[champ]

Briar King, on 17 March 2021 - 03:33 PM, said:

You should read. I'm having fun with it.

Aye, I will do at some point, it's getting around to it that is the problem. More to the TRP.

[JPK]

There are four or five of us doing Gaunt's Ghosts right now. No time like the present!

[Garak]

And at least one person enjoying relieving things through the people experiencing it for the first time.

[Aptorian]

Finished chapter 6 in Gaunt book 8.

Ok, so I think I know who the Pheguth is:

Spoiler

It's probably Lugo.

It's somebody Gaunt refers to as "old friend", said with quotation marks. And it sounds like he's there to kill him.

I don't think there's anyone else alive so far in the books that have been an enemy of Gaunt.

Assuming it is Lugo how the hell did he get to that planet in one year? Was he transferred and fuck up even worse? Did he flee Herodor during the fight? Or was he captured?

I'd speculated who ever it is was planted by the Guard to get close to the Chaos guy but no mortal is likely to be able to withstand what ever weird torture or indoctrination they've got going.

This post has been edited by Aptorian: 17 March 2021 - 08:12 PM

[Garak]

You'll see. Just keep in mind travel between planets is done via the Warp. And Warp travel laughs at logic. Travel time is a wild guess. Five years can pass on board shuip and only 2 days outside, or vice verse, or you arrive before you even left. There is a codex story (army book for the game) about and ork warlord leading a WAAAAGH! (ork holy war/bar crawl) and ending back before he left, in the same system. So he killed the version of him he encountered there because he wanted two copies of his favorite gun. The rest of the orks where so confused by what hapenned that the WAAAAGH! was cancelled.

[champ]

Are the Gaunt books the best place to start?

[amphibian]

champ, on 17 March 2021 - 08:50 PM, said:

Are the Gaunt books the best place to start?

If you have a reasonable 5 minutes worth of understanding of the setting, especially for knowing who the Emperor is, what Chaos forces want to do, what a Tyranid swarm is, what Orks and Necrons are, the Gaunts books are a great place to start. They're kind of like Band of Brothers in a way that some like and some don't.

If you want more of a funnier introduction, I would go with the Ciaphas Cain books as they follow a scoundrel that's highly effective in combat and taking you around the different settings.

[Aptorian]

Personally I think the Gaunt books are too assuming about the readers knowledge of WH40k lore and technicalities. If you're completely blank about Warhammer a lot of stuff will probably be confusing.


I also think the Gaunt angle is a bit too low sci-fi. Some fantastic elements aside, these books could be set in WW2 or Vietnam and they'd work the same. Before starting I pictured every Imperial Guard battle being like the invasion of Stalingrad on steroids, which it is sometimes but it's also pretty ordinary at times.

[JPK]

The Ciaphas Cain books are where I'm going when I finish GG. Though, where would I find more about Tzeentch? That thing sounds fascinating.

[Aptorian]

Only other Warhammer I've read is a Grey Knights trilogy. Tzeentch is a factor in that story.

[Sindriss]

champ, on 17 March 2021 - 08:50 PM, said:

Are the Gaunt books the best place to start?

Think that starting with Eisenhorn series and then follow up with Ravenor series is a great beginning to warhammer 40k. Plus, they are some of the best series in the universe in my opinion.

[Garak]

The anthology Architect of Fate has 4 stories of various people being dickered around by Kairos Fateweaver, a greater deamon of Tzeentch. The Ahriman trilogy follows Ahzek Ahriman, a sorcerer of the Thousand Sons Legion, generally considered Tzeentch's favorite person to troll.

Starting with Eisenhorn does ease you into the setting, let's you see normal life on some worlds and such. It's a good starting point, yes.

This post has been edited by Garak: 18 March 2021 - 08:58 AM

[champ]

I ended up buying the Gaunt books since I am quite comfortable with all the lore, history and races.


I looked into the Ciaphas Cain books but couldn't find a reading order between the books and short stories so I put that purchase on the back burner.


I'll finish Railsea then dive into First and Only.

[Garak]

About what you said BK.

Spoiler

It's true that in most fantasy when the dark elves show up they have black skin because I guess the drow inspired a lot of people. I totally get it as I'm a big of the drow but that's beside the point. The Dark Eldar tend to be pale as a corpse .... their hearts however are so black as to make vantablack look like light grey. While all factions in 40k tend to participate in the "Who's the most evil" race, the Dark Eldar have the lead by a mile. While stories involving them can be funny (dark humor of course) they are irredeemably evil. I need to get into Eldar history for a bit to make my point.

The Eldar ruled a galaxy spanning Empire and had absolute power to do whatever the heck they wanted. So naturally their society became decadent over time. The problem was how far they took it. Let's just say they found the bottom of the barrel of depravity and decided that's way to tame for them, they need more. Parts of the Eldar society was looking at this stuff and went "Nope" so hard they fled to uncolonized maiden worlds, settled down and rejected most technology, become the dinosaur riding Exodites we know these days. Another group jumped on board the Craftworlds and fled the heart of their Empire and became extreme prudes about everything (I'm serius, the Craftworld eldar are really prudish lest they invite the gaze of She-Who-Thrists, aka Slaanesh, the Dark Prince). While these groups were doing that, the rest kept doing nightmare stuff for fun.

All of that depravity and pain and whatnot (because of course they ended up torturing people for fun and when that got boring, the sport became how long and painful the torture could be)? All of it echoed in the Warp. And coalesced into the 4th Chaos God, Slaanesh. Now, the birth of Slaanesh was a long and painful thing for the galaxy, as warp storms broke out everywhere and basically screwed over the human Empire at the time, plunging them into the crap state the Emperor had to save them from. And when Slaanesh was finally born, he-she-it (Slaanesh is all genders and none at the same time) basically created the Eye of Terror, the biggest warp storm in the galaxy (well, it used to be anyway) and collapsed the Eldar Empire when she devoured the souls of 90% of them upon birth.

Right before that happened, a few of the depraved fuckers realized what was coming and fled into the webway (space highway that bypasses the warp but can still be breached by it) and sealed themselves into a pocket dimension in it. There they built a city called Commoragh and became the Dark Eldar.

The Exodites now depend on their worldspirits to keep their souls safe from Slaanesh, the Craftworld wear soul stones that collect their souls upon death and which are then placed into the Infinity Circuit of the Craftworld they hail from. The Dark Eldar? They just keep on doing the shit they did before the fall (actually even worse at this point) and they are constantly loosing bits of their souls to Slaanesh, especially if they leave their pocket dimension. Their soul is an open wound that can only be salved with suffering, a void that can only be filled with tortured bodies, a thrist that can only be quenched by spilled blood. They are beyond terrified of dying, because they know who will eat their souls when that happens and they will do anything, go to any lengths to avoid that. They have resurrection technology that can work even with a pile of ashes.

Here's a quote of that in action: As a cacophony of shrieks rises and falls around the chamber, those installed in the cocoons above slowly feast upon the resonant energies, ever so gradually growing back their bodies - skeleton first, then muscle and sinew, then alabaster skin until they are whole once more. During times of war, it is common for every one of an oubliette's regeneration pods to be filled with leering, red-raw fiends that shiver and rattle with every fresh scream.

There is a reason being captured by them is considered among the worst fates possible in the setting. Especially because of the haemonculi. Mad scientist doesn't even begin to describe these things. Turning someone into a chair, while still being alive and capable of feeling the pain and horror is standard procedure for them. And the Dark Eldar are all about raiding and bringing back prisoners/slaves/sex toys/etc. Gods help any Eldar captured by them, the things they'll do then.

Otoh among their ranks is Lelith Hesperax, widely considered by the fans to be hottest woman in the setting. So there's that.

Regarding the Cain series and chronology:

The events depicted in the novels and short stories are not strictly chronological according to publication, since the Cain Archive was purportedly written in its entirety during Cain's retirement, and select portions are published according to Inquisitor Vail's whim. Aside from Vail, the only clue to the order of the events depicted is Cain's passing reference to some past event.

For instance, in For the Emperor, the first full-length Cain novel, Cain refers in passing to the First Siege of Perlia, which earned him much of his unwanted notoriety, but this event is not depicted in any detail until Death or Glory, the fourth novel.

Using these indefinite clues, the rough chronological order of the short stories and novels is as follows:


1. Fight or Flight (Short Story)
2. Sector 13 (Short Story)
3. The Beguiling (Short Story)
4. Death or Glory (Novel)
5. Echoes of the Tomb (Short Story)
6. The Emperor's Finest (Novel)
7. Dead in the Water (Audio Book)
8. For the Emperor (Novel)
9. Caves of Ice (Novel)
10. Duty Calls (Novel)
11. The Traitor's Hand (Novel)
12. Old Soldiers Never Die (Novella)
13. The Last Ditch (Novel)
14. Traitor's Gambit (Short Story)
15. Choose Your Enemy
16. The Greater Good (Novel)
17. Cain's Last Stand (Novel)

This post has been edited by Garak: 18 March 2021 - 04:52 PM

[Aptorian]

champ, on 18 March 2021 - 04:31 PM, said:

I ended up buying the Gaunt books since I am quite comfortable with all the lore, history and races.


I looked into the Ciaphas Cain books but couldn't find a reading order between the books and short stories so I put that purchase on the back burner.


I'll finish Railsea then dive into First and Only.

You reading Railsea by China Mieville? What do you think about it?

[champ]

Garak, on 18 March 2021 - 04:39 PM, said:

Regarding the Cain series and chronology:

The events depicted in the novels and short stories are not strictly chronological according to publication, since the Cain Archive was purportedly written in its entirety during Cain's retirement, and select portions are published according to Inquisitor Vail's whim. Aside from Vail, the only clue to the order of the events depicted is Cain's passing reference to some past event.

For instance, in For the Emperor, the first full-length Cain novel, Cain refers in passing to the First Siege of Perlia, which earned him much of his unwanted notoriety, but this event is not depicted in any detail until Death or Glory, the fourth novel.

Using these indefinite clues, the rough chronological order of the short stories and novels is as follows:


1. Fight or Flight (Short Story)
2. Sector 13 (Short Story)
3. The Beguiling (Short Story)
4. Death or Glory (Novel)
5. Echoes of the Tomb (Short Story)
6. The Emperor's Finest (Novel)
7. Dead in the Water (Audio Book)
8. For the Emperor (Novel)
9. Caves of Ice (Novel)
10. Duty Calls (Novel)
11. The Traitor's Hand (Novel)
12. Old Soldiers Never Die (Novella)
13. The Last Ditch (Novel)
14. Traitor's Gambit (Short Story)
15. Choose Your Enemy
16. The Greater Good (Novel)
17. Cain's Last Stand (Novel)

Thanks for that, I had seen somthing similar but also found some other books:

Last Night at the Resplendent, The Smallest Detail and A Mug of Recaff, wasn't sure where they fitted in.

Aptorian, on 18 March 2021 - 04:44 PM, said:

champ, on 18 March 2021 - 04:31 PM, said:

I ended up buying the Gaunt books since I am quite comfortable with all the lore, history and races.


I looked into the Ciaphas Cain books but couldn't find a reading order between the books and short stories so I put that purchase on the back burner.


I'll finish Railsea then dive into First and Only.

You reading Railsea by China Mieville? What do you think about it?

Aye, not too far in but I can already tell that I am going to enjoy the book, my first Mieville book, quite a quirky writing style hasn't he. Thanks for a good recommend.

This post has been edited by champ: 18 March 2021 - 05:34 PM

[Aptorian]

Nothing brings more happinesses than the confirmation that somebody's likes a book you like.

[Garak]

Ain't that the truth.

[champ]

Aptorian, on 18 March 2021 - 05:41 PM, said:

Nothing brings more happinesses than the confirmation that somebody's likes a book you like.

I know what you mean, it's like an acknowledging meeting of minds.

[Aptorian]

Did we all fall off Warhammer at the same time?