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First and foremost this is not an angry we hate GW thread this is just a question and am not trying to slate GW.

Is the Space Marine and essentially the 40k universe and back story the only real original idea of GW.

Warhammer is essentially a rip off of Lord of the Rings and various Fantasy writers. Although Skaven now that I think about it is relatively original and nothing really comparable springs to mind please correct me if I am wrong.

Most of what they created in the 40k universe is very original admitedly though a lot is far from it and just a future version of the warhammer (Orks/Eldar). Necromunda is basically a mad max judge dredd themed kind of thing and draws a lot of inspiration from that sort of area. Tyranids are the H.R.Giger aliens and the second addition of tyranids were borderline copyright infringement (tyrant springs to mind)

As I have said not trying to have a go at GW as we all draw our inpirations from everything around us and thats how things progress. Just an interesting thought and wanted to hear other peoples thoughts on the matter

I never really understand posts like yours Baron, I presume your trying to be very clever and witty. If this type of thread had been done before then I whole heartedly apologise for insulting your prescious sensibilites and wasting your time reading what I wrote and also I thank you for taking up your again clearly very very valuable time in posting this, may I see quite hilarious picture of a clearly disgruntled gentlemen who is having to suffer the torrid agony of something that he finds clearly very dull.

All the best and enjoy the way you spend the rest of your day

You just have to understand Luke, threads like this seriously appear every 1-2 weeks. Frankly, they're more regular than my mail service.

In response to your original question, as it does seem rude to leave you without any explanation, a lot of the core concepts were taken from old sci-fi. Stuff like Starship Troopers (the books, not the movie). Really, 40k itself is in it's own way kind of a kludge of several sci-fi themes, a few fantasy ones, and Christianity.

In short, it's not original, but that's not a bad thing. It's all been done before, and the only way you can do anything new is by copying more than one thing at a time.




Automatically Appended Next Post:
Oh, and there's usually a "40k ripped off Starcraft. Blizzard should sue!" troll. That too.

I agree daedalus, its is very very hard to have an original idea, or at least a totally original one. I did not realise that Starship troopers came originally from a book or series of, I will have to look these up.

lukewild1982 wrote:First and foremost this is not an angry we hate GW thread this is just a question and am not trying to slate GW.

Is the Space Marine and essentially the 40k universe and back story the only real original idea of GW.

Warhammer is essentially a rip off of Lord of the Rings and various Fantasy writers. Although Skaven now that I think about it is relatively original and nothing really comparable springs to mind please correct me if I am wrong.

Most of what they created in the 40k universe is very original admitedly though a lot is far from it and just a future version of the warhammer (Orks/Eldar). Necromunda is basically a mad max judge dredd themed kind of thing and draws a lot of inspiration from that sort of area. Tyranids are the H.R.Giger aliens and the second addition of tyranids were borderline copyright infringement (tyrant springs to mind)

As I have said not trying to have a go at GW as we all draw our inpirations from everything around us and thats how things progress. Just an interesting thought and wanted to hear other peoples thoughts on the matter

Wait, what?

Look up the God Emperor of Dune too. That provides the Sardaukar, the God-Emperor, and the Navigators.

Power armour came from Starship Troopers.

Ideas of a Forerunner species which created the various modern species were common in SF before 40K.

The idea of the Chaos Gods comes from Michael Moorcock, and the gods are derived from human myth.

There is very little in 40K which is genuinely original. What GW did was to bind together a mass of ideas with heavy metal and emo culture.

daedalus wrote:You just have to understand Luke, threads like this seriously appear every 1-2 weeks. Frankly, they're more regular than my mail service.

In response to your original question, as it does seem rude to leave you without any explanation, a lot of the core concepts were taken from old sci-fi. Stuff like Starship Troopers (the books, not the movie). Really, 40k itself is in it's own way kind of a kludge of several sci-fi themes, a few fantasy ones, and Christianity.

In short, it's not original, but that's not a bad thing. It's all been done before, and the only way you can do anything new is by copying more than one thing at a time.




Automatically Appended Next Post:
Oh, and there's usually a "40k ripped off Starcraft. Blizzard should sue!" troll. That too.

Items off the top of my head GW stole ideas from.
-Dune - Space emprah etc.
-Alien/Aliens, Nids
-Necrons, ancient Egyptians, Lovecraft
-Marines, Starship Troopers (the book)
-orks/eldar/squats, LOTR which itself stolen from earlier Finnish sagas (I think Finland, one of those countries that eat Swedish meatballs and don't understand the greatness of Texas)
-guard, lots of sci fi including Aliens, starship trooper movies, generic 1917/1943 armies
-Emprah/Horus. One of the oldest stories of mankind in nearly every culture.

I stand throughly corrected on the 40k front, although I assumed there would definately be inspiration from elsewhere I did not think it was quite as bad as your collective evidence suggests, also kick myself for not thinking about Dune.

Also Frazzled I too do not understand the "greatness of Texas" but i put this down to never having been there, although I do think Ron White is a bloody legend and one of the funniest stand up commedians I have ever heard (TATER SALAD YOUR ROCK MY WORLD)

lukewild1982 wrote:I stand throughly corrected on the 40k front, although I assumed there would definately be inspiration from elsewhere I did not think it was quite as bad as your collective evidence suggests, also kick myself for not thinking about Dune.

Also Frazzled I too do not understand the "greatness of Texas" but i put this down to never having been there, although I do think Ron White is a bloody legend and one of the funniest stand up commedians I have ever heard (TATER SALAD YOUR ROCK MY WORLD)

Thats because thou hast not had the greatness of true queso, or Texas barbeque.

Necrons are rather like the Cybermen out of Doctor Who. A dying race which translates itself into machinery and loses its soul in the process, changing to a hatred of normal life.

Kilkrazy wrote:Necrons are rather like the Cybermen out of Doctor Who. A dying race which translates itself into machinery and loses its soul in the process, changing to a hatred of normal life.

Thats an interesting thought.

Its also an old SF (and fantasy) standby, of an ancient, incredibly powerful race that is slumbering. If it awakens it will utterly obliterate the new races.

Hold up...what about CRASSUS ARMOURED ASSAULT TRANSPORT!

I don't know, I just had to say it....

That's inspired by one of these...



A US Marines landing craft. It's so large that it needs its own telephone exchange.

The 40k setting has spun together a lot of concepts from all over sci-fi and fantasy.

This is not a bad thing. Most beloved and/or well-known works do this as well... The Lord of the Rings was heavily inspired by various myths and tales. Star Wars is infamously familair to an old Samurai movie...

40k, like WHFB, has drawn a lot of inspiration from a range of sources and come up with something relatively 'unique.' This is, to be honest, a form of originality.

Kilkrazy wrote:That's inspired by one of these...



A US Marines landing craft. It's so large that it needs its own telephone exchange.

I want one of them for my MERCS force....that would make an awesome centre piece for our table

lukewild1982 wrote:First and foremost this is not an angry we hate GW thread this is just a question and am not trying to slate GW.

Is the Space Marine and essentially the 40k universe and back story the only real original idea of GW.

Warhammer is essentially a rip off of Lord of the Rings and various Fantasy writers. Although Skaven now that I think about it is relatively original and nothing really comparable springs to mind please correct me if I am wrong.

Most of what they created in the 40k universe is very original admitedly though a lot is far from it and just a future version of the warhammer (Orks/Eldar). Necromunda is basically a mad max judge dredd themed kind of thing and draws a lot of inspiration from that sort of area. Tyranids are the H.R.Giger aliens and the second addition of tyranids were borderline copyright infringement (tyrant springs to mind)

As I have said not trying to have a go at GW as we all draw our inpirations from everything around us and thats how things progress. Just an interesting thought and wanted to hear other peoples thoughts on the matter

....




When GW started out, they were a bunch of frothers that were playing D and D, then came out with a third party magazine with that and other games, that eventually spawned more and more creativity that was scattered and patchwork. When they went corperate, they lost thier way and forgot thier purpose, which lead to the slow degredation of thier games and hobbys.

The concepts are straight forward Sci-Fi, Fantasy, and wargaming. As for GW? They like to think of themsleves as the be all end all of gaming, but pointf fact, they are just a Yuppy conglomerate of feel good companies that basicly sell the same thing, Wargames. At the end of the day, that stuff really doesn't matter. It is even getting more irrelevent now, as they abdicate thier product in the name of $$$. Bottom line, GW sells models, games, and hobby materials, not lamborgini's, Rolls Royce, or Bentley cars. They get thier perspective back, they might be able to survive the year. If not, they go the way of the Mongoose.


As to where it came from? Go reference "SLC PUNK"

Steveo will tell you all about that. You have to remember, it was a different time back then....

Kilkrazy wrote:Look up the God Emperor of Dune too. That provides the Sardaukar, the God-Emperor, and the Navigators.

Power armour came from Starship Troopers.

Ideas of a Forerunner species which created the various modern species were common in SF before 40K.

The idea of the Chaos Gods comes from Michael Moorcock, and the gods are derived from human myth.

There is very little in 40K which is genuinely original. What GW did was to bind together a mass of ideas with heavy metal and emo culture.

I don't think "emo" culture existed in 1987. However, the rest of your post is spot on.

Not much new under the sun in Fantasy and Sci-Fi and GW is no exception. However, in terms of 40k, GW combined existing elements in a way that was fairly original, and packaged them in a way that is very accessible. GW is brilliant at incorporating existing concepts into their universe. Necrons and Tau, are the two more obvious examples of well executed ways of co-opting existing Sci-Fi concepts (Terminator and mecha-based-anime, respectively) into the 40k universe and presumably reaching out to fans of those genres.

The 'emo' culture was alive and kicking in the 80's. It just went by a different name, and bands like 'The Cure' were at the forefront.
Off topic I know, but I feel like it had to be said.

You mean Goth.

I was "Painting minis" for almost 8 years before GW and RT came on the scene.

Your points are flawed with revisonist history.
I dont like posting negative items like this, however its got to a point that threads like this bore me to the back teeth.

Other commentators on here have quite rightly pointed out where your flaws are. I will not add to the vaild points raised.

Enjoy the hobby , paint , have fun.

Sorry to derail the thread a bit...

sarpedons-right-hand wrote:The 'emo' culture was alive and kicking in the 80's. It just went by a different name, and bands like 'The Cure.

Not true.

Tauzor wrote:You mean Goth.

I thnk that's what he means...

Every youth generation has it's ways of expressing disaffection, but to equate emo culture with goth is over-simplistic. They each had/have their own musical styles, fashion standards, literature and folkways. There may be common elements, but there's really no reason to combine them as one sub-culture. Celebrate them each for what they are.

That said, confusion is undestabdable. Due massive and varied over-use of the term, it is getting harder and harder to define what is "Emo". It started as an offshoot of Hardcore punk, but who knows what "dark" emo subgroups may have sprung up and laid claim to Goth influences.

"There is nothing new under the sun."

That was written 2500 years ago and is still mostly true.

"Ex Africanus semper aliquod novum."

There's the old adage there is no such thing as an original idea.

EDIT: Crap. Polonius beat me too it.

Kilkrazy wrote:That's inspired by one of these...



A US Marines landing craft. It's so large that it needs its own telephone exchange.

Well...actually the AAV-7 seems to be more of the 'inspiration' for the Crassus.


I can't say for certain, but it looks more and more like an amalgation of the two.

-guard, lots of sci fi including Aliens, starship trooper movies, generic 1917/1943 armies

Just to throw in dates most of the rest of the world recognise it as 1914/1939 armies

But, back to the OP, a lot of 40k was based on stuff that GW worked on at the time.

They got permission to use the term "Land Raider" from Judge Dredd. There was a tank called a Land Raider in a JD story, at the time GW was making the official JD miniatures. 40k even had hoverboards, from Judge Dredd.

Matchbox even made a toy of the JD Landcruiser/Killdozer model. The company that Lesney subcontracted plastics moulding to (inserts for the cars) also did the first GW plastics.

GW had the licence for the JD rpg, and the Rogue Trooper franchise at the time (boardgame and miniatures).

There are elements of Dune, Foundation, Starship Troopers, Moorcock's Eternal champion, and many others in the 40k melange.

A lot of the satirical humour in the oeuvre derives from the zeitgeist of late 70s, early 80s UK. JD shows the same influence.