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 Disciple of Fate wrote:

 Solar-powered_chainsword wrote:


Simple laws of how unity works don't fall down because it's in a sci-fi/fantasy universe. It seems fairly simple that when people combine, they grow stronger. That's why a government is better than everyone doing their own thing. There's no evidence that the tolerance thing is what brought mankind low, in fact, the opposite seems to be true. Sure, when mankind became weak, many of its allies turned on it. But to say every single ally actively attacked it would be ridiculous, and clearly didn't happen. However, if mankind with its current "DEATH TO THE XENOS!" ideology faltered, then nothing changes. Mankind is still tore apart by aliens, but now even more, because what few aliens don't want to destroy us now have an active reason to. So yeah, not making new enemies seems to be a fair decision.

The opposite seems to be true? How, all the references to Old Night are about humanity under siege and lone worlds surviving the onslaught while many other didn't. So far the HH books have given us one example of humans living with aliens, no other mentions to friendly aliens surviving. The idea behind the Great Crusade was "wipe aliens out now, don't have them around when we might be weak later". This became official policy and dogma to the Imperium 10k years down the line, but they don't pursue it to the point of self harm, they leave the less hostile ones alone because they don't have the strength. Besides, friendly aliens are few and far in between. The whole death to xenos and psykers sthick is meant to prevent Old Night 2.0 but lets see where Guilleman goes with this, the unofficial Eldar alliance might get more official because you never know with GW now.

Interex and Diasporex both had humans and aliens living together. Besides, the galaxy is so big that making broad sweeping statements like "imperials law's harshly and without a fault enforced on every imperial World" just don't hold onto scrutiny. In one place Day of the Feast of the Emperor Acsension is celebrated by dragging alien corpses through cheering crowds, while in another Arbites can only impotently glare at alien merchants and take silent note on the faces of their customers. On a third World aliens beg for a mere change to slave in the mines, and on a fourth humiliated Astartes bring imperial tribute to an empire that Imperium can't afford to fight for the moment, muttering "Soon" under their breath. Law maybe the law, but it doesn't mean that Imperium has power, or the care, to enforce it on all its member worlds, since orthodoxy doesnt instatly translate to orthopraxy.

40k has room for anything and everything, while still holding on to its core as a reversal of the usual Star Trekky scifi, where, instead of the better part of human character allowing us to fix our problems and to find common ground with everyone else, no matter how different they may be, it is the worst aspects of humanity that come to rule, not only us but everyone else too, with greed fear hate and ignorance being what's common with all peoples, creating a self perpetuating circle of misery without an end.

Morgasm the Powerfull wrote:

 Disciple of Fate wrote:

 Solar-powered_chainsword wrote:


Simple laws of how unity works don't fall down because it's in a sci-fi/fantasy universe. It seems fairly simple that when people combine, they grow stronger. That's why a government is better than everyone doing their own thing. There's no evidence that the tolerance thing is what brought mankind low, in fact, the opposite seems to be true. Sure, when mankind became weak, many of its allies turned on it. But to say every single ally actively attacked it would be ridiculous, and clearly didn't happen. However, if mankind with its current "DEATH TO THE XENOS!" ideology faltered, then nothing changes. Mankind is still tore apart by aliens, but now even more, because what few aliens don't want to destroy us now have an active reason to. So yeah, not making new enemies seems to be a fair decision.

The opposite seems to be true? How, all the references to Old Night are about humanity under siege and lone worlds surviving the onslaught while many other didn't. So far the HH books have given us one example of humans living with aliens, no other mentions to friendly aliens surviving. The idea behind the Great Crusade was "wipe aliens out now, don't have them around when we might be weak later". This became official policy and dogma to the Imperium 10k years down the line, but they don't pursue it to the point of self harm, they leave the less hostile ones alone because they don't have the strength. Besides, friendly aliens are few and far in between. The whole death to xenos and psykers sthick is meant to prevent Old Night 2.0 but lets see where Guilleman goes with this, the unofficial Eldar alliance might get more official because you never know with GW now.

Interex and Diasporex both had humans and aliens living together. Besides, the galaxy is so big that making broad sweeping statements like "imperials law's harshly and without a fault enforced on every imperial World" just don't hold onto scrutiny. In one place Day of the Feast of the Emperor Acsension is celebrated by dragging alien corpses through cheering crowds, while in another Arbites can only impotently glare at alien merchants and take silent note on the faces of their customers. On a third World aliens beg for a mere change to slave in the mines, and on a fourth humiliated Astartes bring imperial tribute to an empire that Imperium can't afford to fight for the moment, muttering "Soon" under their breath. Law maybe the law, but it doesn't mean that Imperium has power, or the care, to enforce it on all its member worlds, since orthodoxy doesnt instatly translate to orthopraxy.

40k has room for anything and everything, while still holding on to its core as a reversal of the usual Star Trekky scifi, where, instead of the better part of human character allowing us to fix our problems and to find common ground with everyone else, no matter how different they may be, it is the worst aspects of humanity that come to rule, not only us but everyone else too, with greed fear hate and ignorance being what's common with all peoples, creating a self perpetuating circle of misery without an end.

Again, as far as I'm aware the Interex were only human. Hence Horus going over to negotiate. The only thin that makes them look alien is their weird technology. I don't think its stated anywhere in the first HH books that the Interex were aliens amd humans? The Diasporex is true, but its the only mention we have gotten.

Sure, certain worlds can deviate and we know it happens. But those are individuals worlds in opposition to Imperial law, not the Imperium as a whole doing that, which is mainly where this debate has been going. Do Imperial worlds peacefully interact with aliens? Yes. Does the Imperium as a whole peacefully interact with aliens? No, they best they used to get was a grudging "I don't have time to exterminate you right now." This might all be subject to change. The Imperium crushes some while overlooking other planets for breaking the law.

40K does has room for everything true. But making the Imperium as a whole more tolerant and less dogmatic is undermining what the Imperium is about in 40K. It would line up better with our personal beliefs, but it would also make 40K more generic.

IIRC hte Interax did have aliuens living along side them but they where basicly a servitor race.

Huh, I thought the Interex had conquered the Kinebrach(?) and that is how they acquired their technology like the anathame but they didn't actually live together on the same planet. I will take another look at the books because it seems my memory is fuzzy on the Interex. But that's still only two races on the entire GC.

 Disciple of Fate wrote:


Sure, certain worlds can deviate and we know it happens. But those are individuals worlds in opposition to Imperial law, not the Imperium as a whole doing that, which is mainly where this debate has been going. Do Imperial worlds peacefully interact with aliens? Yes. Does the Imperium as a whole peacefully interact with aliens? No, they best they used to get was a grudging "I don't have time to exterminate you right now." This might all be subject to change. The Imperium crushes some while overlooking other planets for breaking the law.

40K does has room for everything true. But making the Imperium as a whole more tolerant and less dogmatic is undermining what the Imperium is about in 40K. It would line up better with our personal beliefs, but it would also make 40K more generic.

I would never wish the Imperiums law or policies more tolerant, it's part of its twisted charm. But to what extent can we even talk about Imperium in a same way as we do of modern nation state? One can't just draw a few lines on the map of the galaxy and say " There, thats the Imperium". GC followed on the heels of previous human settlement and only where it could travel in the Warp, making it map of the Imperium look more like a cobweb(I'd highly suggest finding the FWs Horus Heresy 1 book, which has a map of astropath communication network, which i'd argue, is the truest map of the Imperium we have seen to date"), with the lore in the rulebooks emphasising how more and more spread thin Imperium is getting. It's really more like feudal empire or a loose federation, made of countless member states, each functioning differently, mostly held together by faith, importance of which could be emphasised more in my opinion, since, in the medieval Europe, which Imperiums is a futuristic version of, faith was REALLY important. I mean, we don't even see the Ecclesiarchy selling indulgances, a practice that fits perfectly to 40k! I mean talking about our modern values affecting 40ks supposed grimdark Dark Ageness, theres something thats missing, alongside with people treating it like a singular nation state.

It's not really the Imperium in general that going on and on about, but that its member states are prone to hypocrisy, greed, short sightedness and in general are staring at their own bellies, with the grimdarkness of the whole thing being, that no matter what course of action Imperium takes each time, be it strict or lenient, it will eventually lead to it crumbling a bit yeat again, which slowly add up.

I'd also like to see more stories that aren't IG and/or SM fighting a random enemy of the day or some Inquisitions blokes fighting random cultists, I mean, those stories can be good, but there are just so many of them. I'd rather see something different, like a War of the Roses-style struggle between imperial worlds, or a Cold War paranoia thriller style story between imperial and non-imperial nations, or something, maybe the Odyssey, anything… as long as it keeps the general tone and doesn't go all Warhammer Adventures.

Morgasm the Powerfull wrote:

 Disciple of Fate wrote:


Sure, certain worlds can deviate and we know it happens. But those are individuals worlds in opposition to Imperial law, not the Imperium as a whole doing that, which is mainly where this debate has been going. Do Imperial worlds peacefully interact with aliens? Yes. Does the Imperium as a whole peacefully interact with aliens? No, they best they used to get was a grudging "I don't have time to exterminate you right now." This might all be subject to change. The Imperium crushes some while overlooking other planets for breaking the law.

40K does has room for everything true. But making the Imperium as a whole more tolerant and less dogmatic is undermining what the Imperium is about in 40K. It would line up better with our personal beliefs, but it would also make 40K more generic.

I would never wish the Imperiums law or policies more tolerant, it's part of its twisted charm. But to what extent can we even talk about Imperium in a same way as we do of modern nation state? One can't just draw a few lines on the map of the galaxy and say " There, thats the Imperium". GC followed on the heels of previous human settlement and only where it could travel in the Warp, making it map of the Imperium look more like a cobweb(I'd highly suggest finding the FWs Horus Heresy 1 book, which has a map of astropath communication network, which i'd argue, is the truest map of the Imperium we have seen to date"), with the lore in the rulebooks emphasising how more and more spread thin Imperium is getting. It's really more like feudal empire or a loose federation, made of countless member states, each functioning differently, mostly held together by faith, importance of which could be emphasised more in my opinion, since, in the medieval Europe, which Imperiums is a futuristic version of, faith was REALLY important. I mean, we don't even see the Ecclesiarchy selling indulgances, a practice that fits perfectly to 40k! I mean talking about our modern values affecting 40ks supposed grimdark Dark Ageness, theres something thats missing, alongside with people treating it like a singular nation state.

It's not really the Imperium in general that going on and on about, but that its member states are prone to hypocrisy, greed, short sightedness and in general are staring at their own bellies, with the grimdarkness of the whole thing being, that no matter what course of action Imperium takes each time, be it strict or lenient, it will eventually lead to it crumbling a bit yeat again, which slowly add up.

I'd also like to see more stories that aren't IG and/or SM fighting a random enemy of the day or some Inquisitions blokes fighting random cultists, I mean, those stories can be good, but there are just so many of them. I'd rather see something different, like a War of the Roses-style struggle between imperial worlds, or a Cold War paranoia thriller style story between imperial and non-imperial nations, or something, maybe the Odyssey, anything… as long as it keeps the general tone and doesn't go all Warhammer Adventures.

No, but Rosebuddy seemingly argued that.

I mean we can't talk about the Imperium as a modern state or according to modern morals because what is real in 40K is absolute bonkers. We have had some dark pages in history and that's just human versus human without all the nightmarish elements in the background. I saw the map, but its been emphasized for a long time as little islands with vast unexplored wilderness in between. That's a really cool part of the fluff, the idea that entire empires can exist but the Imperium just hasn't noticed them in between two worlds of theirs. I think imperial federation is more apt than feudal empire since the Imperium has a lot of institutions that don't fit feudalism all that well, especially the Imperial Guard and Navy. As for faith, GW already creates the Middle Ages impression very well with the in universe events around the Ecclesiarchy. As for indulgences, the SoB 2nd edition codex mention that you can pay for forgiveness (or die for the Emperor of course):

SoB codex page 38 2nd edition
Imperial citizens can commit a multitude of sins, ranging from fairly minor infractions like making the wrong response to a hymnal, to heresy and blasphemy. The Imperial Creed teaches that a person's soul will either join the Emperor or be consumed by Chaos; every wrong commits the double sin of weakening the Emperor and strengthening Chaos. There are many degrees of penitence, such as paying a fine, performing good deeds, exclusion from certain masses and ceremonies and so on. For more extreme sins, the only way to purify the soul is to undertake a long an dangerous pilgrimage, flagellation and, in the extreme cases, death. For the most serious offences, there can be no mercy, regardless of status, wealth or breeding.

Minor offences can be repaid in a number of different ways. For example, a worshipper can join the Frateris Militia and purify their soul by fighting against the enemies of mankind. The less martially-minded may be allowed to clean the shrine and attend to the clergy. A hefty contribution to the shrine may procure forgiveness, and the Ecclesiarchy also accepts penitent fines in the form of lifestock, land, trade goods and other valuable commodities. Informing on the sins of others is another popular method of penitence. The greater the act performed in the Emperor's name, the more forgiveness is afforded by the Ecclesiarchy.

The last part just sounds like an invitation to get the moneybags to cough up the dough.

Yes, the political struggle behind the scenes is supposed to be massive and destructive, but we only get glimpses. Sadly the books are especially now mostly written to sell the figures, instead of exploring more of the universe that isn't on the receiving end of a bolter. But GW can't sell you humans fighting humans, it can sell you IG fighting (C)SM or Orks.