quote some stuff that you should've been quoting.

Such as?

Obviously, I wish to highlight the ideological battles and divide.

But why would my ideology define my accent? Accents are defined by location and geography. Not who I choose to shoot at.
And I challenged this point - the Red Corsairs have essentially the same ideology as the Black Legion. If ideology was the determining factor on accent, then they'd lose their British Imperial accent, and adopt an American Traitor accent. You said this wouldn't be the case, even though they have a different ideology to the IMperium, and the same ideology as Chaos.

I'm not so concerned about culture, more concerned about the ideological battles.

And that's fine. But why would your ideology affect your accent? That's like me saying "I want to show the different worship of gods within Chaos, so all my Nurgle worshippers will be of African ethnicity, all Khorne worshippers Indian, all Tzeentch worshippers of Caucasian, and all Slaanesh worshippers Asian." In what way does someone's choice of god affect the colour of their skin?

In case you think that this whole accent split idea might be ruined by poor portrayals? I mean, that's why you oppose this right?

No, I'm not concerned about bad portrayals of accents. I don't think accents are even needed, unless one was going to go all out and have specific accents for Chemosians, Fenrisians, Cadians, Colchisians, etc etc.

You bring up so many points. but what's your motivation for opposing this?

Is my motivation needed? Does my argument require a reason to be made? Surely I can express my opinions on an idea, and my points treated with the same attitude regardless of my motivation?

If my motivation is required to critique your idea, it's because I don't think different accents between 30k and 40k would be conducive, especially when accents for different populations on different planets are glossed over reasons.

Our conversation has gotten too long and it will be daunting for other visitors

I don't think that's entire grounds to restart a thread that's still on topic. If I'm wrong, I'll accept that, but I don't think a thread restart is needed.

 Sgt_Smudge wrote:

Can I restart this thread? Then you and I can just PM each other. I'm afraid this thread has become too cluttered with our conversation.

The conversation is still on topic. Anyone can comment and critic the OP, my points, or anyone's points. I 'm not sure if restarting it would be conducive to the subforum.

Ok, but we could make it more conducive.

I've sent you a PM to discuss important things that might be considered off-topic.

If that is what you hear as you read the fluff, then by all means go ahead. However from the replies in this thread it's pretty clear that most people generally don't assign accents to factions.

The point I got from Sgt Smudge is that all of the traitors, loyalists, and even subfactions within each weren't just some catch-all "side" that were basically clones of each other. Each faction, each legion, each planet, had their own rich histories, which would naturally produce their own unique accents. To generalize it all can be rather insulting to people who otherwise like the lore of the individual planet or chapter.

Like, the idea that Space Wolves would speak something vaguely celtic while White Scars spoke like mongols gives them distinction and celebrates their differences and their own unique fluff. Lumping all of them under "british english" because they're all "Loyalists" just sounds like all of their character and fluff are being glossed over. The same thing applies to the traitor legions; Chemos always felt like it had a renaissance italy feel to it (at least for me), so I'd imagine the Emperor's children speaking vaguely like what Leonardo Da Vinci would have, while Nostramo was basically a planet-sized Gotham City. People there probably talk like they were in a Noir film, with hard boiled detectives, hardened criminals, and mob families with their specific euphanisms. Lumping all of that into a generic "American english" (and to say that it would sound exactly the same as the aforementioned Mongol White Scars just because they're from relatively the same time period) just feels like it does a disservice to the fluff.

I think Maximus is trying to think too deeply into the fluff and trying to compare it with Modern day too closely.


The issue is, that even within the legions themselves, during the great crusade there was major accent differences. As the original members of the legion were all from Terra, but as the Primarchs were collected new recuits came from their worlds, in many cases Gothic wasn't the native tongue.

If you want to see how GW portrays the different accents in Media.. all you have to do is play some of the many video games that are out there

GodDamUser wrote:
If you want to see how GW portrays the different accents in Media.. all you have to do is play some of the many video games that are out there

If you were a writer working on some WH40K media, what accents would you give the characters?

 Maximus Bitch wrote:

GodDamUser wrote:
If you want to see how GW portrays the different accents in Media.. all you have to do is play some of the many video games that are out there

If you were a writer working on some WH40K media, what accents would you give the characters?

I wouldn't focus on their accents tbh..

It would also depend on what media and where it was being done, and the exact subject mater...

The fact that people would think the OP question is racist is crazy to me. Bioware, of all companies, does uniform accents across races (Dwarves are American, Feraldans are British, Elves are Welsh, e.t.c.) and no one accuses them of it.

Anyway, it could be a cute narrative trick to split the factions by accent, but based on how huge and diverse some of these empires are (like the Imperium) and the direction GW seems to have gone over the years, it's not something I'd consider terribly likely. More likely that certain planets have certain accents and anyone from that galactic region should sound similar to someone else (aside from aliens, who should probably sound different due to physiology).

GodDamUser wrote:

 Maximus Bitch wrote:

GodDamUser wrote:
If you want to see how GW portrays the different accents in Media.. all you have to do is play some of the many video games that are out there

If you were a writer working on some WH40K media, what accents would you give the characters?

I wouldn't focus on their accents tbh..

It would also depend on what media and where it was being done, and the exact subject mater...

But let's say there's a need for speech. (No pun intended)

Cutscenes for a dead-serious WH40K game, for example.

 Maximus Bitch wrote:

But let's say there's a need for speech. (No pun intended)

Cutscenes for a dead-serious WH40K game, for example.

There is still a massive amount of variables to consider. One of the big things about the 40k universe is that is it so large and diverse that it shouldn't been lumped into sterotypes at all, and there should be differences depending on the scenario.

To do so just weakens the setting

GodDamUser wrote:

 Maximus Bitch wrote:

But let's say there's a need for speech. (No pun intended)

Cutscenes for a dead-serious WH40K game, for example.

There is still a massive amount of variables to consider. One of the big things about the 40k universe is that is it so large and diverse that it shouldn't been lumped into sterotypes at all, and there should be differences depending on the scenario.

To do so just weakens the setting

Ok, maybe some Cadian IG and some Blood Angels & Raven Guard vs Black Legion & Death Guard & Night Lords. In 40K, not 30K to be clear.

 Maximus Bitch wrote:

Ok, maybe some Cadian IG and some Blood Angels & Raven Guard vs Black Legion & Death Guard & Night Lords. In 40K, not 30K to be clear.

Now you are talking large scale battle.. in which case accent has less importance, as the focus is on the special effects and cinematography. In which case I wouldn't put any effort into their accents at all, just go with what ever actor's went best with the various roles had

GodDamUser wrote:

 Maximus Bitch wrote:

Ok, maybe some Cadian IG and some Blood Angels & Raven Guard vs Black Legion & Death Guard & Night Lords. In 40K, not 30K to be clear.

Now you are talking large scale battle.. in which case accent has less importance, as the focus is on the special effects and cinematography. In which case I wouldn't put any effort into their accents at all, just go with what ever actor's went best with the various roles had

Let's say there are a few Dramatis Personae, like in the HH novels. And not all battles are large scale.

Then you might end up with a random distribution of accents. I think that would come across as rather odd?

 Maximus Bitch wrote:


Then you might end up with a random distribution of accents. I think that would come across as rather odd?

Not really especially if you are only dealing with a few from various factions.. then it is a case depending on the exact audience and if there is going to be a heavy combat focus within the 'movie', then a random distribution works... as the focus is on the individuals within a larger setting than on their particular backgrounds

You tend to find with movies where they put a big emphasis on a particular groups accent, it tends to sound bad and overacted.


The only movie franchise that I can directly think off that did the accent thing 'well' was the original Star Wars, in which case the Hero's were generally speaking with American accents, while the Imperial Officers were British... a bad example of over emphasis of accent is once again from Star Wars, in Rouge One where you have the 'British' Rebels, which just felt completely overdone and weakened the movie I felt

Not really. I work in a team of 5 and we have 8 different accents (Four members of the team speak more than one language).

Moreover, I'm chinese and the other guy is Taiwanese. Then there are two people from Seoul, South Korea (and they actually do share an accent). And we each speak with a different accent for english (for example, I speak like a surfer dude, the younger korean guy speaks like a mellow hippie, the Taiwanese guy sounds like a MLG player who's balls finally dropped, and the older korean guy speaks with the stereotypical "asian" accent).

When speaking our native words, the Taiwanese guy has an (obviously) taiwanese accent (the more higher pitched accent). I actually have what people have described as a "Stage Actor" accent, as i learned all my chinese from watching TV in my youth (The way I speak is apparently not that much different from a cartoon villain according to my friends). The two korean guys speak similarly, but the older one is noticably more meek than the younger one, who speaks with a much harsher tone (like every sentence ends in a hard punctuation).

For a team with 4 out of 5 members from basically the same continent (and an age gap measured in 1-2 years), we still managed a selection of accents far more diverse than what you're suggesting.

As for the examples:

Cadian - Canadian
Blood Angels - British Heightened Received Pronounciation
Raven Guard - Not quite sure as I'm not sure what exactly their cultural inspiration is.

Black Legion - Sir Ian McKellen's voice specifically.
Death Guard - American terminal patients.
Night Lords - The Joker


EDIT: If you want to check out a series with some excellently done accents, check out Shadow Raiders. The only one that is blatantly a fake is the one for Blokk, for which Scott McNeil decided to do a Governator impersonation and ends up sounding like wolverine with a pencil stuck up his nose.

GodDamUser wrote:

 Maximus Bitch wrote:


Then you might end up with a random distribution of accents. I think that would come across as rather odd?

Not really especially if you are only dealing with a few from various factions.. then it is a case depending on the exact audience and if there is going to be a heavy combat focus within the 'movie', then a random distribution works... as the focus is on the individuals within a larger setting than on their particular backgrounds

Let's say in the English language but for an international audience. With quite a lot of dialog. Like the HH, we can say that we have a few Dramatis Personae from each faction. So the Blood Angels talk to each other and then talk to the Raven Guard etc. Same with the Chaos side.

The audience might go "Hmmm, that guy's got this accent, his friend's got another, but the enemy has the same, and yet another?"

GodDamUser wrote:

You tend to find with movies where they put a big emphasis on a particular groups accent, it tends to sound bad and overacted.

Yeah I hope such an idea can be executed tastefully.

GodDamUser wrote:

The only movie franchise that I can directly think off that did the accent thing 'well' was the original Star Wars, in which case the Hero's were generally speaking with American accents, while the Imperial Officers were British... a bad example of over emphasis of accent is once again from Star Wars, in Rouge One where you have the 'British' Rebels, which just felt completely overdone and weakened the movie I felt

Yeah, my idea could be just like the old Star Wars. The old Star Wars has a clear good vs evil line though, as I've mentioned before, that's something that should be avoided. I haven't watched Rogue One.

 Maximus Bitch wrote:

Let's say in the English language but for an international audience. With quite a lot of dialog. Like the HH, we can say that we have a few Dramatis Personae from each faction. So the Blood Angels talk to each other and then talk to the Raven Guard etc. Same with the Chaos side.

The audience might go "Hmmm, that guy's got this accent, his friend's got another, but the enemy has the same, and yet another?"

Well the thing is.. The Spacemarines did have different accents within their own legions.. As they all originally started out as Terrain, then stated recruiting from their Chapter worlds as the Primarchs were found...

And then they didn't always recruit from a single world.. i.e. Gulliman had basically made his own little empire when the Emperor rocked up and as a result the Ultramarines legion recruited off several worlds.

And if you are going for a more intimate portrayal of Spacemairnes like they went for in the HH novels then you don't want them all sounding exactly the same as that removes individuality from them

 MechaEmperor7000 wrote:
Not really. I work in a team of 5 and we have 8 different accents (Four members of the team speak more than one language).

As for the examples:

Cadian - Canadian
Blood Angels - British Heightened Received Pronounciation
Raven Guard - Not quite sure as I'm not sure what exactly their cultural inspiration is.

Black Legion - Sir Ian McKellen's voice specifically.
Death Guard - American terminal patients.
Night Lords - The Joker

Haha what is an American terminal patient? The Joker's voice is a little strained and unreal, Mark Hamill's joker at least. And we probably wouldn't want all the guys in one faction to share the same voice.

IMHO, best to have them talk like normal people.


I thought the Black Legion came from Cthonian gangs too.

I still think that it'd be more congruous for the audience if most of the traitors spoke with one accent and vice versa.



Automatically Appended Next Post:

GodDamUser wrote:

 Maximus Bitch wrote:

Let's say in the English language but for an international audience. With quite a lot of dialog. Like the HH, we can say that we have a few Dramatis Personae from each faction. So the Blood Angels talk to each other and then talk to the Raven Guard etc. Same with the Chaos side.

The audience might go "Hmmm, that guy's got this accent, his friend's got another, but the enemy has the same, and yet another?"

Well the thing is.. The Spacemarines did have different accents within their own legions.. As they all originally started out as Terrain, then stated recruiting from their Chapter worlds as the Primarchs were found...

And then they didn't always recruit from a single world.. i.e. Gulliman had basically made his own little empire when the Emperor rocked up and as a result the Ultramarines legion recruited off several worlds.

And if you are going for a more intimate portrayal of Spacemairnes like they went for in the HH novels then you don't want them all sounding exactly the same as that removes individuality from them

Yeah, Marines within a team could have different accents. If that's the effect you'd like to see.

Well, I don't think they'd all sound the same. Listen to your friends and family members, they've all got different voices right?


Anyway, what accents would you give the characters? Would you still randomly distribute them? Also depends on the effect one's trying to achieve.

Terminally ill patients that speak with a predominantly american accent (usually their native accent would be completely drowned out by the wheezing and coughing, but there would still be some traces left to dictate the general region).

Also I'm thinking of 40k Black Legion, which is no longer made up of solely people from Cthonia (in fact, a lot of the original Luna Wolves have either died or rebelled against Abaddon, so the original Cthonian accent would be a minority). Whatever the accent most predominantly would be in any given Black Legion warband would vary wildly. I just prefer the liquid gold that is Sir Ian McKellen.

As for the Night Lords, I was just getting across the idea of a deranged psychopath that isn't a frothing mouth berserker or introvert. However going by the theme that Nostramo was basically Gotham City, and that the later recruits of Night Lords are from their prisons, they would sound less like hard boiled detectives and more like Batman's rogue gallery. The portrayal of Jerome Valeska from Gotham is what I expect most of them to talk like (and yes, I do realize the irony that the one person who is explicitly NOT the joker is the voice I imagine a whole bunch of Jokers to sound like).

 MechaEmperor7000 wrote:
Terminally ill patients that speak with a predominantly american accent (usually their native accent would be completely drowned out by the wheezing and coughing, but there would still be some traces left to dictate the general region).

Also I'm thinking of 40k Black Legion, which is no longer made up of solely people from Cthonia (in fact, a lot of the original Luna Wolves have either died or rebelled against Abaddon, so the original Cthonian accent would be a minority). Whatever the accent most predominantly would be in any given Black Legion warband would vary wildly. I just prefer the liquid gold that is Sir Ian McKellen.

As for the Night Lords, I was just getting across the idea of a deranged psychopath that isn't a frothing mouth berserker or introvert. However going by the theme that Nostramo was basically Gotham City, and that the later recruits of Night Lords are from their prisons, they would sound less like hard boiled detectives and more like Batman's rogue gallery. The portrayal of Jerome Valeska from Gotham is what I expect most of them to talk like (and yes, I do realize the irony that the one person who is explicitly NOT the joker is the voice I imagine a whole bunch of Jokers to sound like).

Ok, assuming they all sound like "normal", modern-day people. So some Black Legionaries will have higher pitched voices, and some Black Legionaries will have deeper voices.