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 Orblivion wrote:
The novel series has completely killed the Horus Heresy for me, I have zero interest in it anymore.

It has gone on far too long. Should have been maaaybe a trilogy for each Legion, some Legions probably only needed one book.

MarkNorfolk wrote:

 aphyon wrote:

 Hairesy wrote:
I like the Horus Heresy right now because Primaris Marines don't exist yet. Oh, no wait that's right. They do.

In the grim darkness of the far future there is only facepalm.

Nah your still good, just consider anything after 7th ed lore wise to be fan fiction.

That's how I feel... except it's anything after Realms of Chaos: Slaves to Darkness.

Haha, awesome.

Ok, so is that before or after the introduction of Eldar and all the Aspects, etc (Compilation?).

Grimtuff wrote:40k. Heresy books should have never been written. Fight me IRL.

My #1 complaint about the Horus Heresy series is that it took an era from distant past, shrouded in mystery and uncertainty, and made it pretty much just 40K but with more Marines and the Primarchs still around.

Stylistically, it's all the same gothic ornamentation. Technologically, it's many of the same exact designs as still mass-produced in 40K. Culturally, it turns out the Imperium of 30K was every bit as brutal and repressive and un-enlightened as the Imperium of 40K, they were just aggressively secular instead of aggressively religious. Contextually, it turns out that nothing believed in 40K about the primarchs or Emperor was larger-than-life mythology; they actually were borderline caricature personalities, with size corresponding to importance like Orks.

The technological stagnation in particular is a retcon, because prior to the Horus Heresy becoming A Big Thing there actually was evidence of technological change. Tank designs were given years of introduction, and Imperial Armour books described improvements to vehicles over centuries. Battlefleet Gothic showed a chronology of the Imperial fleet changing over the millennia, and the Chaos ships in M41 were almost all post-Heresy Imperial designs. But now it seems like damn near everything used in 40K was actually invented prior to or during the Heresy, and the Imperium can't so much as make a new Leman Russ variant without a long-lost STC.

So there's nothing fundamentally different about 30K from 40K. The intervening ten thousand years have been reduced to essentially zero change. You could retcon the Horus Heresy to taking place in M39 and it would have no effect on the setting, because a thousand years is still far more than enough time to fit all the events post-Heresy.

Even just the idea of taking the two lost legions- per Rick Priestley, an indication of how much of history has faded into myth and uncertainty- and turning it into a Horus Heresy conspiracy mystery seems incredibly self-indulgent.

Also, my #2 complaint is that the primarchs' relationships read like WWE rivalries with a heaping help of daddy issues, and personally I don't find that particularly interesting. I read around the margins because I like HH-era Mechanicum.

I'll get off my soapbox now.

I agree Catbarf, on all of that.

It's really over explained the setting. They've gone so far as to tell us exactly why the Tyranids are here or why the Primarchs were even first scattered.

It's removed a lot of the moral ambiguities of the 41st millenium. We know who the idiots and the arseholes are now (spoiler: The Emperor). It actually makes it really hard for me to justify my own Imperial army. They aren't the remnant of a noble system descended into grimdark anarchy. The system was evil and wrong right from the very start, objectively so because we've watched it start.

There are aspects of the HH I enjoy, and characters like Macaldor and Sigismund stand out to me as interesting aspects of how things got started prior to how things became in 40k. However, being an Ork player, most of the setting is not that interesting to me since most Ork stuff more or less happened in the GC era with Ullanor and Gorro, so a bunch of marine spank isn't that engaging for me. Like others have mentioned before me, GW really dropped the ball with the "show, don't tell" part of the HH mythos because they've botched a lot of things in their attempt to flesh out the era, such as Horus' fall and how little characterization he has considering that he's the central figure of the Heresy, Fulgrim's weird fake-out swap with the daemon possessing him, and some legions really losing out narratively among other things.

I mean, one could simply not read the HH series. I've only read a few books and so a lot of this lost mystery is simply not an issue for me. I mean, once you get finished Fulgrim if you're reaching for the next book that's saying something about your character that's best left for discussion on Gab.

I always thought the Horus Heresy was better as a series of myths and legends. Although I will admit the marines on marines conflict probably was easier for GW to balance.

 Hairesy wrote:
I mean, one could simply not read the HH series. I've only read a few books and so a lot of this lost mystery is simply not an issue for me. I mean, once you get finished Fulgrim if you're reaching for the next book that's saying something about your character that's best left for discussion on Gab.

Not noticed how the HH series has bled into regular 40k yet, eh?

The same primarch bs Avenger's-style storyline present in the HH books is now also front and centre in 40k. Another major appeal of 40k was the mystery, there was no hard canon like there was in say, Star Wars or other sci fi series. It was a period of time stretching longer than recorded human history so far that was purposefully muddy. It was a time of myth and legend where everything was true and also wasn't. There had been many hours of discussions over the years on discussion forums over slowly piecing together 40k's history. Now the HH series has removed a good chunk of that and every-bloody-thing must be connected to it. Why are the Tyranids brought to the galaxy as a result of the HH for example? That is just utterly dumb and serves to make the galaxy seem smaller.

The Index Astartes articles in the early 2000s were enough. They should have left it at that. Just enough to give you a peek and draw your own conclusions, this boxout of Captain Garro being a prime example.

White Dwarf 265 (Jan 2002), p74 — Captain Garro, Hero of the Death Guard

When Horus's rebellion was finally understood, seventy Space Marines, alone of five Legions, remained steadfast in their loyalty to the Emperor. These men seized the Imperial cruiser Eisenstein and broke the Traitors' blockade of the Isstvan system to carry word of the treachery to Terra. Their warning may have saved the Imperium. Commanding the Death Guard contingent was a great battle-caption, Garro.

There are conflicting testimonies regarding the fate of Captain Garro and his men. There are those who say that in the turmoil accompanying Horus's assault on the Imperial Palace no one knew what to do with the handful of loyal Marines whose entire Legions had turned traitor. The captain, indeed all of the Eisenstein seventy who survived the gauntlet to reach Terra, were placed in custody pending deposition by the Emperor himself, a deposition which, after his fall and enshrinement in the Golden Throne, never came. Garro and the other 'Heroes of the Imperium' never saw the light of day and died prisoners. Others maintain that Garro himself fought in the palace defence, and when he saw what his brother Legionnaires had become, he renounced arms and served devotedly at the Master Apothecariate, where Space Marine Apothecaries receive their training, futilely seeking a cure for the plage which had taken his entire Legion of brothers, until his own death.

More fanciful taletellers link Garro and his band to secret societies moving behind the public face of the Imperium, and claim that Garro and his original Space Marines atill live, an elite force committed to thwarting the aims of Nurgle, Mortarion and the Death Guard, who appear in battle clad in the colors and flying the banners of the pre-Heresy Death Guard, then vanish, like grey ghosts from the warp.

Still others report that Garro was unable to resist the same lure to damnation which claimed his Primarch. In the aftermath of the Heresy, Garro turned to Nurgle and became a champion of the Death Guard. As the Lord of Flies, he still leads Plague fleets from the Eye, clad in black iridescent armor and a power claw like a great skeletal hand, accompanied by the maddening buzz of insectoid wings.

They left it up to the reader to decide his fate. Even when laying out the history of a legion, they still had 40k be "your guys". It was up to your own headcanon what happened to him, there was no incorrect answer. But now? Nope. He became the founder of the Grey Knights. Sorry everyone who liked a bit of mystery and how deep it made the background.

 Grimtuff wrote:
They left it up to the reader to decide his fate. Even when laying out the history of a legion, they still had 40k be "your guys". It was up to your own headcanon what happened to him, there was no incorrect answer. But now? Nope. He became the founder of the Grey Knights. Sorry everyone who liked a bit of mystery and how deep it made the background.

No, he didn't. He was very specifically not one of those chosen to become a Grey Knight. Did you read Buried Dagger? I assume not because then you'd know that.

 Gert wrote:

 Grimtuff wrote:
They left it up to the reader to decide his fate. Even when laying out the history of a legion, they still had 40k be "your guys". It was up to your own headcanon what happened to him, there was no incorrect answer. But now? Nope. He became the founder of the Grey Knights. Sorry everyone who liked a bit of mystery and how deep it made the background.

No, he didn't. He was very specifically not one of those chosen to become a Grey Knight. Did you read Buried Dagger? I assume not because then you'd know that.

Well, yes- isn't it obvious I have not read them nor have any intention of reading them. But once again you have missed the forest for the trees. My point was his character's fate is now set in stone and "canonised", unlike before, when it was left up too the reader, but go on- nitpick like you always do because you don't have an argument.

 Grimtuff wrote:
Well, yes- isn't it obvious I have not read them nor have any intention of reading them. But once again you have missed the forest for the trees. My point was his character's fate is now set in stone and "canonised", unlike before, when it was left up too the reader, but go on- nitpick like you always do because you don't have an argument.

The argument is entirely based on subjective opinion and you would never accept it because your opinion is different from mine.
I was going to write a big spiel about sequels, prequels, and whatever-equels doing the exact same thing from KOTOR to LotR but what's the point? You don't care about my opinion and I don't care about yours.

Just because other media does it too doesn't mean it's a good thing.

 kirotheavenger wrote:
Just because other media does it too doesn't mean it's a good thing.

That's why I didn't bother because as I said, your opinions are different from mine and that won't change on this particular subject.
That being said...

 kirotheavenger wrote:
It's removed a lot of the moral ambiguities of the 41st millenium. We know who the idiots and the arseholes are now (spoiler: The Emperor). It actually makes it really hard for me to justify my own Imperial army. They aren't the remnant of a noble system descended into grimdark anarchy. The system was evil and wrong right from the very start, objectively so because we've watched it start.

This is interesting to me because the internet would have me believe old 40k wasn't morally ambiguous (i.e. the Imperium was explicitly a bad thing) and that it was newer 40k material that brought in the idea that the Imperium was good.
Yet when we have the HH series fairly often showing the Imperium as it should be shown, a fascist militant dictatorship ruled by a being who is convinced of his and his race's superiority, that's a bad thing? How could an empire entirely built on war and conquest, led by a man who dubbed himself the Emperor of Mankind, ever have been a good thing? What's noble about Xenocide against peaceful races like the Diasporex or the Interex, or enforcing your rule on a human world because they're the same species as you?
As for the justification part, who cares? Are you advocating for a fascist takeover of society or calling for anyone who disagrees with you to be enslaved or eradicated? No? Cool, then there's no problem.

 Gert wrote:

This is interesting to me because the internet would have me believe old 40k wasn't morally ambiguous (i.e. the Imperium was explicitly a bad thing) and that it was newer 40k material that brought in the idea that the Imperium was good.
Yet when we have the HH series fairly often showing the Imperium as it should be shown, a fascist militant dictatorship ruled by a being who is convinced of his and his race's superiority, that's a bad thing?

Prior to the HH series, it was understood that the Imperium was (currently) oppressive, but we did not know if that because of its very founding, or if it was a product of millenia of decay.

How could an empire entirely built on war and conquest, led by a man who dubbed himself the Emperor of Mankind, ever have been a good thing? What's noble about Xenocide against peaceful races like the Diasporex or the Interex, or enforcing your rule on a human world because they're the same species as you?

Having not read but a few HH novels, that detail all seems to be brought on by the HH series, explicitly giving us "the sins of the founding." No more ambiguity.

Seriously having the author who hates the imperium (and loves chaos), that goes out of his way to make them look inept or worse, write the seminal books about the emperor doesn't help.

This is purely retconned lore. the obscurity of time and myth gave us an entirely different perspective on the age of the imperium before it was re-organized as a religious empire.

We are back to the point of people who do not understand 40K trying to tell us what it is via their current day moral perspectives. look at GW circa 3rd edition when the lore was solidified, and you will see quite a different take on the emperor and the evens of the heresy.

 aphyon wrote:
Look at GW circa 3rd edition when the lore was solidified, and you will see quite a different take on the emperor and the evens of the heresy.

Quite so, I recently read the lore in the "Siege of Terra" board game. A lot of the modern details didn't exist at the time or were quite different - no fight with Sanguinius, Horus just strangled him. No Ollanius Pius, just some random Terminator.
Hell, I got the impression The Emperor and the Primarchs were normal people! There was a paragraph explictly in The Emperor's head about how he didn't know what to do, but everyone was looking at him, so he had to do something. Granted he was still a immensely powerful psyker.

 Insectum7 wrote:
Prior to the HH series, it was understood that the Imperium was (currently) oppressive, but we did not know if that because of its very founding, or if it was a product of millenia of decay.
Having not read but a few HH novels, that detail all seems to be brought on by the HH series, explicitly giving us "the sins of the founding." No more ambiguity.

My counter to that would be the Emperor Himself, the Legions, and the fact He set out to conquer the stars with said Legions. Rome might have built some very good roads and aqueducts but the empire still brutally conquered and suppressed millions of people.
I'm not denying the Emperor had good intentions but they were based on Xenophobia and human supremacy so the idea that a pre-Heresy Imperium was a good empire kind of falls apart. Now, instead of it being just vague "The Emperor and His Legions conquered the stars", it's "Oh God the Emperor let his bloodthirsty hounds off the leash and they did huge amounts of genocide".




Automatically Appended Next Post:

 aphyon wrote:
Seriously having the author who hates the imperium (and loves chaos), that goes out of his way to make them look inept or worse, write the seminal books about the emperor doesn't help.

This just goes to show you haven't actually read books written by ADB and are just parroting talking points from 4chan.

ADB made the Imperials seem very competent in Cadian Blood, at least. With the Guardsmen generally able to deal with most threats pretty well, including CSM's, the Raven Guard getting a solid ambush on the Death Guard and the Terminus Est almost getting destroyed.

 Gert wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Prior to the HH series, it was understood that the Imperium was (currently) oppressive, but we did not know if that because of its very founding, or if it was a product of millenia of decay.
Having not read but a few HH novels, that detail all seems to be brought on by the HH series, explicitly giving us "the sins of the founding." No more ambiguity.

My counter to that would be the Emperor Himself, the Legions, and the fact He set out to conquer the stars with said Legions. Rome might have built some very good roads and aqueducts but the empire still brutally conquered and suppressed millions of people.
I'm not denying the Emperor had good intentions but they were based on Xenophobia and human supremacy so the idea that a pre-Heresy Imperium was a good empire kind of falls apart.

Conquering doesn't necessarily mean "bad", however. I'd argue that the "conquering" of Imperial Japan and Nazi Germany by the Allies in WWII was a good thing. Incredibly violent, but still a net positive.

Human settlements across the galaxy could have been constantly under siege by Orks and other Xenos. Or constantly warring among themselves in perpetual cycles of violence. Conquering those territories might have legitimately brought peace, stability and prosperity.

Now, instead of it being just vague "The Emperor and His Legions conquered the stars", it's "Oh God the Emperor let his bloodthirsty hounds off the leash and they did huge amounts of genocide".

Exactly, there's no question now. All has been clarified. . . Yay.

 Insectum7 wrote:
Conquering doesn't necessarily mean "bad", however. I'd argue that the "conquering" of Imperial Japan and Nazi Germany by the Allies in WWII was a good thing. Incredibly violent, but still a net positive.

The Allies didn't conquer Germany, Italy, and Japan in the same way those nations did their neighbours and certainly not the way the Imperium conducts its wars of conquest. Of course, you know that because you used quotation marks to denote your use of the term.

Human settlements across the galaxy could have been constantly under siege by Orks and other Xenos. Or constantly warring among themselves in perpetual cycles of violence. Conquering those territories might have legitimately brought peace, stability and prosperity.

Exactly, there's no question now. All has been clarified. . . Yay.

But people keep complaining that the Imperium is never shown as bad. Here it is being bad, and now that's not allowed?

The biggest issue is really The Emperor himself. He was always shown as a glorious figure, he united Old Earth and led humanity into a new age of progress in the Great Crusade.
The fact that it was somewhat violent is right there in the name, but this was always a golden age of the Imperium.

Turns out - no. The Emperor is an incompetent arsehole, how he ever reunited Old Earth I don't know when he can't even feign equality for 18 people.
You can't even weasel out with "inconsistent narrator" because there is no narrator, we witness these events as a fly on the shoulder.

That means the hero that I am fighting, the vision I am fighting to reclaim, is not golden it's objectively horrible.

 kirotheavenger wrote:
The biggest issue is really The Emperor himself. He was always shown as a glorious figure, he united Old Earth and led humanity into a new age of progress in the Great Crusade.
The fact that it was somewhat violent is right there in the name, but this was always a golden age of the Imperium.

Golden age doesn't mean good though. It's entirely down to perspective and context. The "Golden Age of Britain" is used to describe the reign of Queen Victoria but it was absolutely not that for many people within the British Empire nor the nations it conquered. The Golden Age of Piracy can hardly be considered good for the victims of piracy.
The Golden Age of an empire founded on conquest and Xenophobia, led by a self declared Emperor of Mankind backed by Legions of supersoldiers isn't exactly what I would classify as a "fun time".

Turns out - no. The Emperor is an incompetent arsehole, how he ever reunited Old Earth I don't know when he can't even feign equality for 18 people.
You can't even weasel out with "inconsistent narrator" because there is no narrator, we witness these events as a fly on the shoulder.

You mean the various books that are written from like a hundred different perspectives? Very few of which agree on anything much at all.

That means the hero that I am fighting, the vision I am fighting to reclaim, is not golden it's objectively horrible.

And it's not real so it doesn't make you a bad person. Your Dudes are also very much Your Dudes. So while the Imperium during the Crusade was still an awful place, Your Dudes don't necessarily know that. The biggest thing people seem to not understand with the HH series is that just because You the Reader know the thing, doesn't mean the people in-universe know the thing. There are examples of Imperial citizens in 40k that believe Xenos are just scary stories to keep kids from sneaking extra snacks or being naughty. The Cult of the Four-Armed Emperor fully believes that their version of the Emperor is the real version because the Cult Creed dictates it to be so.

Only 2 books left in the Heresy.
Then this old hobby Is getting put back in the shed with the copies of RT and the WD 23, i know are in there somewhere.
Modern 40K doesnt do it for me, and dont like the way it seems to be headed. So i just dont care where it goes from here.

This just goes to show you haven't actually read books written by ADB and are just parroting talking points from 4chan.

You would be incorrect, also i do not use 4chan.

 Gert wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Conquering doesn't necessarily mean "bad", however. I'd argue that the "conquering" of Imperial Japan and Nazi Germany by the Allies in WWII was a good thing. Incredibly violent, but still a net positive.

The Allies didn't conquer Germany, Italy, and Japan in the same way those nations did their neighbours and certainly not the way the Imperium conducts its wars of conquest. Of course, you know that because you used quotation marks to denote your use of the term.

Two things:
1: We don't think of the Axis powers as being "conquered", it's true. But after their militaries were obliterated and many civilians slaughtered, remaining fighting forces were disbanded, their political structures were replaced, and their territory occupied. There is no more Nazi Germany, and there is no more Imperial Japan. The difference between that and "conquered" is pretty lost on me, unless the implication is that "conquered" necessarily means exploitative, which I'm not sure it does.

2: "certainly not the way the Imperium conducts its wars of conquest" . . . Specifically, prior to the HH being spelled out in excruciating detail, we did not know how the Imperium conducted its wars of conquest. Quotations from early publications like Rogue Trader read: "Over ten thousand years ago the Great Emperor of Mankind ascended to the Golden Throne of Earth. Of the wars he waged to get there, of the countless agonies of battling worlds, there is no record." We knew some broad strokes about it, but relatively little otherwise.

 Gert wrote:

Human settlements across the galaxy could have been constantly under siege by Orks and other Xenos. Or constantly warring among themselves in perpetual cycles of violence. Conquering those territories might have legitimately brought peace, stability and prosperity.

Spoiler:

That is . . . not a response. Legitimately, if war and perpetual strife can be halted due to a greater show of force, that can be a net benefit. Big kid breaks up a fight between two little kids. There's no rule of law without the power to enforce it.

Exactly, there's no question now. All has been clarified. . . Yay.

But people keep complaining that the Imperium is never shown as bad. Here it is being bad, and now that's not allowed?

Prior to the HH novels it was still a question. Was it always so horrible? Or did the Imperium slowly decay into this? Or was it a result of the HH in particular? Maybe the beginnings were heroic and noble. The Emperor's armies sweep through the galaxy and bring order and protection to all human civilization, etc. etc.

I want the grit in the 40K setting that I involve myself in now, in the 41st millenium. I didn't want all those questions about the past answered.

 Insectum7 wrote:

That is . . . not a response. Legitimately, if war and perpetual strife can be halted due to a greater show of force, that can be a net benefit. Big kid breaks up a fight between two little kids. There's no rule of law without the power to enforce it.

Why are you assuming that the human colonies had the right to be there in the first place? What if those Xenos were the original indigenous population?

Humanity spread into the stars like the Americans spread into the new west. It was manifest destiny writ large onto the galaxy, and with the same results of mass genocide of the peoples who originally inhabited it.

 Insectum7 wrote:
Two things:
1: We don't think of the Axis powers as being "conquered", it's true. But after their militaries were obliterated and many civilians slaughtered, remaining fighting forces were disbanded, their political structures were replaced, and their territory occupied. There is no more Nazi Germany, and there is no more Imperial Japan. The difference between that and "conquered" is pretty lost on me, unless the implication is that "conquered" necessarily means exploitative, which I'm not sure it does.

If you ignore the fact that Germany, Italy, and Japan were all the aggressors in WW2 and that at least Germany and Japan conducted massive campaigns of ethnic cleansing and genocide, then sure you could portray those powers as the victims. You absolutely shouldn't but you can.

2: "certainly not the way the Imperium conducts its wars of conquest" . . . Specifically, prior to the HH being spelled out in excruciating detail, we did not know how the Imperium conducted its wars of conquest. Quotations from early publications like Rogue Trader read: "Over ten thousand years ago the Great Emperor of Mankind ascended to the Golden Throne of Earth. Of the wars he waged to get there, of the countless agonies of battling worlds, there is no record." We knew some broad strokes about it, but relatively little otherwise.

Yes, I'm sure the Emperor was peacefully signing treaties and accords with thousands of supersoldiers, fleets, and Titans at his back. I also remember all those crusades from our reality where there was lots of peace and goodwill. BTW how's the sand this time of year? Good enough to stick your head in?

That is . . . not a response. Legitimately, if war and perpetual strife can be halted due to a greater show of force, that can be a net benefit. Big kid breaks up a fight between two little kids. There's no rule of law without the power to enforce it.

You can't be so naive that you don't see the parallels with literally every authoritarian and fascist regime in history, hell not even history because it is literally happening right now.
Let's take an example from another SciFi property, Bajor from Star Trek.
The Cardassians invaded Bajor to "keep it safe" from the other Alpha Quadrant powers. Then the Cardassians enslaved the Bajors for 50 years and ruined their planet through strip mining for their military-industrial complex.
The Federation took Bajor as a protectorate, setting up Starfleet personnel to oversee a peaceful transition of power while also providing resources, trade and materials for the Bajorans to rebuild with the goal of eventually joining the Federation. Most importantly, the Bajorans could ask the Federation to leave at any point and the Federation would agree.
That is the difference between a fascists space empire and a democratic organisation coming to protect a planet.

Prior to the HH novels it was still a question. Was it always so horrible? Or did the Imperium slowly decay into this? Or was it a result of the HH in particular? Maybe the beginnings were heroic and noble. The Emperor's armies sweep through the galaxy and bring order and protection to all human civilization, etc. etc.

Ok, whatever you say Palpatine.

The idea that the pre-Heresy Imperium was anything but a growing shadow of its future self is a joke. A militaristic empire built on the back of conquest and genocide with no form of representation for the common person ruled by a self appointed not-God cannot be good, it can be better than something worse but it cannot be good.

I think we are missing the point that the 40K universe is a so over the top grim dark parody that what the emperor did was necessary for the survival of humanity. as the old joke goes, i love playing in the 40K universe but i would never want to live in it. while living in some of the other sci-fi universes might be kind of nice.

The fact that the time of the emperor prior to the HH was a time without the powers of the chaos gods being omnipresent threats and technology was advancing or being re-discovered and the nascent imperium was not a religious, degrading society. comparable to 40K that would be a golden age.

 aphyon wrote:
I think we are missing the point that the 40K universe is a so over the top grim dark parody that what the emperor did was necessary for the survival of humanity.

NO. That is completely missing the point. What the emperor did was never necessary for the survival of humanity, it is what he thought was necessary and he is such a colossally arrogant psychopath that he never considered that there could be an alternative.

What the Imperium does and has done was never necessary for humanity to survive, it is necessary for the Imperium to survive. That is the irony. The inflexibility and dystopia of the Imperium is not some fall from the lofty heights of the grace and intelligence of the Emperor, it is exactly the same.

The Emperor is the Thanos of the 40k universe. He thinks he is making the "hard choices" that others "don't have the will to make". But he isn't. He is just a psychopath whose solution is genocide and he never considers any alternative because he believes he is the only person with a solution.

Every tyrant throughout history has believed they were doing what was necessary to achieve their goals and their ideals. And every tyrant was wrong. The Emperor and the Imperium he built was just the latest in the 40K universe.

 Gert wrote:

 Insectum7 wrote:
Two things:
1: We don't think of the Axis powers as being "conquered", it's true. But after their militaries were obliterated and many civilians slaughtered, remaining fighting forces were disbanded, their political structures were replaced, and their territory occupied. There is no more Nazi Germany, and there is no more Imperial Japan. The difference between that and "conquered" is pretty lost on me, unless the implication is that "conquered" necessarily means exploitative, which I'm not sure it does.

If you ignore the fact that Germany, Italy, and Japan were all the aggressors in WW2 and that at least Germany and Japan conducted massive campaigns of ethnic cleansing and genocide, then sure you could portray those powers as the victims. You absolutely shouldn't but you can.

I do not portray them as victims. I point out that aggressors can also be violently conquered.

2: "certainly not the way the Imperium conducts its wars of conquest" . . . Specifically, prior to the HH being spelled out in excruciating detail, we did not know how the Imperium conducted its wars of conquest. Quotations from early publications like Rogue Trader read: "Over ten thousand years ago the Great Emperor of Mankind ascended to the Golden Throne of Earth. Of the wars he waged to get there, of the countless agonies of battling worlds, there is no record." We knew some broad strokes about it, but relatively little otherwise.

Yes, I'm sure the Emperor was peacefully signing treaties and accords with thousands of supersoldiers, fleets, and Titans at his back. I also remember all those crusades from our reality where there was lots of peace and goodwill. BTW how's the sand this time of year? Good enough to stick your head in?

Naturally the Great Crusade was full of violence. . . Because you do not sign peace treaties with Orks, who's very hallmark as a race is a joy of being an aggressive, warlike species. They love to butcher and enslave humans. You say "xenophobia" as though it is automatically bad, when in the case of many species in the 40k universe, the xenos ARE aggressors. You've already intimated that "aggressors" are justly conquered.

That is . . . not a response. Legitimately, if war and perpetual strife can be halted due to a greater show of force, that can be a net benefit. Big kid breaks up a fight between two little kids. There's no rule of law without the power to enforce it.

You can't be so naive that you don't see the parallels with literally every authoritarian and fascist regime in history, hell not even history because it is literally happening right now.
Let's take an example from another SciFi property, Bajor from Star Trek.
The Cardassians invaded Bajor to "keep it safe" from the other Alpha Quadrant powers. Then the Cardassians enslaved the Bajors for 50 years and ruined their planet through strip mining for their military-industrial complex.
The Federation took Bajor as a protectorate, setting up Starfleet personnel to oversee a peaceful transition of power while also providing resources, trade and materials for the Bajorans to rebuild with the goal of eventually joining the Federation. Most importantly, the Bajorans could ask the Federation to leave at any point and the Federation would agree.
That is the difference between a fascists space empire and a democratic organisation coming to protect a planet.

Imperial worlds are not all oppressive dictatorships. Many worlds allow offworld travel and trade. The Imperium, by and large, doesn't really care how a world is run or a populace is treated, so long as the tithes are paid and the Imperial creed is heeded in some form or another. The vastness of the Imperium means it varies wildly in its implementations. Some worlds absolutely horrible, some reasonably pleasant. Such is to say that Imperial rule is not automatically awful, even though it sure can be.

Prior to the HH novels it was still a question. Was it always so horrible? Or did the Imperium slowly decay into this? Or was it a result of the HH in particular? Maybe the beginnings were heroic and noble. The Emperor's armies sweep through the galaxy and bring order and protection to all human civilization, etc. etc.

Ok, whatever you say Palpatine.

The idea that the pre-Heresy Imperium was anything but a growing shadow of its future self is a joke. A militaristic empire built on the back of conquest and genocide with no form of representation for the common person ruled by a self appointed not-God cannot be good, it can be better than something worse but it cannot be good.

If killing Nazis and firebombing/nuking Japanese cities is 'justified', than violently retaking territory from Orks and other aggressive/oppressive in-universe factions is 'justified'. Not good necessarily, but justified. If the end result of such a Great Crusade creates a stable human territory in which the society can evolve into something more mature than a morass of previously existing warlord-anarchies, I'd argue that starts to be 'good'.

The Imperium has the additional quirk of requiring a self-appointed god to provide the navigation point that makes long distance interstellar travel possible. . . So there's that too.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 A Town Called Malus wrote:

 aphyon wrote:
I think we are missing the point that the 40K universe is a so over the top grim dark parody that what the emperor did was necessary for the survival of humanity.

NO. That is completely missing the point. What the emperor did was never necessary for the survival of humanity, it is what he thought was necessary and he is such a colossally arrogant psychopath that he never considered that there could be an alternative.

What the Imperium does and has done was never necessary for humanity to survive, it is necessary for the Imperium to survive. That is the irony. The inflexibility and dystopia of the Imperium is not some fall from the lofty heights of the grace and intelligence of the Emperor, it is exactly the same.

The Emperor is the Thanos of the 40k universe. He thinks he is making the "hard choices" that others "don't have the will to make". But he isn't. He is just a psychopath whose solution is genocide and he never considers any alternative because he believes he is the only person with a solution.

Every tyrant throughout history has believed they were doing what was necessary to achieve their goals and their ideals. And every tyrant was wrong. The Emperor and the Imperium he built was just the latest in the 40K universe.

Well, back to the larger point. We (you I suppose, since I haven't read the HH series) would not know all this without the HH series going through it all with great detail, whereas prior to the series that was just one of several possibilities.