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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/12 22:31:47
Subject: Exercise in creative futility
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Longtime Dakkanaut
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What's your ideal 40k? What does the setting look like? Who are the players, is it character driven or setting driven (example: 2nd ed was more setting driven and characters were dragged along by inertia - 10th ed seems mostly to orbit the actions of a handful of characters).
Parameters
You can't just delete factions - at most you can modcon (modified continuity) rather than retcon. You can change how they work, act or function, but you can't just delete the tau, custodes or whatever. This is an exercise in creativity, so look for ways to creatively change them to fit your preferences rather than deleting - squats get eaten by nids but there are still roving bands of pirates for example.
You can choose any edition to work from if you want (so I suppose you can technically delete the tau if you choose 1st or 2nd ed as your base - although you could add them in as well if you want)
Any historical aspects of 40k that were there are still available - marsupial orks, warp vampires etc - but you are free to invent whatever you want.
You can add your own factions on top of the existing ones
It's the creative modconning that I'm interested in - some of the coolest fiction I've seen is when people have narrow parameters and have to find creative ways through rather than just dropping things.
For example:
The emperor was born of shamans - but those shamans, themselves reincarnating ancient hominids, were themselves not actually human, their original forms were australopithecines and as such their psychology is not the same so they created effectively a non human saviour in human form with directives that weren't necessarily in keeping with humanity. A hippy trying to maintain the natural flow of the universe and force humanity to fit with that. So his ultimate goals are actually to Amish-ify humanity and all of his actions have been malfunctions trying to work in a human environment he was never designed for. His creators are fallible and thus he is fallible.
The custodes process is the last remnant of the men of gold, the final line of human engineering and what was originally the overseer strain of humanity. The votann as the men of iron have gene codes that enforce servitude around custodes and their ancestor cores have been trying to weed these strands out, but the only successful method is psychotic rage in the presence of custodes, which has resulted in huge wars. The ancestor cores have started generating clone skeins for infiltration and assassination, taller and more human looking these skeins are able to operate alone for centuries inside the imperium, seeking out any custodes and killing them with an enzyme they secrete that interferes with their unique genetics. Designated Ghost Omega, the Custodes have no knowledge of what they are, only that some insidious force is picking off their warriors throughout the imperium.
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/12 22:52:04
Subject: Exercise in creative futility
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Regular Dakkanaut
Aus
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Creative futility? My ideal 40k is the one where GW will sell you a 2000 point army for less than $500!
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/12 23:13:50
Subject: Exercise in creative futility
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Longtime Dakkanaut
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RustyNumber wrote:Creative futility? My ideal 40k is the one where GW will sell you a 2000 point army for less than $500!
Not really what I was referring to :p
The futility is because we all discuss various aspects we like and don't like about the setting and GW will just GW. Futility because it can be the greatest idea ever with universal acclaim but unless GW writes it, it doesn't really matter.
Headcanon is an exercise in futility because it's only discussable inside your own head.
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/12 23:39:43
Subject: Exercise in creative futility
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Humming Great Unclean One of Nurgle
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The game is well-balanced, but that’s secondary to having a robust system of customization. Named characters are, with few exceptions, just particular builds of generic characters. Daemons get a lot more units. /selfish
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This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2025/01/12 23:39:56
Clocks for the clockmaker! Cogs for the cog throne! |
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/13 00:11:50
Subject: Exercise in creative futility
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Longtime Dakkanaut
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I tend to imagine stories that are possible within the 40k universe as written, so this is an interesting question, and I'm not sure I've ever really considered changes.
So a thing I would like to explore at some point would be an Age of Apostasy campaign/ variant game. So there would be Daughters (pre-Vandire), Brides (Vandire contemporary) and Sisters of the first four Orders (Post Vandire).
But that isn't so much "modconing" as better facilitating the playing of an alternate era of established lore.
I want the Triumph of Saint Katherine to feature Sisters that can "Break out" and be used as Canonesses of their respective Orders with their respective Relics. I want to play the Crusade campaign where each of the six orders has to Quest for their relic before the Triumph as a whole can be assembled.
But again, that's more playing with an established historical timeline.
Maybe shake up Tyrannid/ Genestealer relations by making it more common that Cult elements, particularly those that most closely resemble Tyranids, are reintegrated in such a way that they can be reused in subsequent vanguard operations.
This might manifest as providing a 'Stealer squad leader to represent a purestrain that had survived a life in a Cult- one that had been born within the genestealer lifecycle rather than spawned as a tyrannid. These leaders have strategic knowledge of various enemies based on lived experience, while spawned organisms are more likely to be ignorant of everything other than the consciousness of the hivemind.
I believe Patriarchs in particular would be valuable to a Tyrannid fleet.
I'd like GW to emphasize the Cults that survive the arrival of the Nids, rather than constantly focusing on those that don't. This is mechanically supported by the "Seed the Stars" victory in the Crusade rules, and in fact, many of the elements of the GSC I'd like to see emphasized in the lore are well represented by Crusade content.
I'd like to see the Necromunda Squats be officially acknowledged as usable in Votann armies with datasheets as necessary. I'd like to see Demiurg as a Tau alien auxilliary, and I'd like both Demiurg and Vespids to be more than one-unit affairs.
My ideal 40k is Narrative driven, escalation campaign and almost an RPG, and that's pretty much already possible.
I like it when my stories can occur along side the official fiction- I don't tend to use named characters unless my armies, within their own Crusades, happen to lend support to a battle that is part of the larger narrative.
My current background is set mostly in Pacificus, which facilitated interactions with Blackstone Fortress characters and Tyrannic war characters, but not so much Pariah Nexus or Vigilus characters.
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/13 00:17:16
Subject: Exercise in creative futility
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Longtime Dakkanaut
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Those all sound really interesting.
I think the diplomatic zoat concept for the tyranids could be brought to the fore, where they are very convincing about people apotheosing into the hive mind, becoming part of God.
Basically the Zoat becomes a cult proselityser to all species, using their psychic power to convince people to welcome the star children and join them. Why hide your cults when you can make them mainstream? No need to infest when you can just convince.
Having the hive mind speak to you through the zoat, acting as a real, beneficent god, supporting you, embracing you and that feeling making the descent of the tyranids an angelic host come to raise you to heaven could be a great and disturbing image.
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/13 00:22:59
Subject: Exercise in creative futility
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Witch Hunter in the Shadows
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Start with a streamlined oldhammer with the goal of reducing superfluous rolls, excessive one off rules and rerolls. A relatively new player should be able to look at the board and have at least some estimate of what is a threat to what, how soon, and what can either fight them or be fed to them.
Changing the fluff is interesting but personally i'd just like it to be easier to play and to get players into... but if I had to pick, Primaris would be the result of the cursed founding, Sons of Antaeus creating more of a rift between the old guard and the new who are the creation of the admech, inquisition, and high lords.
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This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2025/01/13 13:04:14
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/13 00:53:42
Subject: Re:Exercise in creative futility
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Mysterious Techpriest
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I'd like a Casual Mode.
One where I didn't have to worry about "Balance Data Sheets" and the "Meta."
The Company can still release FAQs and Errata, but it's not a steady stream of updates, army rebalances, and point readjustment.
You want to give us a Chapter Approved book once a year with all the upgrades in points or changes, that's cool with me.
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/13 01:00:13
Subject: Exercise in creative futility
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Terrifying Rhinox Rider
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I'd immediately have at least one of the existing named codex characters from each subfaction do something villainous or antagonistic. That means Tigurius, Ulrik, Belial, and Corbulo, that class of character, immediately do some team killing against their own faction. They would also have institutional approval for these actions, eg they accuse a company of Ultramarines of disloyalty, massacre them, and most chapter and imperial authority figures approve of and support this.
Most subfactions do not have multiple characters, and if they have even one he's probably outdated, eg Nuadhu Fireheart. This can be allowed for, it's fine.
Specifically, Eldar gain this moral ambiguity by, for example, Duke Sliscus filling a Yriel-style role for one of the other craftworlds. Black Library novels already have numerous characters moving from the webway societies to the craftworlds, or vis versa, and instead of being unusual it could be common for there to be first cousins, siblings, romantic partnerships, social, commercial and political ties between the craftworlds and web way cities. Several of the Phoenix lords and other craftworlders still do badguy stuff, and do it to important Eldar and Imperial chacters or subfactions. There is now a prefix-free Eldar faction that lives up to the all-sides-are-bad principle.
Orks are a shooting army, because duh, and they wear as much or more military-surplus style helmets, hats, and uniform remnants as they did in the 90s. They have many human-governed vassal worlds who pay them in tribute. One of the main plot points for Orks is that for example Goffs are such fundamentalists that they take control of other clans, as has always been the case. This can be used by other factions who covertly support Goffs to sabotage Waaghs, and it's not just Blood Axes who act as useful idiots to Necrons, Eldar Imps etc., but any clan. Goffs are Islamic State, Bad Moons are KMT, Deffskulls are NPFL, eg.
When players use special characters, the VP those characters score and scored by anyone using their auras, enhancements etc goes to a special pool that counts toward a draw, and not a win for the controlling player.
Horus led a large group of chapters in rebellion, the same ones as the normal legions, however there's no reason to say these 18 units are somehow first, or higher status, or all other marine units have to descend from them. Some of them face some stigma, eg the super orthodox Red Scorpions are sometimes higher in favor with Terra than the Ultras or Fists, and are disdainful of the failures by Ultras et al during the Heresy.
If anything, it's possible for Ultras to be underdogs, for example Calgar comes back from a campaign out in the frontier and in the meantime all marines have started to look to someone else as their spiritual liege. Some other chapter and chapter master get theirndaybin thensun as the Socs, and the Ultras have to spend time time as the greasers, or at least as Veronica Mars.
This all should help players be smart, because atm a lot of sci-fi fantasy fans have the opposite of knowledge about the world, their various mass media pastimes actually obscure reality from them rather than elucidate it.
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/13 04:36:13
Subject: Exercise in creative futility
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Fixture of Dakka
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I'm not entirely clear on the assignment. Are we talking about game rules or setting/lore changes?
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ATTENTION. Psychic tests are unfluffy. Your longing for AV is understandable but misguided. Your chapter doesn't need a separate codex. Doctrines should go away. Being a "troop" means nothing. This has been a cranky service announcement. You may now resume your regularly scheduled arguing.
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/13 05:47:44
Subject: Re:Exercise in creative futility
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Been Around the Block
Łódź, Poland
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Idk I like Warhammer like it is. All I would change are Squats. For me Tau is that one race that don't fit the universe, and they are cool with that, but one is enough. I think that all GW should make different in the past is taking some other vibe into Space Dwarves, make them more grimdark. For me when we have already Votann AND Tau in same universe, it is one more faction like this and we are halfway more to Infinity game than Warhammer.
Don't get me wrong, I love Infinity, and I think Squats models are good made, but I would prefer GW to add more grimdark stuff, especially that 10ed is really gone with cool edgy vibe. I think they should add Dark Mechanicum army, some cool Hereteks leaders, some blasphemous servitors as infantry, Kelbor Hal as named hero and some additional vechicles
EDIT Oh, and I think that If GW made this whole female custodes stuff in books, there should be at least some named hero mini relased. But I understand why they aren't doing it :(
EDIT Oh, and I would love to see more Admech minis like Tech Priest Dominius or Belisarius Cawl. Deformed inhuman cyborg priest is for me something that literally is missing a bit from Deformed inhuman cyborg priest fraction. I would love to see some retcon or update with more Techpriests AND Dark Mechanicum
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This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2025/01/13 05:51:51
"From the moment I understood the weakness of my flesh, it disgusted me'' |
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/13 05:51:27
Subject: Exercise in creative futility
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Mysterious Techpriest
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Wyldhunt wrote:I'm not entirely clear on the assignment. Are we talking about game rules or setting/lore changes?
I wasn't either so I just winged it.
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/13 06:18:40
Subject: Exercise in creative futility
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Resolute Ultramarine Honor Guard
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I'm waiting to see what the fall out of the return of the Primarchs does. GW has made a mint out of changes that change nothing. The return of the Primarchs will likely do the same to overall balance once there are equal numbers - but it could add some interesting subplots with Guilliman vs Lion vs Russ. But recent fiction release has been pretty stalled on the current 40K Setting.
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My WHFB armies were Bretonians and Tomb Kings. |
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/13 08:06:38
Subject: Exercise in creative futility
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Oozing Plague Marine Terminator
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Wyldhunt wrote:I'm not entirely clear on the assignment. Are we talking about game rules or setting/lore changes?
I read the OP and thought I had understood it - but then I read the replies and couldn't connect most of them at all to what the OP said or how I understood it.
I thought this was meant to be a thread about creative writing in 40K.
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/13 08:25:46
Subject: Re:Exercise in creative futility
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Battlefield Tourist
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Cool idea for a thread. I pretty much run my own version of 40K in my head these days, and since I'm mostly providing forces for non-wargamers in the games I play, my version is what we actually do in practice. It's quite satisfying!
Emperor - he's a really powerful psychic gestalt. The stupid decisions he makes are down to the fact that a gestalt is rule by committee and sometimes one or other personality takes the reins. He's normal human size and the giant golden figure is just an illusory projection. His power is psychic, and he could be strangled by a normal Ork as in the old background.
Primarchs - normal sized space marine leaders, the prototype for the Legions. The stuff about gene-loyalty is scaled back a bit, these guys are still heroes, maybe with cool powers, but much more normal scale - a cut above a chapter master but not much more than that.
The Great Crusade - the Crusade wasn't "nearly finished" when the Warmaster took over. It was about halfway done. So there's huge swathes of the galaxy that are not under Imperial rule, while there is also a massive section that is. All the stuff that is true about the current Imperium is true in that region, but the unconquered sections are full of all kinds of different human civilizations, allowing for all the cool creative human societies and sci fi tropes that make the Crusade era so compelling. I compress the timeline a bit to make this all work. If you like, think of my 40K as being 33K or something.
Space Marines - bring these back to the brainwashed criminals of Rogue Trader rather than the super duper humans they are today. They're decently tougher and stronger than the average human but not to the ludicrous levels they've become in modern background.
The Horus Heresy - the Heresy is ongoing, and due to the slow nature of information moving through the Warp new fronts are opening and being brought in all the time. There is also a race to colonize the free space by both sides to get new recruits. The Siege of Terra happened, and Chaos lost, but that wasn't enough to crush the rebellion, it was just one (important) battle, so Chaos are on the backfoot.
The Nature of Chaos - Warp storms and warp magic are toned down. There are sometimes warpspace breaches and daemon armies, but they're very rare events.
All of these changes I feel allow for more creativity in the setting while also keeping the unique character of 40K. You could argue that a lot of this is currently true but not emphasized, so call it a change of emphasis if you like. I also want to bring in the cool elements from the Heresy era while getting rid of the parts I find silly.
Squats - I prefer the Demiurg idea, and in my idea they'd be like deep sea fish, living at high pressures on high gravity worlds, needing pressure suits to operate at pressures humans find comfortable. Therefore you rarely ever see them out of their suits, and I'd imagine something with a sort of fish like face and a beard of tentacles. I'm not opposed to the Leagues of Votaan existing as one of those free human civilisations though, and I think that's all fine. I just want to have Demiurg as another relatively neutral Xenos species.
Eldar - Dark Eldar are the most common type of Eldar by a country mile. They're a bit toned down - the depraved pain addicts exist but they're mostly in the haemonculus cults. Your average Eldar is the piratical raider from Rogue Trader. I reckon they get themselves lobotomised to reduce their psychic potential to keep Slaanesh at bay. Craftworlders are traditionalists who are horrified by this practice and keep the the Path and rigid discipline to avoid the need for such butchery, but they're a really small minority of the total number of Eldar. Though with outsized influence because Farseers being able to see the future with the unlocked potential of the Eldar makes them pretty terrifying. But you can find Eldar Pirates hanging around a lot of free space.
Orks - pretty much unchanged. The Anzion theory is just a theory, and I'd emphasize the mercenary Blood Axe style Ork a bit more to make them potential players in the mixing pot of free non-imperial space, but other than that the whole Orkology thing is great as far as I'm concerned and I'm happy with it.
Tau - Ethereal mind control is Imperial propaganda. The Tau are a bit more multispecies than presented and I'd add a few more minor xenos, make the multispecies federation aspect a bit more prominent and downplay the suits bigger than a broadside. They'd have their alliance with the Demiurg as well, and plenty of human auxillaries.
Tyranids - pretty much leave as they are, because they're great!
Necrons - the C'taan are an ancient evil AI xenos that did the whole biotransferance thing ages ago. They infect thinking machines and turn them against their masters for inscrutable reasons. That's why there was a war against the Men of Iron, and Necron Warriors are just pre-Imperial androids made by humans possessed by this malign intelligence. There's still androids in other human cultures but the signal of the C'taan is limited by the speed of light, so they're just waiting for the signal to get there to start a new robot rebellion. Lacking psychics, they can't do warp travel but can smuggle infected droids onto warp capable craft sometimes. This is why human tech is so anti-AI and why all the ships have to have huge crews doing every single thing manually, because it's too dangerous to lose an entire warship to this plague. The Canoptek stuff is either the original xenos or some other xenos robot race they conquered ages ago.
I make this change because I think it's silly that Necrons look like human skeletons, they look like something humans would build and anyway they are inspired by Skynet so why not lean into it, especially with the cool myth of the Men of Iron right there. But I think a weird AI xenos keeps the mystery and horror of them well enough.
Broadly I want to bring the background to more of what it was in Rogue Trader but with some twists to suit my tastes, and if I was roleplaying in this world you'd have the Imperium as a major antagonist faction rather than the default protagonist faction, because you'd probably be in Free Space bordering the Imperium rather than the Imperium itself. You'd have a lot more chances to talk to the various Xenos types too, and there'd be more of an ongoing civil war between the Imperium and Chaos to use to your advantage.
Rules wise, I don't really mind. Something like 4e or 5e as core with the right codices is probably my sweet spot but I'm relatively happy with One Page Rules 2.X.
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/13 09:50:55
Subject: Exercise in creative futility
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Oozing Plague Marine Terminator
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Okay, I'll give it a try:
Chaos Followers:
The insane cartoon villain followers we see usually in the official narrative exist, but normally your way towards Chaos is from legitimate uprising against imperial rule. Most Chaos guard and rebels won't carve marks into their face, instead they just hate the Imperium because it sucks. When the uprising is successful though, it gets messy. You know, like when Lenin died. Guys with moustaches arrive, infighting begins and they're not sure if nurglists or khornists are right.
Imperium:
It's the ruthless hellhole as we know it. Space Marines aren't usually saviors, most of the time they kill imperial civilians someone declared traitors. Or Xenos that just happened to be in the way of a new imperial autobahn. Marine chapters are raised to 1million each to have any believable impact on galactic affairs, but since that's still a ridiculously small number they're a myth for many imperial citizens. The Guard are the main force of the imperium and do most of the work.
Due to the Rift the Imperium is also breaking apart, Daemons can run around everywhere basically.
Chaos Marines also add three zeroes to their numbers, so there were 200.000.000 Black Legionaires that attacked Cadia.
Orks do Orky things. But they might be a little less funny and more organized, since the greatest WAAAGH obviously is coming because of Thrakka.
The Tau are more like they were in 3rd edition. If the ethereals do some mind control stuff, it's very small. Maybe they just control Tau Fox news and Tau X. They do have a problem with their allies falling to Chaos since the Rift, but honestly, if I'm allowed to adjust canon a bit, I'd make Tau able to fall, too. Their whole "too small presence in the warp" sounds like Mary Sue.
AdMech get all their 30K toys, because I don't like any 40K AdMech model but the 30K models are some of the best in GWs catalogue. Stomp stomp, robot time!
Leagues of Votann start growing their beards because they look stupid without them, you know, just like those ugly klingons in Discovery that had to learn how to look cool again in season 2. Also they stop being immune to Chaos, too. Chaos dwarfs are cooler than normal dwarfs because they not only have proper beards but also big hats.
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/13 09:56:12
Subject: Exercise in creative futility
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Posts with Authority
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My ideas pretty much align with what Da Boss outlined above. At a bare minimum of twisting the established lore would be the continuation of Horus Heresy to the present days. The heresy will never be completely over as long as Chaos still exists. This would cater to endless Imperial civil wars, giving more nuance to the human faction. Amongst the conflicts, there'd be "blackshield" worlds which took part in the heresy but once the fighting subdued, the ruling officials didnt want to return to following neither Chaos nor IoM. They might even LARP into it by claiming to be still a part of either faction, but as soon as vox links to the establishment would close, life would resume as normal. This would create more "neutral" areas in the galaxy, which could resemble things more as outlined in the RT era.
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"The larger point though, is that as players, we have more control over what the game looks and feels like than most of us are willing to use in order to solve our own problems" |
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/13 10:04:58
Subject: Exercise in creative futility
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Ridin' on a Snotling Pump Wagon
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Army wise?
I’d like to see Tau comprised of more client species. With the right touch, that army could be a natural home for cool ideas which don’t extend to full armies in their own right. Even if it’s just as crew from things like the Stormsurge.
Just show us a proper coalition.
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/13 21:31:08
Subject: Exercise in creative futility
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Longtime Dakkanaut
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Wyldhunt wrote:I'm not entirely clear on the assignment. Are we talking about game rules or setting/lore changes?
Sgt. Cortez wrote: Wyldhunt wrote:I'm not entirely clear on the assignment. Are we talking about game rules or setting/lore changes?
I read the OP and thought I had understood it - but then I read the replies and couldn't connect most of them at all to what the OP said or how I understood it.
I thought this was meant to be a thread about creative writing in 40K.
That was my intention, but i suppose mentioning editions could confuse things with rules (I was using it to delineate different snapshots of 40k background). "What's the setting like" was my main point.
Lots of great ideas and concepts in here. Go nuts, I just enjoy the creative aspect and how people reinterpret things. I'm not looking to try to push any particular version as the best or most correct, just in creative concepts, for no other reason than we can.
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/13 21:59:13
Subject: Re:Exercise in creative futility
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Mysterious Techpriest
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Here's my outlook, everyone enjoyed the 5 minutes to midnight ascetic of earlier editions... so let's push it to the brink.
First off, bring on the End Times. Bring Back Leman Russ.
When he returns he has Rogal Dorn in tow.
In these End Times, the Primarchs essentially take command if the Imperium. There is literally no one to stop them.
They start to rebuild the Legions and the Imperium essentially becomes rather large city states, where you can have Ultramar and their Allies (their human military, Knight Households, and Mechanicus Forge Worlds)
This way [in game] you have a reason to mix and match multiple detachments within a single army as long as they are Imperial Allies or apart of your Subfaction.
You can do the same with the Chaos Primarchs, and give them territory on the map.
Since this is the End Times, we can cull some of the chaff. Remove some of the characters who are mentioned, but are one sided caricatures of villians and heroes.
You can push the Ynnari story forward, you can even have the death of a God or two. Maybe kill off the Necron "deciever" or really freak people out by showing that he was simply an avatar of Tzeentch the whole time.
Hell, kill off Abaddon, and have the Chaos Primarchs fighting each other (as they should).
You can put the nail in the coffin if the Emperor and kill him off, the make the universe so grim dark its black.
Then through the power of humanity have him become a literal god. The same thing Horus was afraid of him doing. Now you can say, gak, Horus was right.
This could lead to all sorts of fun.
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/13 22:09:00
Subject: Exercise in creative futility
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Longtime Dakkanaut
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The galaxy is huge, insanely so. The imperium controls only a million worlds, so at most a million star systems, out of 200 billion stars.
The dark between these stars is oppressive and terrifying. Each world is a mote in the dark tethered only by the astronomicon and irregular shipping. That tether is tenuous and easily cut. Humanity across the galaxy lives with the ever present existential dread of being cut off from the rest of the imperium.
Thousands of empires exist in parallel to the imperium, filling the huge space between the million worlds. If you look at a map of the galaxy you will see a patchwork of disputed control, multiple overlapping empires that appear right on top of one another but almost never meet. the galaxy is huge after all.
Orks fill much of the space, but rarely in coherent empires. Clashes between empires is almost exclusively over expansionism, looking to take suitable planets. But unless they run into each other in the dark between stars, these empires rarely ever encounter one another.
Beyond orks, beyond chaos, beyond tyranids, the people of the galaxy fear the dark between worlds and its inexorable hunger. The astronomicon is as much for propaganda as it is for communication, for it projects security theatre to the people of the Imperium, directly from the emperor himself. But that gnawing fear of isolation and the dark is always there.
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This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2025/01/13 22:09:47
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/14 21:57:23
Subject: Re:Exercise in creative futility
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Fixture of Dakka
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Hmm. My instinct is to say that I'd keep most things pretty much unchanged, but let's spew out a stream of consciousness and see what happens.
Marines: Tall primarchs definitely feels like a mistake. If anything, I feel like primarchs should generally be a bit smaller than marines. Make them superheroes who could pass as normal humans rather than giants. And in a similar vein, don't make all marines gorillas wrapped in tank armor. Lean into the idea that each primarch had quirky powers and specializations. Let Raven Guard be more human-sized but lean into their stealth powers. Let "big marines" be the purview of more direct primarchs. Marines all being giant target with paper doll dress-up style differences definitely feels like a symptom of the lore being written to suit the minis rather than the other way around. We should probably just have femarines in the mix from the start too. Let's ditch primaris marines as a concept. New primaris armor and toys can exist, but they're *just* equipment. Bring back the spooky supernatural vibes of tampering with the Emperor's work being a cursed enterprise.
Dark Angels probably need a different shtick. Especially now that the Lion is back and forgiving the Fallen. Their whole "thing" was the mystery behind the Fallen and the hunt for the same. Now it turns out a bunch of the Fallen were just the result of marines/primarchs being too emotionally immature to have a 2 minute conversation 10,000 years ago. Or we could just not bring back the Lion. He isn't really adding much of interest to the setting. I don't like Roboute, but I do find his stuff a bit more interesting on the whole. Would probably get rid of him because loyalist primarchs coming back just kind of smacks of, "Horus Heresy is popular! Let's sell minis the guys from that!"
Eldar: I'd probably brush aside some of the more questionable lore tidbits from Gav's books. I like the guy's work, but sometimes he just throws lore details around like hand grenades and raises a lot more questions than he answers. In the, "this makes a mess of canon," sense rather than the, "Hmm. How thought-provoking," sense. I'd probably also ditch the Visarch. He's trying very hard to be "mysterious," but just kind of comes across as cringe most of the time. I'd also either remove Yvraine and have Malys take her place, or else just make Yvraine more likable. I *want* to like that character so much, but she just comes off as a whacky jerk in like half of the books she's in.
Dark Eldar: Less of a change, more of a re-emphasizing. I'd move some of the attention away from Commorragh proper and instead play up satelite cities, webway hubs, fantastical webway sub-realms, etc.
Tau: We either need more 4th sphere content or less. The idea that a bunch of auxiliaries went all Event Horizon and now some tau are racist isn't super interesting on its own. We either need more movers and shakers leaning into that intolerance in a way that threatens the empire, or else we should consider just removing it.
Tyranids: I feel like these guys could benefit from being a smidge more zerg-y. Let each hive fleet have a Cerebrate equivalent to give them a bit more overt personality. Let them spend more time harvesting/farming/converting worlds instead of just insta-stripping them. Make it more common for organisms to mutate/change form in a short span of time rather than evolution being mostly a "between generations" thing. You lose a little of the unknowable alien locust vibe, but you gain a lot of potential for customization/adding personality.
Chaos: Git rid of the "once a god existed, they always existed," thing. It doesn't really make sense. And not in a cool Lovecraftian way. It's just messy and logically incoherent. Feels like something that sounded cool in the moment but just doesn't hold up under any scrutiny at all. I'd also make the "instantly crazy" chaos transition less of a thing. Creatures in the 41st millenium have tons of valid reasons to slowly slide into the clutches of the chaos gods. The cartoony insta-evil thing that they frequently do robs of of the pleasure of watching a slow-burn descent into madness and an exploration of the more positive vibes of the chaos gods. A servant of Slaanesh who sees himself as a champion for his people, fighting to let his planet enjoy life rather than the horrible existence of an imperial slave, is way more interesting than someone waking up one day and deciding that creepy serial killing sounds fun.
Thousand Sons cults. Get rid of the redundant ones. Either come up with better ones, or make each one more clearly be a "dark version" of one of the Heresy era cults. We don't need Scheming, Deception, and Treatury to each be their own thing.
Alpharius didn't die as depicted in the HH novels. Either that never happened, or it's made more clear that his mind had body hopped into someone else. The end of that novel is just silly otherwise.
I'd give Iron Warriors a better shtick. As-is, they're the most boring of the original legions, among the most whiny, and the most lacking in a cool gimmick. Oh, you dig trenches good? Cool. Hey. Do you think maybe one of the centuries old super soldiers with no social lives maybe cracked open Siege Warfare 101 at some point too? And then did it better because they have like, shadow teleportation or magic wards or a quirky emphasis on mobile combat or something?
Necrons: I want the metaphysics of these guys pinned down in a more satisfying fashion. Like, they have thoughts, feelings, memories, etc., but they explicitly don't have souls? But then we know that psychic races' souls contain thoughts, feelings, memories, etc. And generally a soul in 40k seems to just be tied to your emotions, sense of self, etc. It just raises a bunch of weird questions and feels like someone wanted to write the words "soulless undead machines" without thinking through the implications of that in the context of the setting. And that's before we factor in whatever "heka" is and the more soul-like propereties of flux.
Custodes: Did leave Terra, but don't deploy as full armies. They're spread thin, carrying the Emperor's light to every corner of the galaxy. (Treat them more like imperial agents than a proper army.)
Automatically Appended Next Post: Da Boss wrote:
Eldar - Dark Eldar are the most common type of Eldar by a country mile. They're a bit toned down - the depraved pain addicts exist but they're mostly in the haemonculus cults. Your average Eldar is the piratical raider from Rogue Trader. I reckon they get themselves lobotomised to reduce their psychic potential to keep Slaanesh at bay. Craftworlders are traditionalists who are horrified by this practice and keep the the Path and rigid discipline to avoid the need for such butchery, but they're a really small minority of the total number of Eldar. Though with outsized influence because Farseers being able to see the future with the unlocked potential of the Eldar makes them pretty terrifying. But you can find Eldar Pirates hanging around a lot of free space.
Pretty sure Dark Eldar actually *are* the most populous subfaction of eldar in default 40k except maybe for exodites. Commorragh is like, unfathomably huge. Craftworlders have a method for suppressing their psychic powers until you start walking the path of the seer. So if your version of drukhari aren't just psychically atrophied by default, then they'd probably just do what the craftworlders do; no physical surgery needed. And obviously without the pain-eating elements, things like wych cults operating at scale don't really make sense. So I think what you're describing is basically just to make "dark eldar" vanishingly rare and instead make Corsairs as populous as drukhari are now?
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This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2025/01/14 22:04:25
ATTENTION. Psychic tests are unfluffy. Your longing for AV is understandable but misguided. Your chapter doesn't need a separate codex. Doctrines should go away. Being a "troop" means nothing. This has been a cranky service announcement. You may now resume your regularly scheduled arguing.
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/14 22:50:35
Subject: Re:Exercise in creative futility
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Mysterious Techpriest
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I take it all back.
I want to put C.S. Goto, Mat Ward, Aaron Dembski-Bowden, and Ian Watson at a table.
Record their answers to:
"What is Warhammer 40,000 to you?"
"What is the core concept of Warhammer 40,000?"
"If you were in charge of the fiction for the next ten years, what would it look like?"
That would be my answer to this thread.
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This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2025/01/14 22:52:14
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/15 00:01:04
Subject: Re:Exercise in creative futility
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Pestilent Plague Marine with Blight Grenade
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Wyldhunt wrote:Thousand Sons cults. Get rid of the redundant ones. Either come up with better ones, or make each one more clearly be a "dark version" of one of the Heresy era cults. We don't need Scheming, Deception, and Treatury to each be their own thing.
The cult names for the Disciples of Tzeentch are way better. You've got names like Cult of the Transient Form, Unbound Flux, Host Duplicitous, Eternal Conflagration, Seekers of Infinite Wisdom, Transcendental Change, etc. IMO these are far more interesting and evocative than what we get in 40k.
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/15 05:25:46
Subject: Re:Exercise in creative futility
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Fixture of Dakka
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ArcaneHorror wrote: Wyldhunt wrote:Thousand Sons cults. Get rid of the redundant ones. Either come up with better ones, or make each one more clearly be a "dark version" of one of the Heresy era cults. We don't need Scheming, Deception, and Treatury to each be their own thing.
The cult names for the Disciples of Tzeentch are way better. You've got names like Cult of the Transient Form, Unbound Flux, Host Duplicitous, Eternal Conflagration, Seekers of Infinite Wisdom, Transcendental Change, etc. IMO these are far more interesting and evocative than what we get in 40k.
Sounds like it! Honestly, the cult names from 8th or 9th (whenever we first got them) seemed like they were probably the result of trying to hammer a square peg into a round hole. It seems to me that there was a directive to create X subfactions for the army and to follow the general template we got (bonus spell, warlord trait,strat, and relic for each subfaction). But then the designers, recognizing there were a bunch of different cool ways to represent illusions and trickery and such, basically just couldn't squeeze all those cool ideas into a single subfaction. So they just said, "Look, we've got like 3 different subfactions worth of tricky special rules. Let's just open the thesaurus and do the Cult of Deception three times."
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ATTENTION. Psychic tests are unfluffy. Your longing for AV is understandable but misguided. Your chapter doesn't need a separate codex. Doctrines should go away. Being a "troop" means nothing. This has been a cranky service announcement. You may now resume your regularly scheduled arguing.
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2025/01/15 07:46:28
Subject: Exercise in creative futility
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Battlefield Tourist
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Wyldhunt: I suppose, yes, I do want to make it so that corsairs are by far the largest contingent of Eldar. I want to make it a bit more like Rogue Trader.
The problem I have with the current eldar stuff is the whole Slaanesh thing dominates them so much that they're pushed into super extremes in both directions. Everything about their existence is about escaping She Who Thirsts. In that paradigm, I don't think Corsairs really make a lot of sense. How do you leave the strict Path and not feed on pain and still stay safe from Slaanesh? I know there are justifications built in but I find them unsatisfying.
My other goal is that I use "my version" of the setting as an RPG setting, and I want to make talking to aliens you meet, at least Tau, Demiurg, Eldar and Orks, a bit more of an option than it is in the default game. So making a lot of Eldar be a bit less extreme works well in that sense.
For the wargame, amping up the differences works better, and it IS cool that there are these two extreme paths they can take. I would still have Dark Eldar and Craftworlders in the setting but both would be rare and extremely powerful and influential. I would say they would have the most outsized influence compared to their numbers of any faction, because I'd give both the incredible psychic potential and future sight abilities which just make them incredibly difficult to take on if you really follow through on it. I think of them as absolute apex level threats, but both are forced into an extreme existence that is almost a cage to maintain this.
Totally understand why an Eldar fan wouldn't like my version. I'm not a big Eldar fan and this was my attempt to make it something more palatable to me.
And yeah, this does mean I'm basically just dropping Exodites. Even though dinosaur riding space elves is cool.
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