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Nay, the unbreakable litany of “old thing good, new thing bad” holds firm.

 Some_Call_Me_Tim wrote:
Nay, the unbreakable litany of “old thing good, new thing bad” holds firm.

Well dam, can't argue with that logic

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

 Some_Call_Me_Tim wrote:
Nay, the unbreakable litany of “old thing good, new thing bad” holds firm.

Well dam, can't argue with that logic

Do you know who can argue against that? Half-eldar librarians and inquisitors like sherlock obi-wan cluesou.

Rose colored glasses cover a lot of sins, but there were some odd bits back then…

Undivided Princes are still a thing in both the game and background.

I vote for the various old Tyranid creatures that are now forgotten. At least I think they're forgotten. For all I know they may have been brought back by now.

Razorwings: Flying pterodactyl things. Later replaced in the fluff by Gargoyles. You can see them in the background of some old art.

The Fleshstealer: A parasite that takes over an organism's body, leaving them conscious but helpless. It then absorbs more and more creatures until it becomes a living nightmare of fused flesh. Probably inspired by John Carpenter's The Thing, but maybe a little too similar to a Chaos Spawn to keep around.

Squigs: Ork Boyz who got devolved by Tyranids and later taken back by the other Orks. A retcon to Ork background that was later retconned itself (it didn't make sense, since the Tyranids are only recent arrivals to the galaxy).

The best one though was the Protoid: basically a Tyranid version of The Blob.

Apart from the squigs, I don't know if those ever appeared in the 40K game proper, but they showed up in the boardgame Doom of the Eldar, about the defence of Iyanden Craftworld. The Tyranid background was in a state of mutable flux for quite a while until Andy Chambers revamped it all with Epic Hive War and 2nd ed Codex Tyranids.

-----

However, my favourite bit of forgotten fluff--or more likely "oops forget we ever said that" gaffe--comes from the original release of Battlefleet Gothic:

The Eldar battleships, the Void Stalker class, were a joint venture between the Eldar and the Imperial Navy. Yes really. Eldar pirate princes sneered at the idea that they would ever need anything as big and clunky as a battleship, but they changed their tune once they saw the first prototype.

That bit of fluff appeared in White Dwarf when the Void Stalker was released, but was never reprinted as far as I know. Can't think why ...

PenitentJake wrote:


I recently discovered Cardinal Bucharis, who would have been a contemporary of Vandire, but who outlived him. A decade or so after Sebastion Thor assumed the mantle of Ecclesiarch, Bucharis went mad on the planet Gathalamor and began another era within the Age of Apostasy known as the Plague of Unbelief.

Cardinal Bucharis was also important in the Space Wolves background (I think his fleet laid siege to The Fang).

The 2nd ed Space Wolves Codex was the first one released and has a few odd quirks in it, like the idea that the legendary 'kraken's egg' might be a trophy from Hive Fleet Kraken--which had only just arrived in the galaxy at the end of the 41st millennium according to the much later 2nd ed Codex Tyranids.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

-WHFB being just one world within the Warhammer 40k galaxy, albeit separated off by layers of magic. I'm glad they ditched that concept and gave each setting it's own distinct universe with only a few threads connecting them via Warp shenanigans.

Oddly this survived well into 3rd edition 40K in the early 2000s--there's a sneaky reference to it in either the Witch Hunters or Daemonhunters Codex as a possible plot hook. (The one about a 'primitive planet that the Chaos Gods have often tried to conquer.') Tuomas Pirinen, who wrote Mordheim and 6th ed WFB, also still talks about this as the standard background IIRC.

Zoats eating zoatibix.

Loved the short story in the 3rd Ed sm codex where an explorator stumbled on a corpse in a test tube of a genetically engineered supersoldier that was like a space marine, only better.

With hindsight- primaris, about twenty something years before their introduction

Here's a more recent tidbit that just hasn't gone anywhere yet, but still could.

In one of the BSF expansions, they added a dark eldar ship card, but not the Dark Eldar model who was the pilot.

The ship was called the Eye of Vect, and it has killer stealth technology. The ship was stolen by Veth Rayden, who is actually more of a Corsair than a DE.

I mention this because I'm thinking of converting up a Corsair Felarch with a female torso to represent Veth Rayden- I'm thinking the character could play a role in the campaign.

 Gert wrote:
Undivided Princes are still a thing in both the game and background.

Where?

Oddly, I miss the Slann from the RT days although they didn't do much with them at the time. Then it became that the Slann were the Old Ones who made the Krork and the Eldar to fight the Necrontyr. And even that went away.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
Where?

The CSM Codex and possibly the Daemon Codex not sure about the latter. The new DP still has Undivided features as well. There have been plenty of Undivided Princes over the years as well, plus Lorgar and Perturabo are both Undivided Daemon Primarchs. It's just easier to be a God aligned Prince because you get that God's err... Undivided attention.

 Gert wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
Where?

The CSM Codex and possibly the Daemon Codex not sure about the latter. The new DP still has Undivided features as well. There have been plenty of Undivided Princes over the years as well, plus Lorgar and Perturabo are both Undivided Daemon Primarchs. It's just easier to be a God aligned Prince because you get that God's err... Undivided attention.

Undivided daemon princes have been gone from CSM and DoC for years, and daemon primarchs are like saying Guilliman counts as a chapter master.

Well Ultras are a 3rd founding chapter so yes he probably counts-as a chapter master....

 Gert wrote:

 NinthMusketeer wrote:
Where?

The CSM Codex and possibly the Daemon Codex not sure about the latter. The new DP still has Undivided features as well. There have been plenty of Undivided Princes over the years as well, plus Lorgar and Perturabo are both Undivided Daemon Primarchs. It's just easier to be a God aligned Prince because you get that God's err... Undivided attention.

Nope. Your DP has had to have a mark of one of the four since the 4th ed CSM dex. All of those Undivided princes over the years? Retconned out since they made Bel'akor the one and only Undivided DP. Perty and Lorgar? GW have never addressed it since the aforementioned retcon, so anything on the topic is purely speculation.

 NinthMusketeer wrote:

-Lesser Chaos Gods, these guys I miss. They get a few easter eggs here and there but I always preferred the Warp being somewhat like a world contested between four superpowers; while they unquestionably dominate the scene there is still wildlife, and there are still smaller factions surviving in the cracks.

-Undivided Daemons/Daemon Princes, in a similar vein I miss these existing as well as a general element of the big four not being everything there is to Chaos. The good news is they are coming back! I'm interested to see how this aspect of the fluff is managed and if it marks a return to GWs original sentiment.

-Nuance to the Chaos Gods. They used to be quite explicitly not entirely evil, nowadays any sort of 'good' aspect is generally labelled as deception or just a justification on the way to further corruption. While the old fluff did not always handle this aspect very well, I do miss the narrative element that the Chaos gods very much represent positive manifestations of emotion as well with those aspects simply being a strong secondary rather than nonexistent. Nurgle is perhaps the only Chaos god that has really maintained this, while Khorne is certainly the worst in how he's been flanderized.

I always felt like chaos was a missed opportunity in the modern setting. Khorne is murder incarnate but also honor and the deity of physical prowess. Me and some friends had fun idea doing a black crusade (the chaos rpg) campaign we’re everyone represented the positive sides of the chaos gods. So the khorne dude would be ridiculously honorable (like never attacking an enemy that surrendered, never striking an unarmed opponent etc). The Slaanesh dude was all for accepting everyone’s emotions in a surprisingly therapeutic mannner. The tzeentch dude was for the preservation of knowledge and making it available to everyone and so on. It was a cool idea but we never got very far with it.

@locarno24 That is an absolute classic. The Inquisition book is one of my old treasures, though I never actually played the game haha. Before dark heresy it was the best source of how things work in the imperium on a micro level.

@Mad Doc Grotsnik That story was later republished in Let the galaxy burn. The name of the story is Children of the Emperor. The author is Barrington J Bayley.

Some other more or less forgotten lore tidbits:

-Warp gates. Big portals Manufactured by the Imperium that ships could go through for far safer warp travel. It was much slower then regular warp travel so most captains preferred risking the open warp. Also only worked between two points. From 3rd ed rulebook.

-The Sensei. Literal offspring of the Emperor. Psykers who where anathema to deamons. They where generally opposed to the imperium as it conflicted with their ideas for humanity. Was later retconned to having been a tzeentch plot. 2nd ed I think? Could be 3rd.

-Space marines all being mind scrubbed criminals. 1st ed.

-A full blown planet scale chaos invasion of a computer program. One of my favorite short stories of all time. Hell in a bottle by author Simon Jowett.

I’m not sure how to put this but... 40ks writing was all over the place before. However it was also bigger in scope. Far more strange concepts and explorations of minor themes. The vastness of the setting used to be one of it’s selling points. Current 40k is much more concerned with a select few important characters/factions rather then the enormous multitude that is the galaxy. It used to be a bigger setting I guess. At least it feels that way. Not exactly forgotten lore but definetly SOGgy.

 Nerak wrote:

-The Sensei. Literal offspring of the Emperor. Psykers who where anathema to deamons. They where generally opposed to the imperium as it conflicted with their ideas for humanity. Was later retconned to having been a tzeentch plot. 2nd ed I think? Could be 3rd.

I have the original Realms of Chaos books where the Sensei were first detailed and playable.

They were descendants of the Emperor, not necessarily direct offspring. Also not all of the Emperor's descendants are Sensei. Only some are. Why is not known, but I assume it is something like a recessive trait that was only expressed in a fraction of the Emperor's offspring

The Emperor does not know of the Sensei. That is one of their other quirks. They are undetectable by psychic means, not because they are blanks but because their psychic signatures blend in harmoniously with the warp. If you think of psykers as being positive on a scale, with even normal humans having a slight psychic potential, and Pariahs as being negative on a scale, then Sensei would be 0. Completely neutral.

Sensei have the key characteristics of:

1) Immortality. They do not age once they reach adulthood and do not die of old age though they can still be killed by violence or other means.

2) Psychic undetectability. As mentioned above.

3) Immunity to the negative emotions promoted by the Chaos gods. They simply do not feel the extremes of negative emotions that feed the Chaos gods. A Sensei can kill but does not do so out of fury. A Sensei can carouse and drink but does not feel the urge towards excess, and so on.

4) They have an instinctual urge to promote the old harmonious warp, and thus find themselves fighting oppression and situations that promote the emotions that feed the Chaos gods. Therefore they often end up as freedom fighters, pirates, vigilantes, revolutionaries, etc...

The fortuitous combination of genes the Sensei have inherited from the Emperor makes them very special. Their most important trait is their immortality. Although they can be killed they do not age, and possess amazing powers of recovery. They are also protected from the Chaos Powers, and the untainted flow of the warp can move through them unimpeded. A Sensei cannot experience hate, bitterness, or irrational anger, because these things are part of the disharmony of the Chaos Powers. They radiate natural confidence and harmony, and can even draw upon the energies of the warp to use their psychic powers. Sensei do not risk attracting daemons or other malicious psychic forces by using their powers. Being untainted by Chaos they are utterly invulnerable to the predations of the Chaos Powers. In fact because they harbour no trace of the emotions and concepts embodied by the Chaos Powers they are largely invisible to them.

p. 185, Realms of Chaos: The Lost and the Damned

We see a similar kind of invisibility in the Yncarne in the Gathering Storm. The Chaos gods could not perceive the Yncarne through their supernatural means except indirectly through the effects of its actions.
The Sensei were like Champions of the Star Child but their gifts available in the books were less overtly supernatural and might be just passed off as incredible skill or strength. Things like WS or S bonus for example are not that remarkable in the 40K galaxy.
I would also personally imagine them to have powers of natural persuasion if they are to survive for any length of time in the 40K universe. Of course I'm sure the Inquisition might then accuse them of being with Slaanesh. One of the powers a Sensei could acquire was the potential to redeem a Chaos Champion, though doing so would strip away Chaos Gifts.

They were never retconned. An Inquisitor wrote a report wherein he thought a Sensei band had links to a previously purged Tzeentch cult and therefore purged them. There is nothing to say he was right, and I would argue there are hints in the report that he was not. The cult could have been set up deliberately to create that opinion. I could see Tzeentch definitely appreciating the irony of getting the Emperor's Imperium to persecute his own descendants, and thereby screwing up one genuine hope for humanity. Readers seem to be unable to distinguish between in-character opinions of what is true and out of character out of universe statements of what is true. All sorts of people in the Imperium are mistaken about many things.

The star child and sensei stuff is some of my favourite fluff, the idea that the way to save humanity is to kill the body of the emperor and the whole imperium is going to stop that is in fact damning them is joyously ironic.

The latest novel, Throne of Light, by Guy Haley mentions the Star Child, and that particular cult of the Star Child that was supposedly destroyed. Apparently 4 of its leaders escaped.

There are also bits in the story about visions of a golden child and a radiant figure rising from a throne. So it seems GW is exploring that angle. Whether or not the visions are true or not, there are groups in the Imperium and on the side of Chaos that certainly take them seriously. Now all we need is a Sensei...

LOL- Unfamiliar with the Star Child fluff from 40k, but I was born in the same year that Wicked Lester changed their name to Kiss, and the Star Child will always be a Noise Marine named Paul Stanley.

I always liked the synskin idea. Protective layer, spray on, but need to remove it before it runs out of goodness.

On 40K background becoming more rationalised/coherent, I kind of agree.

The novels etc still throw up some surprises, but the more out-there stuff is of the past. But, with 40K being more a mythos than a setting, not a thing of the past. It’s all still kind of canon.

I am a huge fan of old Necron Pariahs. While I prefer C'tan being shattered, Pariahs were one of the sad consequences of new lore.

Also, I do like the idea that the Emperor could have lived, Inquisitors just kept it from happening. Thanks for the tidbit.

We may see Pariah’s return yet. Reversing Bio-Transference could involve many steps.

I do like the ideal of Malal being the fifth Chaos God in 40k, but I'm not sure how much made it into print before the creator departed and took the concept with him.

I know it is slightly echoed with Malice these days, which is why when I was doing a 13th Company force back in the Eye of Terror days, they looted armour from the Sons of Malice.

Quartered black & white is not a fun scheme to paint, I'll say that.

Am I just imagining things, or was it once canon that the STC the Rhino/Predator/etc. were derived from was actually intended to be a general-purpose workhorse tractor, but Dark Age tech was so crazy durable and versatile that bolting armour and guns to an STC tractor still makes a better combat vehicle than anything the Mechanicus could invent on their own? I'm sure I once read something about the rediscovery of the Land Raider STC being such a big deal because that thing was actually meant to be a tank.

I thought it was the Leman Russ chassis that was meant to be an agricultural reason, which is part of the reason they'll run on just about anything.

I'm pretty sure the RH1N0 was always meant to be a transport vehicle, though not necessarily a combat-focused one.

Lexicanum references 5th edition marine coded and imperial armour 2 to support rhino always being an exploration and transport vehicle.

The Siegfried is recorded as being based on an agricultural land crawler.

https://wh40k.lexicanum.com/wiki/Siegfried

Russes are referenced as being discovered as combat STCs

The Rhino was also mentioned as an "Tracked Exploration and Multi Defence vehicle" in Index Astartes.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
We may see Pariah’s return yet. Reversing Bio-Transference could involve many steps.

I believe that Necron Pariahs are the perfect candidate for a Necron Kill Team.

On a side note. This thread is proving a wonderful treasure trove for obscure lore. I’ve wanted to make a 40k Iceberg image that could rival the elder scrolls one, but slowly am running out of entries.

One of that list is the Tyranid Narvhal; the bioship responsible for allowing the hive fleets to enter warp-speed. I don’t remember them mentioned in more recent fluff, and I hope they weren’t retconned.

The Ordo Sepulturum, Ordo Cadia, and the Cadian Interior Guard.

All things lost to time or retconned into the dumbest possible crap.

The Ordo Sepulturum still exists, it got mentioned in Avenging Son. The Ordo Aegis comes up when I searched for the Ordo Cadia, which may or may not have evolved into the Ordo Maledictum which is dedicated to finding ways to drive back or close the Great Rift.
As for the Interior Guard, can't guard what doesn't exist lol.