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pm713 wrote:
Last I checked the Pylons were only on Cadia.

As far as I can recall there was one other Planet in the Eye of Terror Codex that had Pylons on. I'll have a look when I get in.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/392010.page

Look for "Sentinel Worlds" in that thread. There are pylons there.

40k story has continued past 13th Black Crusade, even when Creed fall into chaos in the end. at least when Cadia got Exterminatus from Chaos, Creed escapes instead of stay on Cadia with Warp Jump and he(along Cadian 8th) got one way ticket to the future where 40k universe got eaten by Kingdom hearts' Heartless

 CREEEEEEEEED wrote:
You know, when I first heard that Cadia fell, I was pretty annoyed. But after reading that. I'm just proud. (Proud of fictional characters. What has my life become?)

Creed's Pride did what Guardsmen do: They died STANDING. And they held the line with epic balls of steel. Imperial Guard fans have a reason to be proud. I know I am.


As for the Tactical Genius himself, I suspect that Trollzyn is saving him for a part to play later on in this little drama.

 oldravenman3025 wrote:
As for the Tactical Genius himself, I suspect that Trollzyn is saving him for a part to play later on in this little drama.

Or he could just be saving him for himself.
I'm sure he'd love nothing better than to proudly display the greatest tactical mind the imperium has ever had.
(and I'm sure he'd love to rub it in Zahndrekh's face... if the old coot were capable of comprehending what he was looking at).

 oldravenman3025 wrote:
As for the Tactical Genius himself, I suspect that Trollzyn is saving him for a part to play later on in this little drama.

Is Trazyn going to pull a tactical genius with the tactical genius?

https://regimental-standard.com/2017/01/18/cadia-another-imperial-victory/

Satire aside I quite enjoyed all of this and am delighted to see my beloved sisters have a role that isn't just punching bag. Have a tough time seeing sisters buddying it up with xenos in future though.

I quite enjoyed the story (Just finished it), but one question kept nagging at me:
Aren't Abaddon's resources starting to flagg just as much as the Imperiums?
Like, yeah, he started with a full Legion and not just a Company, (So, 10,000 marines, right? Or was it 20,000?) And presumably gets new recruits whenever other chapters fall to Chaos, but it still seems like he should be running out of resources considering how carelessly he spends them.

As a quick summary, here's what he loses:
An important general
One of the most powerful ships in the universe
An exceedingly high number of Marines
A Warlord Titan, and several Reavers and Warhounds

It's possible that the Titans could be salvaged with enough time, I'll admit, but that seems unlikely after the planet took an Orbital Bombardment on steroids.
It's also unclear exactly how many Chaos Space Marines die, but it's *at least* one for every loyalist, and the way it reads, it was probably a lot more. (For example, they get hit by full squads of Raptors, kill all of the attacks, and take 2-3 casualties, implying that they're dealing closer to 3:1 casualties, not including the losses inflicted by Guardsmen and Skitarii.)

In fact, based off of the written details, it really seems like Abaddon's asdault on Cadia cost him *at least* several thousand CSM. There were something like 800 Loyalist marines from the various chapters, (precise numbers are hard to come by,) and every scene featuring them included 2:1 or 3:1 losses at worst and 5:1 or more if you read it with an imperialist bias. Once you add in casualties from all the other sources, you've got a minimum of a couple thousand CSM dying, more likely to be 5,000 or so, and if we're estimating high then it could be as many as 10k.

Even if Abbadon has something ludicrous like 50,000 CSM, that's some really major losses. Maybe Cadia was worth it, but it really seems like that level of attrition wouldn't be sustainable.

Legion was in numbers of 6 digits. And also it's not like they don't make new ones...

Waaaghpower wrote:

As a quick summary, here's what he loses:
An important general
One of the most powerful ships in the universe
An exceedingly high number of Marines
A Warlord Titan, and several Reavers and Warhounds

The Daemon Prince? Can't he be resummoned?
The loss of the Blackstone Fortress is a significant blow.
I wouldn't assume that Chaos lost a lot more Marines than the Loyalists. There's often a perspective imbalance.
Not that many Titans for one of the most fortified worlds in the Imperium.

Also, Abaddon will likely be able to call on the services of the other Chaos forces now. Even if he doesn't directly command all of them they'll likely attack the Imperium anyway now that the Cadian Gate is broken open.

tneva82 wrote:
Legion was in numbers of 6 digits. And also it's not like they don't make new ones...

Okay, so I googled this - The sources are conflicting, but some do say upwards of 150-200k. Even so, that was pre-heresy - Nobody came out of that with their whole army intact. In fact, they would have taken the brunt of the casualties.

And yeah, CSM can theoretically make new marines, but not any more quickly than Astartes can. Those massive, massive casualties aren't going to disappear overnight.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

SomeRandomEvilGuy wrote:

Waaaghpower wrote:

As a quick summary, here's what he loses:
An important general
One of the most powerful ships in the universe
An exceedingly high number of Marines
A Warlord Titan, and several Reavers and Warhounds

The Daemon Prince? Can't he be resummoned?
The loss of the Blackstone Fortress is a significant blow.
I wouldn't be so quick to assume Chaos lost a lot more Marines than the Loyalists. There's often a perspective imbalance.
Not that many Titans for one of the most fortified worlds in the Imperium.

Also, Abaddon will likely be able to call on the services of the other Chaos forces now. Even if he doesn't directly command all of them they'll likely attack the Imperium anyway now that the Cadian Gate is broken open.

The Daemon Prince can probably be resummoned, but he just got his ass handed to him while Khorne was juicing him with every boon he could throw at him. He's a disappointment to his patron. That Prince isn't going to be an asset going forward.
And... I'd call it a perspective imbalance if it wasn't for the fact that we get told about pretty much every loyalist's death, (in general terms, if not specific,) and it's always accompanied by mentions of the tons of casualties they inflicted.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Also keeping in mind that this happened just after the other events of the rest of the 13th Crusade - An exact time is not given, but it can't be more than a year or two, tops, given the events that take place. Abbadon has NOT had the time to replenish his forces from the prior events of the Crusade.

Has anyone mentioned in the thread that the mysterious eldar at the end could in fact be one of the Eldar from before the fall?

That there might be time travel afoot in the next book

 oldravenman3025 wrote:

 CREEEEEEEEED wrote:
You know, when I first heard that Cadia fell, I was pretty annoyed. But after reading that. I'm just proud. (Proud of fictional characters. What has my life become?)

Creed's Pride did what Guardsmen do: They died STANDING. And they held the line with epic balls of steel. Imperial Guard fans have a reason to be proud. I know I am.


As for the Tactical Genius himself, I suspect that Trollzyn is saving him for a part to play later on in this little drama.

Trollzyn is all about recreating major historical events. Trollzyn cares less about saving the imperium then he does preserving the moment. And no imperial represents cadia more then creed. Trollzyn likely kept what was left of the 8th and creed and a bunch of CSM black legion in a stasis room in mock battle and poor trollzyn is just missing his abaddon action figure to finish his set.

Wait, does that mean Trazyn is a wargamer? What if this some sort of necron pass time, and Trazyn is a TFG who goes out of the way to get the more powerful people he can find so he can win every game?

 Latro_ wrote:
That there might be time travel afoot in the next book

Doubtful. The only thing close to time travel (outside Black Library stuff) is skipping over years due to being in the Eye/Warp.

Check out the Ordo Chronos...

SomeRandomEvilGuy wrote:

Waaaghpower wrote:

As a quick summary, here's what he loses:
An important general
One of the most powerful ships in the universe
An exceedingly high number of Marines
A Warlord Titan, and several Reavers and Warhounds

The Daemon Prince? Can't he be resummoned?
The loss of the Blackstone Fortress is a significant blow.
I wouldn't assume that Chaos lost a lot more Marines than the Loyalists. There's often a perspective imbalance.
Not that many Titans for one of the most fortified worlds in the Imperium.

Also, Abaddon will likely be able to call on the services of the other Chaos forces now. Even if he doesn't directly command all of them they'll likely attack the Imperium anyway now that the Cadian Gate is broken open.

Marines knocked out doesnt not mean marines killed. With Chaos winning and having control of the skies, many of those marines that were knocked out can be brought back.
The IoM wounded were left on the planet and died.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Waaaghpower wrote:

tneva82 wrote:
Legion was in numbers of 6 digits. And also it's not like they don't make new ones...

Okay, so I googled this - The sources are conflicting, but some do say upwards of 150-200k. Even so, that was pre-heresy - Nobody came out of that with their whole army intact. In fact, they would have taken the brunt of the casualties.

And yeah, CSM can theoretically make new marines, but not any more quickly than Astartes can. Those massive, massive casualties aren't going to disappear overnight.

Hon'sou and Fabulous bill can make new marines in hours. Abby might not be able to match that, but replacing losses isnt necessarily slower than the IoM.

His point still stands. If the next couple world's put up even half as much of fight as Cadia then Abbadon's got nowhere near enough to contest the Imperium long term.

That said, this was probably just author indulgence and Abby will have as much as he needs for the plot.

Audustum wrote:
His point still stands. If the next couple world's put up even half as much of fight as Cadia then Abbadon's got nowhere near enough to contest the Imperium long term.

That said, this was probably just author indulgence and Abby will have as much as he needs for the plot.

Could easily be made up for by including a few other parts of the crusade.

Cadia is a system, of which Cadia Prime is the key defense work that protects several other fortress planets. It is what was just destroyed, and with it gone the rest of the worlds could fall to Chaos very easily.

Similarly with the Cadian gate now open, Chaos can pour into lightly defended sectors of the galaxy very easily and inflict substantial losses on the IoM without much risk to their own. They could also raid and pillage some forge or hive worlds gaining valuable supplies.

Now they probably wont write about it, but we should probably assume that Cadia falling wasnt the only losses the IoM suffered.

@Exergy:
I have a hard time believing that a Black Templar or Space Wolf clubbed a Legionairre over the head, knocked him out, and walked away. Both because that wouldn't hurt a Space Marine, and because the weapons being used were explosives and chainsaws. They didn'y get shot in the head, they had a small grenade blow up inside their skull. They didn't get stabbed, they got eviscerated.

Waaaghpower wrote:

The Daemon Prince can probably be resummoned, but he just got his ass handed to him while Khorne was juicing him with every boon he could throw at him. He's a disappointment to his patron. That Prince isn't going to be an asset going forward.
And... I'd call it a perspective imbalance if it wasn't for the fact that we get told about pretty much every loyalist's death, (in general terms, if not specific,) and it's always accompanied by mentions of the tons of casualties they inflicted.

Wasn't he beaten by Saint Celestine? Khorne doesn't seem that harsh on those who fail him actually. An'ggrath the Unbound died to an Inquisitor on Vraks and is seemingly still top dog.
Maybe Chaos did take a lot more casualties than the Loyalists. They were still assaulting a fortress world and have thrown the gates wide open to vast Chaos incursions. Plus Cadia can't be retaken.

Breotan wrote:Doubtful. The only thing close to time travel (outside Black Library stuff) is skipping over years due to being in the Eye/Warp.

One Necron in particular is very good at time travel. Orikan the Diviner. It tends to lead to unexpected problems though. Plus he can see the future.

Waaaghpower wrote:I have a hard time believing that a Black Templar or Space Wolf clubbed a Legionairre over the head, knocked him out, and walked away. Both because that wouldn't hurt a Space Marine, and because the weapons being used were explosives and chainsaws. They didn'y get shot in the head, they had a small grenade blow up inside their skull. They didn't get stabbed, they got eviscerated.

Space Marines are renowned for going into coma-like states when severely wounded, being recovered and becoming combat ready again after medical treatment.

SomeRandomEvilGuy wrote:

Waaaghpower wrote:I have a hard time believing that a Black Templar or Space Wolf clubbed a Legionairre over the head, knocked him out, and walked away. Both because that wouldn't hurt a Space Marine, and because the weapons being used were explosives and chainsaws. They didn'y get shot in the head, they had a small grenade blow up inside their skull. They didn't get stabbed, they got eviscerated.

Space Marines are renowned for going into coma-like states when severely wounded, being recovered and becoming combat ready again after medical treatment.

Space marines are heartier than anything in the galaxy not a necron. Of course some of them are going to be dead dead, but more often than not their wounds are recoverable.

On the positive the only thing that really mattered was the Chaos fleets swept the lanes and then defeated the Phalanx. Land stuff is irrelevant when you can bomb the planet from orbit. Abaddon could have saved a lot of chaos lives...kind of like the other Spazz Emprah and the death stars.

 Exergy wrote:

SomeRandomEvilGuy wrote:

Waaaghpower wrote:I have a hard time believing that a Black Templar or Space Wolf clubbed a Legionairre over the head, knocked him out, and walked away. Both because that wouldn't hurt a Space Marine, and because the weapons being used were explosives and chainsaws. They didn'y get shot in the head, they had a small grenade blow up inside their skull. They didn't get stabbed, they got eviscerated.

Space Marines are renowned for going into coma-like states when severely wounded, being recovered and becoming combat ready again after medical treatment.

Space marines are heartier than anything in the galaxy not a necron. Of course some of them are going to be dead dead, but more often than not their wounds are recoverable.

I don't buy this excuse. This applies to things like lasgun shots and stab wounds, not being ripped apart by a chainsword or having your head melted off by plasma. Even if we disregard all casualties inflicted by the guardsmen, that's still a couple thousand dead CSM - Loyalist Space Marines would have the knowledge and discipline to double tap.

(Also: Within the story itself, it is very explicit about Space Marines dying on both sides. It sometimes uses Purple Prose, but more often than not the language is very clear - Those CSM are dead, dead, dead.)

This also isn't counting any CSM who were on the Blackspear, who are certainly dead now.

So unless Abbadon has thousands of viable subjects sitting around, and the skill of Fabulous Billy at making new Marines, this and the last assault a couple years earlier mean his stock of CSM should be running very, very thin.

To be fair if you don't really care about mutations it's likely quicker and easier to make a chaos marine using thier geneseed than making an imperial marine. I have a feeling chaos standards are a lot less taxing than imperial standards.

gungo wrote:
To be fair if you don't really care about mutations it's likely quicker and easier to make a chaos marine using thier geneseed than making an imperial marine. I have a feeling chaos standards are a lot less taxing than imperial standards.

You still want someone incredibly strong and talented, though. Otherwise you're just wasting your time and limited genr-seed on sub-par chaff.

 Breotan wrote:

 Latro_ wrote:
That there might be time travel afoot in the next book

Doubtful. The only thing close to time travel (outside Black Library stuff) is skipping over years due to being in the Eye/Warp.

There was fluff that the Harlequins knew all the paths of the webway, some of which led to different place in time.. older fluff but still ...

i think the amour might be from the Eldar Empire era, reclaimed by someone as a relic.

Waaaghpower wrote:
This applies to things like lasgun shots and stab wounds, not being ripped apart by a chainsword or having your head melted off by plasma. Even if we disregard all casualties inflicted by the guardsmen,

To be fair those wounds can still be lethal and guardsmen pack more than enough guns to turn large targets into tiny meat chunks.

I love the fact that if we say there was 100,000 Chaos Marines attacking cadia, and say that they were supported by 50 million cultists, they racked up an impressive kill death ratio.

So 850 million humies on cadia
Half we could say were killed by fleet bombardments and titans, artillery, all the fun stuff.
Being generous and say it was one for one by the cultists
So the 100,000 chaos marines are left with 375 million dudes to kill. Roughly leaving each marine killing half the cadian 8th by themselves (iirc The 8th were 8000 strong)

In terms of the writing on how the black legion were killed in droves, its an imperial biased book (so bloody biased) so of cousre the imperials will be written as heroically killing evil mooks while ignoring their failures and deaths.

Me, i choose not to drink the emprah's kool aid.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
And that ratio doesnt account for the chaos force attacking one of the most heavily defended and fortified planets/system in the galaxy.

What's the source of the Chaos numbers? It sounds like you came up with them