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Its true, thats the reason they started the Horus Heresy series in the first place. Its also why I think they'll advance the plotline after they finish with the Horus Heresy. Its also why they've made the Chaos characters more likable, before when it was fun to root for the Imperium they were just comic book badguys stoped by superhuman holy warriors. Its also the reason they introduced the Nids Necrons and Tau.

I'm not sure what it is but the Imperium has just become so 1dimensional, it use to be kind of deep, humans doing what they had to survive in a hellish galaxy dedicated to thier death, I was an Imperial fan in times long past. Now they make me want to puke, the Imperial guard are just so pathetic, the mind of the Imperial Guardman is usually split between ignorance and cowardess, the astartes are marginally better, the only fully fleshed Imperial characters are the ones in the Inquisition.

That's because you've spent too much time in the 40k fluff. Just take a long break for 40k and grimdark and you'll come back eventually. Or if you prefer change up your army for a while. The Imperium follows a theme that's been established since rogue trader times, I don't really think they can change it much. You could always write your own fluff to expand on stuff though, that might help things seem a bit less 1 dimensional.

All I can say is that ... well, "that's your opinion". Personally, I have zero interest in the Horus Heresy because I think that this stuff is one-dimensional, both in its focus as well as the tiresome habit of desperately tuning everything up to eyeball-rolling levels of "larger than life" kind of epicness. If the franchise is going stale, then it's because some writers started treating it like a theatre stage populated by cliché-laden superheroes rather than a living, breathing world. Interestingly, the "comic book" feeling is something I get from the newer books rather than the old stuff - which was at times silly, but at least less lopsided, both in quantity as well as content.

That being said, Rogukiel still has a point - if you busy yourself with one thing for too long, it can become boring. Mix things up a bit. I am jumping back and forth between various interests for years now, but always return after a break, and simultaneously keep an eye on my favs so as to not miss anything important.

I have to agree 100% with Lynata, when a specific part of a hobby becomes tiresome or unattractive, its time to change focus, different game or elements get changed up and try to start from a fresh perspective.

IOM has bored me to tears in the last years, and so I shifted my focus to Tau and Orks, with a little IG and marines tossed in from time to time, has done wonders for my enjoyment.

yes the HH is not my cup of tea (consisting of super this beating on super that, while they walk away from explosions) I liked the days when the HH was just myth and legends, now we know the primarchs shoe sizes...

But all that said, its still my favorite setting to expand upon, since you can make it your own, just dont drown in the fluff to much, and have fun with your own.

That and breaking out Gorkamorka for some truly fun old school games

40k fluff has always been stale.

Like cheesy puffs several years past their best before date.

Come from it being recycled from so many other sources. OK, they put a 'new' spin on it, but it's still grandad's axe* when it comes to gaming.

If you wish to rejuvenate it, play something else for a while (Just don't read the fluff - or you might end up having an even lower opinion of 40k fluff). Just play and forget that 40k exists for a while.
It'll still be there when you come back.

*It's had 4 new axeheads and 3 new handles, but it's just like the day he bought it.

Stale Imperium is intentional. Stagnancy is it's key-defining trait and has always been.

ZSO, SAHAAL wrote:
the Imperial guard are just so pathetic, the mind of the Imperial Guardman is usually split between ignorance and cowardess,

This is basically the exact opposite of accurate. Guard fluff consistently portrays them beating the snot out of theoretically superior forces (except in IA, where they always lose against demonstrably inferior forces, like Tau, because IA is about pushing xenos resin kits, since all of their guard resin is so gorgeous it sells itself).

Sir Pseudonymous wrote:

ZSO, SAHAAL wrote:
the Imperial guard are just so pathetic, the mind of the Imperial Guardman is usually split between ignorance and cowardess,

This is basically the exact opposite of accurate. Guard fluff consistently portrays them beating the snot out of theoretically superior forces (except in IA, where they always lose against demonstrably inferior forces, like Tau, because IA is about pushing xenos resin kits, since all of their guard resin is so gorgeous it sells itself).

You talk nonsense. Non of the Xenos forces in the IA books were inferior to their guard equivalents, the Tau on Taros were in fact better equiped than the Guard ( although less numerous). The entire Taros whinefest is simply idiotic because the book itself makes it clear that the campaign was il fated from it's very beginning ( undermanned, badly lead and supported against a well equiped, well supported and well lead Tau force ). IA 4 has a small group of guardsmen fight bravely against a vastly superior Tyranid force. The Vraks campaign was an IG victory. The Krieg regiments, despite their outdated tactics, managed to hold against renegade milita, several chaos marine warbands and even a fullscale daemon incursion. The most recent IA books has the IG win against a large and technologicaly superior Eldar Force ( not to a small part thanks to the idiotic behaviour of the Eldar ).

If you wish to complain about the IA books then have a look at the Badab War books which were filled with some of the worst spessmuhreen spank ever to be seen in a book not written by Mr. Ward.

It's the nature of the beast. One the one hand its greatest strength (the 'quarter to midnight' feeling creates a great atmosphere). It also means that there is no potential for the developers to cock up the game universe by advancing it in an ill-thought out manner and then damaging the fanbase, as has happened with other notable game universes.

On the other hand, it means things can get a little stale if you have played for so long. Its also very difficult for new codecies and rule books to not feel contrived, copy-pasted from previous books, or write anything new without it getting a response from people who liked the previous incarnation of the rules or background. And in that sense I don't think the Codex writers have a very easy time of it. See the response to Devastators now being made up of inexperienced marines, or the response to the Necrons being 'fleshed out' with more personality, despite there being very little there beforehand. Matt Ward gets a lot of criticism for his OTT prose and narrative, but really what else was there he could have done with it being a copy of what had already come several times before?

40k fluff is IMO really boring I much prefer the fantasy fluff. In 40k everyone is out for themselves there is no bonds of friendship which really doesn't seem like what humans would do. I know this is going to sound strange but to me fantasy fluff is a lot more realistic. The factions make allies with eachother they make treaty's. for instance the empire and the dwarfs have been like battle brothers for thousands of years

Personally, I happen to enjoy the 40k background. I think the quality varies hugely by author, but even that is a matter of subjective taste rather than objective merit most of the time. Apparently, I'm in the minority opinion, but I don't think it's hard at all to find 40k books which are rich, vibrant, and filled with characters and plots of great literary depth. (I'll go ahead and cite something specific as an example, in this case the Night Lords trilogy by Aaron Dembski-Bowden, the most recent of which came out in April of last year, which I assume is recent enough to qualify for the discussion at hand.)

I think some authors have very different styles, which can lead people to think that the fiction is stale. (Especially if you got a bite of Ben Counter when you'd really prefer a Dan Abnett, or vice versa.)

Perhaps you have been overexposed recently. Or it's always possible that the 40k background just isn't your cup of tea. But I, for one, still derive great satisfaction from it, and don't think that it's going stale at all. That i,s of course, just my opinion.

 KingDeath wrote:

Sir Pseudonymous wrote:

ZSO, SAHAAL wrote:
the Imperial guard are just so pathetic, the mind of the Imperial Guardman is usually split between ignorance and cowardess,

This is basically the exact opposite of accurate. Guard fluff consistently portrays them beating the snot out of theoretically superior forces (except in IA, where they always lose against demonstrably inferior forces, like Tau, because IA is about pushing xenos resin kits, since all of their guard resin is so gorgeous it sells itself).

You talk nonsense. Non of the Xenos forces in the IA books were inferior to their guard equivalents, the Tau on Taros were in fact better equiped than the Guard ( although less numerous). The entire Taros whinefest is simply idiotic because the book itself makes it clear that the campaign was il fated from it's very beginning ( undermanned, badly lead and supported against a well equiped, well supported and well lead Tau force

The imperial forces were superior in every aspect but availability of high-speed transport, and plot armor. As the story is contrived for the Tau to win, the guard do the absolute worst thing they possibly could in any situation: setting down as far from their objectives as could be justified, spreading their forces as thin as possible for no reason, forgetting that an armored column charging a small town was made of tanks mid-paragraph, and so on, in addition to random "artistic license" taken with the various equipment, like marker lights somehow outranging battlecannons, seeker missiles constantly killing leman russes (when they only so much as scratch the paint 16% of the time), a titan being one-shotted by something that wouldn't even get past its shield, an armored column forgetting it's made of tanks mid-paragraph, and so on.

IA 4 has a small group of guardsmen fight bravely against a vastly superior Tyranid force. The Vraks campaign was an IG victory. The Krieg regiments, despite their outdated tactics, managed to hold against renegade milita, several chaos marine warbands and even a fullscale daemon incursion. The most recent IA books has the IG win against a large and technologicaly superior Eldar Force ( not to a small part thanks to the idiotic behaviour of the Eldar ).

The only copy of four I've ever seen was a horrible scan wherein most of the pages were largely obscured by glare (actually, I think they were photos, and the idiot taking them was using a flash).

Vraks had its own list of stupid problems, like how the whole idiotic affair should have been all but invalidated by the presence of titans, and of course the air support and massive quantities of armor assets, and space marines using their "strategic brilliance" to do ridiculously stupid things with heavy casualties (related: raid on kastorel-novem, where the space marines decide that a large army of orks can be pushed onto a small force of light infantry by a smaller force of light infantry ).

IA11: Imperial Guard fighting in a stupid way against somehow even more stupid Eldar, and rules that seem somewhat op compared to the more cautious rules and pricing IA usually provides, all relating to brand new resin kits. A troubling direction for them to start taking.

If you wish to complain about the IA books then have a look at the Badab War books which were filled with some of the worst spessmuhreen spank ever to be seen in a book not written by Mr. Ward.

IA books are bad enough when they're about guard, and marine fluff is bad enough all the time... I flipped IA9 ope to its table of contents once, saw it was all marine campaigns and characters, and didn't bother even flipping through it.

Honestly, I think the only thing the IA writers have going for them over Ward is a better grasp of english; they're easily as incoherent and inconsistent, in some cases even more so.

 Lynata wrote:
All I can say is that ... well, "that's your opinion". Personally, I have zero interest in the Horus Heresy because I think that this stuff is one-dimensional, both in its focus as well as the tiresome habit of desperately tuning everything up to eyeball-rolling levels of "larger than life" kind of epicness. If the franchise is going stale, then it's because some writers started treating it like a theatre stage populated by cliché-laden superheroes rather than a living, breathing world. Interestingly, the "comic book" feeling is something I get from the newer books rather than the old stuff - which was at times silly, but at least less lopsided, both in quantity as well as content.

That being said, Rogukiel still has a point - if you busy yourself with one thing for too long, it can become boring. Mix things up a bit. I am jumping back and forth between various interests for years now, but always return after a break, and simultaneously keep an eye on my favs so as to not miss anything important.

This. Ironically, it's often the comic books/graphic novels that provide me with the least one-dimensional situations or (less frequently) characters. Too bad they've stopped creating them.

Jayo'r wrote:
40k fluff is IMO really boring I much prefer the fantasy fluff. In 40k everyone is out for themselves there is no bonds of friendship which really doesn't seem like what humans would do. I know this is going to sound strange but to me fantasy fluff is a lot more realistic. The factions make allies with eachother they make treaty's. for instance the empire and the dwarfs have been like battle brothers for thousands of years

Honestly, I like fantasy a bit better myself, though for reasons almost entirely opposite to these. In fantasy, all the factions are rather small and realistically scummy, while in 40k the Imperium and Adeptus Mechanicus form the largest and second largest unified military forces respectively, with the most advanced tech outside of the Eldar and Necrons (and certainly the most practical tech out of any faction). Fantasy also has a more personal brutality that's detached from morality, while 40k has impersonal unpleasant-but-necessary brutality.

Fantasy also lacks space marines. Though of course, if one were to translate them over, you'd get one guy (if you preserved the scale) about whom "the biggest mary sue ever" would be a gross understatement, who despite being only one person is somehow critically involved in everything that's happening everywhere at all times, like a less believable Forest Gump. Also, half of the army books would be about him exclusively, except for one that gives him a sidekick, with the biggest difference between them being what color shirt he happens to be wearing that day.

I agree that the IOM is one dimensional, because all the good characters are the same person:

Started out as a normal human.
Recruited into an IOM military power.
Rose through the ranks quickly.
Has masses of faith in humanity and the emprah.
Fought in a particularly spectacular battle.
Now leads his forces in the name of all things good and happy, creating victories everywhere.

That's why I swapped to chaos. When it comes to 40k, I have some form of split personality problem, so I just jump between the four gods to keep myself entertained


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Pacific wrote:
It's the nature of the beast. One the one hand its greatest strength (the 'quarter to midnight' feeling creates a great atmosphere). It also means that there is no potential for the developers to cock up the game universe by advancing it in an ill-thought out manner and then damaging the fanbase, as has happened with other notable game universes.

On the other hand, it means things can get a little stale if you have played for so long. Its also very difficult for new codecies and rule books to not feel contrived, copy-pasted from previous books, or write anything new without it getting a response from people who liked the previous incarnation of the rules or background. And in that sense I don't think the Codex writers have a very easy time of it. See the response to Devastators now being made up of inexperienced marines, or the response to the Necrons being 'fleshed out' with more personality, despite there being very little there beforehand. Matt Ward gets a lot of criticism for his OTT prose and narrative, but really what else was there he could have done with it being a copy of what had already come several times before?

He could have kept up the grimdark.
The necron fluff was rewritten to allow the creation of a new model range, understandable.
Except that the 4th ed necron codex gave the sense that the tomb worldss were slowly awakening, and many more powerful technologies were yet to be brought back online.
It was a massive step in the wrong direction, IMO, to end the terminator-esq want-to-kill-you-because-you're-alive unstoppable march of the living dead.
Now the necrons march to the tune of "walk like an Egyptian".

Annoyance aside, the 40k setting was made for grimdark, with small pinpricks of light. It takes me about 30 seconds to come up with suggesting that while necron technologies are immesurably advanced, there is a small glimmer of hope for the IOM in that not all systems were brought back perfectly. Some cannot recognise friend from foe (read: living from dead).
It is hellishly more grimdark to have an army lead by death itself (the nightbringer), than it is to have metal egyptians who made death their b**ch.

That's because you've spent too much time in the 40k fluff.

I quite enjoy Chaos oriented fluff particularly the Night Lords and Red Corsairs. I loved the Chaos pirate bar scene in blood reaver.

like a less believable Forest Gump

The most annoying movie that everybody loves save the godfather.

All I can say is that ... well, "that's your opinion". Personally, I have zero interest in the Horus Heresy because I think that this stuff is one-dimensional, both in its focus as well as the tiresome habit of desperately tuning everything up to eyeball-rolling levels of "larger than life" kind of epicness. If the franchise is going stale, then it's because some writers started treating it like a theatre stage populated by cliché-laden superheroes rather than a living, breathing world. Interestingly, the "comic book" feeling is something I get from the newer books rather than the old stuff - which was at times silly, but at least less lopsided, both in quantity as well as content.

That being said, Rogukiel still has a point - if you busy yourself with one thing for too long, it can become boring. Mix things up a bit. I am jumping back and forth between various interests for years now, but always return after a break, and simultaneously keep an eye on my favs so as to not miss anything important.

I guess its a matter of taste. I thought the HH books actually made the Primarchs look less epic by showing their flaws. They were just overpowered humans, capable of superhuman feats but with every possible human flaw.

Makes me wonder what you'd propose to make 40k "less stale".

 DemetriDominov wrote:
Makes me wonder what you'd propose to make 40k "less stale".

Re-grimdark the necrons,
End the "Failbaddon" jokes,
Bring us some more cannon on the emperor,
Have a tournament wherein the IOM makes a huge push for the galaxy (like a restart of the great crusade),
Have Ghazkhull bring home a WAAAGH! on terra [in their next codex],
Have the warp explode with fresh horrors, and start mauling on some eldar [in the next Daemons/Eldar codex?].

I came up with that in less than 30 seconds.

So in essence you want to:

1. Fire Matt Ward
2. Finish the HH
3. Relive the glory days of the GC
4. Put the Imperium on the brink of extinction
5.Do what Fail'a'baddon's been doing since his debut.

I'm sorry, but you're going to have to put more than 30 seconds of time to find some originality to instill into the 40k universe. The problem with doing it for almost 30 years is that a lot of ideas go into the IP and invariably you end up with a considerable amount of repetition that makes things stale.

More Chaos fluff, more stuff about the politics and infighting amounst the legions in the eye, bring back the lost and the damned, more mortals serving the dark gods being mentioned in the fluff. More Tau getting desected by either Chaos, the Dark Eldar, or the Inquisition, I enjoyed hearing about the Blood Ravens exsperimenting with the medical qualities of Tau blood, more dead and tortured xenos that lends me guiltless sadism.

The fluff has more or less been the same since 2001 when they added tau and necrons.

The issue now is GW making fluff terrible such as in newcrons and GK.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
The fluff has more or less been the same since 2001 when they added tau and necrons.

The issue now is GW making fluff terrible such as in newcrons and GK.

.snip.

 Lynata wrote:
All I can say is that ... well, "that's your opinion". Personally, I have zero interest in the Horus Heresy because I think that this stuff is one-dimensional, both in its focus as well as the tiresome habit of desperately tuning everything up to eyeball-rolling levels of "larger than life" kind of epicness.

That is the foundation of 40k. That and the grimdark, which is of course, epically larger than life.

If the franchise is going stale, then it's because some writers started treating it like a theatre stage populated by cliché-laden superheroes rather than a living, breathing world.

The codices? Yeah, between Ra- I mean Marbo, Draigo, or Harker this is basically true, within the codices.

Which writers were you thinking of?

Interestingly, the "comic book" feeling is something I get from the newer books rather than the old stuff - which was at times silly, but at least less lopsided, both in quantity as well as content.

"Comic book" feeling? Between graphic novels like Watchmen, All-Star Superman, Kingdom Come, Sandman, Lucifer, and more stories than I care to mention, 40k should feel honored to be compared to comic books, which in many cases have quality vastly outstripping the vast bulk of 40k fluff, GW, BL, FW, or otherwise. I've never gotten using comparisons to comics as a detriment towards quality, comics have had real depth and literary (For lack of better term, comics arguably do not technically qualify as literature) merit for decades.

That said... 40k's fluff is frankly better than most other games out there, and is the only reason I've ever played it.

What fluff are you basing your opinion on OP? I can count many truly heroic and upstanding Imperials.

I agree with Lynata for what its worth.

Until Sisters and Orks are portrayed by the authors in the manner they're supposed to be portrayed, that of highly-skilled warriors who can physically man-handle Space Marines with ease, I think I'm just going to take a break from 40K. It's so ridiculous.

Void__Dragon wrote:That is the foundation of 40k. That and the grimdark, which is of course, epically larger than life.

I'd disagree. From what I took away from the books - at least the GW material - the epicness, whilst being there, is essentially a stylistic tool. If you take care and read between the lines, disseminating the various accounts, you will notice how many of the epic things are actually legends or folklore - just like we have in our real world.

The "danger" I see is that a lot of fans have recently started to take them serious, word for word - and whilst such impressions are of course often coloured by one's fondness of their favourite faction, I also believe that the various novels, which portray such events in much greater detail and focus, are often regarded as "that's how it really happened" (and I well remember a fellow dakkanaut recently argueing on exactly these grounds for why novels should be held in higher regard than codex fluff).
It's the nature of this form of storytelling.
And part of the reason for why I count myself amongst the "should've stayed a mystery" crowd when it comes to the HH.

Void__Dragon wrote:"Comic book" feeling? Between graphic novels like Watchmen, All-Star Superman, Kingdom Come, Sandman, Lucifer, and more stories than I care to mention, 40k should feel honored to be compared to comic books, which in many cases have quality vastly outstripping the vast bulk of 40k fluff, GW, BL, FW, or otherwise. I've never gotten using comparisons to comics as a detriment towards quality, comics have had real depth and literary (For lack of better term, comics arguably do not technically qualify as literature) merit for decades.

But I said comic books, not graphic novels. I understand that the latter are technically comics as well, yet the context of the discussion should have made it obvious that I'm thinking more of the "popular superhero X saves the world from the Villain of the Week" kind of comics. You know, lighthearted entertainment with lots of action. In 40k, this has even sparked its very own term within the fandom: "bolter porn".

I own several graphic novels myself, so it's not like I do not recognise what that medium is capable of. Ironically, however, I have to agree with Bran Dawri regarding the 40k comics and graphic novels. Admittedly I have not read many of them (I think only four or five), but they were much less "cheesy" than most of the novels, perhaps because due to their short length and powerful visuals they tend to focus on a general portrayal of the dystopia of the setting, rather than hyping a particular character or faction.

All-Star Superman, Kingdom Come, Identity Crisis are not "graphic novels", they're your standard comics.

I feel the same way but I guess for different reasons. Been losing interest and the whole thing just doesn't seem as grimdark anymore. Just seems a little lighter and, well, less dark.

For me it's probably because my favourite "race" or faction is the space marines. Love 'em to bits, super over powered and kill everything and anything. But that's the thing, you play with cheat codes enough, you start to have less fun with the game, so I guess it's time for me to play the game properly.

But i'll still be that one kid who'll probably kiss his portrait of Roboute Guilliman before I go to bed (jk, probably Sanguinius)

Selym wrote:

 DemetriDominov wrote:
Makes me wonder what you'd propose to make 40k "less stale".

Re-grimdark the necrons,
End the "Failbaddon" jokes,
Bring us some more cannon on the emperor,
Have a tournament wherein the IOM makes a huge push for the galaxy (like a restart of the great crusade),
Have Ghazkhull bring home a WAAAGH! on terra [in their next codex],
Have the warp explode with fresh horrors, and start mauling on some eldar [in the next Daemons/Eldar codex?].

I came up with that in less than 30 seconds.

The Necrons are plenty grim-dark. OldCrons weren't grim-dark, they were boring.
"Failbaddon jokes" exist because people (players) are stupid. They think that a Black Crusade that fails to take Terra is a failure, never comprehending that taking Terra was never the goal in the first place.
All cannons are the God-Emperor's cannons. How many more cannons does a guy on a chair really need?
They kinda did. That was the 13th Black Crusade world event. The Imperium got spanked because the players behind those armies kinda had their heads up their fourth points of contact. The Imperium is not currently in shape enough for another Macharian Crusade.
Why would daemons have a particular hatred for the Eldar, who spend most of their time masking their psychic presence or using it in roundabout, stealthy ways? It doesn't really make any narrative sense for what's come before.

Did someone say that the vraks compaign was a victory, I thought that the whole thing ended in somewhat of a stalemate

A lot of you guys and girls have said you've lost the feeling of the grim dark setting. Ive only recently gotten into warhammer 40k, i started collecting when i was 6 years old but never had many models until i was about 18, i started reading the Horus heresy when i was about the same age. So far i have read up to Mechanicum, most of these books were written well. The first three in the series were probably my favorite. Decent of angels was a wonderful story tale, and Legion was amazing when it came to Dan's imperial guard writing skills which are impressive. Every book Ive read was grim dark. Now i even got distracted from the HH because 40k seemed so much more interesting. So much more was going on, and it is VERY grim dark. Ive read the Night lords trilogy and that is about as best a read and the most grim dark i think any 40k fans will ever get. Ive read the salamanders trilogy and Nick kyme has become a better writer but it was alright. And Ive read 9 battle books, most of them were good books, in several the writing wasn't bad, but several poor examples of writing imo. I'm not sure how the OP or you fans are bored of 40k or not getting the Grim dark your looking for. I have just started the Word bearers omnibus, and i dont like the word bearers but after reading 20 pages its just was well written as the next good book out there, and Anthony Reynolds captures the grit like ABD. There are like 100 books in 40k too read, and for all you bored or IOM fans step out of the box and pick up a chaos book. You'll be doing yourself a big favor. Get caught up in the revenge and split personality of a chaos host, or the get wrapped up in the dark angel secrecy or the imperial guardsman jokes and awesome portrayals. I personally cannot wait for the HH to be over, Terra is coming soon, and the scouring after that, so much to learn about and to flesh out 10 000 years i think right now is the pinnacle of BL authors and its a good time to be excited because in another few years the scouring is coming.

40k isn't a boring setting i think its one dimensional players who love a certain race or legion or chapter are creating this one dimensional setting because they wont see things from another's perspective and therefore simple do not care [i][u]