#because nurgle will take it too seriously

[krankhar]

To add to the discussion, Horticulture is not weird in his no nonsense behaviour, all plagubearers are like that. Their job is to count all the diseases of Father Nurgle, and they take this impossible task very seriously.

Not all Nurgle daemons are joyful like Nurglings or Beasts of Nurgle, the Flies are known to be depressed. In fact, they're Beasts of Nurgle who got sad that nobody wants to play with them (yeah, the big monstrosities with tentacles behave like playful puppies), so they enter in a chrysalis and become flies that will enact their revenge on the cold and cruel world XD

Ku'gath himself is known for being depressed since he became a Great Unclean One. He was originally a Nurgling one of the numerous that were on the shoulders of Grandfather Nurgle himself, when he was concocting a new disease that could be the master of all diseases, the masterwork of Nurgle himself. Sadly Ku'gath slipped when he leaned too close, fall in the cauldron and drank all the disease. Nurgle, contrary to what the other God's would do, did not destroy or even punish his child, he congratulated him and made him his favorite Unclean One. But Ku'gath never forgave himself for what he did, and ever since he's trying to redrew the perfect plague that he drank.

Note that Nurgle is not infinitely patient either, in 40K, Ku'gath lost his statute of favourite of Nurgle, because of his role in the Plague Wars. Rapidly, it's the invasion of Ultramar by the forces of Nurgle, who almost succeeded but Guilliman stopped it just in time. And in that war both Mortarion and Ku'gath disobeyed Nurgle and took risks that transformed what could have been a minor victory into a defeat. So in 40K, the new favourite is Rotigus, Lord of Rains and Ku'gath is slowly being reconstructed in Nurgle's garden, in atrocious suffering XD

To be fair, I'm pretty sure that plotline is just to justify that they didn't made a model of Ku'gath. Sadly for him his palanquin does not fit in the new kit for Great Unclean Ones....

For our next topic in Chaos Week...Gurgle.

The plaguefather. Gurgle is the Chaos god of disease, stagnation, The Lord of Decay, also the god of rebirth.

For Nurgle, all is a cycle of death and rebirth. Nurgle plagues mortal life with sickness, but to the Plaguefather's followers these diseases are signs of love. For Nurgle, to grant a plague as a gift grants endurance against pain and protection from the ravages of disease, while also spreading greater infection.

Nurgle has similar kinds of followers to the other Ruinous Powers; Cults, Demons, Norscans, etc. But with the addition of some Skaven who hide this betrayal of their Horned Rat God from their fellows.

Nurgle as the epitome of stagnation sits in oposition to Tzeentch directly as the harbinger of Change.

Some prominent Nurgle followers include Ku'Gath plaguefather (a demon called a Great Unclean One), Epidemus the Maggot King (a plaguebearer demon), and Tamurkhan a mortal champion of Nurgle who nearly ascended to Daemon prince status.

Nurgle corrupts and yet cares for (in as much as a Ruinous Power can) his children and followers. The downtrodden, beggars, Skaven, Bile Trolls, Plagued Ogres, and all sorts come into his embrace and are allowed to endure and even thrive in the pestilence and rot they are subjected to.

As always, correct me if I'm wrong, add to things if there's more to be said, or just spread the post around like the plagues of Nurgle :)

Next we speak on what I like, what could be changed, headcanons, and such.

[faisdm]

A guide to the cool parts of the Warhammer 40k Fandom

So, suppose you’ve heard Henry Cavill being out of both the DC movies and The Witcher is now planning to be in a Warhammer 40k thing, or you’ve seen stuff about the upcoming Rogue Trader or Space Marine 2 videogames, or been playing Darktide, and you might be thinking “Well... maybe it’s cool, but also I’ve heard the fandom can be scary and has a Nazi problem!” this is a quick guide to finding the cool parts of the fandom.

First off, the golden rule of 40k is anyone who thinks the Imperium are “The Good Guys” and misses the satirical elements of the setting should be avoided like they’re carrying Nurgle’s Rot (that’s a really bad plague...if that wasn’t obvious).

The Imperium of Man is a fascist religious oligarchy where people live on horrible polluted shitty planets eating “corpse starch” which is exactly what it sounds like, and everyone worships a mouldering corpse on life support because if you don’t, an inquisitor might arrest you for heresy and you’ll get turned into a frankenstein’s monster robot drone. Anyone who thinks that’s cool is definitely a pile of wank. Being shitty is the whole point of the setting; if it was a nice place, I wouldn’t want to send all the nice people to get shot with guns literally called “Meltas” that do exactly what they sound like they do, or get chopped up with chainswords (that’s a chainsaw-sword! No kidding!). It’s an outrageously shitty galaxy where bad people do bad things, but it’s exaggerated to such an extent it becomes kind of cathartic or funny?

There ARE people who play 40k who are total asshats, and a minority who are nazis, it’s true, and a real issue (just last year GW had to make a statement about it when people with nazi-themed armies turned up at tournaments and despite nearly everyone at the tournaments refusing to play with them, the staff wouldn’t throw them out because of “the rules!!!” so thankfully now the rules are “no nazis” finally), but there are also lots of really great people in the hobby too, and you can find them by looking for spaces that explicitly don’t welcome them. The more cool people are in the hobby, the better!

Cool 40k Youtubers who can be a gateway into the cool part of the hobby and finding cool people in it include:

Arbitorian - Makes great lore videos and even ones commenting on the problematic elements of the setting

Snipe & Wib - Couple who are in a ska band (and so are cooler than I will ever be) and make tongue-in-cheek lore retrospectives in their Codex Compliant series.

Midwinter Minis - Chilled out painting videos and fun, easy-to-follow battle reports, not gatekeepy, so great for beginners.

Dana Howl - Really cool and unique painting videos that don’t take the hobby too seriously.

Goobertown Hobbies - The Bob Ross of Warhammer.

Oculus Imperia - This absolute legend makes incredible, atmospheric lore videos in-character as an Imperial scribe discussing the historical events of the setting, complete with character development as he gets gradually disenchanted with the state of the Imperium. Chef’s kiss.

And a cool place to get news and stuff that’s explicitly trans-friendly and doesn’t welcome the shitty side of the fandom is Goonhammer. You can find starter guides to most Games Workshop/warhammer games on there.

So hopefully... if you’re looking for a taste of grimdark but with decent folk, that’ll get you rolling. I take no responsibility if you wind up spending a ton of money on little plastic people and paints due to this.

[flowing-paint]

Alternative miniature manufacturers

Riding the wave of last week’s post, I decided to create a collection of all the alternative miniatures manufacturers I know of. You can look for the best proxy using the info in this thread or just start a gang for some minor rules-only game. I wish Tumblr had the possibility to make “sticky posts” but they seem not to exist so I hope Google will index this page for ease of reference. I will, of course, keep it up to date with all my new findings as I stumble upon them.

I had this thread in mind for some time but I still don’t know how to organize the contents to maximize readability. The first solution I came up with is writing the name of the site and link the various section and/or link the more prominent miniatures below. Feel free to suggest improvements if you so wish.

Kromlech

This site has huge amounts of Ork models. I mean... A LOT! And they’re also super-cool so if you are an Ork player, give this a good look. For example:

Goliath mines - cute moving mines. Not being an Ork player I don’t know if they are playable but they are really cute.

Ironshark jetbike - simply wow!

They also carry a wide selection of scenic bases and many Nurgle proxies so you might be interested even if you don’t play Orcs.

Warmonger Miniatures

I came to this site looking for paint combinations. It seems they also have their colors system but they surely have a huge line of fantasy miniatures. They are in the old Warhammer Fantasy Battles style and will probably fit as proxies or additional units for out of production units. The pictures on the site say more than words so, be sure you check out all the different factions! Here I just show you some good looking models:

Plague doctors - They’re simply awesome.

Karliki - I’m not the dwarf type of guy but this dude is great!

Elven spearmen - These can be easily painted to be Dark Elves!

Eureka minis

This is another huge site to source your miniatures. Maybe it’s not ideal to source Warhammer proxies but the amount of figures they sell is so vast that you may easily find something you like in there! Their range of miniatures varies between fantasy miniatures and realistic modern warfare figurines that also come in multiple scales. They have so many minis that you should really sit in front of their site for half an hour to get a grasp of the whole picture. Moreover, they are the home of “Pond Wars” one of the cutest miniatures lines I’ve ever seen. Check it out! Here are some minis I love:

Frog king - Reminds me of WHFB second edition Slann... may work as a replacement too if you don’t own the original.

Ethereal - You can use this in your undead armies, whatever the game you’re playing. It’s just a piece of floating cloth but they make it look so dynamic!

Soviet NCO - A Soviet agent with a gas mask! Fuck yeah!

Ironclad Miniatures

I already mentioned this site in the previous post about proxies because I bought two of their Steam Tanks to use in my Death Guard army. However, they’re not just that: they also carry many 28 mm figurines and terrain pieces like bunkers and trenches.

Ruins - You can use them in all kind of wargames ‘cause, you know... war=ruins, no matter the setting.

British Grenadier - Go and fight with that hat!

Sanwar - Star Wars, anybody?

Miniature Scenery

Another Aussie site that mainly consists of laser cut MDF terrain but also sells vehicles. The quality and complicatedness of the design are awesome... I was seriously thinking about buying their heavy tank for Warhammer 40k purposes but then I moved to the cheaper and more fluff-oriented steam tanks choice. You will agree with me that this tank can easily proxy all those kick-ass Forgeworld tanks easily. It is pricey but I think it is worth. I will probably buy one someday... If you need MDF terrain this site may be one of your best bets.

Imperial ruins - To use in 40k

Pagoda - To use in MERCS or Infinity

Dwelling - To use in Fantasy or Age of Sigmar

Buzzard - Viable Heldrake proxy?

Well, you have a lot of terrain and vehicle choices that do not really look like cheap MDF... they do come at a slightly high price though.

TTcombat Scenics

I have been eyeballing this site for a while because I wanted some cheap MDF terrain pieces for my Warlord death army (the project is sleeping now ‘cause I have nobody playing this game around me). They mainly sell their own MDF terrain but they recently became Dropzone/Dropfleet commander authorized retailers so you can also buy miniatures for those games from them. This is particularly juicy for me as I will need DFC miniatures in the future and I can combine shipping this way! Here I link you some nice products I’ve been looking at for quite some time:

Cyber defense platform - Nice to use as terrain in a Necron army! Too bad I don’t play Necrons...

Industrial Hive - I would like to buy this to combine with my Pegasus Toxic plant but then I will need a full house just to play MERCS or WH40k! It’s super tempting though.

Riftgates - The cheap alternative to the Baleful Realmgates in Age of Sigmar. You save something like 90 $...

Ramshackle Games

This is a small miniature company in Nottingham, like GW back in the days... but way grungier! Take a look at the vast selection of post-apocalyptic miniatures they offer and you will agree with me they can be used in a lot of futuristic miniature games. They have a semi-complete catalog to download here. Take a look at these great miniatures:

Gorillagon - May work as a proxy for some Nurgle dude

Chicken - He may be swollen and overweight but he always eats his cereals for breakfast!

Rhebok tank - This may be the perfect Plagueburst Crawler proxy!

This company does not only make miniatures but they also commercialize games. It seems they also had a successful Kickstarter in 2017 for a game called Mini Gangs but I didn’t hear of it and, therefore, I missed it... looks like an awesome gang game though so, I’m a little salty. I hope they release it soon. Meanwhile, I will download the free version of their Nuclear renaissance game (pdf rules here) and see if it looks interesting. I may buy the book if I find the system interesting and IF I find somebody to play it with...

eBay

I go with this last as everybody knows it. It is not strictly a “miniature” manufacturer but you can find almost everything in here. I usually source the test models for my color schemes on eBay and also many proxies. As I wrote in the previous post, most of my Chronopia proxies come from eBay but I also found 2nd edition 40k models and a bunch of Tyranid gargoyles on sprue for a ridiculously low price. If you are into that kind of thing, “Forgeworld” models are also available for reasonable prices. You should definitely check it out if you can. I write here a couple of shops that always carry interesting deals or interesting models:

The Troll Trader - cheap used GW models

Games Thriftshop - cheap used GW models (This may have somewhat lower quality models but is probably the cheapest. I tend to favor this one)

Warex Mini - Original resin models designed to be used as Warhammer 40k proxies. Mostly Chaos and Tau but they also have all the other factions. You just have to use your fantasy to match the names. Have a look at some completely dope alternative sculpts:

Typhus

Mortarion

Leman Russ

Tau Lady sniper

Ok, let’s say I put an end to this post for today but I want to keep it updated as I find new pages and new miniature manufacturers. I hope you like the idea of having a hub to put all the info together. If you want to contribute, please write your preferred sources in the comments and I will be very glad to add them here!

... game on!

[luci-yabs]

Have you seen "If the Emperor had a Text-to-Speach Device" series? I just watched it all and I feel like I understand 40k fans a lot more now. It explains where the Isha x Nurgle thing came from. I feel like it also keeps the Tau hatred alive as well. The Magnus hatred too. And probably the Eldar hatred as well. I get the feeling fans take it too seriously, even though the creator himself called it a dumb fnfiction.

I have seen bits of it, those bits turned me so off of it though that I have never taken an interest in it, no. At least in part because it seems to mostly treat anything which isn’t the Emperor or Primarchs as basically meaningless or inherently inferior.

Another person did also mention its role in propagating the Isha/Nurgle thing, which is an enormous pity, but also sadly just something I’ve become accustomed to. For some reason many 40k Fans really feel Isha has to be attached to someone from Chaos or the Imperium and having her stand on her own is simply abhorred. 

[askmalal]

This is, I suspect, something Boudicca, Hashut, Konrad, and I would enjoy listening to. And Khorne…. Maaybe Khorne.

[ghoultyrant]

Dawn of War II

At one point I watched a Let’s Play covering Dawn of War II, starting from the base game, going through Chaos Rising, and then doing the Marine campaign in Retribution. The excruciating stupidity on display lead me to A: decide I didn’t want to buy the game, even though I love the original Dawn of War, and B: write the following semi-coherent ravings of a madman.

They are slightly edited for comprehension and I made a little to clarify what any given thing is alluding to, but not much. I had vague notions of posting this to Vigaroe once upon a time, but it really doesn’t fit the tone I’m trying to maintain on that site. Tumblr, meanwhile, I’m perfectly happy to dump things that may or may not be insightful or entertaining and move on with my life.

Here we go.

-----

Broadly: Let's take steps to scale down the player's troop count, and still end up with hundreds of Space Marines dead before the end of the campaign. Also broadly, let's have our special snowflake characters have squads (66% of them, anyway) but have the special snowflake character be the only one that counts: not only do your battlebrothers sensibly wearing helmets not count against your score at the end of the mission for dying, but if the special snowflake moron dies his goons instantly die too. I thought we were fighting against the Tyranids, not as the Tyranids? The score mechanic in general, as well as secondary objectives in general. They don't commit to the score mechanic as mattering, and secondary objectives seem absolutely worthless. In Dawn of War 1, secondary objectives were more like advisories: here's something you might want to deal with, but it isn't mission failure if you ignore it, hope you appreciate the heads-up. In II, they seem to be plotty things with no functionality and not much plot either, present because?... Also: WHY BRING BACK ANGELOS WITH THE WRONG VOICE? (fixed for Chaos Rising, to be fair) I'm a character narrating at another character completely unironically. The Tyranids are MYSTERIOUS AND DANGEROUS OOOOOHHHHH. I AM THE BOX GHOST! BEWARE!

(It’s a constant thing with the game to treat the Tyranids as mysterious and much more scary than anything else in the 40k setting. It falls flat, in spite of the heroic efforts on the voice actors’ parts)

HEY BOSSMEN SPACE MARINES FUCK YOU YOU AREN'T THE BOSS OF US EVEN THOUGH YOU ARE AND WE AREN'T FILTHY HERETICS GO RUN SOME ERRANDS FOR US AND WE MIGHT MAYBE IF YOU SAY PLEASE DO AS YOU ASK. (Derosa’s initial interaction is idiotic) SCALE? WHAT'S THAT? TINY RAIDS BY A FEW HUNDRED GUYS CAN TOTALLY COMPROMISE AN ENTIRE PLANET'S SECURITY. AND NOT BY SECURING A LANDING ZONE OR WHATEVER. (What, exactly, are the Eldar supposed to be doing here?) Psionically gifted individuals. Because we aren't Blizzard fanboyz or NUFFIN. PSYCHIC GODDAMMIT. PSYCHICALLY GIFTED INDIVIDUALS. Furthermore, 40k is a setting in which psychic powers make you a reviled pariah who counts themself LUCKY to be treated as a subhuman tool. IT'S NOT A GIFT.

(Maybe ‘psionic’ has become the 40k default term since I wrote this back in like 2013. I stand by it anyway)

Naturally, It's A Girl Who Doesn't Do As Told was ENTIRELY to then bitchslap her for being bitchy. Admitting her error just leads to her begging you help them anyway, rather than assuring you that Angel Forge will be accessable to you since your need clearly is urgent. In other words, the entire sequence is mental masturbation with a very tiny helping of plot. Yaaaay.

(Still Derosa, only now I’ve shifted from hating her to hating the writer) Angel Gate fails in open mode! Because everyone knows all devices automatically stop doing what they're designed for if denied a continuous supply of electricity! Rather than ceasing moving. Like in real life. Incidentally, how does a GATE protect a PLANET?

(Angel’s Gate is retarded. And not the 40k funny/grimdark retarded, but “does anyone on this team understand anything?”) The Eldar are trying to blow up the subsector's planets to SOMEHOW stop the Hivefleet from... going towards the Craftworld. Not, like, weaken them, or something. Somehow the writer thinks this should redirect them from Ulthwe, instead of HURRYING THEM ALONG.

(This is dumb) WHERE ARE THE BLOOD RAVENS GETTING THEIR INFORMATION. SERIOUSLY.

(Once you’re more than halfway through the game, people just... know things, without any greater explanation than ‘scouts report things they can’t possibly know’) Hey, Force Commander, let's monologue at you why you're here AT THE END OF THE GAME AS PART OF AN OPTIONAL SCENE.

(Yes, you only learn at the end of the game why your avatar is in Sector Aurelia. What?) Derp final mission derp stupidly designed uberbosses in general. Also, thinking the Avatar of Khaine can burn down an entire world, and also EFFORT: THE GAME in terms of... rampaging godmonster patiently waiting in an arena to be killed. Yay.

(I boggle every time I remember this) Chaos Rising PLANET AURELIA IN SUBSECTOR AURELIA. What, is it capital Aurelia on continent Aurelia in hemisphere Aurelia?

(Real life can be like this. There’s still a reason for the One Steve Limit) Personal drop pods because reasons except Cyrus with Commander Hairgel because reasons on the first mission. (No explanation is provided for this) Traitor Guard calling the position, rather than the time or just saying "THEY'RE IN POSITION OPEN FIRE!"

(They’re scripted to only fire on a handful of locations on the map. Come on, writer, help me suspend my disbelief) EVERYTHING IS BUILT INSTANTLY. EVERYTHING. FORGET THAT THIS GAME HAS NO BASEBUILDING MECHANICS TO JUSTIFY THIS NONSENSE, BAD GUYS HAVE INSTANT CONSTRUCTION SPEED. In general, everything happens in implausibly short time periods: when did the traitor get to Aurelia before everyone else? How?

(Chaos Rising’s plot is slipshod nonsense from step one, and it never improves. If anything it gets worse) What is the point of bringing back Eliphas WITHOUT HIS VOICE ACTOR?

(I don’t get this. Bring back arguably the single most popular character from the original game, who was so amazing due to his voice, and then... don’t bring back the voice actor? I really hope they tried and failed to get the man, rather than just failing to realize the voice mattered) "Most notably, the Blood Ravens have-" OUR BATTLEBROTHERS YOU FUCKER. "I must tend to one of the generators, Spess Mahreens-" BROTHERS. To be entirely fair, he's the pure run traitor, BUT COME ON MARTELLUS. (Why does Martellus talk like he’s some outsider? Who thought this made sense?) Of COURSE bitchslapped Derosa is a pseudo-love interest. OF COURSE. (I’m sorry, creepy writer, but this is fucked up in addition to being stupid nonsense. Why are you even writing a Space Marine having a romantic interest? And why does treating a woman like shit act as a vital part of your courtship ritual?) Some Corruption-if-failed-to-deploy missions are vaguely plausible. Sure, Thaddeus hates your guts forever and goes EEEEVVVILLL if you don't let him protect the home he so dearly loves. But Tarkus corrupting for not punching Eldar is dumb and Jonah corrupting for not going on the Space Hulk is DUMBER. HE SHOULD CORRUPT FOR GOING ONTO THE SPACE HULK.

(Corruption is a cool idea. Missions Corrupting someone because they get super-pissed makes sense. Your Psyker Corrupting for failing to go into a Warp-infested horror show is such a basic fail I have no words and cannot imagine how this got conceived of, let alone made it into the final product) Really? Araghast and Eliphas are Bale and Sindri again? REALLY?

(I don’t mind re-doing a cool character dynamic, and Sindri and Bale were great. But Eliphas was more interesting than that. You don’t bring back a cool character so they can do that less-cool thing some other characters did!)

Ulkair is pretty much a Slaaneshi demon with a good laugh and the wrong body. Fuck.

(I liked that Dawn of War II tried to give Nurgle representation and Slaanesh representation, since the original game was basically all Tzeentch and Khorne. It was undercut by making our Greater Demon of Nurgle a straightforward sadist having nothing to do with Nurgle values. Either do the new thing and get it right, or go back to the old thing you were fine at doing. Don’t write the new thing the exact way you wrote the old thing and pretend it’s different) RETRIBUTION Tutorial still sucks, albeit with less narrating at each other. Khornate Noise Marines!

Khornate Noise Marines in Alpha Legion colors. Relic, what?

(It’s baffling how Relic has a clear grasp on most of the lore, up to and including some fairly esoteric stuff, and then they cram in nonsense anyone who’s only peripherally familiar with 40k could probably tell you is wrong) "This is the Ascendant, Azariah Kyras." This is the shitty dialogue, unnatural speech.

(That’s Kyras talking, if you hadn’t guessed) I realize Kyras is supposed to be crazy, but... really? Nihilism? Khornate let's-Tzeentchian-plot nihilism, at that?

(I’ve seen other people point out how it’s questionable to have a Khornate psyker eg in Winter Assault’s campaign, but I’m personally willing to let that pass because that’s one piece of canon that’s always seemed flawed to me. That doesn’t mean Kyras actually makes sense. He doesn’t. At any point) why does kyras tell you his weakness

(It’s like the writers have utter and total contempt for their player base. You couldn’t have one of our dudes take a guess that the demonic artifact of empowerment might, maybe, when destroyed, stop empowering him? Or even have Kyras do 5-year-old levels of cunning and try to pretend very hard that it’s not important? I mean the game wants us to think Kyras is Very Smart and then he tells you his weak point for no actual reason. The writing in Dawn of War II: bonkers to the very end)

[luci-yabs]

Fracture of Biel-tan problems

I decided, for myself, to codify what I found to be the problems which undermined Fracture of Biel-tan in my opinion. I didn’t list them in any particular order, just how they came to me;

1) The Antagonist: Fracture lacks a clear central Antagonist as compared to Fall of Cadia (Abaddon) or Rise of the Primarch (Magnus) which is partly because Fracture attempts to more be a ‘Journey Adventure’ in which the cast zoom from one locale to another and deal with each problem as it arises. However, as the story is about the birth of Ynnead itself, finally, its somewhat diminishing to the narrative that no major antagonist is ever involved in this supposedly monumental endeavour. Most acutely felt is that Slaanesh’s involvement largely is over by Act 1 and the Masque is the only real Character to represent Slaanesh, and she’s hardly significant. Of course part of the problem for this is that Slaanesh is the most neglected of the Chaos Gods, having the least Characters to call upon, and with no Fulgrim Miniature made yet, there wasn‘t a particularly new or potent Slaanesh Character to stick in the photo sections (unlike Thousand Sons who’d recently recieved their revamp around that time). Still it is a bit baffling that not even Lucius or the Emperor’s Children were involved, Slaanesh being Ynnead‘s primary opponent, not Tzeentch. This lack of a central Antagonist certainly made Ynnead’s birth feel much less auspicious or important in the Aeldari’s dynamic with Slaanesh.

2) The Actual Fracture: The Fracture of Biel-tan itself is only the starting step, with most of the book not dealing with it or its ramifications for Biel-tan. This feels a bit odd, surely it would have been better to just call it the ‘Birth of Ynnead‘ book then? Having the Fracture, and Awakening, also not as the climax does, again, rob the climax of a lot of punch. By contrast the Climax of Fall of Cadia sees the entire Cadian Planet destroyed in a rain of debris and the Climax of Rise of Primarch sees Roboute manage to seal Magnus into the Webway, but in Fracture the Climax is...Yvraine gets her ass kicked, tricks Ahriman into showing her mercy, and then suck punches him. For a book about the arising of Ynnead it feels very anticlimatic and, in all honesty, disappointing. I’d have thought saving the Fracture, and Yncarne’s birth, for a large ‘Big Damn Heroes‘ moment at the climax of the story would have worked better, and also served to hype Ynnead and the Yncarne more, seeing as the Yncarne’s ended up being a rather underwhelming figure so far, for the Avatar of a God intended to face off against one of the Big Four personally.

3) Faith: This is a big one in the characterization and, at least partly, this is because Yvraine wasn’t built up in novels before we met her (something I really think would have made Fracture  run smoother). Ynnead and his plotline is VERY different to the stock Space Marine Plotlines that make up 90% of the setting as, in a surprising reversal for 40k and its main protagonists, the character is not meant to be secular, but rather is meant to be finding faith in a new God. As Space Marines and Primarchs dominate the narrative to such an extent to make almost everyone else irrelevant, and all the good ones are secular too, there isn’t much in the way of a positive representation of faith, since almost all the major good guys disparage it. However, Yvraine is a chance to do something different; here is a cynical woman, one who was faithless, finding faith. That’s interesting, that can be a fascinating character study. Sadly though she converts so quickly, and with such little internal monologue, that it almost smacks more of Ynnead brainwashing her than an actual internal change. I would have loved if Yvraine resisted the Call, gradually over the story she resists her ‘Chosen One’ destiny and only bit-by-bit does she change. open, come to embrace Ynnead for a climatic full conversion. I’d also have loved a ‘Knight of Infinite Faith’/‘Knight of Infinite Resignation‘ type Soren dynamic to go down, where the climatic moment for Yvraine requires a Leap of Faith, a trust which she cannot have any guarantee will be rewarded, but which she has faith will and this pays off in the awakening of Ynnead.

4) Numbers: A constant headache with 40k but, in particular, with Craftworlds. How strong, or weak most of the time honestly, Craftworlds really are is high inconsistent. Biel-tan could defeat ten Chapters and two Battlefleets, yet the Daemon Army which nearly destroys it is never specified as even being that particularly large, Fabius Bile thinks Lugganath is so powerful that even the Emperor’s Children in their Heyday with Fulgrim couldn’t take it, but an understrength Invaders Chapter curbstomped Idharae. Some attention to how weak/powerful the forces involved actually are, giving me a better idea of their capacity relative to the rest of the Galaxy would help. For example must I then assume that the Daemonic Army which invaded Biel-tan could defeat 10 Chapters 2 Battefleets? Must I assume the Nurgle Hulks coming after Iyanden are stronger than any of the numerous foes Iyanden’s faced recently (seriously its become ridiculously cliche to invade Iyanden). What of Ahriman’s force at the end? How small, or big, compared to a Craftworld Warhost was Yvraine’s group? How big, compared to a Space Marine Chapter, was Ahriman’s force? Without this knowledge of context its hard to know the relative power dynamics.

5) Ahriman casually beating Yvraine/Visarch/Yncarne: This part was awful, just awful. Not only does it continue GW/BL’s fetish for makign Humans and Space Marines simply look wholly superior to all others, but it also in the book they are introduced undercuts and undermines the Ynnari themselves awfully, making the Yncarne look so pathetically weak it can’t even stand up to Ahriman.

6) The Visarch: He needed to do more. He really did. I actually very much enjoy his characterization in Gav Thorpe’s novels, but in the actual Fracture book he feels completely exogenous and with no real connection to Ynnead at all.

7) The Pace: This was always going to be a bit of a problem with the intense ‘Journey Adventure’ Aspect to the story, with Yvraine zooming around from hotspot to hotspot. The result can be a somewhat jarring and abrupt story, the brief stop on Iyanden, revelation that the Twilight Spear was a Crone Sword, then being gone being the best example. Ultimately I think Fracture spent a bit to much time focusing on other Aeldari subgroups’ own subplots, and a tighter, neater, focus just on Yvraine would have worked better. 

8) The Croneswords: Why did they make them find all but one? Now we know every single mission to get a Cronesword is going to be a failure, removing completely the ability for the Ynnari to have major successes! Ah! Its like GW/BL hates the Aeldari! Why not make them find one, or two, so that they can actually have big triumphs in future where they find more?

9) Death: I think 40k should kill characters off in big plot changes. I understand that might be unpopular but I think its good. I like that Aun’va died, I like that Kell died (I think in both cases the Characters should have been given more triumphs and achievements, particularly in the run up to their deaths, but I suppose only Space Marines get to do that) and I think a death would pack a punch. It doesn’t have to be someone with a Miniature, but a character with some established place in the lore dying would help drive in the stakes of a larger moment in the narrative; Kelmon? Iyanna? Sunspear? Illic (lets be honest he never does anything but fail)?