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Reforging would bring us to the collector's discussion about at what level of new or modification it is no longer the actual object but let us not go into that unending tangent

Breton wrote:
Gulliman was sitting in stasis on Macragge.

A couple of points on that:

- He is 1 of 9 Loyalist Primarchs who were not exact copies of each other. The helm of one may not fit the head of another. Some don't even have heads after all.
- Guilliman was sitting on a raised podium with a stasis field obscuring the view. Exact measurements aren't really going to be possible and the Chapters have more pressing matters than to go about measuring who's dad was bigger.

 Maréchal des Logis Walter wrote:
Plus I mean, the dark freakin angels of all people, the ones hellbend on living in the past and pursuing the same quest for all that time, and where information is filtered at a fair few levels, the upper echelon may well have some documentation about their gene daddy.

You mean the Dark Angels who were notorious for their secrets even before the disappearance of the Lion and who mindwipe their own Astartes and kill outsiders who learn too much?

Yes, originally the Lion was not as large as he is in the background added with the Horus Heresy series. However, there is plenty of in-universe reasoning for why the Chapter still absolutely believes the helm was his.
I mean can you say for certainty how tall, wide, or broad your great-grandfather was? Throw in 10k years of secretiveness, war, tragedy, and losses, and the fact the Chapter remembers their Primarchs actual name is a shock, and even then they call him "The Lion" more than Lion'el Jonson.

 Gert wrote:
We as outside viewers can go "Yeah that's not going to be a helm that the Lion wore because it's too small" but until now, the Primarchs had been missing for ten thousand years and the only "living" Astartes that can even remember his Primarch was Bjorn and he's barely lucid as it is.

Where are you getting "barely lucid" from as a description of Bjorn?

He's 10k years old and if he spends more than 5 minutes out stasis he loses his marbles and thinks he's in the Heresy again.

Got an actual source for the latter part? Last I checked his background material, he didn't have any major cognitive issues once he'd adjusted to being brought out of stasis again.

mrFickle wrote:
How many people got to see RG in stasis outside of the denizens of the planet and some pilgrims. Information doesn't flow freely through the galaxy like we have with the internet so people can’t freely educate themselves against the dogma drilled into them.

Also the lion helm could have been re forged. But I’ll be honest I always thought that he didn’t wear it and the watcher in the dark just carried it around close to him for the force field.

I believe that was the case for the original model, though funnily enough the current one does let you have the option.

As for your question:

The Shrine of Guilliman built to contain his body was one of the most holy places in the entire Imperium, and one which welcomed millions of pilgrims every year.

He was in Stasis for at least 10,000 years, "millions" means at least 2 so I'd say a floor of 20,000,000,000. And that's not counting all the Pict Screens, Remebrancer holos, and whatever else GW makes up as a representation of futuristic but still basically Television.

 Dysartes wrote:
Got an actual source for the latter part? Last I checked his background material, he didn't have any major cognitive issues once he'd adjusted to being brought out of stasis again.

That's Dreadnoughts as a whole. Bjorn is kept in stasis and is only awoken once every thousand years because he's a ten-thousand-year-old dreadnought. Just because he's Bjorn doesn't mean he stops having all the same problems as any other Dreadnought.

Quote on dreads going mad? I've don't think I've ever read that it was a general rule

 Gert wrote:

 Dysartes wrote:
Got an actual source for the latter part? Last I checked his background material, he didn't have any major cognitive issues once he'd adjusted to being brought out of stasis again.

That's Dreadnoughts as a whole. Bjorn is kept in stasis and is only awoken once every thousand years because he's a ten-thousand-year-old dreadnought. Just because he's Bjorn doesn't mean he stops having all the same problems as any other Dreadnought.

The only problems with degradation I'm aware of with Dreads I'm aware of are Redemptor Dreads destroying the pilot over time (may also be a thing for certain Heresy chassis too), and Black Rage on some Blood Angels (& successor) dreads. I've never seen anything about normal Dreadnoughts dealing with cognitive problems over time.

Again, I ask you - can you cite your source for this claim?

 Dysartes wrote:

 Gert wrote:

 Dysartes wrote:
Got an actual source for the latter part? Last I checked his background material, he didn't have any major cognitive issues once he'd adjusted to being brought out of stasis again.

That's Dreadnoughts as a whole. Bjorn is kept in stasis and is only awoken once every thousand years because he's a ten-thousand-year-old dreadnought. Just because he's Bjorn doesn't mean he stops having all the same problems as any other Dreadnought.

The only problems with degradation I'm aware of with Dreads I'm aware of are Redemptor Dreads destroying the pilot over time (may also be a thing for certain Heresy chassis too), and Black Rage on some Blood Angels (& successor) dreads. I've never seen anything about normal Dreadnoughts dealing with cognitive problems over time.

Again, I ask you - can you cite your source for this claim?

Leviathans eventually kill their occupants, apparently. Never heard anything about Deredeos. Contemptors are apparently such a stable platform that even "current" 40k Chaos Contemptors don't suffer from the madness that most other Chaos dreadnoughts are usually afflicted by.

And yes, I can source those for you if you want.

It’s long established some Dreadnought occupants can’t be roused from their sleep. I don’t think it’s tied to a specific chassis or sarcophagus type. Just seems to be an inevitable consequence of the underlying technology, somewhere along the line.

Probably worth keeping in mind it seems very doubtful any Dreadnought was ever designed to last forever.

 Dysartes wrote:
The only problems with degradation I'm aware of with Dreads I'm aware of are Redemptor Dreads destroying the pilot over time (may also be a thing for certain Heresy chassis too), and Black Rage on some Blood Angels (& successor) dreads. I've never seen anything about normal Dreadnoughts dealing with cognitive problems over time.

Again, I ask you - can you cite your source for this claim?

Carcharadons: The Outer Dark - The two Dreadnoughts deployed during the conflict on Piety V are both kept in chains and when unleashed can only vocalise screams of pain and rage.
Iron Warrior - Venerable Brother Altarion routinely forgets those who serve with him, referring to them as Brothers long dead.
Word Bearer's Omnibus - The Warmonger (Sol Talgron) often drifts into memories of the Heresy believing himself to be a warrior of flesh and blood.
Know No Fear - Dreadnoughts are placed into stasis to manage the physical and psychological pain of being put in a Sarcophagus.

The whole point of Dreadnoughts going into stasis isn't to keep them from being damaged, it's to prevent them from losing their sanity at being trapped in a metal box for eternity. This isn't new lore, it's been in 40k for years.

Sorry, can’t resist. But….

AcTuAlLy? Original Dreadnoughts were battle suits, where the occupant could freely enter and exit between battles.

However, Dreadnought Psychosis, where the wearer becomes so used to the power granted by the suit, slowly went insane and lost faculties.

But that didn’t last terribly long. I’ll need to go delve into my Rogue Trader books to try to get a rough idea as to when they became the Dreadnoughts we all know and love today.

 Gert wrote:

 Dysartes wrote:
Got an actual source for the latter part? Last I checked his background material, he didn't have any major cognitive issues once he'd adjusted to being brought out of stasis again.

That's Dreadnoughts as a whole. Bjorn is kept in stasis and is only awoken once every thousand years because he's a ten-thousand-year-old dreadnought. Just because he's Bjorn doesn't mean he stops having all the same problems as any other Dreadnought.

I can't tell you the book or the page, but I imagine others can once I describe what I remember. Bjorn gets hauled out of Stasis pretty religiously once a (Time Period) to tell the young ones all the Sagas and stories. In the story this comes from they do a little first person for Bjorn as well.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Sorry, can’t resist. But….

AcTuAlLy? Original Dreadnoughts were battle suits, where the occupant could freely enter and exit between battles.

However, Dreadnought Psychosis, where the wearer becomes so used to the power granted by the suit, slowly went insane and lost faculties.

But that didn’t last terribly long. I’ll need to go delve into my Rogue Trader books to try to get a rough idea as to when they became the Dreadnoughts we all know and love today.

Thanks Doc for pointing out to the origins

As far as I remember mostly from codices dreads are also used as advisors in a fair few chapters as they have got more experience and knowledge than most flesh and bone brothers.

 Gert wrote:

 Dysartes wrote:
The only problems with degradation I'm aware of with Dreads I'm aware of are Redemptor Dreads destroying the pilot over time (may also be a thing for certain Heresy chassis too), and Black Rage on some Blood Angels (& successor) dreads. I've never seen anything about normal Dreadnoughts dealing with cognitive problems over time.

Again, I ask you - can you cite your source for this claim?

Carcharadons: The Outer Dark - The two Dreadnoughts deployed during the conflict on Piety V are both kept in chains and when unleashed can only vocalise screams of pain and rage.
Iron Warrior - Venerable Brother Altarion routinely forgets those who serve with him, referring to them as Brothers long dead.
Word Bearer's Omnibus - The Warmonger (Sol Talgron) often drifts into memories of the Heresy believing himself to be a warrior of flesh and blood.
Know No Fear - Dreadnoughts are placed into stasis to manage the physical and psychological pain of being put in a Sarcophagus.

The whole point of Dreadnoughts going into stasis isn't to keep them from being damaged, it's to prevent them from losing their sanity at being trapped in a metal box for eternity. This isn't new lore, it's been in 40k for years.

^It looks like many of those examples are of Chaos Dreadnoughts. Those have a very different existence than loyalist Dreadnoughts.

From 2nd edition Chaos Space Marine codex:
"Among Imperial Space Marines it is considered a great honor for a mortally wounded warrior to be interred inside the armored sarcophagus of a Dreadnought so that he can continue to serve the Emperor. Chaos Marines consider being consigned to a Dreadnought a living death, a torture or punishment from the dark gods of Chaos. [. . . ] As a result, most Chaos Dreadnoughts are completely psychotic." The same distinction is made in the 8th edition CSM codex.

It is also noted throughout many codexes that loyalist Dreadnoughts are revered by their brothers, "whose advice is sought by initiate and Chapter Master alike. It is not uncommon for Dreadnoughts to serve as members of the Chapter Council, lending wisdom to strategy as they do fury on the battlefield." Codex SM, 5th edition. I don't imagine they are sought for wisdom while simultaneously being insane. If they are kept in stasis so that they don't go insane . . . then it follows that loyalist dreadnoughts are, by and large, sane. They chaos ones? Yeah those ones are kept in chains.

Breton wrote:

 Gert wrote:

 Dysartes wrote:
Got an actual source for the latter part? Last I checked his background material, he didn't have any major cognitive issues once he'd adjusted to being brought out of stasis again.

That's Dreadnoughts as a whole. Bjorn is kept in stasis and is only awoken once every thousand years because he's a ten-thousand-year-old dreadnought. Just because he's Bjorn doesn't mean he stops having all the same problems as any other Dreadnought.

I can't tell you the book or the page, but I imagine others can once I describe what I remember. Bjorn gets hauled out of Stasis pretty religiously once a (Time Period) to tell the young ones all the Sagas and stories. In the story this comes from they do a little first person for Bjorn as well.

Here's the one from Space Wolf Codex 2nd ed. pg 16:

Bjorn does not seem "barely lucid". He sometimes questions memories, but that's not "insane".

Exactly one of those is a Chaos Dreadnought.

In order they are Carcharadon, Ultramarine, Word Bearer and Ultramarine.

Those were just the books I had to hand that I remembered from. I could go searching through my library of like 200 books but I also need to work and eat.

^Well I suppose I'll just repeat my general opinion about the reliability of Black Library for sources, in that it's often not a great source to draw conclusions from.

Loyalist Dreadnoughts being kept in chains and only being able to scream in rage and pain does not seem to map well to the typical "Dreadnought experience".

Forgetting names? I'm fine with that.

From Index Astartes I:


So Dreadnoughts do indeed lose their faculties over time, but I think the rate of such varies by the individual. Obviously Chapters like the Flesh Tearers have their Dreadnoughts fall to the Black Rage rapidly, whereas Bjorn is still relatively* sharp after 10k years.

Old Dreadnoughts tend to spend more and more time in stasis to protect their fraying minds. Honestly, it isn't surprising. The human mind just hasn't evolved to hold memories over thousands of years, and Space Marines have improved memory over basic humans. That quantity of memories must become quite the burden over the centuries, especially if they are disjointed through time by the periods in stasis. Plus, decay will probably make the memories increasingly patchy.


*Sharp for a bloke who has lived 10,000 years. The fact he is still able to advise a Chapter containing such mighty and experienced heroes as the 700 year old Grimnar suggests he is still a very capable thinker once warmed up, and he is certainly not a liability on the battlefield. Bjorn has been a HQ choice for a reason.

 Insectum7 wrote:
^Well I suppose I'll just repeat my general opinion about the reliability of Black Library for sources, in that it's often not a great source to draw conclusions from.

Loyalist Dreadnoughts being kept in chains and only being able to scream in rage and pain does not seem to map well to the typical "Dreadnought experience".

Forgetting names? I'm fine with that.

So what you're saying is I'm right but you don't want to admit it? Ok dude.

Insane is not the same as forgetful.

I never said insane, I said barely lucid and then clarified my statement.

You're picking on words when multiple sources have shown that Dreadnoughts are not a reliable source of information concerning events that occurred hundreds if not thousands of years before.

You did say “prevent them from losing their sanity”.

So you're the word police is that it?

Can you explain the line between “insane” and someone who has lost their sanity?

Edit: if you’d like to rephrase your earlier words, now is a good time to do so.
Nothing wrong with admitting you goofed a bit.

I mean, when Index Astartes states that Dreadnoughts start to lose their grip on reality and spend more and more time in stasis to slow this, I think it is pretty reasonable to assume that the stasis helps stop them from going insane.

The most basic definition for psychosis is losing touch with reality. For those that don't know, psychosis isn't just the bouncing off the wall type and certainly isn't just becoming a murderous individual (that is an exceptionally rare form).

Barely lucid means someone is struggling to remember things but can still recover.
Insanity is when they've lost hold of reality as some Dreadnoughts do and curing insanity is nigh impossible.
It's a scale not an on/off switch.

The examples I gave show this scale.
Altarion shows the earlier issues found with Dreadnoughts where they mix up events and people from their memories.
The Warmonger is further along where he sometimes slips into the past but can still be brought back to the present.
The Carcharadon Dreadnoughts are the final product, beings of rage and hatred born of eternal pain and suffering. Useful as weapons and nothing more.

Most Dreadnoughts won't reach that final stage because they inevitably get killed before then being warmachines. In the same way that an Astartes is functionally nigh immortal due to their decreased aging and regenerative abilities but never get to test that because they die in battle.
Just because something is rare, doesn't mean it doesn't happen.

 Gert wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
^Well I suppose I'll just repeat my general opinion about the reliability of Black Library for sources, in that it's often not a great source to draw conclusions from.

Loyalist Dreadnoughts being kept in chains and only being able to scream in rage and pain does not seem to map well to the typical "Dreadnought experience".

Forgetting names? I'm fine with that.

So what you're saying is I'm right but you don't want to admit it? Ok dude.

No, I'm saying that BL isn't a great source because it's brought us 12' tall Berzerkers, Marines marching at 60 mph, Chimeras being cut in half with Lughtning Claws and Imperial Assassins struggling to take down a Marine. So when I hear about loyalist dreadnoughts being chained up and only being able to scream, I toss it in the junk pile next to the rest of it.

 Gert wrote:
Barely lucid means someone is struggling to remember things but can still recover.

I do not think that word means what you think it means. Either way I've posted a source for Bjorn and he seems plenty aware of his surroundings, and appears to have clear memories involving the Primarch.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Haighus wrote:
I mean, when Index Astartes states that Dreadnoughts start to lose their grip on reality and spend more and more time in stasis to slow this, I think it is pretty reasonable to assume that the stasis helps stop them from going insane.

The most basic definition for psychosis is losing touch with reality. For those that don't know, psychosis isn't just the bouncing off the wall type and certainly isn't just becoming a murderous individual (that is an exceptionally rare form).

Right, but the same article cites Bjorn as being exceptionally old, and we have a story where Bjorn is nowhere near insane either. It's more like he would just rather not be there. I think one could interpret "grip on the material world inevitably begins to slip" as a sort of disinterest, rather than a psychosis. We've also got a history where the Venerable Dreadnoughts have a higher WS and BS than the typical Dread. If they can do battle effectively, lead troops and take part in war councils, I question the validity of the term "psychosis".


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Gert wrote:

- Guilliman was sitting on a raised podium with a stasis field obscuring the view. Exact measurements aren't really going to be possible and the Chapters have more pressing matters than to go about measuring who's dad was bigger.

Source for stasis fields obscuring views, otherwise it's just a matter of trigonometry. And Guilliman was one of the most famous and visited shrines in the Imperium, I'm sure it's seen a lot of observation for piety, study and artwork.

 Insectum7 wrote:

 Haighus wrote:
I mean, when Index Astartes states that Dreadnoughts start to lose their grip on reality and spend more and more time in stasis to slow this, I think it is pretty reasonable to assume that the stasis helps stop them from going insane.

The most basic definition for psychosis is losing touch with reality. For those that don't know, psychosis isn't just the bouncing off the wall type and certainly isn't just becoming a murderous individual (that is an exceptionally rare form).

Right, but the same article cites Bjorn as being exceptionally old, and we have a story where Bjorn is nowhere near insane either. It's more like he would just rather not be there. I think one could interpret "grip on the material world inevitably begins to slip" as a sort of disinterest, rather than a psychosis. We've also got a history where the Venerable Dreadnoughts have a higher WS and BS than the typical Dread. If they can do battle effectively, lead troops and take part in war councils, I question the validity of the term "psychosis".

I think there are a number of things at play here. Firstly, different individuals are almost certainly going to deteriorate at different rates, just like actual humans. Some humans are sharp at 100, others have dementia in their 50's. There is a spectrum. Bjorn is always noted as exceptional, the oldest known dreadnought.

Secondly, Bjorn is routinely woken once every thousand years. He is only woken otherwise for truly exceptional battles, like serious assaults on the Fang. He has essentially been stopped in time to prevent further deterioration, which suggests even he is on the cusp of serious degeneration. Bjorn served routinely as a dreadnought for just 300 years before he started spending more and more time in stasis. It isn't clear at which point a dreadnought is considered venerable and probably has no hard and fast rule, but I get the Impression any dreadnought >1000 years old is very rare, and Bjorn sleeps that long. He has probably only been awake a couple of dozen times in ~9000 years.

Thirdly, psychosis can occur from low mood states like severe depression, and I think that is a far more likely type for most chapters than the raging murderer type some dreadnoughts are prone to (particularly Blood Angels and successors). I suspect that without stasis sleep, most dreadnoughts would slip into a sort of irreversible catatonia eventually and fully withdraw from the real world. It seems that would likely be within a few centuries of continuous activity based on when dreadnoughts typically seem to withdraw from regular service and spend more time in stasis. To be clear, I think the time in stasis pauses this process and prevents it progressing, preserving these great heroes of the Chapter until they are needed.

 Insectum7 wrote:
No, I'm saying that BL isn't a great source because it's brought us 12' tall Berzerkers, Marines marching at 60 mph, Chimeras being cut in half with Lughtning Claws and Imperial Assassins struggling to take down a Marine. So when I hear about loyalist dreadnoughts being chained up and only being able to scream, I toss it in the junk pile next to the rest of it.

Sounds a lot like "I don't like it so it doesn't count". I'm not picking single examples, I'm showing you multiple examples across a range of books set at different points in time and written years apart by different authors that all say the same thing.
At no point have I claimed that all Dreadnoughts are at the same level as the Carcharadon examples while you have claimed the concept of Dreadnoughts going senile or losing their mental faculties is non-existent. Even after you were shown a specific example from Index Astartes you're still claiming it doesn't exist.
You cherry pick examples that don't suit your narrative rather than taking them as a whole.