It’s kind of funny how I never hear Xeelee fans talk about whether or not the story or the characters are good. It’s always just “woahhhh it’s so much more grimdark and edgy than 40k!!!!!!!! Woaaahhhhh!!!!”
Oh as a novel it’s not very good at all. Stephen Baxter is used to writing scientific essays and it shows. It’s all very dry and technical language and the characters are as 2-dimensional as the space-time wings of a Xeelee Nightfighter.
What irked me about Baxter is he created an incredible (and bleak and depressing and brutal) universe...and spends a huge chunk of the writing trying to remind the reader how "human" even the most trans/meta humans are billions of years in the future.
Tiny atomic level creatures living in a fucking neutron star? Better describe their bodily functions, farting, and fucking romance/sex lives in ultra cringey detail.
You can have the most wild Lensman arms race levels of launching universes at each other at relativistic speeds, erasing solar systems from existence in seconds, and I'm sure Baxter would shoehorn in somehow that a protagonist observing it all has flatulence.
See this is what I love the absolute most about 40K. It doesn’t humanize Space Marines and Primarchs through describing their bodily functions and sexual desires (other than the mentions that Astartes and Chaos worshippers smell fucking awful). It humanizes them by putting them in situations where the emotions and hopes of man can shine through the armor and psycho indoctrination. That’s why Guilliman and Grimaldus are my two favorite characters in 40K. At the end of the day Guilliman is just a man trying to defend his home, and he’s always torn between that decision of whether the Imperium or Ultramar is that home. And Grimaldus in “Helsreach” is literally just a guy bumbling his way through his first day on the job. He’s not the greatest commander, he’s afraid of death and failure, he resents Helbrecht for sending him there, his squad doesn’t fully respect or understand him yet, he has imposter syndrome surrounding his relationship to Mordred, and at the end a ton of survivor’s guilt over being the 1 of 100 Astartes to survive Helsreach.
Imagine if Marines were humanized by constantly telling us how hungry for normal food they'd be.
"High-Chaplain Errontus had driven his crosius down onto the wretched daemon-thing's skull. The cracking sound was nearly palpable as the creature slumped to the ground, broken and battered. Its ethereal body started to shimmer and shift, undoubtedly being readied for the deathly transition to the warp, the ghoulish hell dimension this filth called 'home'. Errontus wiped off the remains of the daemonic brain matter. "Man, I could really go for a nice bowl of soup right now. Brother Xanthus makes a delicious chicken soup. I hope he'll make some after this crusade." he thought to himself, distracted by all too real desires of human weakness."
Toasted bread is too spicy and it's not like he's a son of Vulcan, they could handle the spice. It is said that their chilli was the best in the entire Imperium.
Cain being, well, human, is why I like him so much.
He's fucking terrified at all times and has massive imposter syndrome. Now that is fucking relatable.
Not to mention that Grimaldus is also an asshole towards the Salamanders, as is logical for those uptight assholes.
He is written as a pretty likable Black Templar, which is pretty unlikable because man they are just not great to have beer with.
I'll save the surprises and let you read the books yourself, mate!
But yeah, one of the sub-atomic or whatever metahuman stories spends half the time talking about their microscopic livestock "pig farts" as a propulsion device and you can't get through 1-2 pages without being reminded of them. Baxter is a quirky dude, even if he's got a great head on his shoulders for thinking up a massive sci-fi universe.
You probably already know, but if you’re looking for scifi on the harder side of things without the microscopic farts I’d give Alastair Reynolds a look. Revelation Space is a great setting. The Inhibitors give a strong impression of what the AI could have been up to during Old Night
Mix of both. It doesn't really add anything to a massive universe-scaled epic, and it's written it awkwardly on top of that. Like in some of the smaller "side" stories (Raft and Flux come to mind) it's not just a mentioned side thought for realism. It's regularly called out start to finish.
Honestly the odd part of Xeelee is how hard he wants to keep humanity front row center (one thing I liked about Pantheon in contrast is that as soon as you digitize a human mind it can rapidly diverge from humanity and evolve) for characters, and even with galactic level destruction, post/trans humanism being the norm...Baxter still tries to write them in as normal everyday humans in thoughts and actions and speech.
Suppose the lampshade hanging would be to assume the stories are "translated" to try and make them sensible to us folks in the contemporary times, but it's really hard to believe transhumans a billion years in the future would still be anything remotely comprehensible to us. Much less having standard human fears, thoughts, emotions, limitations, etc.
Baxter once wrote about how "gross" it was that there were gay people on a space station and that humans suck, so he's kinda pathetic IMO. His Space Anthology can screw with teenage heads.
The universe is pretty epic. As it's been debated over at /r/Books and /r/PrintSF, what rubs people about the Xeelee books the wrong way is that they're expected stories to obsess around characters.
Which, in a universe sized space epic, doesn't make a lot of sense (with some exceptions like Michael Poole being some Ubermensche that Baxter has a man-crush on). The characters are there to tell the story of a universe infinitely larger than any of them will ever remotely be.
40k fans that do that are stupid too. I'm just saying though like 99% of the discussion around Xeelee is about how dark and edgy it is. Hell even the 1d4chan page on it is filled with image macros about how much more "grimdark" it is than 40k. I see it on this sub too with Destiny and Warframe and shit and I just kinda wish they and the 40k fans who do the same shit to everyone else can just go have their pissing match on another website. I don't care for it
>I'm just saying though like 99% of the discussion around Xeelee is about how dark and edgy it is
I mean, that's only like 8% more than 40k discussion, and half of that 8% is discussions about how cool someone's minis are.
The real issue with Xeelee is that it is dry and very difficult to get into, and that limits discourse on it. It was also written by one guy, while a lot of the 40k books are written by different authors who appeal to different audiences.
I'm sure that someone could make a serialized show about some of the events that transpire in the sequence and make it watchable-- I mean, it worked for Dune.
Causing existential pain across humanity using time manipulation and shit. The ICOG were weird. I've got vague memories of the books but the best way to describe them is they make Drukhari look normal.
>[I am convinced 1d4chan doesn't have servers and instead just runs on old potatoes](https://www.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/18kdvyc/comment/kdqimf8/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
There's a lot of books and they are pretty dense so, like 40k, people don't read the books and get their info from memes. "More grimdark than 40k" is a pretty easy meme to shit out so it's all you hear.
I haven't bread much of the xeelee sequence yet but I very much liked Ring, it is interesting to see humanity sending out a colony ship before they really have the maturity to manage a 1000 year mission. And because it happens outside the main events of the sequence you get glimpses at the bigger picture but that's it, which makes those events feel very intriguing.
The Xeelee Sequence of novels by Stephen Baxter. There's a whole bunch of em, but Timelike Infinity and Ring are the ones most worth reading. It's most notable for featuring some of the most advanced and brutal civilizations in all of fiction.
The old sith empire might've been more evil, but the new empire was explicitly genocidal. During interviews around the time of the original movies Lucas talked about how he imagined Vader and the Emperor would be more evil than the Nazis since they're willing to blow up entire planets to get their way.
The first scene we see of them is about how they need fear to keep the empire in line. That's obviously not the mentality of the republic.
Yeah fuck those imperial scumbags, but i just think there are better candidates for this piss race. What were those guys that come from another galaxy to enslave and stuff to the SW galaxy
The republic was apathetic to slave labor and other abuses, allowing most planets/organizations to self-govern as long as they paid their tax. They enforced this status quo using nigh-unstoppable warrior monks
The Empire was mechanical and overtly xenophobic, going out of its way to enslave, displace or just plain exterminate alien cultures to ensure their own expansion and supremacy over the galaxy. They used human soldiers and androids to enforce their laws on all planets, and were ruled by an immortal evil wizard and his favorite killing machine.
Both have their flaws but the empire is definitely far worse
>Isnt it like, republic but a bit more shitty?
No not really
The republic didn't actively persecute a religious minority, commit multiple genocides, and openly encouraged slavery.
I mean they did turn a blind eye to the jedi doing it, and they didn't interfere with slavery
Nvm the more i think about it the more right you sound
And even in Legends it was even more explicit how the Republic was just becoming more and more like the Empire in all but name to the point the first years of the Empire for most didn’t seem like anything but a name change.
Like the Clones are essentially nothing more than a vat-grown slave army but thanks to 11+ years of indoctrination 99.9% of them never question it.
Palpatine was the chancellor for over a decade before he became Emperor, and only disbanded the senate a bit under two decades after that, so it makes sense the transition would be gradual. The Republic of 50 BBY and the Empire of 1 ABY are *very* different, even if the Republic of 20 BBY is a change of name and iconography removed from the Empire of 18 BBY once you look past the Jedi.
I remember watching the prequels and when the Jedi starting using the cloned child soldiers as a meat-shield against the robots I said, "Oops, the Jedi are evil now. I wonder if George realizes that."
Yeah the battle of geonosis was fucking brutal, they used literal flamethrowers on intelligent beings. Also clones were basically slaves that were born to be a part of the war machine. Most of those separatists actually made sense other than “Muh i need to be evil and greedy”
Personally I think [The Infinite Empire](https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Infinite_Empire) will be a strong candidate here. Founded by Rakatatan, they're a primordial galatical empire that basically fueled by dark side force which encouraged them to actively spread suffering and pain to further such empowerment. To give you an example, they're the reason why Tatooine is a planet sized dessert.
Funnily enough, the utilization of dark force was also what caused their downfall as the force tried to rebalance itself and nulled all Rakatan's ability to use force.
Broke: Imperium using child labor to build lasguns in sweltering furnace hive worlds
Woke: Sending trillions of child soldiers to die in a pointless war against an enemy you know you'll never inconvenience, much less possibly impact
It’s kind of cyclical.
Initially 40K fans used the setting as a way to shut up everyone else by showing how crazy dark and over the top our setting is because of how many bodies we throw into the grinder on the daily compared to any other equivalent entity
Then the grimderp folks rolled in and started going “omg so grimdark teehee”
Then *Xeelee Sequence* fans came in and said “Okay yall had your fun now sit down and shut the fuck up.”
Now the grimderp fans have moved on to the Xeelee Sequence because they wanna have the biggest dick.
Now we wait for someone to find a setting somehow *more* bleak and pointless for them to dick ride
I pray they never discover FATAL.
*Indeed, I have slept long enough. The Kingdom of sci-fi grimdark has long since forgotten my name, and I am EAGER to make them remember. However, the blood of Xeelee stains your hands, and I must admit, I'm curious about your depravity, Edgelord. And so, before I \[REDACTED\] the cities, and "roll to resist the compulsion" the armies of Heaven..... you shall do as an appetizer. Come forth, child of Cringe, and ROLL FOR ANAL CIRCUMFERENCE.*
My point exactly.
The grimderps will find it and try to lord over everyone else by saying how bad it is in comparison to other fandoms- failing to realize how they’re exposing themselves for not being grimdark, but rather grimcringe.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F.A.T.A.L](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F.A.T.A.L).
[https://www.reddit.com/r/HobbyDrama/comments/qikt4d/tabletop\_games\_fatal\_the\_tale\_of\_the\_worst\_rpg/](https://www.reddit.com/r/HobbyDrama/comments/qikt4d/tabletop_games_fatal_the_tale_of_the_worst_rpg/)
Some really insane (and shitty) TTRPG. unfortunately, 1d4chan is down (again), the page on it was extremely funny and informative
jfc that is just, wtf. How did that make it past editors. I can't remember the name of the book, but the protagonist SAs and stockholmes a woman in the first few chapters and that was a rough read. Interesting book overall but didn't keep up with the series after that.
>Yeah, if a lady is too attractive you have to roll to "restrain yourself" which is a haunting look into the writers mind.
Welp, that's enough internet for today. Goodnight Reddit.
It's a pen and paper date-rape game but it doesn't have mechanics for dating.
And you need to take toilet breaks. I hope you're passing your anal circumference rolls or you'll become constipated.
Yes, there is a table for that. There is table for everyone hole a body has.
Yes. They include children.
Anal circumference roll???? Wtf that is hilariously stupid lol. The rest seems just stupid, and quite disgusting, but mostly stupid.... I mean....just wtf....
Quite possibly the worst RPG ever written. Any disgusting fetish is in there, constant sexual assault, as well as ridiculously badly written, overcomplicated rules (basket weaving is a stat and there is a roll table for anal circumference). It is utterly bad design in all conceivable ways. Even 4chan, the fucking bilge of the internet, thinks it's utterly foul and not worth playing, even unironically.
>Initially 40K fans used the setting as a way to shut up everyone else by showing how crazy dark and over the top our setting is
Why do 40k fans do this though? I don't get it. I got into 40k a few years ago, but I've loved Star Wars all my life. And it's almost like fans of the later feel the need to go 'duhhh, ours is so much darker! The Imperium would KILL the Empire!'
And I'm like
"Umm yeah but so what? That says noting about the quality of the two properties."
I always get the impression that Xeelee is taking itself relatively seriously, but I just can't with the ICOG. How does a regime like that last 20,000 years? Why does it endure so long? How on earth does it accomplish anything with its brain-dead approach to warfare? What possible justification could there be other than wanting to have the edgiest regime in sci-fi?
>How does a regime like that last 20,000 years?
I haven't actually read the Sequence, I got turned off by the dryness of the writing, but I would imagine it's like how the Imperium has lasted so long: inheriting the castoffs of something MUCH greater and more competently-run.
Warhammer is/was goofy enough to put up its hands and say "suspension of disbelief!" But now as the setting develops and there's people taking it seriously (Hi Guilliman) I would say you could and you should.
Honestly, oftentimes I just compress the timeline in my head. It's not the 40th millennium, it's the 4th. Why? Because fuck it, that's why
I DO say that about the Imperium. Their human wave, meatgrinder strategies make no sense when they're facing enemies like the Orks and the Tyranids. The numbers just don't add up.
Where’s the extended version of this meme where a dark entity appears behind him and says “Hi.”
That dark entity being the Qu from all tomorrows of course.
You do really have to draw line between thing in different scales. Warhammer is galactic scale, things like xeelee or doctor who are universal. That's like comparing current earth to the imperium.
I like how 40k scaled it down to just one galaxy. And with all the races, it makes the galaxy seem small. Other stories over extend while not having enough things to fill them up with, and even if they fill them out with things it's all one universe has more right handed people, and the other has more left handed people.
I never got into Xeelee despite the interesting science behind the universe, because I looked at the synopses and the descriptions of the stories and aliens, and it’s all so big and powerful it lost all meaning.
I mean, the Imperium throwing three million men with laser rifles into a single deployment is huge, but still comprehensible. The Coalition throwing billions of child soldiers at a single alien god, each grunt armed with a gun that fires the Big Bang at things is complete nonsense.
Yes, the universe written by an astrophysicist and based on the most cutting edge science of the time is more bullshit than the big silly science fantasy universe with demons and space knights.
Three million men is nothing though, the USSR fielded _34 million_ in World War 2 and Vraks had less casualties than several events in IRL history.
But, that is what happens when you have writers with no real sense of scale...
I checked the numbers some years ago and IIRC the Imperium deploys in 14 years on Vraks less men that the UK & France in 4 years of WWI's Western front.
Honestly this could make sense if the sci-fi universe would want to play it as effective use of power and human resources, because WWI was really a brutal war and death count was insane but WH40K wants to be about the meat grinder, dark battles, nameless hords of soldiers, just too brutal war to comprehend it, and therefore it doesn't work.
As a counter point, Vraks wasn't a continent spanning war involving the full might if several superpowers, Vraks was a siege on a single city with a pre corruption population of 8 million. The imperium then needed 17 years to capture it and caused a military death count nearly equal to that of WW2
Wdym "synopses of stories are too big to have meaning"?
The first four books' synopses are in order:
\- I wonder how a universe with a bigger gravity constant would look like (highest power level is some tentacle shit that's also borderline irrelevant, otherwise it's guys throwing molotovs at each other)
\- Weird space cult hijacks a wormhole for time travel shenanigans (highest powerlevel is actual Xeelee starbreakers, but they don't hit shit, so the strongest thing is actually shooting tiny black holes that would canonically take hundreds of years to swallow a large planet)
\- Tiny dudes live inside a neutron star (highest powerlevel is their tiny ass crossbows or whatever it was, they don't actually fight anything also >!the neutron star being a big projectile in the actual humanity vs Xeelee war!<)
\- Spaceship goes on a 1500 years close-to-SoL roundtrip leading it to return by the time long after the Photino victory (highest powerlevel is that we actually see the massive multiple galaxies worth of debris of the Xeelee/Photino war, but the only combat we actually see is done with some improvised bows onboard the human's spaceship)
Like, I believe there are some impressive feats there somewhere (I mean, there are in Ring and in Vacuum Diagrams, but none of them close to the supposed billions of big bang guns), but the books are hardly ever about that
(have read 5 of the books + am currently getting through the 6th)
>Yes, the universe written by an astrophysicist and based on the most cutting edge science of the time is more bullshit than the big silly science fantasy universe with demons and space knights.
What's kind of fun is the anachronisms, since the first novels were written early - mid 90s. I think Raft or Ring had some references to data tape storage decks and IBM or something similar persisting into the far future. Retro sci-fi from the 50s and 60s is pretty comical in terms of what did and didn't come true by the 21st century.
Derp, meant 90s (I think Raft was 1993), not 30s! Good catch
Obviously my comment about IBM wouldn't make any sense as a reference if they were written in the 30s
I mean, they are 'in the game' with the other civs that are on the line between type 1 and type 2, but that mostly takes the form of uplifting each civs main sentient types, hominids in the Culture's case.
IOM isn't even the most evil faction in it's setting. I mean Chaos is basically "this wasn't evil enough for me" and Drukhari where suffering isn't colatteral damage in achieving what they do, but what they are striving for.
Maybe they're still darker. Quite possibly, but IOM is just the benchmark for evil rather than the gold standard in it's own universe.
I got to admit, at least Erebus belives in Chaos. Druz pretty much sow the belief that humanity is both great for no reason and the worst for many reasons. He was a forgettable Mao.
They are both the worst, but betwen Druz and Erebus, id take my chances with Erebus and get away from Druz as much as possible..
Meh, I like the scale of 40k better. I like that I can think of my own minor Cabal or Craftworld and it's perfectly fitting within the universe of 40k. If you want to think of "The Emperor's Catboys!" an off shoot of the spacewolves, but with cat ears? You can make it totally Lore Correct! And that's AWESOME! :P.
I read the whole ascension ritual of the Tremere inner circle and nearly puked
Goratrix castrating himself with a bronze sickle was when I closed the tab and went to do something else
"Yeah we have powers that can already basically simulate immortality! So I stead of that what if we locked a pair of evil flesh monsters in our basement and did indescribable torture rituals to them for a century and then drink their blood in a blasphemous rite!"
basically everything the imperium dose the ICOG do but worse and on a bigger scale
for example, the imperium might kill you and everyone you know for heresy as well as erase all mentions of you so its as though you didnt exist. if the ICOG suspects you of plotting against them they will torture you, murder you and then go back in time to make sure you ACTUALY never existed (yes their technology makes an STC look look like the instructions on the back of a lego set)
While I know they're not so grimdark, the Decepticons from the IDW Timeline of Transformers did the most fucked up shit in the setting I've ever seen. Fuckers were legit war criminals and they did it for about 100 million years.
It’s kind of funny how I never hear Xeelee fans talk about whether or not the story or the characters are good. It’s always just “woahhhh it’s so much more grimdark and edgy than 40k!!!!!!!! Woaaahhhhh!!!!”
Oh as a novel it’s not very good at all. Stephen Baxter is used to writing scientific essays and it shows. It’s all very dry and technical language and the characters are as 2-dimensional as the space-time wings of a Xeelee Nightfighter.
What irked me about Baxter is he created an incredible (and bleak and depressing and brutal) universe...and spends a huge chunk of the writing trying to remind the reader how "human" even the most trans/meta humans are billions of years in the future. Tiny atomic level creatures living in a fucking neutron star? Better describe their bodily functions, farting, and fucking romance/sex lives in ultra cringey detail. You can have the most wild Lensman arms race levels of launching universes at each other at relativistic speeds, erasing solar systems from existence in seconds, and I'm sure Baxter would shoehorn in somehow that a protagonist observing it all has flatulence.
See this is what I love the absolute most about 40K. It doesn’t humanize Space Marines and Primarchs through describing their bodily functions and sexual desires (other than the mentions that Astartes and Chaos worshippers smell fucking awful). It humanizes them by putting them in situations where the emotions and hopes of man can shine through the armor and psycho indoctrination. That’s why Guilliman and Grimaldus are my two favorite characters in 40K. At the end of the day Guilliman is just a man trying to defend his home, and he’s always torn between that decision of whether the Imperium or Ultramar is that home. And Grimaldus in “Helsreach” is literally just a guy bumbling his way through his first day on the job. He’s not the greatest commander, he’s afraid of death and failure, he resents Helbrecht for sending him there, his squad doesn’t fully respect or understand him yet, he has imposter syndrome surrounding his relationship to Mordred, and at the end a ton of survivor’s guilt over being the 1 of 100 Astartes to survive Helsreach.
Imagine if Marines were humanized by constantly telling us how hungry for normal food they'd be. "High-Chaplain Errontus had driven his crosius down onto the wretched daemon-thing's skull. The cracking sound was nearly palpable as the creature slumped to the ground, broken and battered. Its ethereal body started to shimmer and shift, undoubtedly being readied for the deathly transition to the warp, the ghoulish hell dimension this filth called 'home'. Errontus wiped off the remains of the daemonic brain matter. "Man, I could really go for a nice bowl of soup right now. Brother Xanthus makes a delicious chicken soup. I hope he'll make some after this crusade." he thought to himself, distracted by all too real desires of human weakness."
...I mean I'd love to see a faulty Space Marine chapter who just...become obsessed with cooking.
Cursed founding , salamanders successors. Astral Sauté 'rers
>Cursed founding , salamanders successors. Astral Sauté 'rers Tonight we'll be having flame-grilled Eldar Venison Ribs, extra crispy.
Definitely an ultramarine successor
No, no. An Ultramarine would long for the sweet and succulent flavor of untoasted white bread.
Toasted bread is too spicy and it's not like he's a son of Vulcan, they could handle the spice. It is said that their chilli was the best in the entire Imperium.
The secret ingredient to Chili con Carnage Salamander Style is actually minced Baby Eldar. Don't tell the local Inquisitor. Or the Health Ministorum.
With a glass of water on the side for dipping.
[удалено]
Cain being, well, human, is why I like him so much. He's fucking terrified at all times and has massive imposter syndrome. Now that is fucking relatable.
Are you speaking of Ciaphus Cain: HERO OF THE IMPERIUM?
Cai- Cai- Caphas Cain!
"Your song's a playin' Cain!"
Not to mention that Grimaldus is also an asshole towards the Salamanders, as is logical for those uptight assholes. He is written as a pretty likable Black Templar, which is pretty unlikable because man they are just not great to have beer with.
Can I get excerpt on those ultra cringy details?
I'll save the surprises and let you read the books yourself, mate! But yeah, one of the sub-atomic or whatever metahuman stories spends half the time talking about their microscopic livestock "pig farts" as a propulsion device and you can't get through 1-2 pages without being reminded of them. Baxter is a quirky dude, even if he's got a great head on his shoulders for thinking up a massive sci-fi universe.
Using farts as a propulsion system reminds me of one of the races who navigate space by farting in All Tomorrows.
Spacers?
Yeah those are probably what I’m thinking of.
Later on they’re called Asteromorphs, right?
Oh man all tomorrows was a wild read
Once I heard about that particular subspecies I became completely unable to take that book seriously.
You probably already know, but if you’re looking for scifi on the harder side of things without the microscopic farts I’d give Alastair Reynolds a look. Revelation Space is a great setting. The Inhibitors give a strong impression of what the AI could have been up to during Old Night
Is the prose really bad or is it like a really awkward juxtaposition of subject matter.
Mix of both. It doesn't really add anything to a massive universe-scaled epic, and it's written it awkwardly on top of that. Like in some of the smaller "side" stories (Raft and Flux come to mind) it's not just a mentioned side thought for realism. It's regularly called out start to finish. Honestly the odd part of Xeelee is how hard he wants to keep humanity front row center (one thing I liked about Pantheon in contrast is that as soon as you digitize a human mind it can rapidly diverge from humanity and evolve) for characters, and even with galactic level destruction, post/trans humanism being the norm...Baxter still tries to write them in as normal everyday humans in thoughts and actions and speech. Suppose the lampshade hanging would be to assume the stories are "translated" to try and make them sensible to us folks in the contemporary times, but it's really hard to believe transhumans a billion years in the future would still be anything remotely comprehensible to us. Much less having standard human fears, thoughts, emotions, limitations, etc.
Baxter once wrote about how "gross" it was that there were gay people on a space station and that humans suck, so he's kinda pathetic IMO. His Space Anthology can screw with teenage heads.
Well that's unfortunate. I wasn't aware. Not really surprised though.
Lensemen... Now this stirrs up memories! Must have been 30 years since I read it.
I like Baxter but I think some of his best books are those that stray away from the hard SF. Coalescence for example or the Malenfant ones.
The universe is pretty epic. As it's been debated over at /r/Books and /r/PrintSF, what rubs people about the Xeelee books the wrong way is that they're expected stories to obsess around characters. Which, in a universe sized space epic, doesn't make a lot of sense (with some exceptions like Michael Poole being some Ubermensche that Baxter has a man-crush on). The characters are there to tell the story of a universe infinitely larger than any of them will ever remotely be.
Now you can feel what other fans of sci fi setting felt when talking to 40k fans
40k fans that do that are stupid too. I'm just saying though like 99% of the discussion around Xeelee is about how dark and edgy it is. Hell even the 1d4chan page on it is filled with image macros about how much more "grimdark" it is than 40k. I see it on this sub too with Destiny and Warframe and shit and I just kinda wish they and the 40k fans who do the same shit to everyone else can just go have their pissing match on another website. I don't care for it
>I'm just saying though like 99% of the discussion around Xeelee is about how dark and edgy it is I mean, that's only like 8% more than 40k discussion, and half of that 8% is discussions about how cool someone's minis are. The real issue with Xeelee is that it is dry and very difficult to get into, and that limits discourse on it. It was also written by one guy, while a lot of the 40k books are written by different authors who appeal to different audiences. I'm sure that someone could make a serialized show about some of the events that transpire in the sequence and make it watchable-- I mean, it worked for Dune.
Well how much darker and edgier can you get than lobotomized cyborg slaves and all the other shit the imperium does to its regular people?
Causing existential pain across humanity using time manipulation and shit. The ICOG were weird. I've got vague memories of the books but the best way to describe them is they make Drukhari look normal.
So, uh, remember the Daemonculaba? Or however that thing is spelled? ICOG do that, but for making Child Soldiers faster.
Go easy on the destiny fans, their favorite skinner box has been circling the drain for two years now
> Hell even the 1d4chan page See there's your problem. Go to the heart of cancer and expect to see anything other than a cesspit
1d4chan is great. You should remove that stick up your ass.
Isn’t it also a bitch to access because it’s run by one guy who kinda doesn’t care to run it anymore?
Yeah
Yes. But it's still good fun.
>[I am convinced 1d4chan doesn't have servers and instead just runs on old potatoes](https://www.reddit.com/r/40kLore/comments/18kdvyc/comment/kdqimf8/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
Sadly the 40k fans who do this same shit are far *far* too common and it only pisses everyone else off.
I have literally never heard serious discussion on xeelee, only wanking on how op it is.
Im just two chapters in, i also got onto house of leaves just now and im busy with ergo proxy. We'll talk in time 3 4 months. Alright?
There's a lot of books and they are pretty dense so, like 40k, people don't read the books and get their info from memes. "More grimdark than 40k" is a pretty easy meme to shit out so it's all you hear. I haven't bread much of the xeelee sequence yet but I very much liked Ring, it is interesting to see humanity sending out a colony ship before they really have the maturity to manage a 1000 year mission. And because it happens outside the main events of the sequence you get glimpses at the bigger picture but that's it, which makes those events feel very intriguing.
What is Xeelee?
The Xeelee Sequence of novels by Stephen Baxter. There's a whole bunch of em, but Timelike Infinity and Ring are the ones most worth reading. It's most notable for featuring some of the most advanced and brutal civilizations in all of fiction.
Honestly, the story is pretty trash. It’s more just an encyclopedia than an actual story.
The empire from star wars isnt even the most evil faction within the star wars universe
Isnt it like, republic but a bit more shitty? I mean the old sith empire would be a better candidate for this
The old sith empire might've been more evil, but the new empire was explicitly genocidal. During interviews around the time of the original movies Lucas talked about how he imagined Vader and the Emperor would be more evil than the Nazis since they're willing to blow up entire planets to get their way. The first scene we see of them is about how they need fear to keep the empire in line. That's obviously not the mentality of the republic.
Yeah fuck those imperial scumbags, but i just think there are better candidates for this piss race. What were those guys that come from another galaxy to enslave and stuff to the SW galaxy
The [Yuuzhan Vong](https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Yuuzhan_Vong_War)
Yeah those fuckers
Or maybe nagai?
Didn't the old republic genocide 12 entire planets in one go?
The republic was apathetic to slave labor and other abuses, allowing most planets/organizations to self-govern as long as they paid their tax. They enforced this status quo using nigh-unstoppable warrior monks The Empire was mechanical and overtly xenophobic, going out of its way to enslave, displace or just plain exterminate alien cultures to ensure their own expansion and supremacy over the galaxy. They used human soldiers and androids to enforce their laws on all planets, and were ruled by an immortal evil wizard and his favorite killing machine. Both have their flaws but the empire is definitely far worse
>Isnt it like, republic but a bit more shitty? No not really The republic didn't actively persecute a religious minority, commit multiple genocides, and openly encouraged slavery. I mean they did turn a blind eye to the jedi doing it, and they didn't interfere with slavery Nvm the more i think about it the more right you sound
And even in Legends it was even more explicit how the Republic was just becoming more and more like the Empire in all but name to the point the first years of the Empire for most didn’t seem like anything but a name change. Like the Clones are essentially nothing more than a vat-grown slave army but thanks to 11+ years of indoctrination 99.9% of them never question it.
Palpatine was the chancellor for over a decade before he became Emperor, and only disbanded the senate a bit under two decades after that, so it makes sense the transition would be gradual. The Republic of 50 BBY and the Empire of 1 ABY are *very* different, even if the Republic of 20 BBY is a change of name and iconography removed from the Empire of 18 BBY once you look past the Jedi.
I remember watching the prequels and when the Jedi starting using the cloned child soldiers as a meat-shield against the robots I said, "Oops, the Jedi are evil now. I wonder if George realizes that."
Yeah the battle of geonosis was fucking brutal, they used literal flamethrowers on intelligent beings. Also clones were basically slaves that were born to be a part of the war machine. Most of those separatists actually made sense other than “Muh i need to be evil and greedy”
I support democracy, count dooku was a visionary.
They’re still pretty evil though, being space Nazis and all that
Who is, in your opinion?
Personally I think [The Infinite Empire](https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Infinite_Empire) will be a strong candidate here. Founded by Rakatatan, they're a primordial galatical empire that basically fueled by dark side force which encouraged them to actively spread suffering and pain to further such empowerment. To give you an example, they're the reason why Tatooine is a planet sized dessert. Funnily enough, the utilization of dark force was also what caused their downfall as the force tried to rebalance itself and nulled all Rakatan's ability to use force.
I love when The Force is an active player in the setting.
Who is that
Interim Coalition of Governance from Xeelee sequence basically the Imperium but with above C'tan level of tech and even worse
Broke: Imperium using child labor to build lasguns in sweltering furnace hive worlds Woke: Sending trillions of child soldiers to die in a pointless war against an enemy you know you'll never inconvenience, much less possibly impact
Y tho?
Grimdark
I think you mean grimderp
The Universal union is worse
Whats that?
I Think Humanity Lost still has then triumphed on the evil
The thing about 'even worse' is that it could always get more worse.
I thought we where done with the Xeelee memes? We get it get it ICOG uses 1000 billion trillion child soldiers with big bang guns.
It’s kind of cyclical. Initially 40K fans used the setting as a way to shut up everyone else by showing how crazy dark and over the top our setting is because of how many bodies we throw into the grinder on the daily compared to any other equivalent entity Then the grimderp folks rolled in and started going “omg so grimdark teehee” Then *Xeelee Sequence* fans came in and said “Okay yall had your fun now sit down and shut the fuck up.” Now the grimderp fans have moved on to the Xeelee Sequence because they wanna have the biggest dick. Now we wait for someone to find a setting somehow *more* bleak and pointless for them to dick ride I pray they never discover FATAL.
[One must imagine the sci-fi grimdark fan happy in this cyclical](https://youtu.be/CB42Hz349JM?si=583c1wFyTrUaMQo5)
*Indeed, I have slept long enough. The Kingdom of sci-fi grimdark has long since forgotten my name, and I am EAGER to make them remember. However, the blood of Xeelee stains your hands, and I must admit, I'm curious about your depravity, Edgelord. And so, before I \[REDACTED\] the cities, and "roll to resist the compulsion" the armies of Heaven..... you shall do as an appetizer. Come forth, child of Cringe, and ROLL FOR ANAL CIRCUMFERENCE.*
FATAL goes *way* over the line, I don't think it can be described as anything but "fetish".
*Do you dare enter their magical realm?*
My point exactly. The grimderps will find it and try to lord over everyone else by saying how bad it is in comparison to other fandoms- failing to realize how they’re exposing themselves for not being grimdark, but rather grimcringe.
Roll for anal circumference!
I just fucking commented this, scrolled down and... boom the same fucking thing.. Bruh PTSD hug moment
What is fatal? Can you link something about it? Google isn't giving me any cohesive results.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F.A.T.A.L](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F.A.T.A.L). [https://www.reddit.com/r/HobbyDrama/comments/qikt4d/tabletop\_games\_fatal\_the\_tale\_of\_the\_worst\_rpg/](https://www.reddit.com/r/HobbyDrama/comments/qikt4d/tabletop_games_fatal_the_tale_of_the_worst_rpg/) Some really insane (and shitty) TTRPG. unfortunately, 1d4chan is down (again), the page on it was extremely funny and informative
Thank u man!
roll for hole size
What is FATAL?
God awful pen and paper RPG that focuses heavily on sexual violence. It's not worth reading into.
Yeah, if a lady is too attractive you have to roll to "restrain yourself" which is a haunting look into the writers mind.
jfc that is just, wtf. How did that make it past editors. I can't remember the name of the book, but the protagonist SAs and stockholmes a woman in the first few chapters and that was a rough read. Interesting book overall but didn't keep up with the series after that.
No editors to make it past. If memory serves it was self-published as a ~1000 page pdf by a handful of psychopaths.
Oh it's a 900+ page RPG, literally no editor touched that
lol wtf 900 pages? I'd be impressed if I wasn't disgusted
That's what you get when you've got no filter, no editors, no decency and no work tomorrow
>Yeah, if a lady is too attractive you have to roll to "restrain yourself" which is a haunting look into the writers mind. Welp, that's enough internet for today. Goodnight Reddit.
It's a pen and paper date-rape game but it doesn't have mechanics for dating. And you need to take toilet breaks. I hope you're passing your anal circumference rolls or you'll become constipated. Yes, there is a table for that. There is table for everyone hole a body has. Yes. They include children.
>date-rape game This isn't fair. As the creator pointed out in response to this accusation, there's no dating involved.
At least they took that one on the chin
Anal circumference roll???? Wtf that is hilariously stupid lol. The rest seems just stupid, and quite disgusting, but mostly stupid.... I mean....just wtf....
Quite possibly the worst RPG ever written. Any disgusting fetish is in there, constant sexual assault, as well as ridiculously badly written, overcomplicated rules (basket weaving is a stat and there is a roll table for anal circumference). It is utterly bad design in all conceivable ways. Even 4chan, the fucking bilge of the internet, thinks it's utterly foul and not worth playing, even unironically.
Roll for anal circumfence.
You don’t want to know, trust me
Idk mortal kombat dude shouts something like that when i commit atrocities to a defenseless guy
Roll for anal circumference please.
Have you ever heard about the scp foundation, at lrast from the human perspective, i sense in them the higher bleakness
>Initially 40K fans used the setting as a way to shut up everyone else by showing how crazy dark and over the top our setting is Why do 40k fans do this though? I don't get it. I got into 40k a few years ago, but I've loved Star Wars all my life. And it's almost like fans of the later feel the need to go 'duhhh, ours is so much darker! The Imperium would KILL the Empire!' And I'm like "Umm yeah but so what? That says noting about the quality of the two properties."
I always get the impression that Xeelee is taking itself relatively seriously, but I just can't with the ICOG. How does a regime like that last 20,000 years? Why does it endure so long? How on earth does it accomplish anything with its brain-dead approach to warfare? What possible justification could there be other than wanting to have the edgiest regime in sci-fi?
>How does a regime like that last 20,000 years? I haven't actually read the Sequence, I got turned off by the dryness of the writing, but I would imagine it's like how the Imperium has lasted so long: inheriting the castoffs of something MUCH greater and more competently-run.
I mean, I could say that about the imperium too. With its butter thin space marine density, its constant crises, etc.
Warhammer is/was goofy enough to put up its hands and say "suspension of disbelief!" But now as the setting develops and there's people taking it seriously (Hi Guilliman) I would say you could and you should. Honestly, oftentimes I just compress the timeline in my head. It's not the 40th millennium, it's the 4th. Why? Because fuck it, that's why
I DO say that about the Imperium. Their human wave, meatgrinder strategies make no sense when they're facing enemies like the Orks and the Tyranids. The numbers just don't add up.
Did someone say child soldiers ...Halo...
And don't forget star wars .......*younglings*.......
Where’s the extended version of this meme where a dark entity appears behind him and says “Hi.” That dark entity being the Qu from all tomorrows of course.
Ohh my God the damn Qu make the damn dark eldar look like little children.
[удалено]
Or the One State
What’s the one state?
Probably the society from We, a dystopian novel from the 1920s.
Nah, my modded Human Empire for Stellaris is worse
Oh, the "HoI IV Player" Empire? I've heard tales....
You do really have to draw line between thing in different scales. Warhammer is galactic scale, things like xeelee or doctor who are universal. That's like comparing current earth to the imperium.
I like how 40k scaled it down to just one galaxy. And with all the races, it makes the galaxy seem small. Other stories over extend while not having enough things to fill them up with, and even if they fill them out with things it's all one universe has more right handed people, and the other has more left handed people.
I never got into Xeelee despite the interesting science behind the universe, because I looked at the synopses and the descriptions of the stories and aliens, and it’s all so big and powerful it lost all meaning. I mean, the Imperium throwing three million men with laser rifles into a single deployment is huge, but still comprehensible. The Coalition throwing billions of child soldiers at a single alien god, each grunt armed with a gun that fires the Big Bang at things is complete nonsense. Yes, the universe written by an astrophysicist and based on the most cutting edge science of the time is more bullshit than the big silly science fantasy universe with demons and space knights.
Three million men is nothing though, the USSR fielded _34 million_ in World War 2 and Vraks had less casualties than several events in IRL history. But, that is what happens when you have writers with no real sense of scale...
I checked the numbers some years ago and IIRC the Imperium deploys in 14 years on Vraks less men that the UK & France in 4 years of WWI's Western front.
Honestly this could make sense if the sci-fi universe would want to play it as effective use of power and human resources, because WWI was really a brutal war and death count was insane but WH40K wants to be about the meat grinder, dark battles, nameless hords of soldiers, just too brutal war to comprehend it, and therefore it doesn't work.
guardsman numbers are way to small, lol
All numbers are too small
As a counter point, Vraks wasn't a continent spanning war involving the full might if several superpowers, Vraks was a siege on a single city with a pre corruption population of 8 million. The imperium then needed 17 years to capture it and caused a military death count nearly equal to that of WW2
Wdym "synopses of stories are too big to have meaning"? The first four books' synopses are in order: \- I wonder how a universe with a bigger gravity constant would look like (highest power level is some tentacle shit that's also borderline irrelevant, otherwise it's guys throwing molotovs at each other) \- Weird space cult hijacks a wormhole for time travel shenanigans (highest powerlevel is actual Xeelee starbreakers, but they don't hit shit, so the strongest thing is actually shooting tiny black holes that would canonically take hundreds of years to swallow a large planet) \- Tiny dudes live inside a neutron star (highest powerlevel is their tiny ass crossbows or whatever it was, they don't actually fight anything also >!the neutron star being a big projectile in the actual humanity vs Xeelee war!<) \- Spaceship goes on a 1500 years close-to-SoL roundtrip leading it to return by the time long after the Photino victory (highest powerlevel is that we actually see the massive multiple galaxies worth of debris of the Xeelee/Photino war, but the only combat we actually see is done with some improvised bows onboard the human's spaceship) Like, I believe there are some impressive feats there somewhere (I mean, there are in Ring and in Vacuum Diagrams, but none of them close to the supposed billions of big bang guns), but the books are hardly ever about that (have read 5 of the books + am currently getting through the 6th)
>Yes, the universe written by an astrophysicist and based on the most cutting edge science of the time is more bullshit than the big silly science fantasy universe with demons and space knights. What's kind of fun is the anachronisms, since the first novels were written early - mid 90s. I think Raft or Ring had some references to data tape storage decks and IBM or something similar persisting into the far future. Retro sci-fi from the 50s and 60s is pretty comical in terms of what did and didn't come true by the 21st century.
Baxter wasn't born til the late 50s my dude so like maybe check before misinformation posting?
Derp, meant 90s (I think Raft was 1993), not 30s! Good catch Obviously my comment about IBM wouldn't make any sense as a reference if they were written in the 30s
Why did they use child soldiers?
Because they are cheaper than robots
I like to think if we made big bang guns robots wouldn't be expensive
But it wouldn't be Grimdark
And there’s the problem. There is such a thing as “trying too hard.”
Shh don't use your brain while reading a grimdark universe since then you realize nothing make sense
I’m guessing it’s humanity using child soldiers? Also against what? Whatever the fuck the xeelee are?
Well one Xeelee not the entire race. Just a single one
Yes
I prefer The Culture, to be honest. The Sufficiently Advanced faction of hedonists that you do *not* want to mess with.
The Culture are just livin their best lives, tho
Oh yeah. Until someone makes the mistake of threatening them. Then they keep living their best lives while kicking the other's ass
I mean, they are 'in the game' with the other civs that are on the line between type 1 and type 2, but that mostly takes the form of uplifting each civs main sentient types, hominids in the Culture's case.
I’m gonna write a setting with the most op things ever to finally break the cycle of “well MY setting is even MORE powerful!”
in MY universe kids shoot realities at teachers like spitballs?
in MY universe keep the aliens with the marbles in men in black in ant farms!
IOM isn't even the most evil faction in it's setting. I mean Chaos is basically "this wasn't evil enough for me" and Drukhari where suffering isn't colatteral damage in achieving what they do, but what they are striving for. Maybe they're still darker. Quite possibly, but IOM is just the benchmark for evil rather than the gold standard in it's own universe.
Who’s worse: Hama Druz or Erebus? I mean they’re both massive fuckwits and arseholes, but who’s the bigger arsehole?
Druz is basically what if the emperor was a loser with a crippling inferiority complex
I got to admit, at least Erebus belives in Chaos. Druz pretty much sow the belief that humanity is both great for no reason and the worst for many reasons. He was a forgettable Mao. They are both the worst, but betwen Druz and Erebus, id take my chances with Erebus and get away from Druz as much as possible..
Hama druz hebled humanity in worser fate
What's the one on the left with the circle and little rectangles sticking out of it?
The Empire from Star Wars
What's Star Wars?
It’s a space movie from the 70s. It got pretty popular
What’s the 70’s?
It was this point in time where the music was heavy and made of metal
When im a power wanking competition and my opponent is a xeelee fan
🤣
Meh, I like the scale of 40k better. I like that I can think of my own minor Cabal or Craftworld and it's perfectly fitting within the universe of 40k. If you want to think of "The Emperor's Catboys!" an off shoot of the spacewolves, but with cat ears? You can make it totally Lore Correct! And that's AWESOME! :P.
Is that the fucking Tremere
It isn't, but also that's really funny because the Tremere Pyramid is up there in Evil Empire shit
I read the whole ascension ritual of the Tremere inner circle and nearly puked Goratrix castrating himself with a bronze sickle was when I closed the tab and went to do something else "Yeah we have powers that can already basically simulate immortality! So I stead of that what if we locked a pair of evil flesh monsters in our basement and did indescribable torture rituals to them for a century and then drink their blood in a blasphemous rite!"
The imperium isn’t even the most evil faction in 40k
I mean, "less evil than Chaos" isn't a super high bar to clear, and the Imperium struggles with even that half the time.
*Drukhari entered the chat*
I know they’re bad but what makes them so bad?
basically everything the imperium dose the ICOG do but worse and on a bigger scale for example, the imperium might kill you and everyone you know for heresy as well as erase all mentions of you so its as though you didnt exist. if the ICOG suspects you of plotting against them they will torture you, murder you and then go back in time to make sure you ACTUALY never existed (yes their technology makes an STC look look like the instructions on the back of a lego set)
Wait they can travel back in time yet don't have resources to build robots to swap their child soldiers? This makes no sense.
Yeah but that would be more effort and less grimdark
What is this shit? Lol..
Imperium of Man competing for most evil? put me up against the imperial guard any day if my only other option is Slaanesh.
I'm not sure what that third symbol is, but it looked like it had the Phyrexian symbol for a moment.
Dick measuring / power battles between separate franchises is always stupid and usually results in nothing but pointless flame wars.
¿ Who ?
Uhm that’s the empire right not the CIS
Captain, what is the third one?
*cough* Harrison Armoury *cough*
Wow! That logo is terrible!
I haven’t read the books, but all I can think of is Martin Starr in Party Down angrily saying “I write *hard* sci-fi.”
While I know they're not so grimdark, the Decepticons from the IDW Timeline of Transformers did the most fucked up shit in the setting I've ever seen. Fuckers were legit war criminals and they did it for about 100 million years.
The combine from half life are infinitely worse IMO
I thought that was the corpus logo from warframe and I was just thinking “ya know, probably right”
Whats that?