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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2017/01/16 17:41:08
Subject: Faction representation in the fluff
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Lesser Daemon of Chaos
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I saw an interesting idea in a bolter and chainsword thread that I thought I'd pose as a question. The thread topic was how some factions (mainly IG, orks and nids) are becoming "NPC factions" in that they, even in stories centered around them, will be overshadowed by the stars of the show. Perfect example stated was the distinct lack of cadians in the fall of cadia.
The idea put forward is that GW is leaving them in the dark because they have run out of ideas as to what to do with them. Guardsmen will die in droves until marines arrive, nids are on a threat scale of 0-100 in that they either aren't present or they are the biggest threat in the sector (so they either lose or the entire region is wiped). Orks are... well, orks. Nothing but a nuisance until a big one crawls out of the woodwork and call a waaaagh!
Now personally, I love all three of the mentioned factions and have toyed with the idea of starting a collection for each, but bearing in mind that not everyone wants the 40k story to progress, what could GW do to inject a bit of life into the fluff of these factions? Short of introducing another massive Waaagh!/hive fleet to threaten the galaxy, or toning down the focus on marines from a guard standpoint (never going to happen) I'm not 100% sure what they could do.
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Chaos undivided: 8300, Tau empire: 5600, Ork speed freaks: 1750
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2017/01/16 18:19:25
Subject: Re:Faction representation in the fluff
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Preacher of the Emperor
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An easy one off the top of my head would be to pit them against each other. A bit pandering, I admit, but I think you have story potential for like a guard v Tau situation or guard v ork war that's going on while this end times stuff happens in the Segmentum Solar.
Everything seems hopeless, the guardsmen know reinforcements are trickling down and resupply is getting fewer and farther between, it can't get any worse... Then a hive fleet hits the area like a sledgehammer and basically everybody is scrambling to fight them off.
Thus leading to the inevitable Tau/Imperium alliance. For the greater good.
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2017/01/16 19:48:23
Subject: Faction representation in the fluff
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Slaanesh Veteran Marine with Tentacles
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Really all we need are some stories in which their place in the story isn't usurped by a more "important" faction.
Where a Chaos incursion doesn't interrupt an Ork invasion.
Where the Space Marines don't show up to save the day.
Etc.
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Necrons: 4000+ pts
Tyranids: 1000+ pts
Word Bearers: 1500+ pts
Emperor's Children: 1500+ pts
Minotaurs: 2000+ pts (killed by Primaris, thanks GW)
Custodes: 1000+ pts |
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2017/01/16 20:01:43
Subject: Faction representation in the fluff
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Potent Possessed Daemonvessel
Why Aye Ya Canny Dakkanaughts!
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When it comes to writing there is a problem with each of these three factions,
Imperial Guard: if they are in a conflict that doesn't require a space marine aid then it probably isn't a very important conflict, just 1 of the millions of IG conflicts where they deploy, slowly wittle away at the enemy till they're gone and then move on to the next conflict. Now you could do a more focussed story about a Guardsman unit rather than the conflict but it would have to be a short story seeing as how most guardsmen die in the first couple of hours after the conflict. There is either no character arch or it is so small that you might as well not bother, which is a shame.
Orks: as with IG, there is a problem with character archs in Orks don't have them. An Orks whole motivation is to have a good old brawl with something 'real killy like', there is no way to convey the feelings of an Ork protagonist or watch as they change because they have none and they don't, respectively. Orks are only really good in a story for a couple of good one liners, one of my favourites is "Uh oh" after a big mek accidently tears a whole into real space from which Khorne daemons flood from.
Tyranids: much the same as Orks but without even the humour to prop them up on, in a story they can only really be described from a far ('cause up close they'll nom your face).
I do quite like guard and Orks (Nids less so) making an appearance in a story just to give some much needed change of pace and/or humour to lighten our grimdark world but I can't see many stories having a focus on them. Shame. :/
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This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2017/01/16 20:02:24
Ghorros wrote:The moral of the story: Don't park your Imperial Knight in a field of Gretchin carrying power tools.
Marmatag wrote:All the while, my opponent is furious, throwing his codex on the floor, trying to slash his wrists with safety scissors. |
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2017/01/16 23:32:28
Subject: Re:Faction representation in the fluff
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Commander of the Mysterious 2nd Legion
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yeah problem with 'nids and guard is they are the "Great faceless mass" that IS their whole feel
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Opinions are not facts please don't confuse the two |
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2017/01/16 23:33:50
Subject: Faction representation in the fluff
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Heroic Senior Officer
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Plenty of books featuring guards in large battles where they don't die instantly.
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2017/01/17 00:07:04
Subject: Re:Faction representation in the fluff
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Hardened Veteran Guardsman
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I agree with several of the posters that the best thing would be to have a fight without any large number of SM or CSM/etc. I don't think that writing a story on one of the guards random campaigns would be an issue as GW as done it before (Fifteen Hours, Dead Men Walking etc).
Some potential ideas I've had bouncing around:
Guard discover incoming tyranid fleet via genestealers. Regiments are dispatched to a planet with the intention of trying to evacuate uninfected civilians, while the navy plans exterminatus down on them. Guard and navy get moments of badass, and we see the tyranids being the murdering machines that they are, only stoppable by exterminatus.
Guard get besieged by Orks in a hive. Plenty of chances for crazy Ork stunts (e.g. Dropping stormboyz all over the hive, dropping a rok into the city etc) and you could flesh out guard regiments with different styles to generic cadians ( a logical one would be a mixmatched force of survivors, but what I really want is a roman legion style guard regiment, fighting Orks with spears and shields).
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If you allow yourself to be killed and ingested, your soul is forfeited. |
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2017/01/19 02:27:42
Subject: Faction representation in the fluff
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Mekboy Hammerin' Somethin'
Kapuskasing, ON
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I wouldn't mind reading a novel about Boss Snikrot and his Red Kommandos in the Armegeddon jungles during the period between both invasions by Ghazzy. What little is mentioned plays him up as incredibly sneaky, an elaborate schemer with trained orks up to the task, and supposed to be terrifying due to not just his kunnin ambushes but also in the way he leaves his victims for others to find. It would be great to see this from a scared guardsmen point of view but I'd rather Snikrot and his krew be the focus and main stars of the book since he's still alive and terrorizing ork hunters. Flesh out some colourful Nob followers each surprising competent in their particular skills and we'll adept at keeping their kommando squads in line.
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This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2017/01/19 02:29:52
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2017/01/19 03:19:41
Subject: Faction representation in the fluff
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Stone Bonkers Fabricator General
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'nids obviously lack characters. You dont get a whole personalized story about 'nids. They all think with 1 mind which is borning.
Guard are human, which would initially seem to make them very relatable, but being that the story is 10,000 years long and your average guardsman lives 30 years over half of them as a child and you have problems. Most guardsmen wont survive a campaign in the galaxy. Even if they are winning, they will die of old age. Only a few regular humans are actually worth the rejuvination to live more than a few decades.
Orks have neither of these problems. Orks can live several centuries, perhaps longer if they keep winning. Orks are full of character. I hope to see some Orks join the campaign soon.
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Dark Mechanicus and Renegade Iron Hand Dakka Blog
My Dark Mechanicus P&M Blog. Mostly Modeling as I paint very slowly. Lots of kitbashed conversions of marines and a few guard to make up a renegade Iron Hand chapter and Dark Mechanicus Allies. Bionics++ |
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2017/01/19 03:47:50
Subject: Faction representation in the fluff
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Longtime Dakkanaut
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For guards, its pretty easy, just reverse the roles between Guards and Space Marines. The story starts with a Space Marine Company fighting against a minor threat on their own (Space Pirates for example) and than realising that they bite off far more than they could chew. The ennemy has massive reserves and an abundance of heavy weapons. They are overwhelmed by the ennemies numbers and start to die like flies until Guardsmen arrives in reinforcement and now it turns into a story on how Imperial Guards officers and their veterans platoon will reverse the momentum of the ennemy and save the isolated and crippled Space Marines. Make a little ark about the tension between the rationnal thinking Imperial Guardsmen CO who tries to organise a massive battle between thousans of troops and the overly proudful Space Marine Captain who can't accept the idea of defeat or the dishonor of being rescued by meer mortals (AKA, the trope of the professionnal soldier vs the knight).
With the return of the Genestealer Cults, a "Tyranid" protagonist could be possible. You could make it about all the manoeuvres and sabotage led by a Magus and his efforts to beat his bretheren in favors to thei Patriarch. To me though, they remain best as villains for any army.
Orks in my opinion need to be approched on another angle. The reason I love them so much, their goofiness and destructive stupidity, is also the reason why they fail to make good protagonist or serious ennemies. We need to make orks scary again. Focus on their savagery, their cruelty, their thirst for power, their vision of conquests. We need ork characters that would make us forget that their races in general the murderous clowns of 40K. We need a real Beast. Not one that is as large as an Imperial Knight, but one whose cruelty, savagery, intellect and ambition would make him a fearsome creature.
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This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2017/01/19 03:49:42
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2017/01/19 04:32:25
Subject: Faction representation in the fluff
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Bonkers Buggy Driver with Rockets
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epronovost wrote:For guards, its pretty easy, just reverse the roles between Guards and Space Marines. The story starts with a Space Marine Company fighting against a minor threat on their own (Space Pirates for example) and than realising that they bite off far more than they could chew. The ennemy has massive reserves and an abundance of heavy weapons. They are overwhelmed by the ennemies numbers and start to die like flies until Guardsmen arrives in reinforcement and now it turns into a story on how Imperial Guards officers and their veterans platoon will reverse the momentum of the ennemy and save the isolated and crippled Space Marines. Make a little ark about the tension between the rationnal thinking Imperial Guardsmen CO who tries to organise a massive battle between thousans of troops and the overly proudful Space Marine Captain who can't accept the idea of defeat or the dishonor of being rescued by meer mortals (AKA, the trope of the professionnal soldier vs the knight).
With the return of the Genestealer Cults, a "Tyranid" protagonist could be possible. You could make it about all the manoeuvres and sabotage led by a Magus and his efforts to beat his bretheren in favors to thei Patriarch. To me though, they remain best as villains for any army.
Orks in my opinion need to be approched on another angle. The reason I love them so much, their goofiness and destructive stupidity, is also the reason why they fail to make good protagonist or serious ennemies. We need to make orks scary again. Focus on their savagery, their cruelty, their thirst for power, their vision of conquests. We need ork characters that would make us forget that their races in general the murderous clowns of 40K. We need a real Beast. Not one that is as large as an Imperial Knight, but one whose cruelty, savagery, intellect and ambition would make him a fearsome creature.
Murderous clowns are workable (see: the Joker) and can be made very interesting, but can also be made terrible by mediocre writing and endlessly rehashed tropes (see: the Joker). We sort of have a Beast, and his name is Ghazghkull. As far as we've seen he's intelligent, calculating, blessed by the ork gods themselves, ruthless, inhuman, and very very violent. All we need is something substantial written from his eyes that doesn't focus on Yarrick (Yarrick is awesome enough to steal the spotlight for certain). The problem with orks is that they suffer from the "loses the battle as soon as Astartes boots touch the ground" syndrome, and that making them funny has taken precedence over making them threatening. Mogrok from the Stormclaw campaign is a prime exampe of how not to set up an ork ultimate antagonist, for two reasons: first, he is shown to be effective mostly by virtue of not being orky, and second he basically admits defeat as soon as the SW arrive.
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40k drinking game: take a shot everytime a book references Skitarii using transports.
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2017/01/19 04:41:44
Subject: Re:Faction representation in the fluff
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Consigned to the Grim Darkness
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Captain Joystick wrote:An easy one off the top of my head would be to pit them against each other. A bit pandering, I admit, but I think you have story potential for like a guard v Tau situation or guard v ork war that's going on while this end times stuff happens in the Segmentum Solar.
So... the Ciaphas Cain books?
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The people in the past who convinced themselves to do unspeakable things were no less human than you or I. They made their decisions; the only thing that prevents history from repeating itself is making different ones.
-- Adam Serwer
My blog |
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2017/01/19 10:20:56
Subject: Faction representation in the fluff
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Agile Revenant Titan
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Literally all that needs to be done is to have a campaign run from their perspective. You don't even need to cut Space Marines out at all (although it would probably help).
Just make sure that as a writer, your paper-weight is a fairly sizeable hammer. Then, when someone wanders over to your desk and suggests that rather than Orks as protagonists you could write it from the SM perspective, you can hit them in the face with the paper-weight and go back to muttering about 'bluddy 'umies'
Guard is easy. They just need to come up with a compelling idea for a regiment. Something like the Armageddon Steel Legion.
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2017/01/19 14:52:00
Subject: Faction representation in the fluff
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Fireknife Shas'el
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Most imperial armor books are IG stories.
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This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2017/01/19 14:52:18
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2017/01/19 16:40:21
Subject: Faction representation in the fluff
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Mekboy Hammerin' Somethin'
Kapuskasing, ON
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That's why I think Boss Snikrot wold be a great character to make a book about. He scalps his victims, tortures them and hangs them up alive to bleed to death. He's running a terror campaign. Fluff also says he uses elaborate schemes so he sounds pretty smart.Even if done by the point of view of a leader of ork hunters who is crafty as well and the build up to the climax has the reader believing he'll catch Snikrot only to lose at the climax. Captured by Snikrot who speaks low Gothic only then does the overconfident ork hunter regret underestimating orks just before he's turned into another grisly warning sign to be found by his peers.
Cue grimdark
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This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2017/01/19 16:40:45
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![[Post New]](/s/i/i.gif) 2017/01/19 16:52:46
Subject: Faction representation in the fluff
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Bonkers Buggy Driver with Rockets
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ProwlerPC wrote:That's why I think Boss Snikrot wold be a great character to make a book about. He scalps his victims, tortures them and hangs them up alive to bleed to death. He's running a terror campaign. Fluff also says he uses elaborate schemes so he sounds pretty smart.Even if done by the point of view of a leader of ork hunters who is crafty as well and the build up to the climax has the reader believing he'll catch Snikrot only to lose at the climax. Captured by Snikrot who speaks low Gothic only then does the overconfident ork hunter regret underestimating orks just before he's turned into another grisly warning sign to be found by his peers.
Cue grimdark
Not only have you sold me on a novel, you've sold me on a movie. Yes, it takes a lot of inspiration from the Predator movies, but it still sounds like a good read.
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This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2017/01/19 16:54:11
40k drinking game: take a shot everytime a book references Skitarii using transports.
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