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There are still some ways to advance the plot without destroying the setting, if only to get us past this current cliff hanger so we can start setting up the next cliff.

Hypohthetical Plot Advancements:

Advancement: The daemon primarchs burst out of the warp and Chaos explodes beyond Cadia in the 13th Black Crusade and is now all over the place.

How it Affects YOU: Chaos Primarchs become playable (if insanely expensive) models, maybe Apoc only, maybe not. Otherwise, nothing changes. They burst PAST Cadia so you can still have your Cadian regiments and you can still have your Imperium VS Chaos or whoever battles where-ever and when-ever. Despite this being a plot advancement, the setting stays the same without destroying or restricting you in any way, only now you have the option of fielding daemon primarchs... or writing daemon primarch fanfiction. Whatever.


Advancement: Roboute heals, Lion wakes up, Salamanders find all the relics and find Vulkan, Khan comes back from the warp, Leman Russ returns with the fruit but the fruit's effects aren't immediate, etc. However, the 13th Black Crusade is in full swing and Chaos is all over the galaxy. There is no time for political upheaval and the primarchs immediately go to war against their chaos brethren. Any ideas about fixing the Imperium's current situation can wait, because right now, Chaos isn't just at the doorstep. They're in the door!

How it affects YOU: Same as above, the plot has advanced, but the setting is still just as free form as always. Only real difference is now there are loyalist primarchs you can field on the tabletop or roleplay with or whatever.


Advancement: More tyranids arrive, more necrons wake up, more orks unite under Grazgkull's banner.

How it affects YOU: ....it doesn't. .......alright, honestly besides Chaos and the loyalist primarchs, there aren't many other particularly hanging plot threads I can think of that would be interesting to advance, I guess maybe the Black Templars finally catch up to Grazgkhull but after that, it's kinda like... whatever? *shrug*


Oh, I know.

Plot Advancement: Whatever the hell is chasing the Tyrannids arrives.

How it affects YOU: New playable army!

iproxtaco wrote:Why would they have to be removed? What specific armies have to die in order for the story to progress? Currently, we're sitting on the precipice of several major conflicts. The only way to go from here is to start telling the story of those conflicts. There doesn't ever have to be anything decisive, but it'd be nice to actually play the game and act like my characters and armies are doing something, instead of feeling like I'm reenacting events from the past.

As I mentioned in the last post, I'm referring chiefly to the 13th Black Crusade. Here is a list of the armies that should, with all due respect, be threatened by annihilation. Some of those have already suffered heavy casualties on Armageddon. Or would you suggest that, miraculously, all those armies leave this biggest and most brutal clash between Imperial and Chaos forces since the Horus Heresy without so much as a scratch?
Obviously, IG regiments are at a smaller risk here in that there's many more where those came from (unless a player happens to be one of the unlucky few whose regimental number corresponds to one in the material), but Marine Chapters have only 1k troops, and a Chapter ceased to be functional when that number drops below 100.

And that's not even touching upon the issue that GW has, over the years, hyped up this conflict so much that it's nigh-impossible to resolve it without disappointing people. You can't spend a decade prattling on about how terrible this confrontation is and how it's the End Times of the Imperium and how the result would change the setting - and then proceed to resolve it without much effect on the universe as presented in the material.

It's not difficult to come up with potential results, and it's even fun to think about the different directions the setting would take from there - but I just do not believe that the fans could handle the drastic changes that would accompany this. And if there are no drastic changes, people would be disappointed by how stale everything feels. It's a lose-lose situation for GW either way. The only way to continue past M41 would be to "reboot" the End Times and write out this final confrontation entirely in favour of a more stable timeline that omits such a seemingly decisive climax.

KhornedBeef wrote:
I Agree with the "setting" guys, mostly. Although they could advance the story and kill a few people (individual heroes like Cpt. Tycho have died, if you want to play them, your battle happens in the "past") bit by bit, it doesn't bother me much as long as there is history to explore.

How would you like if your favorite character/faction got that sticker?

"Sure they're your favorite, but all the stuff they did is in the past and they have no future, so not only do they not have any impact on the story, but they will never see any updates because they are wiped out in the advanced plot."

It wasn't so much a suggestion as me pointing out, that GW already risked stepping on a small number of toes, so they might do so again. Though I'm not sure if Tycho was established before Armageddon.
Nevertheless, I'd be willing to make a few sacrifices to the plot gods, if the results is well written. Not wiping out a faction, mind you.

TiamatRoar wrote:
There are still some ways to advance the plot without destroying the setting, if only to get us past this current cliff hanger so we can start setting up the next cliff.

Hypohthetical Plot Advancements:

Advancement: The daemon primarchs burst out of the warp and Chaos explodes beyond Cadia in the 13th Black Crusade and is now all over the place.

How it Affects YOU: Chaos Primarchs become playable (if insanely expensive) models, maybe Apoc only, maybe not. Otherwise, nothing changes. They burst PAST Cadia so you can still have your Cadian regiments and you can still have your Imperium VS Chaos or whoever battles where-ever and when-ever. Despite this being a plot advancement, the setting stays the same without destroying or restricting you in any way, only now you have the option of fielding daemon primarchs... or writing daemon primarch fanfiction. Whatever.


Advancement: Roboute heals, Lion wakes up, Salamanders find all the relics and find Vulkan, Khan comes back from the warp, Leman Russ returns with the fruit but the fruit's effects aren't immediate, etc. However, the 13th Black Crusade is in full swing and Chaos is all over the galaxy. There is no time for political upheaval and the primarchs immediately go to war against their chaos brethren. Any ideas about fixing the Imperium's current situation can wait, because right now, Chaos isn't just at the doorstep. They're in the door!

How it affects YOU: Same as above, the plot has advanced, but the setting is still just as free form as always. Only real difference is now there are loyalist primarchs you can field on the tabletop or roleplay with or whatever.


Advancement: More tyranids arrive, more necrons wake up, more orks unite under Grazgkull's banner.

How it affects YOU: ....it doesn't. .......alright, honestly besides Chaos and the loyalist primarchs, there aren't many other particularly hanging plot threads I can think of that would be interesting to advance, I guess maybe the Black Templars finally catch up to Grazgkhull but after that, it's kinda like... whatever? *shrug*


Oh, I know.

Plot Advancement: Whatever the hell is chasing the Tyrannids arrives.

How it affects YOU: New playable army!

And all of those tip the balance in favor of that faction. That faction suddenly has what it has been chasing for many thousands of years.

You also have to understand the background of the fluff. Take the Primarchs for example. Them waking up. They are the 40k equivalent of King Arther or Gog and Magog. "When we reach our darkest hour our saviour will awaken".

The chaos example, that is chaos busting though and going beyond Cadia. The whole point of Cadia is it is a "last line of deference" situation. They hold the eye of terror in check, keeping a lid on it, but once it explodes it will tip over in to an unstoppable tide.

Tyrannids, Necrons, orks... The whole point at the moment is they are a threat that is just about in check. The Imprium is stretched to the limit at the moment. If adding more has no effect then whats the point? "More orks band together. Noone notices..."

We don't know anything is chasing Tyrannids. Thats part of the point in that. They may be just a plague of locusts going to strip the galaxy bare or they may be being chased. Who knows. If they are being chased we may be saved if we can just hold out... Or it may be much worse...

KhornedBeef wrote:
It wasn't so much a suggestion as me pointing out, that GW already risked stepping on a small number of toes, so they might do so again. Though I'm not sure if Tycho was established before Armageddon.
Nevertheless, I'd be willing to make a few sacrifices to the plot gods, if the results is well written. Not wiping out a faction, mind you.

So you want meaningful, well-written plot advancement without any real consequences (no wiping out factions or major characters)? That's pretty much having your cake and eating it, too.

If you try to advance the plot with no stakes or nothing 'really' changing, just moving around, then how much have you actually advanced the plot? It does not work well for 40k, because you have a setting where any significant change is going to massively shake up the balance of power, and will subsequently trickle down and impact all of the other factions. Let's just do this little example:

Let's say our plot advancement has Chaos taking an advantage in the 13th Black Crusade. What all is affected?

First of all, Chaos is stronger, naturally.
This in turn weakens the Imperium, lowers Marine numbers, reduces Guard and so on.
With more resources going into the Crusade, other threats such as Orks, Tyranids, what have you, get stronger, further pressing the Imperium.
This adds to the spiral of weakening Imperium and strengthening Chaos/Xenos.

Until you get to a point where it is impossible for the Imperium to survive at all. This is not some weird plot twist, this is just how the story is balanced. You cannot make a significant story change without there being an equally significant change in the balance of power. Change the balance of power, and the sheer size of it will mean that the faction is either crushed, or shielded in the very worst kind of plot armor.

So you want meaningful, well-written plot advancement without any real consequences (no wiping out factions or major characters)? That's pretty much having your cake and eating it, too.

*Sigh* probably true. Heck, I'd let them kill Logan Grimnar *ducks quickly away from thrown barrel of fenrisian ale strapped with nuclear warheads*, but with all this build-up, it would still feel anti-climactic.

 PaperworkNinja wrote:
Let's see... the Emperor finally dies. Everyone expects Chaos to reign triumphant until the Emperor achieves godhood because he's able to reunite all the bits of his soul in the Warp and is all "Well, this is all quite embarrassing, isn't it?" and Lorgar's all "SEE, DAD? I TOLD YOU I WAS RIGHT! BUT YOU COULD NEVER LISTEN TO ME!" and the Sensei are all "Please to let us and the Squats out of Fluff Hell kthxbye" The Astronomicon does, however, go foomp temporarily, and a few billion psykers have sudden fatal brainsplosion headaches. The Sisters of Battle now have a more concrete explanation of all their miracles, but everyone still hates them because they don't let the Sisters Repentia wear sensible tunics and trousers. Gork and Mork try to figure out who's gonna crump the Emperor first and another Waaaagh! envelops Armageddon. The four Chaos powers also start fighting amongst themselves because the day ends in Y and they also want to be first to corrupt the Emperor. As a result all of their forces start infighting and ruining even more planets. Cegorach is all catty to him: "Oh, look who FINALLY showed up to clean out this place?" Meanwhile, all the Marine chapters are looking at their Librarians and going "Bob? You in there? Look, I know it's last minute but if you could come in on Saturday that'd be greeeeeat. And clean your brain up off the floor before you close, okay?" The Black Templars are running around planets looking for witches to smite and just finding chunky salsa everywhere. The Dark Angels and their attendant Unforgiven are all en route to the Eye of Terror to pick Cypher up now that the Emperor's returned. Since Empy's back, Lion El'Johnson is back, Luther is making sense and Cypher is now waiting patiently in a tea shop on Cadia.

All of that and you can still have an era of perpetual stagnation in warfare. The Tyranids are still eating their way through the Ultramarines' pocket empire. (Seriously, how no one has jumped down Calgar's throat after the Badab War I don't know.) The Eldar are still a doomed race, the Space Wolves are still drunk as all get out from last night, the Necrons still won't die, the Blood Angels still have their Black Rage and Red Thirst. The only real difference is now humanity has a god to protect them in the Warp itself.

And meanwhile Malal is going "Hey! I was supposed to be the Warp Power of Supreme Irony, not him!"

Thank you for this. I just imagined Cypher sitting like a boss on Cadia sipping some tea.

The lack of progression doesn't bother me at all. 40k has a setting. If I want to know what happens at the end of the 13th black crusade then I will just start a campaign at my local FLGS with my friends and play out what happens. Add to the background and let us play out the "new" stuff on our own.

 Ironwill13791 wrote:


Thank you for this. I just imagined Cypher sitting like a boss on Cadia sipping some tea.

He'll also be wearing a monocle and saying "Hmm, yes, quite."

 Steve steveson wrote:


And all of those tip the balance in favor of that faction. That faction suddenly has what it has been chasing for many thousands of years.

The Imperium's been primarily chasing the primarchs for thousands of years? That's news to me. It's not like the primarchs are the Emperor, here. Although even the Emperor awakening wouldn't solve the Imperiums' current problems or give the Imperium a secure future.

You also have to understand the background of the fluff. Take the Primarchs for example. Them waking up. They are the 40k equivalent of King Arther or Gog and Magog. "When we reach our darkest hour our saviour will awaken".

No, the primarchs are just the sons of the 40k equivalent of King Arthur. Although again, so what? Even if the Emperor himself hypothetically awoke and was magically healed, his power is only so limited. An Ork Warboss (even if a really big one) can still kill him, for crying out loud. Not that I support the idea of the Emperor awakening because there are too many other valid theories, possibilities, and interpretations that would be invalidated by such an event, but the Primarchs on the other hand don't really have that caveat.

The chaos example, that is chaos busting though and going beyond Cadia. The whole point of Cadia is it is a "last line of deference" situation.

Cadia's the first line of defense, not the last.

They hold the eye of terror in check, keeping a lid on it, but once it explodes it will tip over in to an unstoppable tide.

Propagandic nonsense. Chaos will certainly be able to launch attacks much easier on the Imperium by that point but unstoppable? And even if they are, just chuck a ton of necrons and tyrannids at them and stalement is re-assumed. The only way for Chaos to be unstoppable is for the pylons to explode and the Eye of Terror itself envelop the galaxy per Abaddon's plan, and that's not what I'm suggesting here.

Tyrannids, Necrons, orks... The whole point at the moment is they are a threat that is just about in check. The Imprium is stretched to the limit at the moment. If adding more has no effect then whats the point? "More orks band together. Noone notices..."

Precisely. There is no point in terms of the setting itself. The plot advances, the setting stays the same. Except now players have even MORE options to deal with when crafting armies and stories (the primarchs, daemon primarchs, battles of bigger scale, etc).

We don't know anything is chasing Tyrannids. Thats part of the point in that. They may be just a plague of locusts going to strip the galaxy bare or they may be being chased. Who knows. If they are being chased we may be saved if we can just hold out... Or it may be much worse...

Obviously. That's why it's a plot advancement for it to be revealed that something is in fact chasing them, and what that thing is. And voila, plot advancement + new faction without destroying the setting.



Really, your retort is a mess. You're trying to argue my suggestions destroy the setting yet it's pointless if they don't destroy the setting. Stop worshipping Nurgle and accept that sometimes you can have a little change without destroying the current order of balance to an unrecognizable level. The setting wasn't destroyed when the Necrons and Tyrannids were introduced and it won't be destroyed if the Primarchs and Daemon Primarchs are reintroduced. In fact, the setting is already slowly reintroducing them. We actually have CONFIRMATION now that Lion is fully healed just waiting for the signal, and there are "reports of daemon primarchs spotted in the Black Crusade", for example (although I suppose if you really wanted to be technical, the daemon primarchs have always been around anyways and don't need reintroducing. Besides Fulgrim and Lorgar, I suppose).

I like it as a setting rather than a complete narrative so that the games I play can be "mini-novellas" into M.41 I don't like it when drastic changes in the setting are made to advance the story and don't need to know every detail of all the things that have been hinted at.

No it dosen't, way becouse it been set at the end days and we been told time will not advance, you really get annoyed be thing you all ready been told will never happen. Then your playing the wrong game. Now do you really want them to write "and with a wimper mankind ends.", becouse that is the end story, welcoming the Grimdark. No one need to be squated.

 Lynata wrote:
When some hero suddenly becomes unplayable because he died?

well, in fairness death company tycho's death is documented in his entry in the BA codex. This made me feel a bit strange at first, playing a dead charachter, but i sort of went star wars on it and told my self that the warhammer 40k universe is a parallel one set a long long time ago, therefore all the characters are dead, the time just isn't told yet, and that the setting specifically centres on the 41st millennium.

It makes be a bit sad that i probably wont see the story unfold, but i am glad GW held the story line as is, for the reasons above, i like the idea that it is a setting, not a story, instead they should continue beefing out the fluff we are up to.

What are peoples' opinions on the 13th Black Crusade world-wide campaign, actually? That thing actually did advance the plot to the point where later editions actually rewinded things a bit. If WH40k had plot advancement, theretically one way to really milk it would be worldwide campaigns like that.

Did GW stop doing such things because it wasn't popular? Because it painted them into a corner? Or simply because it was too much work for what it did and GW is really lazy these days?

Noir wrote:
No it dosen't, way becouse it been set at the end days and we been told time will not advance, you really get annoyed be thing you all ready been told will never happen. Then your playing the wrong game. Now do you really want them to write "and with a wimper mankind ends.", becouse that is the end story, welcoming the Grimdark. No one need to be squated.

When were we ever told time will not advance? Do you have a citation for this from a GW employee?

Or am I misinterpreting your post? It's a rather... hard to understand post.

I too am with the setting crowd. I'm kind of sad I missed playing in events like the 13th Black Crusade, but I think holding these huge battles as events is the right way to go, not just telling us what happens next. We need another campaign!

TiamatRoar wrote:
What are peoples' opinions on the 13th Black Crusade world-wide campaign, actually? That thing actually did advance the plot to the point where later editions actually rewinded things a bit. If WH40k had plot advancement, theretically one way to really milk it would be worldwide campaigns like that.

Did GW stop doing such things because it wasn't popular? Because it painted them into a corner? Or simply because it was too much work for what it did and GW is really lazy these days?

Noir wrote:
No it dosen't, way becouse it been set at the end days and we been told time will not advance, you really get annoyed be thing you all ready been told will never happen. Then your playing the wrong game. Now do you really want them to write "and with a wimper mankind ends.", becouse that is the end story, welcoming the Grimdark. No one need to be squated.

When were we ever told time will not advance? Do you have a citation for this from a GW employee?

Or am I misinterpreting your post? It's a rather... hard to understand post.

Way back in the day when GW was still a games company. And the Black Crusade is not a advancement it is a Recon. The story has never moved forward, it has just been rewriten. Small but important difference.

 Sheokronath wrote:
I too am with the setting crowd. I'm kind of sad I missed playing in events like the 13th Black Crusade, but I think holding these huge battles as events is the right way to go, not just telling us what happens next. We need another campaign!

^THIS!^

I'd love some new fluff, half the fun of this hobby is in the reading. For me at least.

No, because the current status quo is the best situation in 40k right now. If they progressed the story continuously, a lot of dumb BS would happen. Emperor would come back then die again, Primarchs would come back then disappear again, etc.. A lot of the mystery and suspense in the 40k setting would be screwed with.

I think you could advance the setting in a fairly balanced manner.

As was mentioned, Cadia isn't the last line of defense. It is certainly one of the most important, but it's not the last.

There are ways to balance the story out.
- Chaos gets stronger, has a foothold on Cadia
- More Necrons wake up
- More Tyranids arrive
- More orks unite
etc.

Sure, the current story in the Imperium would basically mean that the Imperium would be in major decline at that point, but there are some ways to escape that. There are dozens of random heroes and heroic entities bouncing around the Imperium, everything from the Legion of the Damned to six missing/injured Primarchs.

What if all those bad things happened, but simultaneously something major changed, like a Primarch coming back/waking up and redoing the codex to account for the growing threat? Maybe Rowboat increases the SM cap from 1K to 5K, and over 100 or so years the number of Marines quintuples.

There's that quote that if the Tyranids arrived in force, every man, woman, and child would need to be conscripted to fight that force. Something similar already happened with the Eldar, there was mention that many civilian paths were abandoned in favor of warrior paths, so it's not completely out of the question that the Imperium could increase their military strength.

It would require very careful writing, but it could be done.

As for losing special characters, yes, a lot of people would get annoyed if some big names disappeared, but GW has killed people in the past, even going so far as to say Eldrad died (sort of) during the 13th Black Crusade (and then promptly turned the clock back).

If you wanted to, maybe make a tradeoff. The Chapter that loses their big name guy gets their primarch back, or something similar. I imagine if Azrael died a lot of DA players would be angry, but they'd probably chill out quite a bit if Johnson woke up to take over. Same thing with Rowboat. If Calgar got eaten by Tyranids, I imagine a lot of people would be sad, but they'd get over it if the Primarch showed back up.

I hear a fair few complaints about this, but I'm not bothered.

40k isn't a story, or a TV series, it's a wargame and, to be honest, there can't really be much story progression in a wargame. Most significant story progressions will involve some things being wiped out, making them unplayable in the game. People complain about lack of story progression but I reckon a lot of it is hypocrisy in way. Consider this: next edition of 40k, GW write into the fluff that the Space Wolves, for instance, have been caught up in a colossal Tyranid invasion and have been nearly wipe out. They write in the rulebook or update the FAQ to say that no Space Wolf army may contain more than 20 models, to represent the fact that only a few remain. There'd be a huge uproar and everyone would complain about how crap GW is and how crap their story progression is.

As much as people scorn GW's "forging a narrative", this is a good thing. There's tons of background about the 40k universe and you're given this background and told "Here you go, work with this." You then play games, using the background as foundation for your games. So, do you want a massive Tyranid Invasion to converge on Fenris? That's fine, the 40k background allows you to do this and, if you wanted to, you could organise a huge campaign to see if the Tyranids do indeed manage to wipe out the Space Wolf chapter. The lack of story progression is what allows you to do this. Again, say GW wrote into the fluff that the Eldar joined with the Tau for the greater good. Now, you can't really play Eldar vs Tau without it not being fluffy, it doesn't work as well and just feels a bit weird, like having to play Space Marines vs Space Marines and having to use the word "traitor" to justify your games within the background of the games.

40K is a setting AND a story. There sheet amount of fluff and lore makes this a whole lot more than just a game setting. That must be obvious by now.

Also, advancing the story changes little. It doesn't have to turn into WH50K. Just for the love of the Emperor, can it not be 999.M41 anymore. Please.

Before reading this thread I was strongly in the "advance the story" camp, but now I'm not so sure. I do think it would make a lot of people mad if things didn't go their way, and I don't think the codex fluff writers are up to the task of doing it in a way that minimizes the people it pisses off while still making narrative sense. I wouldn't want to see entire armies destroyed, but I certainly wouldn't mind characters dying. I'm an Eldar player, but I'd be ok with Eldrad dying (for real this time) and being removed from the game. It would give them an opportunity to add some cool new characters who step up.

Regardless of what happens in the rulebooks or codexes, I think Black Library should step up and give us something. Whether that's a new series a la HH, or some sort of future-history textbook-esque thing just telling how it all goes down. Regardless of whether it affects the game or not, I really do want to know who wins at Cadia, what happens to the balance of power in the galaxy, etc. and I think there are a lot of good storytelling opportunities there.

 MandalorynOranj wrote:

Regardless of what happens in the rulebooks or codexes, I think Black Library should step up and give us something. Whether that's a new series a la HH, or some sort of future-history textbook-esque thing just telling how it all goes down. Regardless of whether it affects the game or not, I really do want to know who wins at Cadia, what happens to the balance of power in the galaxy, etc. and I think there are a lot of good storytelling opportunities there.

But do you really want that?

Think about it real hard.

"Oh, so that is your Cadian Regiment/Chaos Warband there? Too bad they don't count in the fluff, huh?"

It's more a matter of things feeling stagnant. And, yes, I know... this is supposed to feel stagnant because grimdark. That said, advancing a few years or even a decade wouldn't destroy our precious little game universe. In fact, it would freshen it up and create new avenues for new stories to be written/told by the players.

I, for one, am tired of 999.M41. Move it along.

Oh, and Cadia, Imperium wins... because Emperor

 curran12 wrote:

 MandalorynOranj wrote:

Regardless of what happens in the rulebooks or codexes, I think Black Library should step up and give us something. Whether that's a new series a la HH, or some sort of future-history textbook-esque thing just telling how it all goes down. Regardless of whether it affects the game or not, I really do want to know who wins at Cadia, what happens to the balance of power in the galaxy, etc. and I think there are a lot of good storytelling opportunities there.

But do you really want that?

Think about it real hard.

"Oh, so that is your Cadian Regiment/Chaos Warband there? Too bad they don't count in the fluff, huh?"

Yeah actually, I do! If they do a novel series it would mean that they are definitely not going to advance the plot in the rulebooks and codexes, so this would be a branching-off point, where what happens in the novels and what happens in the game are now two totally separate things that don't matter in regards to one another. It would become just another Black Library story. That way people who say that the game is a setting can keep playing at one minute to midnight or in the 10k years of setting since the Heresy, and people who want some resolution get it without it interfering with the game.

FatherTed wrote:well, in fairness death company tycho's death is documented in his entry in the BA codex. This made me feel a bit strange at first, playing a dead charachter, but i sort of went star wars on it and told my self that the warhammer 40k universe is a parallel one set a long long time ago, therefore all the characters are dead, the time just isn't told yet, and that the setting specifically centres on the 41st millennium.

Oh yeah, but with Tycho you already knew. There were also SoB characters like that - Canoness "Eats Tyranids for Breakfast" Praxedes, for example. Even Celestine was said to have been annihilated in the 3E Codex; her apparent return in the 5E book seems like a retcon due to that.

But don't you think these things might have impacted the playerbase more if the players wouldn't know they are playing a doomed character from the start?
Granted, I'm not sure people are really attached to characters like Calgar or Creed or Grimnar or Dante, given that (unlike with Battletech) they don't really have much of a presence outside a few fluff blurbs. But what if we expand this to entire armies?

FatherTed wrote:i like the idea that it is a setting, not a story, instead they should continue beefing out the fluff we are up to.

Word. There are still so many millennia to fill with cool stuff!

DogofWar1 wrote:As was mentioned, Cadia isn't the last line of defense. It is certainly one of the most important, but it's not the last.

Oh, I don't actually think Cadia would be the problem. Just the armies gathering there for the big grinder.

Of course, one solution could be that GW advances the clock into "the next age" far enough so that those armies which have suffered the worst casualties had sufficient time to regain their strength. Having nobody annihilated entirely might feel a little anti-climatic, but it could be a tolerable tradeoff. The real problem that would follow then is ... what's left as the next big thing? When Cadia is resolved, it could only be topped by another battle for Terra. Which would bring us to the same situation we are in yet again. And regardless of how you resolve Terra, what could possibly follow after that?

Unlike Battletech, which can afford to jump from era to era because it is more "toned down" and as such will not sport build-ups anywhere near what happened with the 13th Black Crusade, 40k has always been a franchise that attempted to base the description of its entire universe on Epic with a capital E. This situation here merely shows the downsides to this approach. And it is an issue that the MMO industry is struggling with as well. When you're constantly trying to one-up yourself, you will eventually get to the point where you build a bubble. For 40k, this bubble is called "The Times of Ending".

MandalorynOranj wrote:Yeah actually, I do! If they do a novel series it would mean that they are definitely not going to advance the plot in the rulebooks and codexes, so this would be a branching-off point, where what happens in the novels and what happens in the game are now two totally separate things that don't matter in regards to one another. It would become just another Black Library story. That way people who say that the game is a setting can keep playing at one minute to midnight or in the 10k years of setting since the Heresy, and people who want some resolution get it without it interfering with the game.

I don't think people would take it that way. Right now, Cadia - like Armageddon - is a setting whose outcome can be decided on your table. As soon as a novel series starts to flesh it out for you, lots of people will suddenly feel as if their games "don't count" because an official product is commonly held in higher regard.
And it matters little that GW is already presenting all those novels already existing as mere possibilities twisted by legend and half-truth - a perceived 90% of the fans take it all at face value, including the vaunted Lexicanum wiki.

 iproxtaco wrote:

Will the Eldar may die out or may re-establish themselves? If it wasn't for Slaanesh...
Will the the Emperors death reunite the Imperium or cause it to fracture and die?Fracture. He's the only thing standing between FTL and sub-light travel.
Will the Tau rise up to take there place as a major player able to counter all the threats of the galaxy or will they be snuffed out before they make the leap that is clearly on its way? Possibly.
Will the Necrons rise up to defend against the Tyranids or will they sleep until the danger has passed?Rise up and kick ass. That's their mission - Szarekh will wake as many as possible and mow down the 'Nids.
Will the Tyranids strip the galaxy clean or will one or more factions finally find a way to stop them? The Necrons may have the power if they awake and the Tau may be able to if they have time. Or will the Tyranids carry on to Terra following the beacon of the Emperor only to turn back when they notice the void dragon, or will the Emperor die before possibly then leaving the Tyranids in chaos. Is there more Tyranids on there way? Have we seen just a fraction of the fleet? Yes. No to the void dragon (why would they? It makes no sense for them to just stop because a dragon that was supposedly beaten by an uber psyker in ancient plate armor defeated it. Yes. Yes.
Will Dark Eldar manage to flourish in the safety of the webway, or will there ways eventually eat them up? Gobble gobble gobble burp, said Slaanesh
Will Chaos manage to make strides in to the matirum finally damaging humanity and gaining a foothold in reality or will they be pushed back and the Necrons once again begin to work to hold the warp closed? Probably.
Will the Orks... Na, feth it. The orks are going to carry on being orks what ever happens.

It is a 'setting' however it would be nice if the story progressed a bit. They don't necessarily have to do this through codices and editions, but they can do it through canon with Black Library.

 Lynata wrote:

MandalorynOranj wrote:Yeah actually, I do! If they do a novel series it would mean that they are definitely not going to advance the plot in the rulebooks and codexes, so this would be a branching-off point, where what happens in the novels and what happens in the game are now two totally separate things that don't matter in regards to one another. It would become just another Black Library story. That way people who say that the game is a setting can keep playing at one minute to midnight or in the 10k years of setting since the Heresy, and people who want some resolution get it without it interfering with the game.

I don't think people would take it that way. Right now, Cadia - like Armageddon - is a setting whose outcome can be decided on your table. As soon as a novel series starts to flesh it out for you, lots of people will suddenly feel as if their games "don't count" because an official product is commonly held in higher regard.
And it matters little that GW is already presenting all those novels already existing as mere possibilities twisted by legend and half-truth - a perceived 90% of the fans take it all at face value, including the vaunted Lexicanum wiki.

That's kind of a silly reason not to do it. Nobody's games "count" for anything beyond having fun or an outcome in a campaign or tournament. Just because a novel says something happens doesn't mean it invalidates the games anyone plays. Just because Ragnar lives through the Space Wolf series doesn't mean that anybody's game where he dies on the table is any less of a game than one where he lives. If they can put together a good story, they should do it. That's why Black Library was formed, so they could write stories without them impacting the game. Otherwise everything would just be in the codexes and rulebooks.