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How do!

So ever since 40K moved from a setting, to an ongoing narrative, it’s bugged me that few of any great import ever go splat. Sure, there’s the odd person that comes a cropper (Aun’va, Yarrick) but for the most part? The plot armour is strong.

Of course from a gaming perspective this isn’t entirely undesirable. I doubt anyone particularly fancies buying, building and painting a given named character, only for them to get killed to death in the background.

But, I still feel that to add some stakes to the game, heads must roll, and new blood rise to replace them, and further drive the narrative.

I think that any named Chapter Master should be fair game for the Reaper’s scythe. Only in death does duty end, after all.

Likewise? And I appreciate this is a super contentious one? I think Abaddon snuffing it could make for an interesting circumstance. So far he’s the only one that’s really been able to wrangle the disparate Chaos forces into something approximating a cohesive whole. And honestly? With the Great Rift in play, much of his job is done. Then given it seems incredibly bloody unlikely he’ll be allowed to lead a successful assault on Terra? I feel that to some extent, his tale is done. He’s had his massive victory. Let him fall, and the resulting fallout make matters a whole lot worse for the Imperium, as the varying Chaos Forces now go totally rogue, making their movements and plans even less predictable. Then, in the power vacuum let another rise in his place. Because such a replacement is inevitable.

Orks? Well, they’ve few enough. Ghaz I think can stay, but I feel he needs to take out a major rival/crony. For instance, if Ghaz took out Nazdreg and in doing so absorbed his forces? They become an even more serious threat. So a reverse Abaddon if you will.

Note I’m not arguing for any of these to actually happen. They’re just suggestions as to what might drive the narrative further.

What are your thoughts?

I'd vote for some loyalist Primarch. Doesn't have to be Guilliman because he's in a rather interesting position. But the Lion seems quite pointless to me.
Or take others that have not yet materialized in miniature form. Eldar Craftworlds can't be the only stuff that bites the dust in the 40th Millennium.
All stupid Wolf time stuff be damned, let Russ return as a full on possessed Wulfen werewolf and then just - die. Bonus points if he has to be taken down by the Lion or other loyalists and not in some stupid heroic last stand where he kills a Million CSM.
Make it a cool story if you like, Magnus turns Russ into a mad possessed that has to be dealt with, let the Lion speak up for him to not fill the Memes even more, but then let him be brought down by Logan or Gulliman. On his way down let Russ kill a couple of named Space Wolves characters, they have too many anyway.
Yes, you will see Space Wolves Fans on the streets, but honestly? Eldar players had to witness Biel Tan going down and IG players saw the destruction of Cadia, for once SM can lose something as well.

I'll admit any other faction imo has too few named characters in miniature form anyway, so if you ask me Space Marines, and especially the Angels, the Wolves and the Ultras are the only faction where there's room to kill someone (who has a miniature).

On the other hand it would be a nice change of pace if some Tau or non-augmented humans just die of old age.

Perhaps we could weld two into one narrative whole?

Russ reappears, described as you say. Tears his way through Abaddon and his bodyguard. There is much rejoicing. But…no…that’s not right….settle down, Beavis, they’re all like dead and stuff….oh…he’s not stopping….oh…oh dear. And so one of his Loyal Brothers has to put him down?

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Orks? Well, they’ve few enough. Ghaz I think can stay, but I feel he needs to take out a major rival/crony. For instance, if Ghaz took out Nazdreg and in doing so absorbed his forces? They become an even more serious threat. So a reverse Abaddon if you will.

Ghaz is in a tricky spot due to the Beast series of books. If you consider them canon (which is understandable if you do not, because they are insane) Ghaz looks so utterly pathetic in comparison that it's hard to express, and it makes him harder to take seriously as a threat.

I personally am in camp of just blinking and pretending Beast didn't happen because Ghaz really doesn't deserve this. But if you don't, you pretty much have to massively power him up in order for him to feel like a relevant player in the history of his species the way other central characters like Vect, Eldrad, Guilliman and Abaddon are, or kill and replace him with someone who is.

Redeem Magnus the Red, have him become a Loyalist who sits at the right hand of the Emperor.

Next, kill off Cypher. He serves no point anymore with the Lion wandering about. The Fallen are being redeemed... no need for him.

And finally get rid of the ultimate bizarrely implemented character in 40k, Cawl the Lesser. Why would anyone in the Imperium be okay with an AI?

On Cawl the Lesser?

Is it AI? Or is it just a copy, made possible by potentially suspect, but within letter if not spirit of the law, sanctioned technology?

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Perhaps we could weld two into one narrative whole?

Russ reappears, described as you say. Tears his way through Abaddon and his bodyguard. There is much rejoicing. But…no…that’s not right….settle down, Beavis, they’re all like dead and stuff….oh…he’s not stopping….oh…oh dear. And so one of his Loyal Brothers has to put him down?

I think I like Abby too much, but GW doesn't seem to know what to do with him anymore. His actions on Vigilus already seemed quite pitiful. Would be fun if he actually marched to Terra and then Russ came in as you say, also fractures that Hive fleet that's on the way but in the end starts to slaughter his way to the throne room
However, if he killed Abaddon I want Russ to be severely injured in the process so that the loyalists even stand a chance against him. CSM are too often depicted as punching bags nowadays, at least give poor Abby a nice standoff, badly hurt that Wolf thing. But in the end he'll get his arms ripped off, for the memes .

I vote for Marneus "Plot Armor" Calgar.

Calgar does feel a bit superfluous now Guilliman is kicking around. But what would that bring to the background?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
But I definitely feel a Primarch (not every Primarch!) needs to claim a major kill.

I mean, that’s partly what they’re for. To perform the otherwise untenable decapitation strike as possibly the finest warriors to have ever existed.

Whereas currently? It all feels a bit Saturday Morning Cartoon Villain.

Which is why I’d pick Abaddon. He’s a canker right enough. But if you kill him? Chaos will lose much of what overall cohesion it has. Sounds great. But that could be akin to relieving appendicitis by popping it. Yes OK the appendix no longer hurts loads. But now there’s peritonitis which is much, much worse.

I think it would also give the Galaxy some room to breathe, narratively speaking. All those competing to be the next Abaddon off and around Up To No Good, making ever larger sacrifices and dedications to the gods to win the most favour.

The Imperium would still be trying to recover from the Great Rift too, so it’s not like it gets off Scott Free.

 Lathe Biosas wrote:
Next, kill off Cypher. He serves no point anymore with the Lion wandering about. The Fallen are being redeemed... no need for him.

Cypher's goal has never been to redeem the Fallen, that's just a by product of his actual goal regarding meeting with the Emperor.

Anyone. Everyone? GW have this weird ongoing narrative that doesn't really lead to change. They even promoted, then demoted the Raven Guard Chapter Master over the course of 1 edition (or was it 2?). Why not just kill him? It's not like many people have any real attachment to Shrike anyway.

Even those characters with more history should be fair game. Calgar seems the most obvious, but really any of the named SM characters could go. They could even have had one or two fail to cross the Rubicon Primaris so it actually seemed dangerous.

As someone who doesn't really like too many special characters in the game, I think a general cull across all factions might be good. We now have multiple High Lords as playable models, for example. This seems dumb, but also feels like a good recipe for some interesting story arcs if one of them gets offed because they're spending all their time on the battlefield. Abaddon and Cypher also feel like good choices.

I'd say the Space Marines are the only faction where it'd feel fair to give them a trimming.

Most Xenos factions have too few named characters by comparison for it to really feel good killing any of them off.

Chaos I'm more ambivalent about. Angron is a jobber who only exists to make others look cool by killing him temporarily, and all the other Daemon Primarchs or Daemon characters have the same issue to a lesser extent. Huron exists to show a certain archetype and has the popular Badab war as his origin. Abaddon is maybe a choice but he's always been memed on for being rubbish so having him killed to big up some loyalist would be sad. The 4 chosen mortal champions are kinda bleh because being a chosen mortal champion makes you one note anyway. And Kharn has already come back to life, and Lucius is a jobber like Angron anyway. Maybe you kill Ahriman? He's not exactly popular with anyone, in universe.

But whoever gets killed should be killed by a Xenos force. Like let the Swarmlord kill the Lion. Just do it! Let the Avatar break Marneus Calgar over it's knee. The salt will keep us going for years.

 BorderCountess wrote:
I vote for Marneus "Plot Armor" Calgar.

I'm guessing I shouldn't buy you a copy of the Marneus Calgar comic book from Marvel for your birthday then.

Anyone and anything with more than one "Wolf" in its name

Any character who has “Old” as part of their thing. Kill em, or stick them in a dread. Talion and Cassus spring to mind for the Ultras.

They want to move the timeline forward, fine. But that has consequences.

 Nevelon wrote:
Any character who has “Old” as part of their thing. Kill em, or stick them in a dread. Talion and Cassus spring to mind for the Ultras.

They want to move the timeline forward, fine. But that has consequences.

Traitors win again. Senescence is for casuals!

Oooh…possible cool?

Abaddon gets his arse kicked horribly, ideally by The Lion or Guilliman. Only, turns out he’s a perpetual, previously unknown to all, including himself.

From there, he gets his head kicked in again, and is imprisoned somewhere, creating a new focus for some Chaos Forces.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Oooh…possible cool?

Abaddon gets his arse kicked horribly, ideally by The Lion or Guilliman. Only, turns out he’s a perpetual, previously unknown to all, including himself.

From there, he gets his head kicked in again, and is imprisoned somewhere, creating a new focus for some Chaos Forces.

It would be an almost comical position for Abaddon, seing how he regarded that whole "recover the body of Horus" thing the Black Legion had going with Fabius and his cloning antics as a major fault in their emotional stance, and burning the body and breaking with the past as the Sons of Horus is literally his Alexander-burning-the-ships-moment and the true start of the Black Legion. His forces falling right back into the ol' Chaotic trap of mindlessly repeating the locked-in routine because your warp-addled focus literally does not allow you anything else anymore, only with him in Horus' stead would be a twist right out some 80s material (and therefor, good).

Honestly, with the exception of a few characters whose arcs are explicitly ongoing, I'd be fine if they just started throwing darts. Kill off a bunch of characters, seemingly with no rhyme or reason (maybe even a few who don't get to finish their arcs to keep us on our toes.) and bring in some new blood.

Honestly, it seems like a win/win. The setting gets shaken up, and GW gets to push more shiny new character models on us.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Oooh…possible cool?

Abaddon gets his arse kicked horribly, ideally by The Lion or Guilliman. Only, turns out he’s a perpetual, previously unknown to all, including himself.

From there, he gets his head kicked in again, and is imprisoned somewhere, creating a new focus for some Chaos Forces.

That sounds like a great idea.

The Great Rift can bite the dust. And the whole "ongoing story" thing, that can die, too.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Oooh…possible cool?

Abaddon gets his arse kicked horribly, ideally by The Lion or Guilliman. Only, turns out he’s a perpetual, previously unknown to all, including himself.

From there, he gets his head kicked in again, and is imprisoned somewhere, creating a new focus for some Chaos Forces.

Good lord, could you imagine how much jobbing GW would have him do if he came back on death like Lucius?

Don't do this to him.

Hence having him imprisoned.

You know he’s not going to stay so forever. I know he’s not going to stay so forever. But it gives his most loyal forces a very specific goal. And importantly? Gives Abaddon a narrative rest.

Heck, have his inevitable break out something of a Pyrrhic victory, with his forces suffering horrendous casualties, and dealing a hefty blow to whoever it is charged with defending his prison.

If in between times The Imperium uses his absence and the loss of his strategic oversight to stabilise things? Such a mutually destructive battle could nicely de-escalate the current background.

Abaddon has the task of rebuilding his forces, reforging alliances and bringing the more recalcitrant chaos worshippers back under his heel.

And the Imperium has lost enough Obviously High Value Defenders, that it has to make greater compromises in other areas etc.

So both have a period of rebuilding and licking wounds.

The Emperor.

Then we can have an entire edition of Sisters and Custodes players freak the feth out wondering if their army will be cut from the roster

Think of the Chaos, think of the YouTube rage!

Yes... Yes.

What do you mean? The Emperor is dead already.

 Mad Doc Grotsnik wrote:
Hence having him imprisoned.

You know he’s not going to stay so forever. I know he’s not going to stay so forever. But it gives his most loyal forces a very specific goal. And importantly? Gives Abaddon a narrative rest.

Heck, have his inevitable break out something of a Pyrrhic victory, with his forces suffering horrendous casualties, and dealing a hefty blow to whoever it is charged with defending his prison.

If in between times The Imperium uses his absence and the loss of his strategic oversight to stabilise things? Such a mutually destructive battle could nicely de-escalate the current background.

Abaddon has the task of rebuilding his forces, reforging alliances and bringing the more recalcitrant chaos worshippers back under his heel.

And the Imperium has lost enough Obviously High Value Defenders, that it has to make greater compromises in other areas etc.

So both have a period of rebuilding and licking wounds.

I must say after having read several GW campaign books with CSM in them that's basically how it always turns out for them.
Black Legion (or other Traitor Legion) attacks in big numbers, suffers horrendous losses, imperial side, likewize, barely stands until some Marines arrive, in the end it's a pyrrhic victory for either side and the system they fought over is doomed in the foreseeable future .
Funnily enough, in the next book that same Traitor Legion will be back just as strong and be slaughtered just as bad.

I'm against making anyone a perpetual. It's one of the dumbest things in 40K. I would be SORT of okay if they were like the Highlander in that they just didn't die naturally, but regenerating back from death like Dr Who is awful for the setting.

The evolving narrative and focus on characters is not something I enjoy at all, and it seems to me that having this along with the only characters who die being designated respawning jobbers is the worst of all worlds.

Because it's focused on their characters rather than yours (negative) but still stays stagnant because "no one's ever really gone" (negative) makes the universe feel smaller because these named heroes are in every conflict or the focus of every piece of fiction (negative) and ruins the gravitas of any character or being that can come back from the dead (Lucius, Avatar, Swarmlord, Vulkan and even Ghaz to an extent with comic book Ork medicine).

Killing characters in the moving narrative is the ONLY way to make 40K feel right if you're going to move it forward.

We had more characters dying back when it was a fixed setting than we do now. Makes for awful writing.

 Dysartes wrote:
The Great Rift can bite the dust. And the whole "ongoing story" thing, that can die, too.

You need an element of ongoing story in order to have space for new things, or having old things return. Stagnation doesn't seem good for the game or the setting.

I’m on the fence there.

For most of its existence, 40K was pretty much a sandbox setting where nothing ever changed.

On one hand, that meant the story telling was pretty much in our hands as the players. We had free rein for any number of stories and campaigns. The rules didn’t include ways to permanently squelch named characters either.

On the other? An advancing timeline does bring opportunity. The greatest example I can give her would be Leagues of Votann. Whilst my argument isn’t “this is the only way they could’ve been introduced”, by having their re-emergence linked to ongoing galactic events it felt very cool, and was done well.

But without scalps being claimed? It still doesn’t feel especially dynamic. Like…there’s no actual risk to anyone. For all our home made characters, as the setting says. they won’t be missed because kinda suiting to the setting? They’re inconsequential on the galactic stage. Just necessarily replaceable nobodies. But named characters Won’t Be Missed Because Apparently We’re Not Given The Chance To Miss Them, Because They’re Not Going Anywhere.

For human lifespan races each edition I would kill off the older age characters. Whether by combat or just old age. Half of the characters in the junior level I would promote to the mid level and kill off the others. Half the mid level I would promote to the late level and kill the others. And repeat each edition. Some will be bright and brief and others will have long storied careers. This will make it seem more natural with the time flow of the setting. Unless your nigh immortal you do not live for centuries as a Lieutenant or a Captain.

Tygre wrote:
For human lifespan races each edition I would kill off the older age characters. Whether by combat or just old age. Half of the characters in the junior level I would promote to the mid level and kill off the others. Half the mid level I would promote to the late level and kill the others. And repeat each edition. Some will be bright and brief and others will have long storied careers. This will make it seem more natural with the time flow of the setting. Unless your nigh immortal you do not live for centuries as a Lieutenant or a Captain.

I'm not quite sure if the timeline actually progresses like this since 8th. My feeling is more we had that one timejump during the forming of the Rift, but since then it's merely every edition showing some different battlezones in the galaxy, even without mentioning any time passing at all. So, Mortarion's attack on Ultramar, the Silent King awakening, Tyranids doing their tyranid stuff even more, the Vigilus and the Nachmund campaigns - all of that might as well happen at about the same time or within a timeframe of a few years.