Been hearing a lot of rumblings from normal people in the warhammer community they are tired of fascists worshipping the imperium of man in their community.

is it like a human supremacist group in the lore or something like the empire in Star Wars?

  • RandyLahey [he/him]
    ·
    2 years ago

    ive read way too many 40k novels lol (yeah i read theory) and theres a huuuuuge disconnect between the different writers. youre absolutely right that the eisenhorn/ravenor books in particular are all about how incredibly dogshit the imperium is, and other books do make this clear as well

    but with a lot of the space marine focused ones you can just feel the authors jerking themselves off as they write (someone should compile all the bits from the horus heresy novels where they first describe each of the primarchs in particular lol) and they are often really uncritical or apologetic about not just the space marines but the imperium itself

    and of course the video games mostly go no deeper than "yay space marines"

    • LoudMuffin [he/him]
      ·
      edit-2
      2 years ago

      I like the Grey Knights novels because everything they deal with is shown to be a nightmarish shitshow lol, I couldn't get into the Horus Heresy books

      also the moment in Gaunts Ghosts where the Chaos Space marines get fucking merc'ed by the indigenous people of a planet because they were too full of pride and hubris to wear helmets is 10/10 writing

      • RandyLahey [he/him]
        ·
        2 years ago

        yeah youre not missing much, apart from a couple of the dan abnett ones (this is a recurring theme for 40k novels) the horus heresy novels are unadulterated dogshit

        and lol that sounds awesome

        • CyborgMarx [any, any]
          ·
          2 years ago

          Unironically Angel Exterminatus is a fantastic novel, like in the classical sense

          53 books you’re bound to hit gold

        • TreadOnMe [none/use name]
          ·
          2 years ago

          I think they make sense and are fun if you think about them less as a historical archive, and more like a space opera propaganda piece, with big men with big feelings that they can't deal with. Its like watching Riverdale but with more violence.

      • RandyLahey [he/him]
        ·
        edit-2
        2 years ago

        none of them are anything remotely approaching good literature, but a good rule of thumb is that dan abnett and aaron dembski-bowden (sp?) are their two decent authors and everything else is complete and utter garbage

        yeah eisenhorn is probably a pretty good place to start and probably the best of the ones ive read, i think its a much more interesting portrayal of the imperium than the ones that are just 200 pages of space marines shooting at things

        edit: another series i would recommend are the aaron dembski bowden ones about the night lords - they always seemed like the most teenage edgelord chaos marines but their portrayal in these books is really interesting

        • leonadas444 [none/use name]
          hexagon
          ·
          2 years ago

          kind of What other people told me upon further investigation is that Dan and aaron are the only two people writing for them worth a damn.

          Thanks

          • anaesidemus [he/him]
            ·
            2 years ago

            Yeah I draw a line between Dembski-Bowden/Abnett and whatever the other guys are doing.

            I think a better discussion would be who is the worst of them, I nominate Gav Thorpe.

            • Evilsandwichman [none/use name]
              ·
              2 years ago

              I tried reading some WH40k books but yeah, the comment about 200 pages of space marines shooting things is apt. Even the Caiphas Cain books, while holding some interesting material was full of mostly combat.

              I can't put my finger on why but even the first book of the Horus Heresy written by Dan Abnett (I think?) was too dull to continue and I'm not sure if it was combat intensive (ironically if I'd read it as a kid I probably would've loved it as I found these action scenes cool; now I just want a good story).

      • Prozmar [comrade/them]
        ·
        2 years ago

        I want to take an opportunity to recommend the only Warhammer books that can count as good literature - everything written by Peter Fehervari.