Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

nareik wrote:

 mrhappyface wrote:

 ZebioLizard2 wrote:

So, I do want to know why it is so hard to accept that Abbadon is in fact extremely competent individual. It is only natural and logical to everyone who knows at least basic gak about Chaos. Chaos do not tolerate weakness. Nuff said...

Because the problem is for the longest time, the whole "Crusades have goals!" Was not a major thing for each Black Crusade from the beginning and as a result it's gotten stuck in.

Of course there's other problems that tend to stick even with recent stuff, like people wondering why Ultramarines are pushed so hard in the Space Marine Codex (Because it was originally Codex: Ultramarines), Grey Knights killing Sisters of Battle for a blood ritual (When they used to slaughter entire worlds that knew of them or daemons before without care of the populace)..

It's just not going to change, people are going to constantly get themselves over various subjects, it doesn't help that much of this tends to stem from /tg/ and 1d4chan.

^This.

Originally the black crusades were all failed attempts to attack the imperium, then GW realised that their biggest bad guy had never actually accomplished anything so they changed the black crusades to make it seem as though Abaddon succeeded in finding a relic or testing the imperiums defences.

This is really interesting. Didn't realise Abaddon's Black Crusades predated the 2nd ed codex.

Me either. Even in 2nd the Black Crusades were for specific goals, not just "try to conquer the Imperium". So I'm not even really sure where this "Failbaddon" meme came from, because as far back as I can recall, every Black Crusade (and a lot were not fleshed out at that time) were basically diversions while Abaddon went out and got some phat lewtz for later. They were never "drat and double drat I'll get you marines next time!" failures.

My view of him has changed a ton since reading Talon of Horus, it really makes him and the Black Legion seem awesome.

 Ernestas wrote:
I hope you do realize that I'm here to ask questions and not to convince anybody. I already know my gak and I know that fanboys are beyond reason, I can show them all the facts to the contrary and they still be reduced to ''chaos sucks'' level. They cannot reason, they cannot improve and I do not have to respect them. If you think like that and you think that the lore supports your position then you are simply wrong. Extremely wrong and it is not up to me to educate you. I'm tired of being insulted by morrons who could not figure out the basic facts about w40k universe and yet they presume to know better despite that I point case after case proving it to be wrong.

That's pretty dang rude there. You might get better results from people if you didn't use words like that.

SomeRandomEvilGuy wrote:

 MechaEmperor7000 wrote:

If Abaddon's end goal is to get to Terra and that each Crusade before the 13th had accomplished it's goal of doing whatever Abaddon wanted, then there's no point in the buildup of them ramming the Cadian Gates; they clearly had some way of sneaking out and back to the Eye without going through that bullcrap.

Yes, Abaddon can get out of the Eye of Terror other than through the Cadian Gate. However he doesn't seem to be able to bring all of his forces through with him. The Imperium is militarily stronger than Abaddon and doesn't have the level of disunity as Chaos does. Abaddon's plan is to tear open the Cadian Gate and spread the Eye of Terror in a Crimson Path. This requires the Gate to be sundered. It does make sense.

Also Abaddon "inherited" a crippled Legion and remade into the most powerful one. Every time he sally's out in force he has to unite a bunch of ambitious and backstabbing superhumans. It's not as if he has it easy.

See this is exactly the "Voodoo Shark" effect where the attempt at explaining it just creates more questions that it answers:

If Abaddon can get out of the Eye of Terror at all without much interference, why doesn't he just fortify his escape route and slowly pour his troops into realspace from there? Also his entire schtick is that he can unite chaos like no other, yet he commonly gets backstabbed or betrayed at some point, which kinda goes against that characterization.

All of these do in a sense explain it, but it's going in a roundabout way of doing so that not only makes the narrative clunky but also makes it seem convoluted at times. Instead there's two ways I could have seen it play out without much explaining:

1.) The other 12 crusades weren't Abaddon's idea; they were led by other random Black Legion chaos lords and "Black Crusade" is just a generic term for any random lord to go on a galactic rampage. Abaddon would be the 13th to do this, but it would be his first attempt. This would lend some weight to it because it would mean that, prior to this, Abaddon hasn't taken center stage at all and this is where he truly shows off his stuff.

2.) the other 12 crusades were fetch quests and Abaddon's greater goal was to gain the favour of various legions and gods, much like the trials Archaon had to go through to earn the title of Everchosen. This would actually be a logical progression as each of Abaddon's 12 crusades would instead be a piece of the greater whole of the 13th, showing that he's a long-time schemer like Palpatine or Teridax. I'm pretty sure this was what the Writers were going for considering the 1st Black Crusade had them actually realizing that the Eye was the portal to realspace and the 12th had Abaddon claim the Blackstone Fortress (rather than some of the other ones that made it seem like Abaddon just went out for a day of shopping for loyalist corpses).

...Well, scraping past the insults and the piles and piles of irony, there isn't a 'right' or 'wrong' anwser to questions like 'is Abaddon competent?'.

The lore changes frequently and unevenly, so some people may be working off older iterations of the lore. Vast amounts of the lore is written to push 'army X is awesome' over any idea of consistency, so figuring out what's actually going on is always pretty subjective. There isn't a 'right' or 'wrong' answer to whether Abaddon is competent, and people who answer one way aren't any dumber or less rational than people who answer the other.

JNAProductions wrote:

 Ernestas wrote:
I hope you do realize that I'm here to ask questions and not to convince anybody. I already know my gak and I know that fanboys are beyond reason, I can show them all the facts to the contrary and they still be reduced to ''chaos sucks'' level. They cannot reason, they cannot improve and I do not have to respect them. If you think like that and you think that the lore supports your position then you are simply wrong. Extremely wrong and it is not up to me to educate you. I'm tired of being insulted by morrons who could not figure out the basic facts about w40k universe and yet they presume to know better despite that I point case after case proving it to be wrong.

That's pretty dang rude there. You might get better results from people if you didn't use words like that.

Well, my apologies. Just ignore my arrogance and do not provoke me and it will get better over time. I'm warm person and I do explain in depth of why I think so, but I'm really tired of fools who cannot even read that I write and yet they assume to know better.

 Ernestas wrote:
That's pretty dang rude there. You might get better results from people if you didn't use words like that.

Well, my apologies. Just ignore my arrogance and do not provoke me and it will get better over time. I'm warm person and I do explain in depth of why I think so, but I'm really tired of fools who cannot even read that I write and yet they assume to know better.

text removed.

Reds8n

 MechaEmperor7000 wrote:
This would actually be a logical progression as each of Abaddon's 12 crusades would instead be a piece of the greater whole of the 13th, showing that he's a long-time schemer like Palpatine or Teridax

Teridax is what Abaddon wishes he was. I like him a lot more, but then Teridax has a luxury of a universe with a lot more shades of grey, white and black.

 Ashiraya wrote:
Teridax is what Abaddon wishes he was. I like him a lot more, but then Teridax has a luxury of a universe with a lot more shades of grey, white and black.

Who the heck is Teridax?

MechaEmperor7000,


Yes, this is also interesting question to me. I thought that Cadia was the only stable gateway out of Eye of Terror and Chaos fleets simply overwhelmed its fleet and slipped through other sectors. Now it seems that they can deploy on mass through multiple points from eye of terror. Can anyone explain this phenomena? Did it ever was explained?

 Ernestas wrote:
MechaEmperor7000,


Yes, this is also interesting question to me. I thought that Cadia was the only stable gateway out of Eye of Terror and Chaos fleets simply overwhelmed its fleet and slipped through other sectors. Now it seems that they can deploy on mass through multiple points from eye of terror. Can anyone explain this phenomena? Did it ever was explained?

Because there are temporary portals out once in a while to realspace, but they are very unstable and often you'll lose ships entering or leaving, not to mention the fact that the entrance may be gone whether hours, days, months or years.

It's not stable in the least, one can also create them with various things but it tends to require a ton of power/luck.

 Ernestas wrote:
Well, thank you for explaining it. I just take lore too seriously and I'm irritated by most of w40k fans who take positions of: ''chaos wtf? They are are failures, 13'th crusades and got their asses beaten''. I tend to look at w40k as seriously as possible, trying to see all the hints which writers throw at us and want it to as far as possible from anime bs of one individual pwning entire armies and can only be beaten by another even more badass character.

I think this here is the underlying issue to the consternation you've experienced with people treating Chaos as ridiculous: the setting itself was created to be ridiculous. 40k used to look like this:


Future-80's shade-wearing British super cops, basically!

And, sure, the fluff has started to take itself quite seriously nowadays, but the whole concept that forms the basis of the setting is really quite absurd. Things aren't just grim and dark in the 41st Millennium. They're at the grimmest and darkest that they ever have and can be, nothing can be fixed, human suffering happens on a such a grotesque scale that it skips right over being appalling to end up in a place where it's downright comical, and the only way this is ever going to end for anyone is when some gigantic, seven-breasted crab monsters literally crawls its way out of their eye sockets and murders everyone.

And don't get me wrong, I love the setting, the miniatures, and there are some great, compelling characters out there, but there's still that sheer ridiculousness of the setting that makes it a fun, amusing, rather than depressing, place to visit in the imagination.

I believe GW also said at one point that there are no invalid sources of lore. Abbadon is a gigantic failure in some lore incarnations and, more recently, a scary super genius (Though a badly written one, I feel, in that basically one day GW just told us that his Crusades have accomplished stuff). But either view of him is right because, hey, 'all lore you're willing to accept is valid, forge the narrative.'

And I would like to say that Chaos goes just beyond just tolerating weakness, it loves weakness--it's literally fuelled by human weakness! I felt that Abbadon was more interesting as an incompetent commander still desperately trying to claw his way out of Horus' shadow long after the Warmaster's death while all four gods divvy up his soul , rather than just a standard Arch-villain.

I think what they mean by all sources of lore are accurate is that everything that's printed is actually printed (or said, or whatever) somewhere in the far future. That does not make it correct.

But yeah, I do agree that the universe is large enough that multiple views can be held. It's a work of fiction-nothing wrong with conflicting opinions on it.

 JNAProductions wrote:

 Ashiraya wrote:
Teridax is what Abaddon wishes he was. I like him a lot more, but then Teridax has a luxury of a universe with a lot more shades of grey, white and black.

Who the heck is Teridax?

A villain from a storyline almost as complex as 40k, which means explaining everything he did would be far too long. Ashiraya basically summed it up; he's essentially (in terms of characterization) what Abaddon should have been.

He's a Character (and villain) from Bionicle btw. Going any further would actually start spoiling the plot.

He should be like Khan Noonian Singh from Wrath of Khan.
Sadly, he is like Apophis from SG-1.....

It's the same fandom that regurgitates "HERESY1111!1" like a hyperactive child every opportunity it gets.

I mean the bar for 'maturity' has never been very high. Five minutes on 1d4chan and everybody's a comedian.

Why the fan base is so immature. Mostly because it is.
A large portion of us might be relatively calm adults, but an other portion of us are just 17 year old kids who like to make fun of stuff, cursing enjoy repeating "fun" memes / hearsay and being loud in general.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Why abandon is picked on, well...

My first guess would be that
-its easy to bastardize his name to words like failbaddon
-he has an old model and old rules
-he is the major villain to the most popular armies.

And then I looked ad Ghazkull. He does have horrible rules, a very outdated chunky looking model, lost his grand campaigns to humanity. There isn't much of a difference really and jet no one is calling him faillskull or picking on his poorly fitting metal parts.

So It might just be that he isn't portraited as the major antagonist of armies popular with beginners.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
It might be the same response as the real live ridiculing of political adversaries.

I used to hang out with Abaddon in high school. He never bought weed. Not once!

I don't know why you need to convince everyone that your opinion is the correct one. Just because they don't agree with you doesn't make them deluded.

other than that I agree with you. Abbadon is meant to be a leader of chaos. I've never seen much depicting him as a mindless brute.

I don't really understand how anyone with a sense of historical context can take the 40k setting/lore so seriously. I mean, come on. This is a quote from RT:

Strike the first rune upon the engine's casing employing the chosen wrench. Its tip should be anointed with the oil of engineering using the proper incantation when the auspices are correct. Strike the second rune upon the engine's casing employing the arc-tip of the power-driver. If the second rune is not good, a third rune may be struck in like manner to the first. This is done according to the true ritual laid down by Scotti the Enginseer. A libation should be offered. If this sequence is properly observed the engines may be brought to full activation by depressing the large panel marked "ON".

The tongue that spoke those words is so deeply embedded in the cheek that you'd need to dig it out with a backhoe just to see it.

40k was originally all about satire, humor, and absurdity. It's only in the last couple of editions that it got "super-duper-srs-busness-guiz!" when GW had to start catering to the fantasies of Little Timmy in order to stay afloat. Some of that is even starting to turn around under the new CEO, like the pretty decent throwback Regimental-Standard website (even if some of it is still advertising).

EDIT: Also, to those complaining about the story in BFG: Armada... You do realize that the story wasn't just "made up" by the developer, right? They pretty much transcribed the story (almost word-for-word in some places) from the original BFG rulebook produced by GW itself. The only thing they added was a "protagonist" character for you to play as during the campaign (along with some supporting characters representing the factions). All the story elements were basically lifted from real printed GW material.

Ah, that explains it. You see, I'm a late comer to this universe. Relic had introduced me with its Dawn of War series. I had played gak out that game and the cooleness of its carnage made me curious of that these dudes exactly were. So, I started to read wiki, then books then forums and I felt in love with this universe.

You see, I grew up with Relic portrayal of w40k and then it naturally was strenghtened in DoW2. Both of these games did an absolute justice to every race, portraying them in respectful and damn cool manner. This is how I grew to respect each individual race instead of looking it as a fluff made for lolz.

 JamesY wrote:

pm713 wrote:
He hasn't united Chaos, to my knowledge he hasn't killed any Primarchs and refusing to serve Chaos is no big deal. Almost all Eldar and Space Marines do that. Big whoop.

Refusing to serve, whilst benefitting from them, is unique to Abbadon. Eldar and imperial marines aren't carrying any marks of chaos. I think the unity comes from the fact that they all support him, so he is a warrior they are all agreed upon who will cause the most, well, chaos.

The main issue I think is that he's been around for 18 years without any story progression. It makes him seem like a stagnant threat, rather than an imminent one. Hopefully the black crusade supplements and likely new model will restore him to his intended status.

Then Abaddon is like most Radical Inqusitors.

 Ernestas wrote:
Ah, that explains it. You see, I'm a late comer to this universe. Relic had introduced me with its Dawn of War series. I had played gak out that game and the cooleness of its carnage made me curious of that these dudes exactly were. So, I started to read wiki, then books then forums and I felt in love with this universe.

You see, I grew up with Relic portrayal of w40k and then it naturally was strenghtened in DoW2. Both of these games did an absolute justice to every race, portraying them in respectful and damn cool manner. This is how I grew to respect each individual race instead of looking it as a fluff made for lolz.

I agree that Relic did a fantastic job with the DOW series (both 1 and 2), which I still play even today.

But now that you've got a little historical knowledge behind you, I'd try not to get so worked up about the humor and "lulz" from some of the fanbase... It's kinda like people getting mad and claiming that WH40k/WHFB ripped off Starcraft/Warcraft, without realizing that the former predates the latter, and while both are similar takes on similar material, the one does not necessarily invalidate the other.

He's a pawn of all the Ruinous Powers, not independent of them. Should he lose their collective favor, he'd be Spawn.

You see, I grew up with Relic portrayal of w40k and then it naturally was strenghtened in DoW2. Both of these games did an absolute justice to every race, portraying them in respectful and damn cool manner. This is how I grew to respect each individual race instead of looking it as a fluff made for lolz.

So, despite the claim in your OP, you actually have very little idea of what you're talking about, is that what you're saying? As there are several things Relic got "wrong" in the DoW series, when comparing it to previously-released information from GW.

Do realize, however, that there's no such thing as a "canon" to 40k. This setting doesn't work like pre-Disney Star Wars. There's no pyramid of "this is more canon than this". It's all rumors, myths, lies and half-truths from an in-universe perspective. The tales we get in Codices, BL books, White Dwarf, etc. are all things that are true. Or might be true. Or could be true. Or are made up out of whole cloth. Every individual fan is free to take or leave the aspects of the setting that appeal to them the most/least and form their own version of the setting.

Really, read Talon of Horus. It shows some insight to Abaddon and makes him out to be pretty much a badass. The whole point for creating the Black Legion was to start a new legion, powerful enough to retake the Imperium (that seems to be his goal, not just conquest but more or less that the Imperium is unworthy successors to people like him who broke their backs to build it). He's the one who united the Nine Legions, and put an end to the Legion War, the one who made the Daemon Primarchs kneel to him and brought a unified army back to the Imperium after the Heresy.

He's not some cartoony villain with zany schemes who gets thwarted by meddling kids and their dog, he's the Antichrist of the setting.

I for one like the "change" to his crusades being successful. Change is in quote marks because I'm not sure they are a change at all. The majority of lore is told from an imperial perspective and from their point of view they were failures. Including black library novels
Then eventually we get our first black legion codex that focuses on these things and actually goes into the detail. Here we learn that they were actually successful. It works in the sense that we just hadn't heard the whole truth yet. And even if it was a retcon, it makes much more sense this way imho. Certainly a scheme befitting somebody chosen by tzeentch to be the warmaster of chaos.

Horus was mighty enough to equal the emperor and failed, so obviously a different course of action needs to be taken. Abaddon won't allow himself to fail and so does whatever he thinks is necessary to guarantee success.
In order to do that he needs venture into real space and into imperial territory. EVERYBODY is expendable in order to ensure his success and since he knows he can't take on the imperium by him self, he needs to attack en masse at cadia to keep the imperium distracted long enough for him to succeed. Bonus points if cadia were to actually fall, but that's not his main objective, least not for the past crusades.
So even cadia makes sense to me. A crusade on cadia certainly takes a toll on resources for the imperium. Also we don't know how long it takes him to prepare a warpjump behind the enemy lines so to speak.
Plus he probably doesn't want a large scale invasion to pick up some artefact. It would probably be much harder to open a passage for such a fleet, if it's possible at all. And he would have to make it back in one piece too, which would probably be even harder to do at that scale. Going with the idea of fulfilling certain objective during each crusade also means that he bleives chaos isn't ready yet to head to terra and so retreat would be mandatory. Taking a comparatively small contingent helps with that.

Look at the traitors hate campaign. For all we know Xorphas had been preparing for centuries before going there. They exactly what was hidden there and how to open it. They had to get the artefact first and some means of locating the weakest spot. Not to mention learning the appropriate rituals. AND then manipulating the enemy into doing their bidding. That's one hell of a scheme and that's just for this particular objective.

Either way, it sure beats him flailing his arms and loosing them as he repeatedly smashes his head into a wall screaming IT'S JUST A FLESH WOUND!

And as i tired of those kind of loeple who resort to direct attavk "moron" to justify their wrong conclusions let by and arrogance not knowing the least limit.

You wanted praise, you got it from half the answers. You needed to confirm your opinion then there basically is something wrong. You're not able to tell important matters and what's besides apart: see "christians" which in a wargaming section is totally irrelevant...

But you're right, you needn't educate me: i'm already wel-bred enough to know not to maliciously argue ad hominem, nor to get upset to thoroughly incontrolable wrath against all what's of different state of wind. You might learn from it, as far as i'm concerned i've wasted enough time with you're childish behavor and cinvictions.

I'm still waiting to see the pre-2nd ed codex stuff that states the first crusades were failures.

"Abaddon has led twelve Black Crusades against the Imperium. Some have been great invasions of whole Legions of the lost and the damned, others have been vicious raids with only a few companies of the most deadly Chaos Space Marines at his command. Each attack has sent the Imperium reeling and ravaged worlds close to the Eye of Terror. The High Lords of Terra live in fear of the day that Abaddon unites all of the Traitor Legions into an unstoppable horde and returns to play out the last acts of treachery begun by Horus ten thousand years ago."

"Abaddon dreams of forging a diabolic empire of his own from the blazing ruins of the shattered Imperium. Each world, each city destroyed, is a step closer to wiping the canvas clean so he can make his mark upon the galaxy."

"Abaddon the Despoiler, most feared adversary of the Imperium, has slowly but surely marshalled the forces of countless Traitor Legions to the point where he stands on the brink of challenging the Emperor himself as Warmaster Horus did before him."

To me, perhaps with the benefit of perspective of where the fluff is today, the way the 2nd ed codex is setting the scene is Abaddon has been bringing together the forces of chaos to the point where he can launch the greatest and final black crusade, the one which will bring the imperium to it's knees.

I didn't really play 4th/5th edition; did that the codexes for that period describe the first crusades as failures?

OP, please learn some manners. Most responded in fair comments, and you lashed out if they disagreed with you over background of a game. This isn't arguing "Naziism was wrong, and anyone disagreeing with me is a moron", this was "this fantasy character is amazing, and anyone disagreeing is a moron". While both are opinions, one is grounded in reality that a HUGE portion of the world will agree with, while another is fantasy; it's an escape from the horrors of the real world. Take time to enjoy the setting; both the good and the bad. Enjoy discussion with people who disagree with you, and see if you can sway them to your line of thought through positive examples, not insults.

For what it's worth, I thought Abby was kinda cool in the Horus Rising series. He's no Archaon (that guy is made of win), but he's pretty cool. And I don't consider him a failure.

 timetowaste85 wrote:
OP, please learn some manners. Most responded in fair comments, and you lashed out if they disagreed with you over background of a game. This isn't arguing "Naziism was wrong, and anyone disagreeing with me is a moron", this was "this fantasy character is amazing, and anyone disagreeing is a moron". While both are opinions, one is grounded in reality that a HUGE portion of the world will agree with, while another is fantasy; it's an escape from the horrors of the real world. Take time to enjoy the setting; both the good and the bad. Enjoy discussion with people who disagree with you, and see if you can sway them to your line of thought through positive examples, not insults.

For what it's worth, I thought Abby was kinda cool in the Horus Rising series. He's no Archaon (that guy is made of win), but he's pretty cool. And I don't consider him a failure.

And I did responded in a fair manner, but it is people like you who must pick up a fight over nothing. I will ignore fools who insist on teaching me a lesson basing their arguments on foolish ideas like there is no lore. Of course there is. W40k lore is loose, but GW made it clear that can be considered cannon and that cannot and then fans goes directly against established norms, then there is a problem. It is like saying that squats is still official part of w40k universe because ''hey man, nothing is cannon''.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Roknar wrote:
I for one like the "change" to his crusades being successful. Change is in quote marks because I'm not sure they are a change at all. The majority of lore is told from an imperial perspective and from their point of view they were failures. Including black library novels
Then eventually we get our first black legion codex that focuses on these things and actually goes into the detail. Here we learn that they were actually successful. It works in the sense that we just hadn't heard the whole truth yet. And even if it was a retcon, it makes much more sense this way imho. Certainly a scheme befitting somebody chosen by tzeentch to be the warmaster of chaos.

Horus was mighty enough to equal the emperor and failed, so obviously a different course of action needs to be taken. Abaddon won't allow himself to fail and so does whatever he thinks is necessary to guarantee success.
In order to do that he needs venture into real space and into imperial territory. EVERYBODY is expendable in order to ensure his success and since he knows he can't take on the imperium by him self, he needs to attack en masse at cadia to keep the imperium distracted long enough for him to succeed. Bonus points if cadia were to actually fall, but that's not his main objective, least not for the past crusades.
So even cadia makes sense to me. A crusade on cadia certainly takes a toll on resources for the imperium. Also we don't know how long it takes him to prepare a warpjump behind the enemy lines so to speak.
Plus he probably doesn't want a large scale invasion to pick up some artefact. It would probably be much harder to open a passage for such a fleet, if it's possible at all. And he would have to make it back in one piece too, which would probably be even harder to do at that scale. Going with the idea of fulfilling certain objective during each crusade also means that he bleives chaos isn't ready yet to head to terra and so retreat would be mandatory. Taking a comparatively small contingent helps with that.

Look at the traitors hate campaign. For all we know Xorphas had been preparing for centuries before going there. They exactly what was hidden there and how to open it. They had to get the artefact first and some means of locating the weakest spot. Not to mention learning the appropriate rituals. AND then manipulating the enemy into doing their bidding. That's one hell of a scheme and that's just for this particular objective.

Either way, it sure beats him flailing his arms and loosing them as he repeatedly smashes his head into a wall screaming IT'S JUST A FLESH WOUND!

Well, I would personally say that Abbadon is even more powerful now than Horus at its prime and would stand far greater chance against the Emperor. Just his little sword rivals power of C'than weaponary and would cut Emperor's armor as it would be paper. Emperor's psychic might would only empower sword further. Even though, it is Horus talons who deserve to finish his life.


Well, knowing how disorganized chaos is by nature it is not hard to imagine that Abbadon cannot easily gather all of his allies and he would march out with less that full Black Crusade. One of most notable examples is 12'th Crusade and how one feeble Gothic sector managed to fend off Abbadon's forces. That would be impossible if it full out Chaos assault, so I do assume that you are right. Finding these temporary openings is difficult. Supplying full out invasion is impossible. That would explain chaos raider like behavior during Crusade, using hit and run raiding tactics instead of waging on true head on engagement with feeble servants of the Emperor!


Automatically Appended Next Post:

nareik wrote:
I'm still waiting to see the pre-2nd ed codex stuff that states the first crusades were failures.

"Abaddon has led twelve Black Crusades against the Imperium. Some have been great invasions of whole Legions of the lost and the damned, others have been vicious raids with only a few companies of the most deadly Chaos Space Marines at his command. Each attack has sent the Imperium reeling and ravaged worlds close to the Eye of Terror. The High Lords of Terra live in fear of the day that Abaddon unites all of the Traitor Legions into an unstoppable horde and returns to play out the last acts of treachery begun by Horus ten thousand years ago."

"Abaddon dreams of forging a diabolic empire of his own from the blazing ruins of the shattered Imperium. Each world, each city destroyed, is a step closer to wiping the canvas clean so he can make his mark upon the galaxy."

"Abaddon the Despoiler, most feared adversary of the Imperium, has slowly but surely marshalled the forces of countless Traitor Legions to the point where he stands on the brink of challenging the Emperor himself as Warmaster Horus did before him."

To me, perhaps with the benefit of perspective of where the fluff is today, the way the 2nd ed codex is setting the scene is Abaddon has been bringing together the forces of chaos to the point where he can launch the greatest and final black crusade, the one which will bring the imperium to it's knees.

I didn't really play 4th/5th edition; did that the codexes for that period describe the first crusades as failures?

Well, I'm in interesting position myself. As a later comer and living in small second world country, I'm isolated from community at large and certainly table top game. I never saw Abbadon failing in lore, but I really hope that in w50k Abbadon comes to the Holy Terra itself, smashes rotting Corpse of the Emperor, seals warp portal, denounces ties with Chaos Gods and becomes a second Emperor of mankind. This is only fair considering how much he got gak from w40k community.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Psienesis wrote:
He's a pawn of all the Ruinous Powers, not independent of them. Should he lose their collective favor, he'd be Spawn.

You see, I grew up with Relic portrayal of w40k and then it naturally was strenghtened in DoW2. Both of these games did an absolute justice to every race, portraying them in respectful and damn cool manner. This is how I grew to respect each individual race instead of looking it as a fluff made for lolz.

So, despite the claim in your OP, you actually have very little idea of what you're talking about, is that what you're saying? As there are several things Relic got "wrong" in the DoW series, when comparing it to previously-released information from GW.

Do realize, however, that there's no such thing as a "canon" to 40k. This setting doesn't work like pre-Disney Star Wars. There's no pyramid of "this is more canon than this". It's all rumors, myths, lies and half-truths from an in-universe perspective. The tales we get in Codices, BL books, White Dwarf, etc. are all things that are true. Or might be true. Or could be true. Or are made up out of whole cloth. Every individual fan is free to take or leave the aspects of the setting that appeal to them the most/least and form their own version of the setting.

Nope. I told you that I grew up on DoW series. It is completely different than it being original setting without flaws. It means, that DoW gave me first impression of this world to which I fell in love with. It was a starting point rather than how it must be. In addition, while w40k universe is loose there are clear boundaries which GW set. You cannot just tell any bs and claim it is my lore. Same as with Abbadon, I never encountered him being incompetent and thus I wanted to ask from where it stems.