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I need to know: what is all the hate on the new version of ollanius pius? I love how he is now a perpetual. Everyone complains that it makes his sacrifice worthless but let's be real, the authors have more up their sleeves then him respawning. It also allows to follow his journey to terra and get a hint to his past and probably the past of all the perpetuals( there's like what 7!?) so someone please explain why this new version is such an atrocity(even as the old version doesn't say he isn't a perpetual) because it is confirmed he will be the one to save the emperor.it is confirmed

First, it's worth mentioning that this belongs in the background section of the forums.

But as for your question, a lot of people take issue with it because the symbolism behind his sacrifice meant a lot more knowing that he was just a normal human being. A lone, solitary, average human being standing between two beings of godlike power is a lot more meaningful and thematically evocative than when that someone happens to be immortal.

Because it went from an average man, like you or me, standingh up to the ultimate evil in the galaxy, to some sort of immortal super being. It just cheapened the impact of what Ollanious did.

Which would you be more impressed with? Superman standing up to the unstoppable evil, or Joe Schmoe, a guy who has no possible chance of winning, saying "Screw you, I'm a guardsman dammit. I will hold the line and I will not give an inch as long as I live."

Ollanious Pious (at least the original version) represents the ultimate ideal of the imperial guard. He is the average man who looks the ultimate evil in the eye and says "I may be a normal man, but I will fight until my last breath to hold the line." He represents what draws many players to the Imperial Guard, the idea that normal men, no more special than you or I, can stand up to impossible odds, and win. He may have been cut down, but his sacrifice is ultimately what saved the Imperium. He was a major saint of the Imperial Guard for a reason.

And I do get that, but I'm a summing that in the current fluff, pius will know that if he does confront horus, it will be the end of his long long life.

Remus Ventanus wrote:
And I do get that, but I'm a summing that in the current fluff, pius will know that if he does confront horus, it will be the end of his long long life.

Whether he still dies in the same manner or not, the fact that he's a special snowflake spoils the impact/meaning behind his death.

 Darth Bob wrote:

Remus Ventanus wrote:
And I do get that, but I'm a summing that in the current fluff, pius will know that if he does confront horus, it will be the end of his long long life.

Whether he still dies in the same manner or not, the fact that he's a special snowflake spoils the impact/meaning behind his death.

But knowing that his 40000 year old life would be over has some meaning to it.... I also think he is a true son of the emperor and if I am correct then his sacrifice will have more meaning than any version one can create

Moved to correct forum.

Remus Ventanus wrote:

 Darth Bob wrote:

Remus Ventanus wrote:
And I do get that, but I'm a summing that in the current fluff, pius will know that if he does confront horus, it will be the end of his long long life.

Whether he still dies in the same manner or not, the fact that he's a special snowflake spoils the impact/meaning behind his death.

But knowing that his 40000 year old life would be over has some meaning to it.... I also think he is a true son of the emperor and if I am correct then his sacrifice will have more meaning than any version one can create

You're missing the point though. He's a guy who has lived for thousands of years apparently in the new fluff.

Having him stand up to the ultimate evil just doesn't carry as much weight to some players as a random guardsman who just happened to be in the wrong place at the right time to change history. Making him a super special snowflake detracts from the original meaning of his sacrifice when he was just a normal man. That meaning, in a nutshell, being that even though you may be an ordinary man armed with what is essentially a pop gun and wearing a cardboard box for armor, you can still make a difference by being brave, faithful, and refusing to give up.

This is a guy who watched the closest thing to a god he's ever met, an almost perfect being in every sense of the word, get slapped down like it was nothing. And yet he still decides to stand up to what is essentially the devil himself, knowing full well he doesn't have a hope in hell of winning, because he believes in his cause. Even though he knows his soul could well be completely destroyed, he stands up for what he believes is right.

There's a 1d4chan article that does a pretty good job of explaining why players would gravitate towards the "normal" Olanious to the "perpetual" Olanious. I'll post it later when I find the link.

Found it http://1d4chan.org/wiki/Ollanius_Pius

as always, language, NSFW, etc.

 MrMoustaffa wrote:

Remus Ventanus wrote:

 Darth Bob wrote:

Remus Ventanus wrote:
And I do get that, but I'm a summing that in the current fluff, pius will know that if he does confront horus, it will be the end of his long long life.

Whether he still dies in the same manner or not, the fact that he's a special snowflake spoils the impact/meaning behind his death.

But knowing that his 40000 year old life would be over has some meaning to it.... I also think he is a true son of the emperor and if I am correct then his sacrifice will have more meaning than any version one can create

You're missing the point though. He's a guy who has lived for thousands of years apparently in the new fluff.

Having him stand up to the ultimate evil just doesn't carry as much weight to some players as a random guardsman who just happened to be in the wrong place at the right time to change history. Making him a super special snowflake detracts from the original meaning of his sacrifice when he was just a normal man. That meaning, in a nutshell, being that even though you may be an ordinary man armed with what is essentially a pop gun and wearing a cardboard box for armor, you can still make a difference by being brave, faithful, and refusing to give up.

This is a guy who watched the closest thing to a god he's ever met, an almost perfect being in every sense of the word, get slapped down like it was nothing. And yet he still decides to stand up to what is essentially the devil himself, knowing full well he doesn't have a hope in hell of winning, because he believes in his cause. Even though he knows his soul could well be completely destroyed, he stands up for what he believes is right.

There's a 1d4chan article that does a pretty good job of explaining why players would gravitate towards the "normal" Olanious to the "perpetual" Olanious. I'll post it later when I find the link.

And I do understand that. I suppose knowing that this is the way it is, I'm just trying to look on the bright side

Remus Ventanus wrote:
I also think he is a true son of the emperor and if I am correct then his sacrifice will have more meaning than any version one can create

I sincerely hope he is not, though at this point it wouldn't surprise me.

Pius just rolls a lot of the problems with the HH series into one big ball of canon defilement and bad writing. The original story is "One man can make a difference." The new story is "One man can make a difference... assuming he's a demi-god Primarch, post-human space marine or magic immortal."

To quote the current blurb for the new Imperial Guard codex:

"They are mere mortals in a galaxy of gods and monsters, and yet, at a time when the Imperium of Mankind is beset on all sides, it is the duty of the Astra Militarum to hold back the tide."

Well, not in the HH. There's little place in the HH for 'mere mortals', except to grovel to the Space Marines and their Primarchs, and/or get killed.

The way I see it, there are three major problems with Pius old story.

1) How did he manage to stay alive on Horus ship? Pius surviving all the horrors inside a chaos infested ship filled to the brim with mutants, chaos marines and daemons defies all logic.

2) How did he even end up in Horus ship to begin with? Why did a normal imperial army soldier accompany the Emperor and his bodyguard on such a crucial boarding mission? That on seat was better used for another superhuman warrior I say.

3) How could a normal guardsman even navigate the halls of Horus ship without some special gimmick to help him out? We are talking about a humongous ship here with enough space within it to house millions of souls.


Just admit it already, Ollanius Pius story of old has more plot holes in it than Swiss cheese.

Also a lot of people dislike the Perpetuals in general, beliving it to be a "silly idea"

Me personally I'm with holding judgement until a later time, I suspect they're going to end up giving us a rather big reveal into the nature of the Emperor

As someone used to comic books, asura's wrath, TTGL, homestuck, exalted, strike legion, and other such super-high powered works I don't see a guy who's mostly normal save for a magic compass™ and wolverine regeneration as being all that special.

I mean, I just finished a game where at the end you kill the omnipotent creator of all things by punching him to death.

What's an immortal to that?

Nothing in 40K is realistic so we shouldn't worry about how Ollanius got on to Horus's ship and so on.

The 40K fluff is a mixture of history -- often written by only one side -- legend, propaganda, mistakes and downright lies. The important thing is not what happened according to the "history books", it is what that message is supposed to tell people.

As mentioned above, the original Ollanius story told us that even in the Grimdarkfuture, ordinary humans can have the guts to stand up to anything and make a difference even if it kills them.

The new version tells us not to bother.

I note that the original poster is a new user and, I'm guessing new to the 40K. Something about new people is they like the way things are now or they wouldn't be new. (This applies to fluff and rules.) Older people who have been around for years like the way things used to be, or they would have dropped out. So naturally they don't like radical changes.

Nonetheless, whether you are new or not, it must be possible to appreciate that in a fluff that is full of superhero characters of various types, to replace one of the few significant non-superheroes with another superhero is an impoverishment of the story.

 MrMoustaffa wrote:
Because it went from an average man, like you or me, standingh up to the ultimate evil in the galaxy, to some sort of immortal super being. It just cheapened the impact of what Ollanious did.

Which would you be more impressed with? Superman standing up to the unstoppable evil, or Joe Schmoe, a guy who has no possible chance of winning, saying "Screw you, I'm a guardsman dammit. I will hold the line and I will not give an inch as long as I live."

Ollanious Pious (at least the original version) represents the ultimate ideal of the imperial guard. He is the average man who looks the ultimate evil in the eye and says "I may be a normal man, but I will fight until my last breath to hold the line." He represents what draws many players to the Imperial Guard, the idea that normal men, no more special than you or I, can stand up to impossible odds, and win. He may have been cut down, but his sacrifice is ultimately what saved the Imperium. He was a major saint of the Imperial Guard for a reason.
(...)
There's a 1d4chan article that does a pretty good job of explaining why players would gravitate towards the "normal" Olanious to the "perpetual" Olanious. I'll post it later when I find the link.

Found it http://1d4chan.org/wiki/Ollanius_Pius

as always, language, NSFW, etc.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
(...)
Nonetheless, whether you are new or not, it must be possible to appreciate that in a fluff that is full of superhero characters of various types, to replace one of the few significant non-superheroes with another superhero is an impoverishment of the story.

^Mostly this.
It is also part of a bigger change, the coming of the Perpetuals.

I liked when he was an unknown soldier. There was all the folk legend quality that's been mentioned, and the fact that his identity had gone unrecorded made it even more poignant. Anyone can be the Imperium's greatest historical hero, children!

What we now have is more like an ancillary member of the X-Men. Not a particularly aspirational figure. Real-life humans who do great things are more inspiring than superheroes

I like how everyone here is stating their opinions in absolute terms as if theirs was the only true way to write fiction and applied for all of humanity.

Because it's not arrogant and dismissive of other's opinions at all. :U

 MrMoustaffa wrote:
Because it went from an average man, like you or me, standingh up to the ultimate evil in the galaxy, to some sort of immortal super being. It just cheapened the impact of what Ollanious did.

Which would you be more impressed with? Superman standing up to the unstoppable evil, or Joe Schmoe, a guy who has no possible chance of winning, saying "Screw you, I'm a guardsman dammit. I will hold the line and I will not give an inch as long as I live."

Ollanious Pious (at least the original version) represents the ultimate ideal of the imperial guard. He is the average man who looks the ultimate evil in the eye and says "I may be a normal man, but I will fight until my last breath to hold the line." He represents what draws many players to the Imperial Guard, the idea that normal men, no more special than you or I, can stand up to impossible odds, and win. He may have been cut down, but his sacrifice is ultimately what saved the Imperium. He was a major saint of the Imperial Guard for a reason.

You can argue that Oll Perrsons is an average man in demeanor and behavior who happens to be immortal.

The only thing Oll wanted was to live a normal average life.

godking wrote:
You can argue that Oll Perrsons is an average man in demeanor and behavior who happens to be immortal.

The only thing Oll wanted was to live a normal average life.

Exactly. Heroes are made, not born. But Olly was born special, so... he can do the same things that heroes might do, but...

Well, for them, it's a life-defining moment. For him, it's Tuesday.

 Furyou Miko wrote:

godking wrote:
You can argue that Oll Perrsons is an average man in demeanor and behavior who happens to be immortal.

The only thing Oll wanted was to live a normal average life.

Exactly. Heroes are made, not born. But Olly was born special, so... he can do the same things that heroes might do, but...

Well, for them, it's a life-defining moment. For him, it's Tuesday.

Right, but with that same sentiment...

Does it make what the legend that grew up around him any different? Unless he had a great big flashing sign saying "I CAN'T DIE"...I don't see the issue.

All ollanius wanted WAS to be normal. He was a simple Agri farmer who was quite happy being in noticed.

 Kilkrazy wrote:



Nonetheless, whether you are new or not, it must be possible to appreciate that in a fluff that is full of superhero characters of various types, to replace one of the few significant non-superheroes with another superhero is an impoverishment of the story.

Millions of guardsmen are choppa'd, shot, exploded, eaten, and killed in a messy variety of ways daily. One getting killed 30,000 years ago by Hours isn't that amazing.

It makes Ollanius more heroic to give up his immortality for an ideal. As a perpetual, he understands better than most the actual consequences of his sacrifice.

It's one thing for common Joe guardsmen to die "for the Emporer" when he honestly believes he'll be by his side after death. Ollanius understands that he will be skull loved and slurped up by the primordial destroyer. That is heroic beyond anything even a primarch has done.

 dantower wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:



Nonetheless, whether you are new or not, it must be possible to appreciate that in a fluff that is full of superhero characters of various types, to replace one of the few significant non-superheroes with another superhero is an impoverishment of the story.

Millions of guardsmen are choppa'd, shot, exploded, eaten, and killed in a messy variety of ways daily. One getting killed 30,000 years ago by Hours isn't that amazing.

It makes Ollanius more heroic to give up his immortality for an ideal. As a perpetual, he understands better than most the actual consequences of his sacrifice.

It's one thing for common Joe guardsmen to die "for the Emporer" when he honestly believes he'll be by his side after death. Ollanius understands that he will be skull loved and slurped up by the primordial destroyer. That is heroic beyond anything even a primarch has done.

Couldn't have said it better myself!
Cheers!

I don't see why him being immortal makes the sacrifice so much better than compared to a normal human being.

Someone who's lived their lives multiple times over isn't going to get the same sympathy as someone who is cut down in their prime.

And as to the wanting to live a normal life kinda thing, normal people die and don't get to come back a second or third or fourth time around. Once a normal person is done, they're gone. New Pious gets that wish. Happy ending for everybody.

@dantower: Also, joe guardsman in the time period does now know he will be with the emperor after death, this is still a time when gods and religion is forbidden.

I have to admit, I'm weirded out that so many people read the 'classic' Ollanius Pius story as a real depiction of events.

I mean, I love that story. It is the sort of perfect fable that makes 40k seem real. I could definitely see ex-guardsmen telling that story to their kids. I could see the mothers of guardsmen embroidering it and hanging it on the wall. It seems like a real folk belief, just from a made-up universe.

But really? His last name was 'pious'? It's way too convenient to not be propaganda for the Imperial Cult. I always read it as a fable about the battle between Horus and the Emperor, and, though I assumed that lots of people in the Imperium thought that it was true, I never thought that we were supposed to believe it was true in the 'game universe'. It didn't even occur to be to think that it was an actual story of what actually happened.

I guess that's why it doesn't bother me to have a different version of events told within the HH series. The 'classic' Ollanius Pius was what devout Imperial citizens believed, and it is what devout Imperial citizens believed. Just now, behind that inspiring legend, we have 'what really happened', which almost none of them will ever know. I mean, 40K has a long history of Imperial Saints where the 'saint' and the 'actual person' are fairly divergent (or in which the ignoble origins or ending of the saint are overlooked).

Of course, I'm not claiming that my way of thinking about it was right. I'm just surprised that a story about a pious guardsman who stood up to impossible odds, named PIUS, didn't strike more people as a morality play or religious propaganda instead of war journalism. I mean, if the US announced they had caught a terrorist named Alvin Freedomhater, would most people just gloss over the surname?

It doesn´t matter.

It was a good legend, a good tale, a good story.

Now it is still a legend, a tale. Everything we are told about 40k & 30k is propaganda and lies. There are too many internal contradictions to see it as a collection of facts. It is not 'what really happened'.

It is still a tale. But a boring, lame one. One I am not interested in hearing how it ends. That is related to even worse stuff recently added to something many people thought it was a great story.

 da001 wrote:
It is still a tale. But a boring, lame one. One I am not interested in hearing how it ends. That is related to even worse stuff recently added to something many people thought it was a great story.

And here we have the crux of the issue “This is wrong because I don’t like it”. Wow such objectiveness, such argument.

To be honest, the old story of a lonely imperial trooper somehow slipping past daemons and what not to miraculously save the Emperor at the last minute is truly even more fanciful of a tale than the new spin BL has put on Pius. Which reminds me, I’m still waiting for someone to respond to my three points about Pius.

 SaintTom wrote:


@dantower: Also, joe guardsman in the time period does now know he will be with the emperor after death, this is still a time when gods and religion is forbidden.

That's what we always believed, and still is for the most part true. Irritatingly enough, another thing these Horus Heresy books are doing is bringing to light the beginnings of the cult of the Emperor. Already we have a human saint/prophetess onboard the Eisenstein and other people from Guard regiments far and wide saying things like "The Emperor protects" and reading banned literature on his divinity.

The Lectitio Divinitatus (as the Heresy book progress) is gaining a lot of sway. The Emporer was already embarked upon the path to Godhood before he ever became an undying martyr upon his throne.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Redcruisair wrote:
The way I see it, there are three major problems with Pius old story.

1) How did he manage to stay alive on Horus ship? Pius surviving all the horrors inside a chaos infested ship filled to the brim with mutants, chaos marines and daemons defies all logic.

2) How did he even end up in Horus ship to begin with? Why did a normal imperial army soldier accompany the Emperor and his bodyguard on such a crucial boarding mission? That on seat was better used for another superhuman warrior I say.

3) How could a normal guardsman even navigate the halls of Horus ship without some special gimmick to help him out? We are talking about a humongous ship here with enough space within it to house millions of souls.


Just admit it already, Ollanius Pius story of old has more plot holes in it than Swiss cheese.

1) The way I always thought of it was through good ole' guard numbers. I don't imagine Big E teleported aboard with just, Sanguinius, Dorn, a couple marines, a few Custodes, and a couple guardsmen. I think it was a counterattack of decent proportions. I think thousands of bodies teleported aboard Horus' flagship. Considering the company that the guardsmen were attacking with, it isn't surprising to think that a few of them made it to the heart of the beast.

2) This one is a bit bizarre. At the time it may have come down to not only the best of the best, but the best of what could be spared from the besieged walls of the palace itself. The Emperor may have pretty much just went you, you and, you coming with me.

3)This one is the easiest to answer. IF I were in his quaking feces-filled boots, I'd stick to Astartes, Custodes, and Primarchs like white on rice...If I didn't die in the halls, I'd end up wherever they did eventually.

 Redcruisair wrote:
1) How did he manage to stay alive on Horus ship? Pius surviving all the horrors inside a chaos infested ship filled to the brim with mutants, chaos marines and daemons defies all logic.

The same way Gaunt's Ghosts survived two years on a Chaos occupied world. By luck, by skill (and by being written by Dan Abnett.)

2) How did he even end up in Horus ship to begin with? Why did a normal imperial army soldier accompany the Emperor and his bodyguard on such a crucial boarding mission? That on seat was better used for another superhuman warrior I say.

The Emperor took more than just bodyguards with him. According to Warmaster - a WD game about the attack that has (thus far) not been contradicted, he was accompanied by Sanguinus, Dorn, marines and imperial army troopers. Seizing what would likely be his only chance to get face to face with Horus he took every armed loyalist he could spare.

3) How could a normal guardsman even navigate the halls of Horus ship without some special gimmick to help him out? We are talking about a humongous ship here with enough space within it to house millions of souls.

He wasn't alone, and while it can safely be assumed that the imperial army soldiers who were part of the boarding party would attempt to reach primary objectives like the bridge (or wherever the final battle took place.) No doubt they took horrendous casualties in doing so but it's not beyond belief that some... or one... would survive to the final confrontation.

Ollanious Pious (at least the original version) represents the ultimate ideal of the imperial guard.

It represents imperial propaganda, would'nt the Emp take only space marines with him, why is he telephoning with Guardsmen.