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I don't really agree with that example. If you view it as just a bolter round as in terms of the components and such, than sure, it taking a lifetime would seem absurd...but when you take into account that the Imperium is a society that is heavily imbued with religious superstition, doctrine and ritual, where both the materials and the craftsmanship of it would have to align with those meticulous standards and be stipulated with all sorts of arbitrary time-consuming tasks and exacting specifications along the way, I don't think it's that much of an oddity that creating such a holy artifact could take an artificer a lifetime. It wouldn't just be putting mass-manufactured parts together like with a typical round.
The absurdity lies in why anyone tasked with managing the Imperium's heavily stretched resources would think an artificer's lifetime of work is worth one (1) dead heretic or alien, when that same artificer could instead craft enough regular-ass boltguns and bolter shells to kill thousands of heretics or aliens.
The Imperium's workers are countless, but so are the Imperium's enemies.
.
The Imperium is a wasteful, corrupt, inefficient Empire that considers life so cheap and its set ways of doing things along with its religion as being of such importance that having someone dedicate their life to producing a single arbitrarily designated holy item that will no doubt be used with little regard, rather than their abilities being put to a more worthwhile and a less wasteful purpose, is the sort of thing that defines them. They're so stubborn and locked in with their absurd beliefs and methods that just makes sense to them, they're not meant to in any way be a group that thinks logically and goes "Maybe having this person do something more useful with his skills would be a good idea". It's a crumbling empire that refuses to accept that a lot of their problems are of their own doing and they could do things better.
Mentlegen324 wrote: The Imperium is a wasteful, corrupt, inefficient Empire that considers life so cheap and its set ways of doing things along with its religion as being of such importance that having someone dedicate their life to producing a single arbitrarily designated holy item that will no doubt be used with little regard, rather than their abilities being put to a more worthwhile and a less wasteful purpose, is the sort of thing that defines them. They're so stubborn and locked in with their absurd beliefs and methods that just makes sense to them, they're not meant to in any way be a group that thinks logically and goes "Maybe having this person do something more useful with his skills would be a good idea". It's a crumbling empire that refuses to accept that a lot of their problems are of their own doing and they could do things better.
Alright. But this specific instance (a lifetime to produce a bolter shell) is not an irreplaceable part of what makes the setting interesting. It's one line of fluff in one codex.
Titans are absurd, but they're an important part of the setting. They're cool on the table. They're cool in the fluff. Removing them because "they're not realistic" would make people complain.
Replacing the "lifetime to produce a bolter shell" thing with something that makes more sense (e.g. "each of these bolter shells contains the thrice-blessed ashes of a martyr of the Imperium") would remove nothing from what makes the setting of Warhammer 40k cool and interesting.
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This message was edited 3 times. Last update was at 2021/08/13 18:47:26
Cadians, Sisters of Battle (Argent Shroud), Drukhari (Obsidian Rose)
The machine cult and "praying to the machine spirits" are definitely absurd, though.
So you have never seen someone curse at a machine for not working and then thank it when it does? I see that often, hell I probably did it. Plus there is this group of people call transhumanists, some are not that far away from praying to the machine spirits. You can google "Roco's Basilisk" and have some fun seeing people behaving a bit like 40k characters.
Absurdities I love about warhammer:
It's general esthetic, psychic powers, close combat in the future, mechs (and giant mechs), everything ork, Abaddon's incredible haircut (it doesn't have enough credit), werewolf space Vikings riding giant cyber-wolves into battle, shuriken weapons, ogryns.
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2021/08/13 19:17:39
Mentlegen324 wrote: The Imperium is a wasteful, corrupt, inefficient Empire that considers life so cheap and its set ways of doing things along with its religion as being of such importance that having someone dedicate their life to producing a single arbitrarily designated holy item that will no doubt be used with little regard, rather than their abilities being put to a more worthwhile and a less wasteful purpose, is the sort of thing that defines them. They're so stubborn and locked in with their absurd beliefs and methods that just makes sense to them, they're not meant to in any way be a group that thinks logically and goes "Maybe having this person do something more useful with his skills would be a good idea". It's a crumbling empire that refuses to accept that a lot of their problems are of their own doing and they could do things better.
Alright. But this specific instance (a lifetime to produce a bolter shell) is not an irreplaceable part of what makes the setting interesting. It's one line of fluff in one codex.
Titans are absurd, but they're an important part of the setting. They're cool on the table. They're cool in the fluff. Removing them because "they're not realistic" would make people complain.
Replacing the "lifetime to produce a bolter shell" thing with something that makes more sense (e.g. "each of these bolter shells contains the thrice-blessed ashes of a martyr of the Imperium") would remove nothing from what makes the setting of Warhammer 40k cool and interesting.
.
Removing some of the absurd, illogical, arbitrary or baffling behaviour of the Imperium in order to make it seem more reasonable and rational is something that takes away from the setting, though.
Vatsetis wrote: Sure because XXI century Catholic fanatism has a lot more nuance than its XVI century counterpart...
The only difference is that nowdays they dont control the state apparatus like in the early modern age or in the IOM.
Why do the most realistic elements of the lore seem "absurd" to you?... please just read the newspapers.
The machine cult and "praying to the machine spirits" are definitely absurd, though.
No more absurd than older religions praying to the sun or the forest spirits. It is all based on a lack of understanding and ignorance in a way. Certainly the mechanicus.
Mentlegen324 wrote: The Imperium is a wasteful, corrupt, inefficient Empire that considers life so cheap and its set ways of doing things along with its religion as being of such importance that having someone dedicate their life to producing a single arbitrarily designated holy item that will no doubt be used with little regard, rather than their abilities being put to a more worthwhile and a less wasteful purpose, is the sort of thing that defines them. They're so stubborn and locked in with their absurd beliefs and methods that just makes sense to them, they're not meant to in any way be a group that thinks logically and goes "Maybe having this person do something more useful with his skills would be a good idea". It's a crumbling empire that refuses to accept that a lot of their problems are of their own doing and they could do things better.
Alright. But this specific instance (a lifetime to produce a bolter shell) is not an irreplaceable part of what makes the setting interesting. It's one line of fluff in one codex.
Titans are absurd, but they're an important part of the setting. They're cool on the table. They're cool in the fluff. Removing them because "they're not realistic" would make people complain.
Replacing the "lifetime to produce a bolter shell" thing with something that makes more sense (e.g. "each of these bolter shells contains the thrice-blessed ashes of a martyr of the Imperium") would remove nothing from what makes the setting of Warhammer 40k cool and interesting.
.
Removing some of the absurd, illogical, arbitrary or baffling behaviour of the Imperium in order to make it seem more reasonable and rational is something that takes away from the setting, though.
You are just giving a pass to bad writers that cannot enforce the setting zeitgeist with a sense of nuance.
Turning the IOM in to looney tunes level of absurdity just for lol removes any gravitas to the setting... Unless you are happy if everything is flanderized to the level of the "Regimental Standard". :(
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/08/13 20:01:28
Mentlegen324 wrote: The Imperium is a wasteful, corrupt, inefficient Empire that considers life so cheap and its set ways of doing things along with its religion as being of such importance that having someone dedicate their life to producing a single arbitrarily designated holy item that will no doubt be used with little regard, rather than their abilities being put to a more worthwhile and a less wasteful purpose, is the sort of thing that defines them. They're so stubborn and locked in with their absurd beliefs and methods that just makes sense to them, they're not meant to in any way be a group that thinks logically and goes "Maybe having this person do something more useful with his skills would be a good idea". It's a crumbling empire that refuses to accept that a lot of their problems are of their own doing and they could do things better.
Alright. But this specific instance (a lifetime to produce a bolter shell) is not an irreplaceable part of what makes the setting interesting. It's one line of fluff in one codex.
Titans are absurd, but they're an important part of the setting. They're cool on the table. They're cool in the fluff. Removing them because "they're not realistic" would make people complain.
Replacing the "lifetime to produce a bolter shell" thing with something that makes more sense (e.g. "each of these bolter shells contains the thrice-blessed ashes of a martyr of the Imperium") would remove nothing from what makes the setting of Warhammer 40k cool and interesting.
.
Removing some of the absurd, illogical, arbitrary or baffling behaviour of the Imperium in order to make it seem more reasonable and rational is something that takes away from the setting, though.
You are just giving a pass to bad writers that cannot enforce the setting zeitgeist with a sense of nuance.
Turning the IOM in to looney tunes level of absurdity just for lol removes any gravitas to the setting... Unless you are happy if everything is flanderized to the level of the "Regimental Standard". :(
I don't consider it "bad writing". It shows just how backwards and illogical the Imperium can be and the absurd stipulations they pose upon themselves because of all that. They're an irrational, cruel, backwards crumbling empire that has been stagnant at best for millennia, with its own state-mandated religion and archaic rituals influencing nearly all aspects of how they function, where life is considered so cheap and there's so little mercy and compassion that entire armies get dispatched to recover holy relics or recover missing equipment simply due to its sentimental/religious importance- , that a single extra, extra special holy bolter round for the chamber militant of the Ecclesiarchy has so many exact specifications and baffling arbitrary requirements to its crafting that - just to make a round that is barely different from a standard one - it is considered a worthwhile endeavor for an artificers lifetimes work emphasizes just how far all that can go.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/08/13 20:56:10
I don't really agree with that example. If you view it as just a bolter round as in terms of the components and such, than sure, it taking a lifetime would seem absurd...but when you take into account that the Imperium is a society that is heavily imbued with religious superstition, doctrine and ritual, where both the materials and the craftsmanship of it would have to align with those meticulous standards and be stipulated with all sorts of arbitrary time-consuming tasks and exacting specifications along the way, I don't think it's that much of an oddity that creating such a holy artifact could take an artificer a lifetime. It wouldn't just be putting mass-manufactured parts together like with a typical round.
The absurdity lies in why anyone tasked with managing the Imperium's heavily stretched resources would think an artificer's lifetime of work is worth one (1) dead heretic or alien, when that same artificer could instead craft enough regular-ass boltguns and bolter shells to kill thousands of heretics or aliens.
The Imperium's workers are countless, but so are the Imperium's enemies.
Because it's actually true within the 40K universe that blessed bolt rounds do better against particularly powerful enemies, especially Chaos enemies, compared to normal bolt rounds that bounce off fields or supernatural wards. You don't expend normal bolt rounds on the average random cultist. You fire the blessed bolts at that Daemon Prince. All that religious activity around that ammunition actually has an effect within 40K, whether that be from some latent psychic effect of faith or because the Emperor nudges things.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/08/13 22:15:46
The best absurdity? The everything can hurt/kill everything mechanic :-)
I had a lone remaining space marine sgt with no CC weapon once take down an enemy tank in melee. He just beat the last two wounds off it with his fists. It was so unbelievably 40k that my opponent and I were both just laughing at it the whole time.
If that doesn't embody the spirit of the game, I don't know what does!
The best absurdity? The everything can hurt/kill everything mechanic :-)
I had a lone remaining space marine sgt with no CC weapon once take down an enemy tank in melee. He just beat the last two wounds off it with his fists. It was so unbelievably 40k that my opponent and I were both just laughing at it the whole time.
If that doesn't embody the spirit of the game, I don't know what does!
It was done to avoid the whole "I take a tank company and am now completely invulnerable to your infantry horde army. GG". Back in 3rd edition, they had to introduce a mandatory rule if one used a pure tank company, that basically meant the opponent's weapon hits had a 1/36 chance of scoring at least a glancing hit, no matter the strength of the hit, to at least give opponents at least a slight chance of scratching the tanks if they hadn't loaded up on heavy weapons.
I guess it could be argued that a tank down to the last 2 W might have rents in the armor already and what your marine did was take advantage of existing damage to get at the crew or other vital part of the tank.
This message was edited 2 times. Last update was at 2021/08/13 23:07:06
Gert wrote: I love the Feudal Worlds. They're without a doubt my favourite world type.
A short story has an Inquisitor try to stealthily discover why a new Knightly order, the Order of the Wyrm, has suddenly gained traction. Turns out the Wyrm are fighting a clandestine war against the Order of the Star(?) and both sides turn out to be a Genestealer Cult and Chaos Cult respectively with the High King being a puppet of the Gods who gets executed by another Inquisitor who was also investigating the Chaos Order. Great little story.
I NEED the name of this story!
"Because the Wolves kill cleanly, and we do not. They also kill quickly, and we have never done that, either. They fight, they win, and they stalk back to their ships with their tails held high. If they were ever ordered to destroy another Legion, they would do it by hurling warrior against warrior, seeking to grind their enemies down with the admirable delusions of the 'noble savage'. If we were ever ordered to assault another Legion, we would virus bomb their recruitment worlds; slaughter their serfs and slaves; poison their gene-seed repositories and spend the next dozen decades watching them die slow, humiliating deaths. Night after night, raid after raid, we'd overwhelm stragglers from their fleets and bleach their skulls to hang from our armour, until none remained. But that isn't the quick execution the Emperor needs, is it? The Wolves go for the throat. We go for the eyes. Then the tongue. Then the hands. Then the feet. Then we skin the crippled remains, and offer it up as an example to any still bearing witness. The Wolves were warriors before they became soldiers. We were murderers first, last, and always!" —Jago Sevatarion
DR:80SGMB--I--Pw40k01#-D++++A+/fWD-R++T(T)DM+
Andykp wrote: No more absurd than older religions praying to the sun or the forest spirits. It is all based on a lack of understanding and ignorance in a way. Certainly the mechanicus.
Counterpoint: it's absurd, but it's one of those absurdities we love about Warhammer, per the thread's title.
The point of this thread isn't to defend absurd stuff as "not that absurd when you think about it". It's to separate the absurdity we love, the one that enriches the setting or allows awesome stuff like giant walkers, from the absurdity that just breaks your suspension of disbelief.
.
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/08/14 00:01:11
Cadians, Sisters of Battle (Argent Shroud), Drukhari (Obsidian Rose)
Vatsetis wrote: Sure because XXI century Catholic fanatism has a lot more nuance than its XVI century counterpart...
The only difference is that nowdays they dont control the state apparatus like in the early modern age or in the IOM.
Why do the most realistic elements of the lore seem "absurd" to you?... please just read the newspapers.
The machine cult and "praying to the machine spirits" are definitely absurd, though.
They aren't particularly. Most people have no idea how tech works.
20th century cartoons had jokes about magic gnomes living in refrigerators and switching the light on and off manually when the door was opened/closed for a reason. Cargo cults were very much a thing.
'Percussive maintenance' is a fervent belief in the here and now.
And tech priest rituals have literally been described in archaic terms but amounted to 'spray WD40, yell obscenities, and turn the power off and on again' (apply holy unguents, implore the machine spirit, strike the rune of activation).
I love the absurdities of the AdMech. Especially one bit of fluff about thousands of cyborg troopers dying in a bloody war of attrition to reclaim an STC template... for a self-heating crock pot.
300+ ton tanks that actually work. And chainweapons. All of them. Chainswords, chainaxes, chainfists (especially chainfists). Who wouldn't want an entire army of Ash Williams?
Chainmail on high-tech exoskeletons. Books on the bonnet of a 300mph anti-grav vehicle. The very notion that a hulking 7 footer with half a ton of armour can move stealthily. To name but a few...
Andykp wrote: No more absurd than older religions praying to the sun or the forest spirits. It is all based on a lack of understanding and ignorance in a way. Certainly the mechanicus.
Counterpoint: it's absurd, but it's one of those absurdities we love about Warhammer, per the thread's title.
The point of this thread isn't to defend absurd stuff as "not that absurd when you think about it". It's to separate the absurdity we love, the one that enriches the setting or allows awesome stuff like giant walkers, from the absurdity that just breaks your suspension of disbelief.
.
exactly, it's a celebration of the wonderfuly weird, the fantasticly wacky, the stuff about 40k that makes it "more then just some dystopian future with minis"
as well as to realize that this wacky stuff is part of what we LOVE about 40k.
I'm gonna follow it up by moving into the realm of the controversy here..
I love that sled/chariot.
it combines a few differant inspirations into one absolutely absurd package that just SCREAMS 40k to me.
Lemme explain by what I mean, first of all, you have Logan himself, he's pretty a space wolf, the viking warrior with a wolf theme to his armor and decorations in power armor.. then you combine it with a dash of North Mythology (in this case Thor's flying chariot pulled by goats) replace the goats with wolves cause.. space wolves of course, and add some futuristic tech to it, and you have something absolutely nuts, it's great. and is VERY "40k"
This message was edited 1 time. Last update was at 2021/08/14 05:11:01
Opinions are not facts please don't confuse the two
Duskweaver wrote: Titans. The whole concept of bipedal war machines the size of skyscrapers, when you could just have mounted the same weapons on a big tank chassis, is completely stupid and impractical. But also awesome. 40K wouldn't be 40K without them.
I prefer thinking about it from the assumption that it actually has merit in some way, and then work forwards with that. Once you accept they have the technology to build it, try and see why they might build it instead of some different design.
Titans:
A: They walk because they want to be tall, rather than squat like a tank. They have directed energy weapons that are limited in range only by geological formations or even the curvature of the world they are on. Therefore, being taller is better for the Titan as an offensive platform.
B: They will be deployed again and again across many worlds and many terrain types, and legs will allow greater flexibility and easier pathfinding than a giant tank.
If we're using the term 'absurd' in its proper philosophical/literary sense, rather than its everyday "this doesn't make sense or is hilariously wrong" sense, then the tech-priest praying to his toaster and it actually working is perhaps the most sublime example of the absurd in 40K.
The whole of the 40K setting, at least in its earlier versions, is pretty solidly grounded in absurdism. It's all about fallible human beings searching for meaning in an essentially meaningless universe. 'Gods' are just the extremes of human emotion given form (which renders all worship a kind of spiritual masturbation) and Chaos will eventually eat everything no matter what anybody does, but people fight against that fate anyway, mostly out of stubbornness and ignorance (or alternatively they fool themselves into thinking they can actually benefit from pacts made with beings that are constructed from the worst parts of their own psyches). The Emperor is probably dead, or might never have existed at all, and certainly isn't mankind's saviour, but he's worshipped as a god anyway, in outright defiance of his own stated beliefs and wishes. People do stuff (like praying to their toaster) because they're ignorant about how the universe works, but it sometimes works anyway because human reason and even the concept of causality and what we call 'reality' are themselves flawed concepts. Maybe things just happen totally at random, or maybe there's a malevolent daemon-god pulling the strings, or maybe even the daemon-god is insane and deluded and the strings he's pulling aren't actually doing anything and it really is just random and he just thinks he's controlling everything.
It's why the Inquisition fights Chaos largely by keeping people in ignorance of it (meaninglessness becomes unbearable only when one is conscious of it), and why inquisitors who live long enough to have some understanding of Chaos almost always become radicals and eventually just full-on Chaos worshippers, because to understand Chaos is to recognise that the fight itself is meaningless. To fight Chaos is literally to "imagine Sisyphus happy": the fight is ultimately meaningless, but it is also the closest anyone in 40K can get to a meaningful existence. The Emperor, who tries to defeat Chaos, fails, and ends up with his dream of a future defined by secular human reason turned into the complete opposite of that, is the ultimate absurdist (anti-)hero. Once he ascends to the Golden Throne, his Imperium does a full Kierkegaard and abandons reason for religion.
And then there's the fething harlequins, of course. Literally fighting Chaos by laughing in its face. Plus, the whole thing of existing solely as an 'actor' playing a role and constantly shifting from one persona to another to outwit death/damnation ("appearing creates being") is also straight out of absurdism (Camus IIRC).
A little bit of righteous anger now and then is good, actually. Don't trust a person who never gets angry.
Dark Planet, no use for camoflage. Lets just wear full battle dress all the time.
Also Mordian Iron guard: Reassigned to desert planet/death world/ ice planet etc.... Im sorry? what was that about appropriate combat gear? I coudnt hear you over the swishing of the tassles on my PERFECTLY PRISTINE full battle dress.
"Because the Wolves kill cleanly, and we do not. They also kill quickly, and we have never done that, either. They fight, they win, and they stalk back to their ships with their tails held high. If they were ever ordered to destroy another Legion, they would do it by hurling warrior against warrior, seeking to grind their enemies down with the admirable delusions of the 'noble savage'. If we were ever ordered to assault another Legion, we would virus bomb their recruitment worlds; slaughter their serfs and slaves; poison their gene-seed repositories and spend the next dozen decades watching them die slow, humiliating deaths. Night after night, raid after raid, we'd overwhelm stragglers from their fleets and bleach their skulls to hang from our armour, until none remained. But that isn't the quick execution the Emperor needs, is it? The Wolves go for the throat. We go for the eyes. Then the tongue. Then the hands. Then the feet. Then we skin the crippled remains, and offer it up as an example to any still bearing witness. The Wolves were warriors before they became soldiers. We were murderers first, last, and always!" —Jago Sevatarion
