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So, from read the latest installment of the Horus Heresy(tm) we find out

So, Really?
What's the reason for this book, because i'm starting to think its a mind feth -- continuity wise -- on the level of the tvseries "Lost".

Yeah, the whole continuity thing bugged me too. I have a suspicion though that it wasn't actually written entirely chronologically - I think I'm gonna need to read it again and take notes or something, heh.


But yeah, apart from showing characters, it did seem kind of pointless in the series in general, and unless we've missed something it seems very much a continuity cluster-frag.

I'll be rereading it to take notes of the significant events, because somewhere down the road, i feel something's amiss. and not just the continuity.
The characters were also somewhat. i dunno, "meh" and most of the book felt lika a really terrible, fawlty towers, version of flight of the eisenstein, but on terra.

Keep in mind that Horus Heresy books are often told from a certain perspective. This, like most of the 40k universe, creates parallax errors where events, dates and such do not always match up between accounts.

and in this case the perspective is on-the-fly-denial-of-causality ?

xcasex wrote:
What's the reason for this book, because i'm starting to think its a mindfuck -- continuity wise -- on the level of the tvseries "Lost".

Well, I am convinced the writers of Lost just got drunk at lunch, wrote a bunch of stuff down on cocktail napkins, and made that into the script.

No reason the planners of the Horus Heresy series can't do the same thing.

xcasex wrote:I'll be rereading it to take notes of the significant events, because somewhere down the road, i feel something's amiss. and not just the continuity.
The characters were also somewhat. i dunno, "meh" and most of the book felt lika a really terrible, fawlty towers, version of flight of the eisenstein, but on terra.

Spoiler:

yes, the babu dakkadakka guy was definetly the only proto-astartes but his prodigy had some serious plot-armor and kungfu, enough to best astartes in h2h combat.
i'm also irked by the ending, the remark concerning the vat, babu dhakal calls the other guy (ghota), "son" which also could have a wider meaning.

The whole thing with a daemon, apparation, warp angel, what have you. bound in a statue on terra for umptyzillion years, also seems like a serious plothole. the emperor would have noticed it, especially when an astartes psyker notices it.

For the most part, when it comes to the characters, the only one's i remember and liked were Atharva and kai. the World Eaters were utterly, clusterfucked, rampant berserkers more or less.

and that lone luna wolf, i think babu harvested him, or got hold of his gland. one of the two.

And the ending felt a bit rushed on the whole.

Actually, the one who beat up the astartes was also a true Thunder-warrior. That's why he was 2nd in command.

"Prospero Burns" takes place after the outset of the Horus Heresy. The Istvaan Massacres were the catalyst for the Heresy and Magnus' warning to the Emperor...which was handled in "A Thousand Sons".

The most fun part though is that "A Thousand Sons", "The Outcast Dead", and a little book called "False Gods" all tell conflicting points and have timeline issues.

What makes it better? It's all written by the same guy.

Graham is losing his touch.. if he ever had it anyway.

It really confuses me it seems like a mistake.

In Kasper Hawser dreams Horus says he'll be woundeded by the anathame weapon in a year. This is either while the wolves are attacking Prospero or before he even goes to Fenris where he sleeps for 20+ years so either way it doesn't make sence.

And as others are saying, in outcast dead the emperor already knows horus has turned before the message from Magnus is delivered. Then Leman Russ is sent to bring in Magnus but is bizarrly ignorant of everything that has been happening for the last couple of years.

It's a shame i really liked outcast dead otherwise the whole insight into the emperor was facinating

Because while the Emperor may know that Horus has turned against him(he knew Isstvan when it happened), Russ did not.

Keep in mind that for most people (i.e. everyone but the emperor), there are no cell-phones or interwebs. News takes a long time to travel and parts of the empire don't find out about events until sometime afterward. Astropathic messages (the only 'reliable' communication) can arrive significantly before or after the events they are describing happen because of the nature of the warp.

A central point in 40k is that because of the size of the universe not even dates are positive for some things. There's even a digit in imperial dates that indicates how reliable the record you are viewing is judged to be.

However the Emperor is the one who gave Leman Russ the order to sanction the Thousand sons. He didn't think to mention Horus going bad to Leman?

Also most of the galaxy knew horus had turned if you read nemesis, there are hundreds of worlds declaring for the warmaster before he is even done with istavan

obsidianaura wrote:However the Emperor is the one who gave Leman Russ the order to sanction the Thousand sons. He didn't think to mention Horus going bad to Leman?

Apparently not. Perhaps he thought it would change how Leman reacted or he wanted Leman's mind in the game, so to speak.

Also most of the galaxy knew horus had turned if you read nemesis, there are hundreds of worlds declaring for the warmaster before he is even done with istavan

Hundreds of worlds knew. There are millions of worlds in the Imperium. Not everyone knew. Time and information move strangely in the 40k universe. This is kind of an established fact.

pretre wrote:

obsidianaura wrote:However the Emperor is the one who gave Leman Russ the order to sanction the Thousand sons. He didn't think to mention Horus going bad to Leman?

Apparently not. Perhaps he thought it would change how Leman reacted or he wanted Leman's mind in the game, so to speak.

Someone on the ships would have known though.

Besides, three loyal Legions had just been almost wiped out. Why wouldn't the Emperor inform Russ that the Warmaster had turned? It makes no sense because means that Horus was pretty much allowed to change Russ' order from escorting Magnus to Terra to killing him. Besides, why wouldn't Valdor inform Russ that Horus wasn't to be trusted? Or did Russ decide on his own that destroying Magnus was the only way and Valdor simply went along with it and against the Emperors orders for fun?

SomeRandomEvilGuy wrote:

pretre wrote:

obsidianaura wrote:However the Emperor is the one who gave Leman Russ the order to sanction the Thousand sons. He didn't think to mention Horus going bad to Leman?

Apparently not. Perhaps he thought it would change how Leman reacted or he wanted Leman's mind in the game, so to speak.

Someone on the ships would have known though.

Besides, three loyal Legions had just been almost wiped out. Why wouldn't the Emperor inform Russ that the Warmaster had turned? It makes no sense because means that Horus was pretty much allowed to change Russ' order from escorting Magnus to Terra to killing him. Besides, why wouldn't Valdor inform Russ that Horus wasn't to be trusted? Or did Russ decide on his own that destroying Magnus was the only way and Valdor simply went along with it and against the Emperors orders for fun?

It's been a while since I read PB and ATS, but I thought one of the major revelation was that Horus didn't give or change Russ the order like the old fluff said.
The timeline for PB/ATS (as I remember it) goes like this:
- Magnus tried to warn big E about Horus
- Magnus screws up everything
- Big E gets Leman on the phone or calls him to Terra (it is unclear how the edict comes down) and tells him to Sanction Magnus.
- Russ sets off for Prospero.
- Horus ends up turning anyways.
- No one gets the message to Russ because he's in transit and ends up doing the deed.

Russ knew about the false warning from Magnus re: Horus and found that out from the Emperor (or do you think that Horus told Russ that Magnus warned the emperor about his betrayal?). The Emprah told Russ to Sanction Magnus knowing what Russ would do. That's one of the big revelations of PB, that the Emperor knew that Russ would take down Magnus in the worst possible way, else why would he send Russ? Remember that Russ has been called on to Sanction, by the Emperor, another legion at least once before. It isn't like this command is out of character for either of them.

That's why Russ moseys up to the planet and gives them time to respond, he's hoping Magnus gives himself up so he doesn't have to do what he was told to do. Magnus just sits there sulking in his tower and Russ carries out the Emperor's command.

obsidianaura wrote:However the Emperor is the one who gave Leman Russ the order to sanction the Thousand sons. He didn't think to mention Horus going bad to Leman?

Because when he sent Russ, it wasn't to sanction the Thousand Sons for warning him.

He was sent to sanction the Thousand Sons for violating the sanctity of the Imperial Palace and opening up a freakin' Warp Rift.

Also most of the galaxy knew horus had turned if you read nemesis, there are hundreds of worlds declaring for the warmaster before he is even done with istavan

Nemesis does not take place "right at the start" of the Horus Heresy. It takes place closer to the height of the Horus Heresy, and what's more those "hundreds of worlds" were ones which Horus had left troops on, installed the leadership of, etc. They revered Horus.

Also, I think it is very possible that the Emperor knew of Horus' betrayal when he sent Leman, but didn't tell him.

He knew that if he sent Leman, Magnus might try to parlay and tell him about Horus, so the Emperor planted the seed so Leman would discount it.

This fits exactly with what Kan just said. Whether Horus turned or not, the Emperor wanted the TS sanctioned for violating the IP, opening a Warp Rift and potentially turning to Chaos. He was pre-emptively striking against a force that would ultimately turn against him.

The problem i have with it is that why waste the wolves on a loyal legion even when they have broken the edict of nikea. They were tricked into making that choice by the very people who betrayed the imperium. Did the Emperor not notice that Fulgrim and Mortarion who were pushing for a ruling against horus were the people involved in the betrayal?

They needed as much strength at terra as possible and yet the Emperor was more concerened with reprimanding Magnus.

I'm starting to recall, maybe from First Heretic that it is remarked upon during the dropsite massacre that Leman Russ is attacking Prospero. Can't remember who said it though.

obsidianaura wrote:They were tricked into making that choice by the very people who betrayed the imperium. Did the Emperor not notice that Fulgrim and Mortarion who were pushing for a ruling against horus were the people involved in the betrayal?

How were they tricked, no one forced Magnus to send a message, even Horus was surprised, if not a little bemused, at Magnus actions.

obsidianaura wrote:They needed as much strength at terra as possible and yet the Emperor was more concerened with reprimanding Magnus.

Maybe because no one knew that Horus had turned yet, or only those very few Primarchs involved at Istvaan. Russ was sent before the outbreak of the Heresy. This is why Outcast Dead doesn't make much sense. They can't be retconning the Horus Heresy already surely, they haven't finished writing it yet.

Posted these on the Black Library thread over in News and Rumours, a few quotes from the various books about this. They will hopefully shed some light on the course of events.












Collected Visions places Magnus message before Istvaan as well.

There is no mention of the message from Horus in Prospero Burns although we do have the Space Wolf who has the vision of Horus Betrayal. If the intervention by Horus did in fact happen, perhaps this is a choice by Graham to show that Russ chose to ignore this due to his animosity with Magnus? Why Russ would choose to ignore this I don't know.

Pilau Rice wrote:

obsidianaura wrote:They were tricked into making that choice by the very people who betrayed the imperium. Did the Emperor not notice that Fulgrim and Mortarion who were pushing for a ruling against horus were the people involved in the betrayal?

Pilau Rice wrote:
How were they tricked, no one forced Magnus to send a message, even Horus was surprised, if not a little bemused, at Magnus actions.

I think you miss understand what I meant (I wasn't that clear) I didn't mean Magnus was tricked I meant the emperor and the people gathered at Nikia were. It was Fulgrim and Mortarion (plus the daemon too) pushing for the judgment to be made against Magnus. If the timeline was right in outcast dead then it would be strange to send the wolves against Magnus when the people who pushed to have the judgment made were known to be in open rebellion already

Oh and thanks for all the collation of those quotes from books really helps .

obsidianaura wrote:
I think you miss understand what I meant (I wasn't that clear) I didn't mean Magnus was tricked I meant the emperor and the people gathered at Nikia were. It was Fulgrim and Mortarion (plus the daemon too) pushing for the judgment to be made against Magnus. If the timeline was right in outcast dead then it would be strange to send the wolves against Magnus when the people who pushed to have the judgment made were known to be in open rebellion already

Mortarion was dead against psykers from the start, due to his upbringing on Barbarus. Fulgrim was a sycophant and went with the majority I guess. Sanguinius changed his mind I would assume, as Raldoron was with Russ and Fulgrim .

Nikaea wasn't long after the celebrations of Ullanor so the cracks hadn't started to show yet.

But I agree, it wouldn't have made much sense to send a legion against Magnus IF the Heresy was already known about. It would have been advantages for the Emperor to keep Russ on Terra. Magnus might have stayed loyal and been moped up after wards.

Although Outcast Dead does add extra weight to the Emperor needing Magnus for the Golden Throne, which would possibly warrant the Wolves being sent after Istvaan.

It still doesn't sort the timeline out though.

obsidianaura wrote:Oh and thanks for all the collation of those quotes from books really helps

You are welcome sir

Great quotes!

Pilau Rice wrote:...

Wow thank you indeed.

TOD is a good book. It is well written, full of amazing fluff about the Imperium and has good, interesting characters.
BUT:
1) The timeline makes no sense. At all.
2) It is full of typos and format errors. Really, it is sloppy. Words are missing here and there.
3) It feels rushed. There are a lot of things that go unexplained.
4) A World Eater kills

I was expecting better from Mr Graham.

To the OP: only the second point you enumerated is actually a retcon.

In the Outcast dead the traitor marines have common tattoos does anyone know what that was about?

Maybe it was something to do with the missing chapters.

Besides the strange time problems I really liked TOD otherwise, especially the penultimate chapter
“But you’re going to die”
“I know” said The Emperor

xcasex wrote:
What's the reason for this book, because i'm starting to think its a mind feth -- continuity wise -- on the level of the tvseries "Lost".

Kinda makes me glad that I really haven't bothered reading them, tbh.

I prefer my 'ancient history' to be half remembered inaccurate mysteries than well documented "soap-drama".

On the topic of the Emperor sending Russ after Magnus despite already knowing about the Heresy the revelations in TOD make the argument about the Wolves being better needed on Terra irrelevant because the Emperor already knew the outcome ergo.....

"But you're going to die."
"I know." said the Emperor.

And the idea of the Thousands Sons possibly being able to come back into the fold after the Heresy never could have happened because it was time for Magnus to pay up for the deals he'd made with the Warp to stablize his Legion's gene-seed as revealed in TS and whatever Warp power had brokered the deal (I think we can safely assume Tzeentch) was preparing to remove it's favor if Magnus didn't play ball which I believe the Emperor saw when Magnus tore his way into the chamber of the Golden Throne.

Oh and don't quote me on it but I'm pretty sure the matching tattoos obsidianaura is referring to would be from their time together in the Crusader Host.

It was a very good book still and well worth reading.

I think it was purely a mistake with the timings.

It was written at at very stressfull time in his life (life threatening illness) I'm a little surprised it wasn't picked up by some black library proof reader (do they have such things?)

Maybe the Emperor learning what was going to happen in the end kick started the creation of the Grey Knights?

The main problem with the timings which people seem to be overlooking in this thread is the timing of Magnus' message. He sent a message to warn the Emperor of Horus' betrayal, when the Emperor already knew and forces were en route to Istvaan; that's the main problem with the timing. If we disregard the messages received from Istvaan at the beginning, then it makes some sense IMHO.

Judging by the timings here, Russ would of know of Horus' betrayal when he was sent to 'apprehend' Magnus, as it was common knowledge on terra, with people revolting etc.

In a moment of speculation, the Big E may have sent Russ to remove Magnus altogether as he may have foreseen Magnus' betrayal (and/or seen his corruption when he 'visited' him) and wanted to remove him from the picture (in his typical gentle manner) but Tzeentch intevened.

Personally however, I wasn't a fan of the book altogether, one of the weaker novels in the series so far IMHO. To paraphrase myself from another thread:

"As to my thoughts on Outcast Dead:

I think I'd give it a 7/10. This would indeed make it one of the lower 'ranked' HH novels for me, which surprised me too.

At first I loved the novel and it was a real page-turner. The intrigue of Kai and what he would find, the growing knowledge of Istvaan (such as when they receive the news of the betrayal and Ferrus' death, and the portrayal of Ferrus here is REALLY GOOD), I also found at this point that Graham did a sterling job of making the Astropaths, their abilities and what goes on within them/the warp make sense, which is what I was most concerned about within the novel before I had read it. Up until about Chapter 13/14 I couldn't put the book down. But it was then that things got dubious for me.
I found the course of events largely very predictable, with who would die and such forth, with the action being fairly routine and almost unrealistic (within 40K). For example, that one of the outcast dead wasn't named in the Personae at the beginning, it was clear he was going to die and he got battered and bruised (unlike the others) for seemingly little reason. Furthermore, some characters were really stereotypical, such as Severian, Nagasena, Golovko, Subha etc. and really lacked much depth or character beyond their typecast IMHO. The ending seemed surprisingly rushed as well, whilst I also noticed several mistakes within the novel as a whole (format/spelling etc., one of which was very obvious) and then there was the serious issue with the timings within the novel.

Overall, it really let me down in the 2nd half of the novel, beginning to feel predictable and scripted and not really explaining properly many points/hints and revelations. There were a few nice revelations and some insight into the Emperor, but these didn't really make up for it IMHO and in their own way often didn't make sense. In true HH style it raised a lot of questions (which is good), but unlike usual, it seemed to fail to give a hint of the answer or when they could be answered. For example:

- Severian (the overly stereotypical lone wolf), when can we expect to find out what happened to him? (I'd assume in the next short story collection)
- What was up with the vacant angel?
- How did Dhakal A) make it out of the temple and B) whos geneseed did he take?
- How did Ghota (who may or may not have been a Thunderwarrior, I'm not sure) manage to take on almost the entire outcast dead? Including Tagore, who...
- ... managed to rip the spine out of a fully armoured and armed Custodian, but then get beaten by Ghota and Nagasena?!
- What was the Crusader Host? Why were they imprisoned? How come there were astartes from loyalist Legions imprisoned with them too? But this is good if it's expanded upon in later novels, as these mysteries within the series are really good...
- Artharva's making the brain reanimate was pretty dire IMHO. Furthermore, he could create a kine shield to deflect A LOT (100's?) of Autocannons, but couldn't do more than flick a fireball at Ghota or couldn't rip the enemy to pieces within the Temple?
- Light cutter chase scene was pretty damn weak IMHO.
- Why did Rogal Dorn seem to contradict himself when talking about the Imperial Truth at the end?
- I also was not sure what to make of the Emperor and what some of the visions said about him?

obsidianaura wrote:It was written at at very stressfull time in his life (life threatening illness) I'm a little surprised it wasn't picked up by some black library proof reader (do they have such things?)

Life threatening illness? Could you expand upon this? Are you sure you're not thinking of Mr Abnett?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also, OP can you not refer to it as a retcon when it's actually establishing new fluff on otherwise unknown or barely-known areas; only 1 on your 5 points appeared to be a change to previously established background and that's probably a mistake.
Or is the term retcon now officially up there with 'Mary Sue' and 'Reverse Engineer' for over and inappropriately used phrases?

I guess it is Abnett...

If McNeill has got a life threatening illness too, it is time for the rest of the HH writers to run away before the voodoo kills them all.