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What if...what if Cawl, is really the deceiver?

the plot thickens

 LexOdin9 wrote:

He's the most interesting character I've seen from the AdMech yet. Even Arkhan Land seems kind of boring, to be honest.

The dogmatic rules of his faction make for a ton of GrimDerp techpriests that can't screw in a lightbulb without canting the Canticle of 6-Pi Rotation.

Also, the rules of the Imperium are just begging to be broken.

Not to sound rude but I don't get the impression that you like the faction in general. For fans, having your primary special character go against what your faction is supposed to be predominantly about is frustrating.

Eh, they aren't always portrayed that badly but Cawl just goes against the themes of the Adeptus Mechanicus. Seemingly the rule on AI too. Plus he's ten thousand years old because what the setting needed was a bunch of people from the days of the Emperor running around. Where are all the Mechanicus adepts who are that old? It can't just be Cawl, surely?

The rules of the Imperium kept it going for ten thousand years.

SomeRandomEvilGuy wrote:

 LexOdin9 wrote:

He's the most interesting character I've seen from the AdMech yet. Even Arkhan Land seems kind of boring, to be honest.

The dogmatic rules of his faction make for a ton of GrimDerp techpriests that can't screw in a lightbulb without canting the Canticle of 6-Pi Rotation.

Also, the rules of the Imperium are just begging to be broken.

Not to sound rude but I don't get the impression that you like the faction in general. For fans, having your primary special character go against what your faction is supposed to be predominantly about is frustrating.

Eh, they aren't always portrayed that badly but Cawl just goes against the themes of the Adeptus Mechanicus. Seemingly the rule on AI too. Plus he's ten thousand years old because what the setting needed was a bunch of people from the days of the Emperor running around. Where are all the Mechanicus adepts who are that old? It can't just be Cawl, surely?

The rules of the Imperium kept it going for ten thousand years.

I like the radical tech-priests that push the boundaries, break the rules, and do what they want when they want. For that same reason, I love playing chaotic good characters in DnD.

Interesting admech characters:
- Telok
- Delphan Gruss
- Hieronomus Tezla
- Koriel Zeth

It's just not cool to have your army's heroes be idiots! They should excel in the things they do. What if Guilliman insisted on swinging his sword by grabbing on the bladed edge and hitting enemies with the hilt?

 LexOdin9 wrote:
I like the radical tech-priests that push the boundaries, break the rules, and do what they want when they want.

That's the Dark Mechanicum. You're describing the Dark Mechanicum.

It's okay to admit that you resent the stagnation of the Imperium. Tzeentch welcomes those who demand more out of their lives than a corpse pretending to be an empire.

 Arachnofiend wrote:

It's okay to admit that you resent the stagnation of the Imperium. Tzeentch welcomes those who demand more out of their lives than a corpse pretending to be an empire.

M.

 Arachnofiend wrote:

 LexOdin9 wrote:
I like the radical tech-priests that push the boundaries, break the rules, and do what they want when they want.

That's the Dark Mechanicum. You're describing the Dark Mechanicum.

It's okay to admit that you resent the stagnation of the Imperium. Tzeentch welcomes those who demand more out of their lives than a corpse pretending to be an empire.

I think the best ones are the ones that toe the line between Mechanicus and Dark Mechanicus. The ones that don't commit to chaos but don't give up the Imperium either.

Cawls response to every question when before the Imperial Inquistion.

"I do not recall"

WatcherZero wrote:
Cawls response to every question when before the Imperial Inquistion.

"I do not recall"

Ah, the old classic. I love that the admech and the inquisition are in a constant data-sabotage war. But lets be honest, the inqusition couldn't fly their ships without the abilities of the enginseers who operate the minutiae of the machineries.

Because the Emperor never used alien technology...

POTMS -> Shards of a C'tan
Librarius -> Eldar psychic machinations
Space Marine Genesead -> Largest GSC in the MIlky Way

 LexOdin9 wrote:


I like the radical tech-priests that push the boundaries, break the rules, and do what they want when they want. For that same reason, I love playing chaotic good characters in DnD.

...

It's just not cool to have your army's heroes be idiots! They should excel in the things they do. What if Guilliman insisted on swinging his sword by grabbing on the bladed edge and hitting enemies with the hilt?

Sorry for the delayed response.

Those are (or were) a relatively small sub-faction though. It'd be like if Shadowsun didn't exist and the only special character for the Tau was Farsight. You don't have the small, half-way-to-heresy faction have all the focus.

The orthodox Mechanicus aren't necessarily idiots. They're cautious and wary. It's a universe in which ships designed slightly wrongly turn to Chaos (or admittedly maybe it's coincidence). AI will try to kill you, either because it rebels or it gets infected by scrapcode. Feeling strong emotions feeds eldritch abominations hungry for your soul. Technology from the past is far greater than you could come up in millennia especially considering the practical limitations the Imperium faces which Dark Age of Technology humanity didn't.

Cawl just ignores all of that. He doesn't need to be careful because he's just too clever. He gets away with what is highly implied to be an AI because why would that ever backfire in 40K. He improves upon the God Emperor of Mankind's work; the guy whose downfall heralded the corruption of the Imperium in general. He's ten thousand years old because screw prior fluff about age limitations. He has very little in common with the faction he's supposed to be the main character for. He gets to ignore what should be the consequences for his blatantly heretical actions because of author fiat.

A Marty Stu, basically.

M.

 Infantryman wrote:
A Marty Stu, basically.

M.

Except he doesn't fit the description of the Mary/Marty Sue/Stu.

It's almost as if this term gets thrown around but people don't know what it means...

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Infantryman wrote:
A Marty Stu, basically.

M.

Except he doesn't fit the description of the Mary/Marty Sue/Stu.

It's almost as if this term gets thrown around but people don't know what it means...

It's really just short-hand for a cac-written piece of character. Don't overthink it.

M.

 Infantryman wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Infantryman wrote:
A Marty Stu, basically.

M.

Except he doesn't fit the description of the Mary/Marty Sue/Stu.

It's almost as if this term gets thrown around but people don't know what it means...

It's really just short-hand for a cac-written piece of character. Don't overthink it.

M.

Then SAY you don't think hes a well written character. If you're going to use a term wrong, you need to be corrected on it.

OK, I agree. I'll say he's a professor hamfist used as a quick, off the cuff, delivery system for a revived Guillimon and a model line of Adeptes Restartes.

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Infantryman wrote:
A Marty Stu, basically.

M.

Except he doesn't fit the description of the Mary/Marty Sue/Stu.

It's almost as if this term gets thrown around but people don't know what it means...

Why doesn't he fit the Mary Sue archetype?

He's a brand new character that's been launched into the setting completely unheralded, with super-duper powers that allow him to improve upon the Emperor himself's work, has a hidden army big enough to replenish the Imperium, is older than Asdrubael Vect, came in to save the day when no-one else could, and doesn't afraid of anything.

If it wasn't for the minor detail of him being pretty shady (and headcanon that his research is mainly copied rather than unique), he's the quintessential Mary Sue. I agree that the phrase gets thrown around without people really knowing what it means, but in this instance it's pretty spot-on.

I'd actually like to see the Cawlian (?) Heresy, where it is discovered he is Magos Telok - that body-snatching AI from Forge of Mars series (which is great btw).

That way, he'd've already been in the setting (nameless goon #6 and a body-snatching AI which calls itself Archmagos Telok), and his abrupt and sudden progress would make sense (unethical and faithless artificial intelligence).

What's even better is Telok already jumped bodies at the end of the series of books...


Automatically Appended Next Post:
There's also Galatea from the same series...

 Ynneadwraith wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Infantryman wrote:
A Marty Stu, basically.

M.

Except he doesn't fit the description of the Mary/Marty Sue/Stu.

It's almost as if this term gets thrown around but people don't know what it means...

Why doesn't he fit the Mary Sue archetype?

He's a brand new character that's been launched into the setting completely unheralded, with super-duper powers that allow him to improve upon the Emperor himself's work, has a hidden army big enough to replenish the Imperium, is older than Asdrubael Vect, came in to save the day when no-one else could, and doesn't afraid of anything.

If it wasn't for the minor detail of him being pretty shady (and headcanon that his research is mainly copied rather than unique), he's the quintessential Mary Sue. I agree that the phrase gets thrown around without people really knowing what it means, but in this instance it's pretty spot-on.

I think you're conflating an overpowered/Deus Ex Machina character with a Mary Sue one. The two aren't necessarily synonymous, for example, very few people would call Dr Manhattan a Mary Sue character despite his extreme power setting within his fictional universe.

The whole point of good old Gary Stu is that he's an idealised projection of oneself into a fictional setting. Superficially, they're effectively people imagining themselves as the main characters of a play where they get to write the script, and accordingly always have the perfect comeback, perfect solution to any problem, and so on. At a deeper level, even if you strip out the 'idealised' aspect, it still turns into the character having similar experiences/priorities/thought processes to the author.

Cawl is the result of several separate authors/lore writers sitting around and devising a character (which makes it hard for any individual to be projecting). He's also very specifically written as a 'non-character', that is to say, on a personal level he's the typical exaggerated Mechanicus robotic 'I have no personality or emotions but logic'. I think it would be difficult to argue that such a personality depiction would be the idealised personal version of any GW writer, individually or collectively.

 Ketara wrote:

 Ynneadwraith wrote:

Slayer-Fan123 wrote:

 Infantryman wrote:
A Marty Stu, basically.

M.

Except he doesn't fit the description of the Mary/Marty Sue/Stu.

It's almost as if this term gets thrown around but people don't know what it means...

Why doesn't he fit the Mary Sue archetype?

He's a brand new character that's been launched into the setting completely unheralded, with super-duper powers that allow him to improve upon the Emperor himself's work, has a hidden army big enough to replenish the Imperium, is older than Asdrubael Vect, came in to save the day when no-one else could, and doesn't afraid of anything.

If it wasn't for the minor detail of him being pretty shady (and headcanon that his research is mainly copied rather than unique), he's the quintessential Mary Sue. I agree that the phrase gets thrown around without people really knowing what it means, but in this instance it's pretty spot-on.

I think you're conflating an overpowered/Deus Ex Machina character with a Mary Sue one. The two aren't necessarily synonymous, for example, very few people would call Dr Manhattan a Mary Sue character despite his extreme power setting within his fictional universe.

The whole point of good old Gary Stu is that he's an idealised projection of oneself into a fictional setting. Superficially, they're effectively people imagining themselves as the main characters of a play where they get to write the script, and accordingly always have the perfect comeback, perfect solution to any problem, and so on. At a deeper level, even if you strip out the 'idealised' aspect, it still turns into the character having similar experiences/priorities/thought processes to the author.

Cawl is the result of several separate authors/lore writers sitting around and devising a character (which makes it hard for any individual to be projecting). He's also very specifically written as a 'non-character', that is to say, on a personal level he's the typical exaggerated Mechanicus robotic 'I have no personality or emotions but logic'. I think it would be difficult to argue that such a personality depiction would be the idealised personal version of any GW writer, individually or collectively.

Interesting. Apparently I hadn't done my homework properly! Hold my hand up to not knowing about the whole 'self-insertion of the author as an idealised character' element. Still think that that's not really the crux of it though, although I'm open to persuasion. This from TV Tropes I feel is a pretty good descriptor:

The prototypical Mary Sue is an original female character in a fanfic who obviously serves as an idealized version of the author mainly for the purpose of Wish Fulfillment. She's exotically beautiful, often having an unusual hair or eye color, and has a similarly cool and exotic name. She's exceptionally talented in an implausibly wide variety of areas, and may possess skills that are rare or nonexistent in the canon setting. She also lacks any realistic, or at least story-relevant, character flaws — either that or her "flaws" are obviously meant to be endearing.

Although there is a point about author-insertion (which could well be the case, although it could also not be), the primary point I'm pulling out that most people seem to hone in on is this:

She's exceptionally talented in an implausibly wide variety of areas, and may possess skills that are rare or nonexistent in the canon setting. She also lacks any realistic, or at least story-relevant, character flaws — either that or her "flaws" are obviously meant to be endearing.

This fits Cawl's official fluff down to a tee (although you can argue the toss with the flaws bit, although I'm not seeing many that we haven't invented as headcanon), which is why I feel he qualifies as a stereotypical Marty Stu. The author-insertion is just an extra irritation on top of that, which IMHO isn't required for a character to be deemed to be a Mary Sue.

There's no flaws if you don't actually look for 5 seconds at what goes on with Cawl.

 Ynneadwraith wrote:

This fits Cawl's official fluff down to a tee (although you can argue the toss with the flaws bit, although I'm not seeing many that we haven't invented as headcanon), which is why I feel he qualifies as a stereotypical Marty Stu. The author-insertion is just an extra irritation on top of that, which IMHO isn't required for a character to be deemed to be a Mary Sue.

You're mixing up the outcome of the process with the process itself, old bean. It's a bit like looking at two amoeba and calling them mitosis. Let me extrapolate.

As the example you've given says, our Mary Sue is often 'exotically beautiful' or 'exceptionally talented in an implausible variety of areas'. But she could also have a seriously interesting name. She could have the power of invisibility. She can have many, many traits, but the reason a character has all those 'implausible' traits, the causing force, is because these traits are intrinisically in line with the projected wish fulfillment of the author into the character.

In other words, the tag 'Mary Sue' is not so much about a specific resulting scenario or character traits/depiction as it is the projection of the author itself. That's what the tag is applied to, and that's what makes a Mary Sue. If you research the etymological origins of the phrase, you'll find that it refers to the character functioning as the 'Avatar' of the author. To take another example, a gritty New York cop obsessed with bringing perps to justice who sits down and writes a book about a gritty New York cop with the same desires is making a Gary Stu character. His character doesn't actually need to be 'idealised', it's the act of writing himself into the character, and projecting his experiences and desires into it that makes it into a Gary Stu.


Teenagers writing fanfic where they get to be uniquely interesting is the most stereotypical and shallow level of Mary Sue-dom, which is why the concept of Mary Sue and that of an overly exaggerated character often get conflated. The way that teenagers try to project an idealised version of themselves always seems to involve giving their story avatar beauty, smarts, the perfect solution to any problem, and so forth because they're insecure. But that doesn't make that type of Batman style toolbox character a 'Mary Sue', it's the motivation behind the writer that does it.

To hammer it home, I'm imagining of a character right now. He's insanely good looking, speaks thirty five languages, and an astronaut. Oh, and he's an insurance salesman in his spare time. And he's an interdimensional traveller, a mechanic, and so on. Is he a Mary Sue? No, because he's a character I spent five seconds inventing just by attaching meaningless traits together. Without that self-projection into the character, it's just a normal character. An unrealistic, exaggerated one to be sure, but not a 'Mary Sue'.

 Ketara wrote:

 Ynneadwraith wrote:

This fits Cawl's official fluff down to a tee (although you can argue the toss with the flaws bit, although I'm not seeing many that we haven't invented as headcanon), which is why I feel he qualifies as a stereotypical Marty Stu. The author-insertion is just an extra irritation on top of that, which IMHO isn't required for a character to be deemed to be a Mary Sue.

You're mixing up the outcome of the process with the process itself, old bean. It's a bit like looking at two amoeba and calling them mitosis. Let me extrapolate.

As the example you've given says, our Mary Sue is often 'exotically beautiful' or 'exceptionally talented in an implausible variety of areas'. But she could also have a seriously interesting name. She could have the power of invisibility. She can have many, many traits, but the reason a character has all those 'implausible' traits, the causing force, is because these traits are intrinisically in line with the projected wish fulfillment of the author into the character.

In other words, the tag 'Mary Sue' is not so much about a specific resulting scenario or character traits/depiction as it is the projection of the author itself. That's what the tag is applied to, and that's what makes a Mary Sue. If you research the etymological origins of the phrase, you'll find that it refers to the character functioning as the 'Avatar' of the author. To take another example, a gritty New York cop obsessed with bringing perps to justice who sits down and writes a book about a gritty New York cop with the same desires is making a Gary Stu character. His character doesn't actually need to be 'idealised', it's the act of writing himself into the character, and projecting his experiences and desires into it that makes it into a Gary Stu.

Teenagers writing fanfic where they get to be uniquely interesting is the most stereotypical and shallow level of Mary Sue-dom, which is why the concept of Mary Sue and that of an overly exaggerated character often get conflated. The way that teenagers try to project an idealised version of themselves always seems to involve giving their story avatar beauty, smarts, the perfect solution to any problem, and so forth because they're insecure. But that doesn't make that type of Batman style toolbox character a 'Mary Sue', it's the motivation behind the writer that does it.

To hammer it home, I'm imagining of a character right now. He's insanely good looking, speaks thirty five languages, and an astronaut. Oh, and he's an insurance salesman in his spare time. And he's an interdimensional traveller, a mechanic, and so on. Is he a Mary Sue? No, because he's a character I spent five seconds inventing just by attaching meaningless traits together. Without that self-projection into the character, it's just a normal character. An unrealistic, exaggerated one to be sure, but not a 'Mary Sue'.

Absolutely get it now

I do think it's still more valuable (not to mention more widely accepted) to use the term 'Mary Sue' for the latter character you've just invented without the specific focus on author-insertion. Gets to the crux of why people are irritated by the character.

Might not be in spirit of the original meaning of the term, but it appears to be what the word has evolved into. Unless we can come up with something better

How about instead of "I find this character to be a Mary Sue" you say "I find this character to be unengaging and so exaggerated that it breaks my suspension of disbelief."

And then I can say "yep, me too. Just like the entire Tyranid army does for me, for the same reasons."

Extraneous mistaken post, delete/ignore.

 Unit1126PLL wrote:
How about instead of "I find this character to be a Mary Sue" you say "I find this character to be unengaging and so exaggerated that it breaks my suspension of disbelief."

And then I can say "yep, me too. Just like the entire Tyranid army does for me, for the same reasons."

Usually because the term 'Mary Sue' is both snappier and instantly conjures the idea of someone who is unbelievably talented without subsequent flaws (such that they break my suspension of disbelief). It also seems to hit harder as a phrase than 'I find this character to be unengaging'. Strikes as a real condemnation rather than a mild dislike.

But hey, just because language is fluid doesn't mean that it's not valuable to try and maintain more nuanced meanings. Otherwise you end up with 'awesome' being the only superlative people know...

Tricky that.

 Ynneadwraith wrote:

Absolutely get it now

I do think it's still more valuable (not to mention more widely accepted) to use the term 'Mary Sue' for the latter character you've just invented without the specific focus on author-insertion. Gets to the crux of why people are irritated by the character.

Might not be in spirit of the original meaning of the term, but it appears to be what the word has evolved into. Unless we can come up with something better

Words do evolve, so in fifty years time, it might be widely accepted to use it as something else. For the moment though, it's actually used quite widely by authors as a tool to assess their own writing at a more professional level (I know this because my girlfriend did a Creative Writing degree ). All authors intrinsically will and have to project to a slight extent, it's the only way you can get good, realistic writing. So they use the 'Mary Sue' degree benchmark as a way of separating the good writing from the bad and staying self-aware of their own work.

To take an example, some dude I went to college with who can't write spends his time writing. He just self-published his first book on Amazon. It's about how a nerdy guy in his twenties who having spent his life being decryed as a failure is actually really smart and makes himself a millionaire off his coding skills. Coincidentally, the author codes and is generally a bit of a failure at life. And unsurprisingly, the character in his book literally has a smug recollection of his mum telling he's wasting his life just before he made his uber invention on the first page. The whole thing is pure Gary Stu from start to finish, and it's a huge part of why he's a terrible writer.

If I were to dub his character 'Gary Stu' to someone who just thought it mean 'an OP character' though, they'd be very confused at my usage of the phrase! So whilst it's still in use as a technical term, it's probably worth correcting people on.

I can definitely see the value in using the term for author-insertion, but even in the above case it's a secondary attribute. The primary issue with your college dude's story above is that his genius-level coding is unrealistic to the point of making for a crap story, and any hardships he comes across are just blatant attempts to make the character seem even better. The fact that it's a blatant fantasy of what the author's life should be like is just the icing on the cake.

Basically, his story would be just as godawful if he wasn't a coder

Still, can see the benefit. It's 'not only is your character unbelievably talented and liked by everyone, but it's blatantly obvious that it's supposed to represent you in the universe as well'.

 Ynneadwraith wrote:
I can definitely see the value in using the term for author-insertion, but even in the above case it's a secondary attribute.

Nope. It's the primary. Never said his coding skills were 'genius' level. Just that he'd been more financially successful with them. The character regards himself as being smart, and wallows in his self-appreciation, but it's not a genius, and he hasn't done something several thousand other coders haven't done (hence why the author would probably argue that it's based in reality).

I'll be honest, I didn't read past the first ten pages (I'd stopped rocking with laughter at how bad the writing was by that point and started headdesking), but the entire plot thus far was literally just some loser nerd dude who was a failure suddenly making a successful social media site and a lot of money off it. Then revelling in smugness at how he'd told everyone so, and if only they'd had more faith.

If we interpret 'Mary Sue' as just being exaggerated characters, we end up cutting out the characters the phrase was actually coined to apply to. So the above wouldn't apply, and neither would the gritty New York cop example earlier. A character doesn't have to be exceptional to be Mary Sue, they just have to represent the author's projections. Exceptionalism is the norm and often a defining attribute (because we like to flatter ourselves), but not the rule. The projection is the rule.

On top of that, Cawl being supposedly OP doesn't even make him a bad character.

 Ynneadwraith wrote:
I can definitely see the value in using the term for author-insertion, but even in the above case it's a secondary attribute. The primary issue with your college dude's story above is that his genius -level coding is unrealistic to the point of making for a crap story, and any hardships he comes across are just blatant attempts to make the character seem even better. The fact that it's a blatant fantasy of what the author's life should be like is just the icing on the cake.

Basically, his story would be just as godawful if he

Aaaaaaaaaaah you are doing it right now you are an absolute leg. Well done you had us all going.