Cliches you can't stand

[The Laurent]

>implying that matters any more

Let me use an example, shall I? Let's open For the Emperor, 1st book of the Ciaphas Cain series, one of the bigger favorites of WH40K.

The Imperial Guard is sent to an Imperial World that is near Tau Empire space, to keep the planet from defecting.

They arrive, and they don't start shooting.

The Tau Ambassador gets shot by a Genestealer Cult. So yeah, the fighting gonna begi-

Oh hang on, the main character is offering a flag of truce to the alien, bet his men aren't too happy about it-

Holy fucking shit, everyone agrees with him because no one needs another war for the Imperium!

And later, they meet up to help fight off the Genestealers and Tyranids!

"B-B-But I thought they were all xenocidal maniacs??!!!"

Dude, that thing was written a long long fucking time ago. While its an abstract representation of the setting, its also outdated in a sense. WH40K has been slowly growing into a more nuanced setting of the years for a very long time.

Also, this isn't the only example. If you do a simple trawl of the games, you will notice that the Imperium has worked with xenos a lot.

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The thing is, okay two things. First, I like the Cain books, but they aren't necessarily the most-possible-correct portray of the Imperium.

Second, did you miss the part where at the end he specifically kept a secret that would do nothing but fuck over them and make the Universe a worse place because, "In the end, the Tau are enemies" essentially.

So even the Cain books, which are going for a lighter tone, have shit like that.

 

[tankdrop24]

*shrug* The third games pretty substantially different from the first two in terms of tone and characterization. In small ways, but pretty impactful ones.



What? WHAAAAAT?

Humanity being a fanatical clusterfuck of superstition and ignorance is like, fuckin', one of the cornerstones of the franchise! Warhammer writers have hammered it in over and over and over again! It's in the intro text of the entire franchise!



How? How do you people miss half the entire point of your own favourite setting?! Hoooooooooooooooowwwwwwww.... how do you do this? You people are breaking my brain!

Also, dude. This fictional slur?



Is first used, atleast to my knowledge, by an aristocrat who has a bunch of elven women carried off to have a fucking rape party. So, uh, not cool?

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It's not enough for them to simply watch and identify with an xenophobic authoritarian humanity anymore, now they feel they have to be patted on the back for it, and consider any sort of criticism or alternate perspective an attack.

>implying that matters any more

Let me use an example, shall I? Let's open For the Emperor, 1st book of the Ciaphas Cain series, one of the bigger favorites of WH40K.

The Imperial Guard is sent to an Imperial World that is near Tau Empire space, to keep the planet from defecting.

They arrive, and they don't start shooting.

The Tau Ambassador gets shot by a Genestealer Cult. So yeah, the fighting gonna begi-

Oh hang on, the main character is offering a flag of truce to the alien, bet his men aren't too happy about it-

Holy fucking shit, everyone agrees with him because no one needs another war for the Imperium!

And later, they meet up to help fight off the Genestealers and Tyranids!

"B-B-But I thought they were all xenocidal maniacs??!!!"

Dude, that thing was written a long long fucking time ago. While its an abstract representation of the setting, its also outdated in a sense. WH40K has been slowly growing into a more nuanced setting of the years for a very long time.

Also, this isn't the only example. If you do a simple trawl of the games, you will notice that the Imperium has worked with xenos a lot.

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GASP it's almost like working with other species is a good thing.

If it's going to be a more nuanced setting, then why does it have to be just 'oh the imperials aren't that bad'. Can't their more negative aspects be criticized?

Can't the other factions have their day as heros? The Imperium is big enough to have unambiguous villains.

Or would that get in the way of the macho fantasy of being able to kill and slaughter without negative consequences or criticism because some corpse said it was okay and tell anyone who says otherwise that their some kind of crazy cultist?

 

[Nikkolas]

"Everyone is fighting and dying for me and i feel so bad about it that I'm going to put myself in more danger and waste all of the effort and potential sacrifice of these other people."

Human and understandable? Yes. Repetitive? Also yes. I could really do without ever seeing this in a story again.

 

[Triggerhappy]

Ciaphas Cain is literally a Blackadderesque tongue in cheek romp that makes fun of it's own source materiel! It's not as fucked up as the rest of 40K because it's supposed to be funny.

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It's not that Cain isn't canonical. It's that the Imperium is big enough to contain Ciaphas Cain, and Greghor Eisenhorn, and Cypher, and Caldor Drago. I mean, one thing that gets repeted oft enough in the Ciaphas Cain books is that Ciaphas' career was mostly against pretty conventional enemies. Conventional by 40K standards mind you, where a four ton bug beast that shoots chittering aciding chest bursters at you is downright run of the mill. His run ins with Chaos are atypical stand outs by comparison.

And it likewise shows in the attitudes of the people around him. Valhalans mostly fight Orks, they don't have much need to recite prayers to the Emperor save as a normal party of their day to day observances. Amberly works for the Ordo Xenos, Ordo Xenos usually don't need hocky superstitions when a good bolter will do, they're fighting aliens and genestealers, not chaos cultists.

It's not enough for them to simply watch and identify with an xenophobic authoritarian humanity anymore, now they feel they have to be patted on the back for it, and consider any sort of criticism or alternate perspective an attack.

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To be fair @The Victorian is, by their own admission, stating that they're writing Eldar Supremacy fiction. XXX-Fuck Yeah stories get old and boring even if you're into that sort of thing.

And it's sort of Insulting to the Imperium as, even taken in the darkest light, they provide fodder for way better villains then just going 'dur-hur' ignorant, racist, superstitious humans mon-keigh!

 

[Hykal94]

Because the City's literally some sort of massive bloodmagic ritual glyph for driving everything around it mad and/or evil and/or evilmad.

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I'm actually somewhat very annoyed at this. "Places suck because of blood magic!" or "Nazis were evil because of demons!" or "People went mad due to corrupting stones nearby!"

Places don't suck because of blood magic, but because it's poorly run and lacks infrastructure.
Nazis weren't evil because of demons, Nazis are evil because they did horrible things despite knowing what they're doing is wrong.
People don't go mad from Red Lyrium, people go crazy due to deteriorating health, lack of healthcare and other internal/extrenal elements.

It's an extremely simplistic viewpoint to hold, in my opinion. It's something you see in immature stories. An immature story would put the blame of a crumbling kingdom due to magic or dragons or whatever. A mature story would take more from history, showing that empires divide due to economic, social or institutional reasons. Rome fell because of many things, but one of the big ones is that they used a political system that's good for administering a small area (Italy) on such a large empire. A country that believes in the concept of itself will survive. Countries that do not become warzones. See: a good chunk of Africa and the Middle East.

Now, magical reasons could work if you're going for epics. Dark Souls' multiple kingdoms fell due to the curse of the Undead, its futile attempt to curb it, and by its scope is very grand. That works because Souls doesn't go for mundane, it goes for fantastical.

But something like Dragon Age with its politics AND its hordes from hell? With its Mage-Templar thing? With its hundred of years of kingdoms and empires? It doesn't work as well.

I wish they got rid of that glyphs nonsense. Kirkwall became the way it is due to institutional failures between different factions is actually enough. A lack of cooperation, understanding and trust is exactly a symptom of a failed system: which can be applied to empires, nations, businesses, even families!

Assigning fantastical elements, to what doesn't need it, only dilutes the the conflict. It doesn't enhance it.

 

[The Laurent]

I'm actually somewhat very annoyed at this. "Places suck because of blood magic!" or "Nazis were evil because of demons!" or "People went mad due to corrupting stones nearby!"

Places don't suck because of blood magic, but because it's poorly run and lacks infrastructure.
Nazis weren't evil because of demons, Nazis are evil because they did horrible things despite knowing what they're doing is wrong.
People don't go mad from Red Lyrium, people go crazy due to deteriorating health, lack of healthcare and other internal/extrenal elements.

It's an extremely simplistic viewpoint to hold, in my opinion. It's something you see in immature stories. An immature story would put the blame of a crumbling kingdom due to magic or dragons or whatever. A mature story would take more from history, showing that empires divide due to economic, social or institutional reasons. Rome fell because of many things, but one of the big ones is that they used a political system that's good for administering a small area (Italy) on such a large empire. A country that believes in the concept of itself will survive. Countries that do not become warzones. See: a good chunk of Africa and the Middle East.

Now, magical reasons could work if you're going for epics. Dark Souls' multiple kingdoms fell due to the curse of the Undead, its futile attempt to curb it, and by its scope is very grand. That works because Souls doesn't go for mundane, it goes for fantastical.

But something like Dragon Age with its politics AND its hordes from hell? With its Mage-Templar thing? With its hundred of years of kingdoms and empires? It doesn't work as well.

I wish they got rid of that glyphs nonsense. Kirkwall became the way it is due to institutional failures between different factions is actually enough. A lack of cooperation, understanding and trust is exactly a symptom of a failed system: which can be applied to empires, nations, businesses, even families!

Assigning fantastical elements, to what doesn't need it, only dilutes the the conflict. It doesn't enhance it.

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But Hykal. Think about what you're saying. Are you saying that Dragon attacks aren't a pretty good reason for a land to fall apart? Like, I mean, if dragons suddenly attacked Rome in 2 AD, then Rome might have collapsed several centuries early.

 

[Hykal94]

But Hykal. Think about what you're saying. Are you saying that Dragon attacks aren't a pretty good reason for a land to fall apart? Like, I mean, if dragons suddenly attacked Rome in 2 AD, then Rome might have collapsed several centuries early.

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listen here smartass

 

[Alane1]

Bah if dragons attacked ancient Rome they'd capture them and force condemned to fight them to the deaths in the Colosseum to entertain crowds tens of thousands as a halftime show.

 

[Triggerhappy]

People don't go mad from Red Lyrium, people go crazy due to deteriorating health, lack of healthcare and other internal/extrenal elements.

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Some of those external elements can include the consumption of a toxic mineral, like lead, or contracting a brain parasyte like toxoplasma gondii. Red Lyrium is literally both of those things at the same time. Heck, a lot of people were even exposed to it due to poor working conditions.

So maybe not the best example within Dragon Age itself. You're on firmer ground with bloor rune asshaterry.

Of course, I broadly agree with you that 'people do evil because they are being meat puppeted by evil forces' is a pretty lousy way of establishing morally unambiguous villains to mow down.

 

[Nikkolas]

@Hykal94 Are you calling LOTR or The Silmarillion "immature"? I'm just trying to establish where your line is because "things are happening because evil external magical forces" permeates a lot of fiction and those two are no exception. The entire tragedy of Turin is Morgoth's fault, Denethor going mad is because he looked into a magic doohickey, etc., etc..

 

[MJ12 Commando]

The two are completely interchangable in 90% of cases and a very narrow slice at thaat. When most authors go HFY in stories they sure as shit not talking about black people in New Orleans or gay people in San Fran.

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Man, this makes me kind of want a sci-fi where the Generic Centrist Space America gets its shit kicked in by the aliens and like, the aliens only stop when a bunch of hippies in a flower motif wagon introduce the aliens to the idea of universal peace and love and forgiveness, sacrificing themselves on the desperate hope that the aliens might be able to understand them.

 

[Entropy Judge]

The thing is, okay two things. First, I like the Cain books, but they aren't necessarily the most-possible-correct portray of the Imperium.

Second, did you miss the part where at the end he specifically kept a secret that would do nothing but fuck over them and make the Universe a worse place because, "In the end, the Tau are enemies" essentially.

So even the Cain books, which are going for a lighter tone, have shit like that.

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Although the Storm Trooper codex mentions that short-term alliances with the Tau do happen, and the 86th Deltic Dragoons have worked with the Tau to defend two worlds from Hive Fleet Gorgon splinters.

So, as with everything else 40K, it depends on where you're getting your information from and how much stock you put in it.

 

[Hykal94]

@Hykal94 Are you calling LOTR or The Silmarillion "immature"? I'm just trying to establish where your line is because "things are happening because evil external magical forces" permeates a lot of fiction and those two are no exception. The entire tragedy of Turin is Morgoth's fault, Denethor going mad is because he looked into a magic doohickey, etc., etc..

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I just used Dark Souls as an example of great epics using themes like dark and light doing well though. Like, LoTR gets a pass because it's LoTR for the most part. So no, Tolkien isn't immature. Dragon Age 2 is however, because Dragon Age 2 wants its commentary on mages/templars, does it alright I guess, but kinda throws it out of the window with the mystery of Kirkwall stuff.

 

[Mutton]

Man, this makes me kind of want a sci-fi where the Generic Centrist Space America gets its shit kicked in by the aliens and like, the aliens only stop when a bunch of hippies in a flower motif wagon introduce the aliens to the idea of universal peace and love and forgiveness, sacrificing themselves on the desperate hope that the aliens might be able to understand them.

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It's funny; HFY was actually coined to talk about stories where humanity is wearing a hat rather than being a generic race. Even the "humans beat up the universe" stories were "humanity is like a Mad Max gang raiding the suburbs" instead of "GLORIOUS GALACTIC EMPIRE." Which was pretty cool! It's a shame that it's been grabbed to be used to name generic pap.

 

[DreamerGhost]

GASP it's almost like working with other species is a good thing.

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1)Imperium has tried that, it didin't work out that well.
2)Really, the Imperium litterally did not have any aliens to work with before Tau. The closest they had was Eldar, and if Eldar can save one of theirs for a milion humans, they are totally going to do so. Not the best allies material.

There exist minor alien civilisations at the edge of Imperial space that some Rogue Merchants trade with. We don't hear about them because they are peacfull and thus not a problem.

 

[random_human]

1)Imperium has tried that, it didin't work out that well.
2)Really, the Imperium litterally did not have any aliens to work with before Tau. The closest they had was Eldar, and if Eldar can save one of theirs for a milion humans, they are totally going to do so. Not the best allies material.

There exist minor alien civilisations at the edge of Imperial space that some Rogue Merchants trade with. We don't hear about them because they are peacfull and thus not a problem.

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Why are you giving Watsonian explanations? You realize that you are not in fact defending 40k at all, you're doing the literal opposite. What is happening here is that the writing is being critisised for being too dark. It also sets up a situation where fascism, bigotry and horrific atrocities are 'needed' and even encouraged which is many times worse. This is the fault of the writing, so you explaining that the ridiculous xenophobia is justified in setting is not a mark for the Imperium.

 

[DreamerGhost]

Why are you giving Watsonian explanations? You realize that you are not in fact defending 40k at all, you're doing the literal opposite. What is happening here is that the writing is being critisised for being too dark. It also sets up a situation where fascism, bigotry and horrific atrocities are 'needed' and even encouraged which is many times worse. This is the fault of the writing, so you explaining that the ridiculous xenophobia is justified in setting is not a mark for the Imperium.

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Ah, my mistake.

The Daltonian answer is because a universe where absolutely everyone is an unredeemable asshole and everything is doomed forever apparently is of interest to people. It is of interest to so damn many people that it's basically unavoidable on the internet. Because it allows you to justify damn near anything AND it allows you to play the big damn hero coming to save the day from hard men doing hard decisions while hard. It fills a niche at the far end spectrum of hopelessness.

 

[random_human]

it allows you to play the big damn hero coming to save the day from hard men doing hard decisions while hard. It fills a niche at the far end spectrum of hopelessness.

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'from'? Sure that's not a typo?
That doesn't explain why working with other species is considered a bad thing though from an out-of-universe perspective. This is a pretty major part of the Imperium and it can't be explained just by darkness and grittiness.

 

[Vyslanté]

That doesn't explain why working with other species is considered a bad thing though from an out-of-universe perspective. This is a pretty major part of the Imperium and it can't be explained just by darkness and grittiness.

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So that some people can fulfill their fantasies of killing indiscriminately without remorse. After all, if you can cooperate with them, that means that maybe there's possibilities of not killing eachother.

 

[DocSpooky]

If I remember right, it was because First Contact was the Eldar, who promptly through a hissy fit when the Imperium wouldn't surrender a bunch of planets to them.

 

[DreamerGhost]

'from'? Sure that's not a typo?
That doesn't explain why working with other species is considered a bad thing though from an out-of-universe perspective. This is a pretty major part of the Imperium and it can't be explained just by darkness and grittiness.

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The ammount of fics where the Imperium is "fixed" by introducing "one sane person" is stagering. And also utterly lore breaking. Which is why it's so reviled by the comunity. Seriously, the only two alien species who might(not a guarantee) to not just shoot the humans on sight are the Eldar and the Tau. Eldar are universally dicks who will betray you, and the Tau who are trying to conquer the Imperium.

Anyone who likes the lore enough to talk about it sees the frieendship with the xeno that isn't strictly temporary as a gross travesty against cannon. The rest of the comunity who doesn't care about the lore just generally dislikes people trying to change the only setting that gives them miniatures with chainaxes.

If I remember right, it was because First Contact was the Eldar, who promptly through a hissy fit when the Imperium wouldn't surrender a bunch of planets to them.

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From what I remember, before the AI rebelion, humans had many alien allies, ala Space Treck Federation style. Then literally all of them betrayed humanity in that moment of weakness and the Emperor dealt with them same as he did with the Men of Iron.

 

[GretelOstrich]

From what I remember, before the AI rebelion humans had many alien allies, ala Space Treck Federation style. Then literally all of them betrayed humanity in that moment of weakness and the Emperor dealt with them same as he did with the Men of Iron.

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Have you ever considered that this might be propaganda by the human-supremacist oppressive fascist empire or its human-supremacist fascist ubermensch founder? After all, it's pretty easy to justify your galactic genocide-conquest campaign if all the aliums are totes evil and eat babies, right?

just trust me okey it's totally a training camp for their warriors and not an orphanage, drop the napalm, guardsman

also edit, because I focused on the second half

Eldar are universally dicks who will betray you, and the Tau who are trying to conquer the Imperium.

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seeing as this is the Imperium and 40k humanity, any actions taken against them may be justified a self-defence

 

[DreamerGhost]

Have you ever considered that this might be propaganda by the human-supremacist oppressive fascist empire or its human-supremacist fascist ubermensch founder? After all, it's pretty easy to justify your galactic genocide-conquest campaign if all the aliums are totes evil and eat babies, right?

just trust me okey it's totally a training camp for their warriors and not an orphanage, drop the napalm, guardsman

also edit, because I focused on the second half

seeing as this is the Imperium and 40k humanity, any actions taken against them may be justified a self-defence

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Actually, the whole galactic genocidal conquest campaign was about reuniting human worlds lost when galaxy sized warp storms cut off FTL everywhere. And also recollecting the Primarchs. Murder of xeno was a side activity at best, most of the fighting was against humans who didn't want to join the Imperium.

But yes, atacking the Imperium could be watched ass self defence, as they pretty much have everything on their "To kill" list, but Imperium will die long before they get to the bottom of the list and being dick to them just pushes your name upwards.

 

[silverius]

It's kinda hard to face Mecca when Mecca is on another planet.

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And here I was thinking you were talking about giant robots in space.

Speaking of which. KSP has basically ruined "realistic" space movies for me. I get taken out of it every time a ship turns on its engine and acts like it is in an atmosphere.

 

[holyseamces]

And here I was thinking you were talking about giant robots in space.

Speaking of which. KSP has basically ruined "realistic" space movies for me. I get taken out of it every time a ship turns on its engine and acts like it is in an atmosphere.

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Speaking of Abrahamic religions and Mechs.

I'm still surprised there's no faux-deep Islamic symbolism in any kind of popular media I've seen. I'm actually kind of disappointed.