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I, like many of us, have long since had a profound respect for the lore of 40k,and I personally believe that the greatest part of it is the Imperium itself. The people that make it up, it's history (in regards to its technology especially), its beliefs, and how all of it comes together around its populace, I believe, is a thing of beauty. But I've been wondering, mustn't there be somewhere or something else in all fiction that has comparable organizations? How unique IS this core element(/combination/mix of themes) in the realm of fiction?

I've been praising 40k lore for many years- I just want to make sure that I haven't been doing so too blindly.

So what are your closest comparisons to the Imperium that you've found over the years?

The Galactic Empire from Star Wars? Xenophobic, rules with an iron fist, ridiculously inefficient.

40k is pretty much an amalgam of various tropes and settings from as far back as the late 19th century, i.e. power armor, plasma weapons, technologically advanced theocracies, mindless insect plagues devouring the universe, demons made from emotion, and so on and so on and so on, already existed in other settings. The thing that makes 40k "unique" is that it's a hodge podge of all these things and becomes its own sort of setting. If you want to read settings that include elements from 40k you could read: the Bible, the works of Jules Verne, Starship Troopers, Dracula, Dune, the list goes on.

I don't think there's anything very similar to 40k because there's no other franchise I can think of that is literally just a bunch of cliches slapped together. That said, I love the 40k setting, I'm just saying its originality ironically comes from being a soup of existing ideas, and no other setting I can think of does this effectively.

More specifically, you speak of the Imperium. The Imperium is made of several different factions like IG, Adeptus Astartes, etc.

For IG/Space Marines, you could look into Starship Troopers (for Tyranids as well) and various war movies from the 20th century. The Imperial Cult is reminiscent of the Necromongers from Riddick (although Riddick is newer than the Imperium/40k), and there's some Fritz Leiber in there as well.

Dune is a biggy. Not the original books/film/tv, but the 'next generation' of God-Emperor of Dune, in which the universe spanning Imperium has been ruled for 5,000 years by an immortal prescient God-Emperor who crushes any dissent with his army of warrior-priestesses.

Another would be the Ziru Sirka from the boardgame 'Imperium' and the subsequent RPG Traveller, both of which were published under license by GW. The former is a must-read to anyone who can't comprehend how the Tau have survived as it pits a future Earth against a stagnant ancient empire of 4,000 worlds - or rather against a single border province and its bureaucratically shackled governor.

Dune has
A galactic empire
Psychic navigators
A feudal/mediaeval style of government
Elite troops from a hell world
No robots or computers due to a rise of the machines
Lots of religion
Lots of swordplay

Asimov's Foundation Trilogy has
A galactic empire
Earth is entirely covered in huge metal buildings.
Declining technology that is becoming a religion or superstition

The "parallels" with 40K's Imperium are fairly obvious.

 Gashrog wrote:
Dune is a biggy. Not the original books/film/tv, but the 'next generation' of God-Emperor of Dune, in which the universe spanning Imperium has been ruled for 5,000 years by an immortal prescient God-Emperor who crushes any dissent with his army of warrior-priestesses.

Yep, while I have yet to read anything past Dune Messiah I was drawing parallels to 40K within the first hundred pages. I do enjoy the setting and lore of 40K but I do not pretend that it's 100% original either.

The main idea from where the Imperium (Especially the IG) comes from is a mix from many different settings, including Soviet Russia, NAZI Germany, Colonial Britain and many other aspects of other societies.

In respects to Space Hulk the board game, James Camerons aliens?

To others there are just many different legends, fantasies, sic-fi and real life fiction and nonfiction just moulded together to create the far future, though in my opinion the 40,000 fluff at 'The End Times' is really like the decline of Nazi Germany just in the far future.
When Hitler was barely seen after a fatal accident, the dis-believers of the Imperium (Real life Jews, priests, Catholics, and others) being exterminated or escaping to help the enemy. The new Tau Empire (IMO is post-NAZI America) attacking from the southern reaches (The Invasion of Italy, Greece). Hitler had his own religion being asserted into Germany praising him as a God and it was the same with the Emperor.
Space Marines are like the NAZI Stormtroopers and the Inquisition acts like the SS and they use mass-armour and heavily armoured units to attack the enemy at its weakest (Blitzkrieg).
In other cases its like Russia, so yeah.

 Arcsquad12 wrote:
The Galactic Empire from Star Wars? Xenophobic, rules with an iron fist, ridiculously inefficient.

Te galactic empire was actually much more efficient than either the Old Republic or New Republic though. Plus they were actually technologically innovative.

The closest in other franchises is probably the Covenant from halo. vicious genocidal theocracy that incorrectly interprets history as the basis of their worship and reveres "ancient" technology that they never improve.

Catachan : Vietnam , Krieg : world war 1 , lord solar macharius :Alexander the great and many more . But I love 40 k and everything about them

 Arcsquad12 wrote:
The Galactic Empire from Star Wars? Xenophobic, rules with an iron fist, ridiculously inefficient.

Not really. In fact one could actually point out that Star Wars copied W40K. The Galactic Empire wasn't xenophobic in the movies, it was only revealed as such in the EU, which was written in the late 90's to the early 00's that started the GE as being xenophobic bastards. They also ripped a lot of building styles from 40K as well, and I mean directly and doesn't try to hide it like 40K does.

But for inspiration and ideas, Dune is easily the main thing 40K borrows or steals from, depending on how well they twist it into their own version so it isn't directly copy-paste from another fiction.

In Strike Legion the main enemy is a HUMAN dominated IMPERIUM that callously sacrifices MASSIVE NUMBERS OF SOLDIERS that are backed by an ELITE TRANSHUMAN CORPS OF SUPERSOLDIERS while an IMMORTAL SUPER POWERFUL PSYCHIC has crowned herself as the GOD EMPRESS OF MANKIND.

Also hand grenades that can take out planets being standard issue, the most basic and weakest character being better than the best normal humans who ever lived at literally everything in each of their specialities, anti-matter warheads being used to stun people, drive by shootings with small arms from space that can devastate cities, and space squirrels lawl.

 Wyzilla wrote:

 Arcsquad12 wrote:
The Galactic Empire from Star Wars? Xenophobic, rules with an iron fist, ridiculously inefficient.

Not really. In fact one could actually point out that Star Wars copied W40K. The Galactic Empire wasn't xenophobic in the movies, it was only revealed as such in the EU, which was written in the late 90's to the early 00's that started the GE as being xenophobic bastards. They also ripped a lot of building styles from 40K as well, and I mean directly and doesn't try to hide it like 40K does.

But for inspiration and ideas, Dune is easily the main thing 40K borrows or steals from, depending on how well they twist it into their own version so it isn't directly copy-paste from another fiction.

Well, given that GW ripped the look and feel of architecture from Gothic and neo-Gothic architecture, it would be rather difficult to show that SW EU ripped a neo-Gothic look from 40K rather than from history.

 Kilkrazy wrote:

 Wyzilla wrote:

 Arcsquad12 wrote:
The Galactic Empire from Star Wars? Xenophobic, rules with an iron fist, ridiculously inefficient.

Not really. In fact one could actually point out that Star Wars copied W40K. The Galactic Empire wasn't xenophobic in the movies, it was only revealed as such in the EU, which was written in the late 90's to the early 00's that started the GE as being xenophobic bastards. They also ripped a lot of building styles from 40K as well, and I mean directly and doesn't try to hide it like 40K does.

But for inspiration and ideas, Dune is easily the main thing 40K borrows or steals from, depending on how well they twist it into their own version so it isn't directly copy-paste from another fiction.

Well, given that GW ripped the look and feel of architecture from Gothic and neo-Gothic architecture, it would be rather difficult to show that SW EU ripped a neo-Gothic look from 40K rather than from history.

 Wyzilla wrote:

 Arcsquad12 wrote:
The Galactic Empire from Star Wars? Xenophobic, rules with an iron fist, ridiculously inefficient.

Not really. In fact one could actually point out that Star Wars copied W40K....

Star Wars was came first so I am not sure how W40k copied it.

Nobody's ever interested in me posting about how awesome strike legion is *grumble*.

FacebookJunkie wrote:

 Wyzilla wrote:

 Arcsquad12 wrote:
The Galactic Empire from Star Wars? Xenophobic, rules with an iron fist, ridiculously inefficient.

Not really. In fact one could actually point out that Star Wars copied W40K....

Star Wars was came first so I am not sure how W40k copied it.

Did you even read my post? The Star Wars movies never exhibited anything similar to 40K that it truly borrowed from, 40K is based off 2000AD comics, Dune, and Strike Legion. It was only with the creation of the Star Wars Expanded Universe in the 90's, a full decade since W40K had existed, and in the 00's when stuff like hive cities started popping up in the Star Wars EU. Along with Dark Troopers, the GE being xenophobic, etc. Just because something came before does not mean it didn't copy something else later down the line. Of course as a franchise as well, Star Wars is pretty safe to copy whatever the hell it wants given it's backed by some pretty damn good lawyers, especially with Disney buying Lucasfilm out.

Although the EU also got completely retconned, so it's not like it's a real issue anymore.

FacebookJunkie wrote:

 Wyzilla wrote:

 Arcsquad12 wrote:
The Galactic Empire from Star Wars? Xenophobic, rules with an iron fist, ridiculously inefficient.

Not really. In fact one could actually point out that Star Wars copied W40K....

Star Wars was came first so I am not sure how W40k copied it.

To be fair, s/he does claim that it was the SW EU, written in the 90's and 00's, not the movies, that ripped off 40k. I don't know how much truth there is to those claims, but that is what s/he is claiming.

Given that 40K ripped off the idea of hive cities from things like Asimov's Foundations series (1950s SF) and Judge Dredd (1970s SF) you cannot be serious in suggesting that Star Wars had to rip of GW to come up with a hive city concept.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Given that 40K ripped off the idea of hive cities from things like Asimov's Foundations series (1950s SF) and Judge Dredd (1970s SF) you cannot be serious in suggesting that Star Wars had to rip of GW to come up with a hive city concept.

I'm not.

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Given that 40K ripped off the idea of hive cities from things like Asimov's Foundations series (1950s SF) and Judge Dredd (1970s SF) you cannot be serious in suggesting that Star Wars had to rip of GW to come up with a hive city concept.

Oh no, hive cities go far back, hell possibly even to ancient human mythos. It's just the design of them that looks suspiciously familiar.

Also, as a Warsie, I do indeed know what I'm talking about. I didn't have a choice whether or not I liked Star Wars.

The Expanded Universe actually started developing in the late 70s and early 80s, the Empires xenophobia became a thing at some point during that time as a side-effect of the films depicting not a single non-human imperial, whereas the rebels were shown to be made up of more than just humans.

Xenophobia was around since the first movie.

"Where are you taking this.... thing?" in the Cell block scene.

chaos0xomega wrote:
The Expanded Universe actually started developing in the late 70s and early 80s, the Empires xenophobia became a thing at some point during that time as a side-effect of the films depicting not a single non-human imperial, whereas the rebels were shown to be made up of more than just humans.

Not really. You could point to the rise of West End Games being the start of the EU in '87, but it still was largely formless compared to the EU of the 00's and early 10's before it got retconned this year. While West End did create Aurebesh, the start of the EU contributing to the main material, I consider the real start in the 90's with Dark Empire being created and the Trawn Trilogy soon after. That's when the ball started rolling and novels, comics, RPG's, videogames, etc started to pop out of the woodwork.

 Wyzilla wrote:

 Kilkrazy wrote:
Given that 40K ripped off the idea of hive cities from things like Asimov's Foundations series (1950s SF) and Judge Dredd (1970s SF) you cannot be serious in suggesting that Star Wars had to rip of GW to come up with a hive city concept.

Oh no, hive cities go far back, hell possibly even to ancient human mythos. It's just the design of them that looks suspiciously familiar.

Also, as a Warsie, I do indeed know what I'm talking about. I didn't have a choice whether or not I liked Star Wars.

It looks suspiciously like any number of tall structures with towers and spires including Ankhor Wat, Salisbury Cathedral, Hindu temples, the Petronas Towers, the buildings in Bladerunner, or Things To Come.

 Arcsquad12 wrote:
The Galactic Empire from Star Wars? Xenophobic, rules with an iron fist, ridiculously inefficient.

The GE is nothing like the Imperium in those regards.

Xenophobic: Discriminatory, yes. Genocidal, no.

Iron Fist: As much as you can rule such a massive galaxy with a rather pathetically small army and navy. Its not because your army is particularly powerful, but rather because the GE was ruling over an empire of sheep with most of them simply not having the spine to resist. The general population of Star Wars generally either didn't care about events occurring beyond their own star system or were simply too timid to do anything. A combination of the general populations apathy and/or timidity is why the GE was feared(and why the Rebellion had such a hard time of it)

With the Imperium, the general populace isn't apathetic or timid. They're simply ignorant of most of what happens elsewhere. They're perfectly happy doing whatever jobs they have to do, occasionally sending off regiments of IG to fight in the Emperors wars.

In both cases Resistance is met with brutal retaliation, but the Imperium is a little more capable in this regard. Even if they have the reflexes of a drunken cat dosed up on Valium.

Inefficient: If anything, the Imperium is a little more efficient in that they have the man power to actually enforce their domination. Not to mention being united by religion.

 Grey Templar wrote:

 Arcsquad12 wrote:
The Galactic Empire from Star Wars? Xenophobic, rules with an iron fist, ridiculously inefficient.

The GE is nothing like the Imperium in those regards.

Xenophobic: Discriminatory, yes. Genocidal, no.

Iron Fist: As much as you can rule such a massive galaxy with a rather pathetically small army and navy. Its not because your army is particularly powerful, but rather because the GE was ruling over an empire of sheep with most of them simply not having the spine to resist. The general population of Star Wars generally either didn't care about events occurring beyond their own star system or were simply too timid to do anything. A combination of the general populations apathy and/or timidity is why the GE was feared(and why the Rebellion had such a hard time of it)

With the Imperium, the general populace isn't apathetic or timid. They're simply ignorant of most of what happens elsewhere. They're perfectly happy doing whatever jobs they have to do, occasionally sending off regiments of IG to fight in the Emperors wars.

In both cases Resistance is met with brutal retaliation, but the Imperium is a little more capable in this regard. Even if they have the reflexes of a drunken cat dosed up on Valium.

Inefficient: If anything, the Imperium is a little more efficient in that they have the man power to actually enforce their domination. Not to mention being united by religion.

Oh no. With the EU the Galactic Empire got quite genocidal, and even had their own Hitler Youth during the end of the Republic and the height of the Galactic Empire. They also had industrialized slavery of some species. Hell though, they were genocidal against everyone, it was a Karen Traviss book, but the Galactic Empire used what was effectively a programmable version of the life eater virus that left a world habitable after killing its inhabitants.

Fortunately I never read most of the EU, and what I did read was utter tripe. So I can feel vindicated in ignoring it mostly.

To be frank any SF or fantasy based on a "franchise" is probably low quality because the good stuff stands up by itself.

 Grey Templar wrote:
Fortunately I never read most of the EU, and what I did read was utter tripe. So I can feel vindicated in ignoring it mostly.

Some of them were good. I advise the Dark Horse comics on Darth Vader and Boba Fett, both are well written and enjoyable reads. The KOTOR games and comics were also pretty good, and the Thrawn Trilogy was a Star Wars masterpiece. But yeah, most of the EU can be summed up by this.




-sobs about how hard it is to be a Star Wars fan-

Han Solo punching a sentient space otter does seem like an excellent summary.