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There appears to be a bit of foreshadowing in the recent Dark Imperium and Plague War books. I keep noticing the mention of Martian Space Marines. Many of the Unnumbered Sons (Primaris Legion before breaking up into Chapters) were from their respective chapter's homeworld, but they do mention that Cawl had to recruit from Mars to get the numbers Guilliman needed.

Here are the threads that seem to be in play:

Cawl is aiming to become Fabricator General. Guilliman doesn't think Cawl has enough support for that to be viable.

In Plague War, one of the Primaris Marines decides to use a Mars Born Primaris on guard duty for a living saint. Because he knows that the Martian Primaris are less emotionally attached to Ultramar and her people.

Cawl uses forbidden xenos technology.

Guiliman's non-support of the Ecclesiarchy seems poised to be a second great schism unless he converts or willfully accepts them as equals.

What do you think? Where is the Imperium headed?

I doubt there'd be a schism. The time for that has been and gone. Using xenos tech isn't THAT rare, being unattached to Ultramar is probably standard for everyone not from there and GW aren't that good.

pm713 wrote:
I doubt there'd be a schism. The time for that has been and gone. Using xenos tech isn't THAT rare, being unattached to Ultramar is probably standard for everyone not from there and GW aren't that good.

Such a pessimist GW has been getting pretty good since 8th moved the frozen in time lore.

My bet would be the next "world wide campaign" would be Mars vs Cawl civil war. That way they don't split the Imperium faction.

DontEatRawHagis wrote:

pm713 wrote:
I doubt there'd be a schism. The time for that has been and gone. Using xenos tech isn't THAT rare, being unattached to Ultramar is probably standard for everyone not from there and GW aren't that good.

Such a pessimist GW has been getting pretty good since 8th moved the frozen in time lore.

My bet would be the next "world wide campaign" would be Mars vs Cawl civil war. That way they don't split the Imperium faction.

Yeah nothing says good setting like taking one of the core concepts and chucking it out the window.

That would be a pretty dumb civil war. You can side with the heretek who's incredibly shady or the galactic empire with every advantage.

pm713 wrote:

DontEatRawHagis wrote:

pm713 wrote:
I doubt there'd be a schism. The time for that has been and gone. Using xenos tech isn't THAT rare, being unattached to Ultramar is probably standard for everyone not from there and GW aren't that good.

Such a pessimist GW has been getting pretty good since 8th moved the frozen in time lore.

My bet would be the next "world wide campaign" would be Mars vs Cawl civil war. That way they don't split the Imperium faction.

Yeah nothing says good setting like taking one of the core concepts and chucking it out the window.

That would be a pretty dumb civil war. You can side with the heretek who's incredibly shady or the galactic empire with every advantage.

theres only so much you can do lore-wise when "Stagnation at all cost" is the main concept. i think its good to see actual developments.

VladimirHerzog wrote:

pm713 wrote:

DontEatRawHagis wrote:

pm713 wrote:
I doubt there'd be a schism. The time for that has been and gone. Using xenos tech isn't THAT rare, being unattached to Ultramar is probably standard for everyone not from there and GW aren't that good.

Such a pessimist GW has been getting pretty good since 8th moved the frozen in time lore.

My bet would be the next "world wide campaign" would be Mars vs Cawl civil war. That way they don't split the Imperium faction.

Yeah nothing says good setting like taking one of the core concepts and chucking it out the window.

That would be a pretty dumb civil war. You can side with the heretek who's incredibly shady or the galactic empire with every advantage.

theres only so much you can do lore-wise when "Stagnation at all cost" is the main concept. i think its good to see actual developments.

The concept was an empire that was surrounded on all sides by enemies that was a shadow of its former glory clinging to life. They could have done things without dumping on that but that would've taken thought.

pm713 wrote:

VladimirHerzog wrote:

pm713 wrote:

DontEatRawHagis wrote:

pm713 wrote:
I doubt there'd be a schism. The time for that has been and gone. Using xenos tech isn't THAT rare, being unattached to Ultramar is probably standard for everyone not from there and GW aren't that good.

Such a pessimist GW has been getting pretty good since 8th moved the frozen in time lore.

My bet would be the next "world wide campaign" would be Mars vs Cawl civil war. That way they don't split the Imperium faction.

Yeah nothing says good setting like taking one of the core concepts and chucking it out the window.

That would be a pretty dumb civil war. You can side with the heretek who's incredibly shady or the galactic empire with every advantage.

theres only so much you can do lore-wise when "Stagnation at all cost" is the main concept. i think its good to see actual developments.

The concept was an empire that was surrounded on all sides by enemies that was a shadow of its former glory clinging to life. They could have done things without dumping on that but that would've taken thought.

except that hasn't changed. Gulliman and the Primaris aren't eneugh to truely alter the balance. too little too late

Always fun to see reruns of BattleTech's Clan Invsion and amusingly honked off people that a sacred cow is being questioned.

Sterling191 wrote:
Always fun to see reruns of BattleTech's Clan Invsion and amusingly honked off people that a sacred cow is being questioned.

Battletech's a good example of the pros AND Cons of a advancing storyline. do it right and you keep things intreasting, but it's also too possiable to drive people off when they realize that everything they used to love about the setting has been destroyed

BrianDavion wrote:

Sterling191 wrote:
Always fun to see reruns of BattleTech's Clan Invsion and amusingly honked off people that a sacred cow is being questioned.

Battletech's a good example of the pros AND Cons of a advancing storyline. do it right and you keep things intreasting, but it's also too possiable to drive people off when they realize that everything they used to love about the setting has been destroyed

End times is another example. Although GW did their apparent damndest to insult and belittle the old fan base and drive them away, so I guess it was intentional.

 argonak wrote:

BrianDavion wrote:

Sterling191 wrote:
Always fun to see reruns of BattleTech's Clan Invsion and amusingly honked off people that a sacred cow is being questioned.

Battletech's a good example of the pros AND Cons of a advancing storyline. do it right and you keep things intreasting, but it's also too possiable to drive people off when they realize that everything they used to love about the setting has been destroyed

End times is another example. Although GW did their apparent damndest to insult and belittle the old fan base and drive them away, so I guess it was intentional.

let's not derail this thread with a AOS complaint fest. that said WFB only accounted for 11% of GW's sales, meanwhile AOS accounts for 30%, and this is in a period of 40k GROWTH.

God damn do I hope so.

I would love to see Guilliman forced into the role of a living god against his will thanks to being forced to align with every aspect of the imperium he despises (the inquisition, ecclesiarchy, and blind religious zealotry and ignorance) in order to defeat the wider threat of chaos/xenos because Cawl goes on a shortsighted campaign of reckless advancement. It would be amazing to see Cawl cut deals with technologically advanced xenos entities like the Haemonculi, Tau and Necrons while discarding the stagnation dogma of the traditional adeptus mechanicus, going full heretek but not just "it's a chaos space marine but a robot".

I've always thought the dark mechanicus just being a robot-y mirror of chaos marines was just lazy, and felt hereteks that align with xenos civilizations, abandoning their humanity as they had already become so transhuman anyway were so much more interesting.

Of course, in execution it'd probably be way more boring and GW would probably find a way to make cawl a cackling baddie and Guilliman a shiny perfect hero super duper fast.

BrianDavion wrote:

pm713 wrote:

VladimirHerzog wrote:

pm713 wrote:

DontEatRawHagis wrote:

pm713 wrote:
I doubt there'd be a schism. The time for that has been and gone. Using xenos tech isn't THAT rare, being unattached to Ultramar is probably standard for everyone not from there and GW aren't that good.

Such a pessimist GW has been getting pretty good since 8th moved the frozen in time lore.

My bet would be the next "world wide campaign" would be Mars vs Cawl civil war. That way they don't split the Imperium faction.

Yeah nothing says good setting like taking one of the core concepts and chucking it out the window.

That would be a pretty dumb civil war. You can side with the heretek who's incredibly shady or the galactic empire with every advantage.

theres only so much you can do lore-wise when "Stagnation at all cost" is the main concept. i think its good to see actual developments.

The concept was an empire that was surrounded on all sides by enemies that was a shadow of its former glory clinging to life. They could have done things without dumping on that but that would've taken thought.

except that hasn't changed. Gulliman and the Primaris aren't eneugh to truely alter the balance. too little too late

But the overall message is the return of their greatest heroes, new technologies and sources of material being found and new armies coming from literally nowhere.

Schism of mars during the heresy, was fairly complete and detailed.

The tech locked in those vaults were the precursors to the daemon engines / Dark Mechanicum as "Everything was tainted by Chaos"

Would be weird if GW rehashed it IMO.

DontEatRawHagis wrote:
There appears to be a bit of foreshadowing in the recent Dark Imperium and Plague War books. I keep noticing the mention of Martian Space Marines. Many of the Unnumbered Sons (Primaris Legion before breaking up into Chapters) were from their respective chapter's homeworld, but they do mention that Cawl had to recruit from Mars to get the numbers Guilliman needed.

Here are the threads that seem to be in play:

Cawl is aiming to become Fabricator General. Guilliman doesn't think Cawl has enough support for that to be viable.

We may see background bits and pieces of "Moustachio-twirling Cawl plots his takeover" but if Guilliman doesn't think he has enough support, that means Guilliman does not support him, as Guilliman is like 75% of the Imperium at this point, including almost half of all Space Marines, plus pro-Primaris chapters like the Black Templars, and along with good chunks of the other military factions. The only groups that he doesn't have a direct hand or support of are the Ecclesiarchy and the AdMech themselves, arguable the Custodes as well but I think they would side with Guilliman in this instance.

In Plague War, one of the Primaris Marines decides to use a Mars Born Primaris on guard duty for a living saint. Because he knows that the Martian Primaris are less emotionally attached to Ultramar and her people.

Makes sense, its kind of rehashing the HH stuff about Terran Marines vs Homebred marines. In the traitor legions, homebred Astartes tended to be loyal to their Primarch and Horus, while Terrans were culled. In the Loyal legions the opposite was more true, with Terran Marines more likely to be traitor than homebred.

I think its just natural that an Astartes made on Mars (or Terra) would be less attached to a given place than someone who was born and raised in that system. It therefore makes sense to give them duties away from that place, as they would have no emotional reaction to being seperated from Ultramar. On the other hand, it might make them more objective in the defence of the system, less ready to make mistakes because they know a certain place or because their great great great grand-nephew is on that planet.

Cawl uses forbidden xenos technology.

Common, the Deathwatch and Inquisition readily use Xeno-tech. The AdMech even approves some Xenos gear for use.

Guiliman's non-support of the Ecclesiarchy seems poised to be a second great schism unless he converts or willfully accepts them as equals.

What do you think? Where is the Imperium headed?

This is where the real schism, if any, would occur. The Ecclesiarchy has been the 2nd-most powerful faction of the Imperium for thousands of years. Whether you go the route of "Evil Puppetmaster Church wants to retain control over the masses" or "Space-Pope genuinely believes in his Bible," they won't want to give up everything of the last few thousand years. And yet, Guilliman is living, breathing eye-witness to the Emperor, and apart from Bjorn the Fell-Handed, who is somewhat senile and will inevitably embiggin the stories, Guilliman met with the Emperor. Fought with him. Ate food with him. He can summarily discredit every aspect of His divinity but yet, knows to do so would destroy the Imperium. The idea that the Emperor is rotting to bits would devastate the Imperium, and probably send most to Chaos as they search for a new god to worship, out of need or out of fear of death.

Civil war in Imperium with two Primarches brother on brother would be most interesting stuff ever after all the hurr crusade number (insert number). Knowing GW they might not pull it all off though due to their mediocre writing recently.

 Deadshot wrote:

This is where the real schism, if any, would occur. The Ecclesiarchy has been the 2nd-most powerful faction of the Imperium for thousands of years. Whether you go the route of "Evil Puppetmaster Church wants to retain control over the masses" or "Space-Pope genuinely believes in his Bible," they won't want to give up everything of the last few thousand years. And yet, Guilliman is living, breathing eye-witness to the Emperor, and apart from Bjorn the Fell-Handed, who is somewhat senile and will inevitably embiggin the stories, Guilliman met with the Emperor. Fought with him. Ate food with him. He can summarily discredit every aspect of His divinity but yet, knows to do so would destroy the Imperium. The idea that the Emperor is rotting to bits would devastate the Imperium, and probably send most to Chaos as they search for a new god to worship, out of need or out of fear of death.

So much this. Rowboat is (IMO rightly) looked at as a pretty shallow character due to much of the early writing being less than stellar, but there's a huge amount of growth potential in the inevitable collision of a reborn Imperial Truth and the Ecclesiarchy.

Sterling191 wrote:

 Deadshot wrote:

This is where the real schism, if any, would occur. The Ecclesiarchy has been the 2nd-most powerful faction of the Imperium for thousands of years. Whether you go the route of "Evil Puppetmaster Church wants to retain control over the masses" or "Space-Pope genuinely believes in his Bible," they won't want to give up everything of the last few thousand years. And yet, Guilliman is living, breathing eye-witness to the Emperor, and apart from Bjorn the Fell-Handed, who is somewhat senile and will inevitably embiggin the stories, Guilliman met with the Emperor. Fought with him. Ate food with him. He can summarily discredit every aspect of His divinity but yet, knows to do so would destroy the Imperium. The idea that the Emperor is rotting to bits would devastate the Imperium, and probably send most to Chaos as they search for a new god to worship, out of need or out of fear of death.

So much this. Rowboat is (IMO rightly) looked at as a pretty shallow character due to much of the early writing being less than stellar, but there's a huge amount of growth potential in the inevitable collision of a reborn Imperial Truth and the Ecclesiarchy.

Where's the idea of Gulliman being shallow come from? If you're refering to the 5th edition SM codex, really none of the codices made the primarchs sound deep. and when you get to the HH novels Gulliman honestly strikes me as one of the more intreasting loyalty primarchs, whose depth is found in his subtlities of thought rather then ohh say,,, "WOLF KING! BARBARIAN MAN! BUT SECRETLY SMART!"

BrianDavion wrote:

Where's the idea of Gulliman being shallow come from? If you're refering to the 5th edition SM codex, really none of the codices made the primarchs sound deep. and when you get to the HH novels Gulliman honestly strikes me as one of the more intreasting loyalty primarchs, whose depth is found in his subtlities of thought rather then ohh say,,, "WOLF KING! BARBARIAN MAN! BUT SECRETLY SMART!"

Being slightly less of a caricature than a massive caricature doesnt make one interesting.

Sterling191 wrote:

Being slightly less of a caricature than a massive caricature doesnt make one interesting.

If you are looking for well written characters you might want to avoid HH and 40k then. The lore was built around parodies and caricatures. Such as Inquisitor Obiwan Sherlock Clousseau and Illiyan Nastase.

Am I the only one that thinks whatever GSC is building for the nids will unleash some sort of schism?

DontEatRawHagis wrote:

If you are looking for well written characters you might want to avoid HH and 40k then. The lore was built around parodies and caricatures. Such as Inquisitor Obiwan Sherlock Clousseau and Illiyan Nastase.

Im fully capable of enjoying the 40k setting, and its inherent ridiculousness, while also being realistic about the shortcomings of significant parts of that setting. Thank you for your concern, and for your condescension.

Agree with the earlier poster that if we were going to have some sort of schism the time to do it has passed. The return of Guilliman and the opening of the galactic rift would have been the perfect time to do something like that but I feel GW wasted that opportunity and now all we have is a status quo with more special characters crowbarred in to every piece of background that gets written. People hoping for some great Imperial civil war once another loyalist primarch returns are likely to be disappointed, I think.

Slipspace wrote:
Agree with the earlier poster that if we were going to have some sort of schism the time to do it has passed. The return of Guilliman and the opening of the galactic rift would have been the perfect time to do something like that but I feel GW wasted that opportunity and now all we have is a status quo with more special characters crowbarred in to every piece of background that gets written. People hoping for some great Imperial civil war once another loyalist primarch returns are likely to be disappointed, I think.

I guess they figured splitting the IoM literally in half was eneugh, and they didn't need to also split it figuratively in half

 Argive wrote:
Am I the only one that thinks whatever GSC is building for the nids will unleash some sort of schism?

I would love to see a large GSC actually successfully rebel against the Tyranids, create their own unique Tyranid bio-forms loyal only to the cult, and who then carve out a small empire for themselves.