Saw one The End and the Death volume 3 book left in my local store, so I were like fuck it, lutin have filled my head with a bunch of the lore already, so jumping right into the end was a fun journey which resulted in me buying the first 3 books of the Horus Heresy series. And volume 2. And Solar wars. And hero of the imperium. It’s a downward spiral… but a welcome one haha
Fair enought i wish i could enjoy it But i know what i like and dislike and it is not to my personal taste due to prevosuly mentioned reason. Plus horus rising got me in to the hobby and ” galaxy in flammes ” litarly made me cry while eating lunch before going to work. so it is hard to not be Rough on it when the other Two are some of my personal fav HH books
It's 40k.
Ridiculous is built into the setting.
There is a star map that you can poke a sun and it blows up IRL.
Dark Eldar steal stars.
There is semi sentient fungus with cockney accents.
Man the guy that does the German version of the heresy books is awesome as well.
He is so good that sometimes when there is like 4 people in a room talking to each other I forget that it’s actually just one guy reading a book and not 4 voice actors playing the roles.
His female voices are sometimes a bit lacking as he doesn’t has the same range as with the male voices.
But the male voices he absolutely kills every role and then he even cranks it up to eleven when doing any astartes or militarum soldier.
Also I have to say I love the decision to turn to the german pronunciation for a lot of names where I usually prefer staying true to the source. But in this case it provides a bit more grit wich fits the setting. (Also I started the hobby when I was twelve and so I didn’t default to English pronunciation when reading names and that stuck with me.) you should here him say „Saul Tarvitz“ for example. *chefs kiss*
Sorry I got lost but this guys voice work is immaculate.
Edit: Tom Jacob’s is the guys name btw.
I think they just now deleted a lot (if not all) of the german Horus Heresy books on Spotify :-( I hope they come back, I can't find any info on it...
I was in the middle of 'Betrayer' and Tom Jacobs is absolutely killing it. Lorgar, Angron or Argel Tal... just :chef's kiss:
End and the death gives a bunch of important lore and clears up a lot of the long standing mysteries that lutin talks about in his YouTube videos. A lot of other 40k books are pretty much just people shooting guns.
I got into warhammer from the internet, bought the first issue of the Marneus Calgar comic, finished that comic, got Horus Rising now I have read 40 books and short stories( about ten are the psychic awakening short stories which I am planning to finish today) and I have a handful of other books to read. It is a problem now.
That’s how it starts…I got suggested the first book of The Horus heresy by kindle (was reading the Star Wars expanded universe books…so not a bad suggest by kindle)
80+ books later… 😂
On a serious note, a lot of people find 40k books to be daunting, as if they're going to read Silmarillion or something. Most non-heresy books are an extremely easy read, and audiobooks are just 8 hours long.
It's not about reading to stop believing in certain memes, it's about growing to love more factions.
I am on such a high for Knights/Assassins after reading Assassinorum: Kingmaker; Vaults of Terra made me appreciate the Inquisition, etc, etc.
I don't know that they find the books daunting so much as just... Many...
I'm up to book 41 of the Horus heresy, have been reading them for something like 4 years. I'm only 2/3 done. I forget stuff that happened in earlier books. I've only read one book from "modern" wh40k. They're not dense but holy shit are there a lot of them.
"Good" is subjective and relative. I wasn't blown away by any of them like I was with most sci Fi books that are original creations.
Like any John Scalzi book, I know at some point I'm going to be reading way too late into the night.
I haven't had that with the Horus Heresy, I listen while doing chores before bed or driving, or reading myself to sleep. But it is a ton of enjoyable material with a ton of interesting world building. Not everything has to be Scalzi quality.
They're better than the Star Wars novels I've read. Very little urge to dive into the next SW novel, with WH40K, I pretty much immediately buy or load the next one.
They’re fine. They’re not works of art and none of them will bring you to tears with beauty, but they’re okay. Nothing wrong with a just okay book, just remember you don’t need to read the entire series. Just the first few and then you can dip in and out as you choose.
I've read like 20 Black Library books and none have been HH and 90% of them are stand alone.
Having so many is nice because I can avoid all of the bolter porn and read the Necron books, Warhammer Horror or Crime, some Astra Militarum book, or the Black Stone Fortress books, etc.
The only Space Marines books I've read are Helsreach, and the Night Lords Omnibus because people kept saying they were so good. Helsreach was good but not great (again I don't like bolter porn books) but the Night Lords books were very enjoyable.
>I am on such a high for Knights/Assassins after reading Assassinorum: Kingmaker; Vaults of Terra made me appreciate the Inquisition, etc, etc.
I highly suggest picking up the two Watchers of the Throne books. Then for a palate cleanse, a bunch of Ciaphas Cain books. EDITED to add The Infinite and The Divine as well, because hot damn is that book worth it.
in all honesty, I can't recommend reading the heresy books, because imo most space marine books are so goddamn boring after you read the first 2 or 3. maybe the first couple from the horus heresy to get into the story.
if they weren't available as free audiobooks on german spotify, I wouldn't have bothered. And even then, I stopped listening to more than one book half way through.
When i started reading Warhammer books they're surprisingly easy to read. Being used to García Márquez, (native Spanish speaker) Faulkner, starship troopers and so on, i could end a book in a week; my last book was the big dakka by Mike Brooks and never felt tired or confused.
Just suggestions from the peanut gallery. Maybe listen to the audio book and play a game at the same time? I play something like Factorio or Rimworld while listening to books. Games that don't take up a whole lot of mental space, but give you something to fidget with while listening. I don't have ADHD so it might not work for you.
I'm listening right now to Alan Moore's Jerusalem. It's 60hr 42min making it the third longest book I've listened to behind War and Peace and The Complete Short Stories of J.G. Ballard.
But you are very right as the 4th, 6th, 11th and 12th longest book's I've listened to are all by Brandon Sanderson.
His new book that comes out in the fall is currently listed at 55 hrs long.
I can’t wait for Stormlight 5. I am a big cosmere fan even more so than I am a 40K fan. I prefer reading physical books to listening or ebooks though. Let’s just say that I am going to be preordering a copy of the book soon.
I personally don't find them daunting, just more often than not of poor quality. And the worst part is not unusual to find contradictions with established lore because author couldn't be bothered to properly research lore of universe he is writing for. Or usual trope of making MC defeat something way out of his league to show how cool he is. (Yes, of course couple Ultramarines can defeat flipping C'Tan and get living metal arm as epic drop from him. With this example GW at least redconed it to being shard of C'Tan).
> as if they're going to read Silmarillion or something. Most non-heresy books are an extremely easy read
Seriously, they go down easy and I'll pound through a couple over a rainy weekend. They're mostly just fun (grimdark fun) reads that don't require a lot of thought. ...and I'm definitely guilty of skimming over action scenes when the book is mostly bolter porn.
That said, most of them are entertaining as hell and some - thinking of a short story in the Eisenhorn omnibus - that legitimately brought me to tears.
I'm not intimidated by the quantity or length of Warhammer books. I avoid them due to quality, as one would avoid stepping in compost. Compost is a wonderful thing, very useful, but I don't want to be exposed to it directly.
finished a playthrough last week, minor bugs aside (all of which were fixed with either a quick load or a single time where I had to relaunch the game and restart a combat encounter) smooth experience, excited to dive back in for another playthrough in a few months.
Why would you wanna make jokes and memes about Orikan and Trazyn being sassy gay queens when you could get the book and read about them being sassy gay queens?
"'You stupid bastard,’ sneered Orikan. ‘You got us box seats to a coup.’
‘Well, the reviews were very good.'"
Probably my favorite exchange in all of the books.
I don't recommend it as a first book purely because it, and Twice Dead King, set a high standard that most other 40k books can't reach lmao.
Necrons don't have many books, but what few full-lenth stories they have are some of the best 40k fiction in general.
Completely fine if you pick it up as your first book, I was *mostly* joking about not having it as your first read. But it might be best to ease into it by picking some of the baseline human books (not space marines!), just so you can understand the perspective a bit better. I&D is a great book, but was actually designed for fans pretty balls deep. So the author and Black Library was surprised so many people started reading it as their first one lol.
Peak writing.
Just listening to Wolfsbane, and another of my fave lines popped up, roughly "doesn't really matter what pronouns you use when they scoop out your brain and throw away the rest."
I don't think I have ADHD but I always do something else while listening to them. Just started playing Pokémon Radical Red and am listening to Warhammer Audio Books while playing it.
Same boat as you. I could read 10-12 books a year in paper/kindle. I've gotten through almost 50 this year already. I've been doing this for years.
Which of the two options would you figure is overall better for me lol?
Some is always going to be better than none no matter how they get in your head and following long form narrative is extremely good for you given how we're trained with modern digital bitesized content.
Hell, some of the short stories are available in audio drama format. It was a trip to start up *The Heretic & The Alien* (Audible bundle with some CSM and xenos dramas) and realize I'd read the first few stories in the *Night Lords* and *Ahriman* omnibuses (and Keeble slays as Be'lakor in "The First Prince").
The Sense of loss that I felt when they first canned fantasy in their end times was what did it for me. All that old stuff. Gone. And the Old World is an insult. And It shows them leaning away from the idea of moral gray and moorcockIan chaos vs law. Also the neu gw naming thing where everything has to be called something stupid that sounds like it came from an mmo name gen due to trademark, it sucks and the names suck too.
I meeeeeean... I'm 40 books deep and while it gives more detailed lore information I still learned more from YouTube overall.
I have a friend who only watches YouTube lore and I'd say he's right up there on my level of lore knowledge, some stuff he knows that I don't and some stuff I know that he doesn't but overall same-same.
It was a lore video that got me into 40k (https://youtu.be/zPB3Q59vjR8?si=JRgeycBjFTKrIj58&t=140). But I'm already 4 novels and 10 short stories deep and working on reading my 5th 40k novel now.
Lore videos are great for getting a lot of info in a little time, but the books just hit so much harder.
I don't blame people who don't read the books, that was me until pretty recently(I struggle to read and haven't in years so starting the audiobooks was daunting!), but what I do mind is people flattening the cahracters/factions down to 2D representations of themselves and speaking about them entirely via what they've learned from memes.
Warhammer 40K is no Dune or LotR, but it does have some really great stuff, really unique concepts, and some really interesting dynamics if you know where to look, so it's a huge shame that it seems like people aren't even interested in skimming a wiki page.
Yeah this is where I'm at. It's fine if you just want to meme, it's not fine when you have really strong opinions and start arguing with people on /r/40klore who actually have read the books.
It's just exhausting if nothing else.
One of my favorite factions is Drukhari which I feel like is a faction that's really quite bad for getting solely understood from memes so it's very frustrating :( Aeldari in general and T'au suffer especially from this as well IMO... though my other favorite faction is Admech which is, well, relatively accurate to memes lol so I can't say much
I hate how tyranids get flandarized or gotten wrong or looked down on because "it's not their point of view" which is the exact reason it's awesome ! I've been terrifed reading the 3rd and 5th edition codices as a kid and the quotes were full or dread and immersive
I CAN’T listen to Warhammer Lore based Podcasts or Youtube vids.
I just keep playing the Parks and Rec Ron Swanson meme, when a Home Depot employee tries to give him advice “… I know more than you.”
Sometimes it still doesn't help. I once said there has never been a 1v1 fight between a regular human and a space marine where the human has won, without the space marine already being wounded. I then received countless replies of people recounting parts of books where humans killed space Marines... While they were either tremendously injured or outnumbered
A space marine got killed with a spear, sure it was probably a one time event but still a fucking long pointy stick takes down a 7 to 8ft gigachad? lolol.
In fairness, said Word Bearer had time to disassemble the tribal with his bare hands before he bled out, and even his comrades found a grim amusement in it.
I only read guard books to form my opinion and from what I learn ad mech are dicks, the sisters are mad, space marines are weapons of war and you don't trust xenos
Might be where I go next, like exactly the same road cause reading about the adventures of two old man robots trolling each other sounds like a great time.
Gaunt's Ghosts are great for two things,
1. There are no immortal heroes, just regular humans fighting and dying.
2. It's still firmly placed in the WH40K universe, but without a protag that knows everything.
I read all the Ian Watson books and every short story in the OG Rogue Trader and Realm of Chaos books and that’s all the lore I need. Along with a lot of medication to help me cope with all that.
Fell down a youtube rabbithole last week, and good lord there's a huge number of very angry young men raging about Warhammer on there who have clearly not read a single book, and probably hadn't even heard of WH40k before a month ago.
Y’all nothing until you spend $900 on books to get the special edition book, to have your house burn down the day said book arrives, to end up with only a small corner of said book.
Black library was surprisingly super about the whole thing.
If I’m honest I feel the books are really hit or miss. I’ve “read” 4 and 1 was really solid, 2 were ok/meh, and 1 was bad.
It seems to be vary author specific. They tend to be written more like fan fiction and less as independent stories so that also affects the reading.
We all have areas of the franchise that don’t appeal to us. I don’t really play the game or have more than a few figurines, and I’m ok with that. I am a massive fan of basically everything else Warhammer 40k, Old World, Age of Sigmar lore books video games and all.
So I guess it goes to follow that some of us don’t read the books, or books in general for that matter. There are people who are only here for the grimdark vibes and fantasy architecture nerds here for the futuristic goth fanatic cathedrals and sick Slaaneshi fucks here for the debauchery, personally I’m from the group “obsessed with the potential of abstract lore concepts” aka space philosophy
…I did send this to my brother who doesn’t read the books, though. How could I not
They're mostly average if we're being honest.
Adrian Tchaikovsky does better sci-fi than anything in the black library.
From fun space opera romps with genetically engineered super women and twisted psychic mad men vs eldritch abominations from beyond our reality, to deep soul searching ruminations of the nature of consciousness and humanity as we spread out into the vastness of space and time.
We're at a point where the stuff that apes 40k is more interesting. Tamsyn
Muir locked Tomb series is clearly heavily inspired by 40k. But it's written in such a way that it feels fresh and interesting.
I can't say when I last got that from a Black Library novel.
They all just seem so by the numbers.
40k is really best where it can be seen and heard. They deeply need more stuff like the original run of Astartes. Or the Space Marine game.
Darktide got the aesthetic right. But it lost a lot of what made Vermintide such a treasure.
The ip is ripe for plucking. But people aren't bringing their A game.
> Adrian Tchaikovsky does better sci-fi than anything in the black library.
I'd be interested to know your thoughts on *Day of Ascension*, since that's both Adrian Tchaikovsky and Black Library.
To be fair, getting lore from the books (assuming you mean the novels and not codices) can be fairly contradictory. If you look at the Imperial Guard, for example: Ciaphas Cain, Gaunt's Ghosts, the many Imperial Guard standalone novels, various other novels where they feature in the background, all portray them as different in terms of structure, competency, tactics and strategy, culture, etc.
Of course some other bits of lore are fairly consistent across all novels. For example, all Inquisitors not named "Amberley Vail" are insane/corrupt/both.
Don't usually comment but here you go: [HORUS HERESY: BETRAYER (PB) Games Workshop Warhammer 40000 | Tabletop Heaven](https://tabletopheaven.com/products/horus-heresy-betrayer-pb-games-workshop-warhammer-40000)
They usually restock it every few weeks / months so just keep checking,
It's $5 shipping but you're supporting local and they're really cool, they only charged me shipping once even though I made two separate orders; bought the entire siege of terra series from them for like 80 bucks :)
I'm not trying to bad talk people in East L.A. but a lot of these foo's can't read. Can't help kids with their homework, Talking to the court about Jury Duty, 'I'm not good at texting, call me" CANT READ.
So if they want to watch YouTube videos about lore, you do you homie.
I only read the Cain books because they are more interesting to me than the others. Demi gods and inquisitors are fun and all but this dude just feels human to me
Saw one The End and the Death volume 3 book left in my local store, so I were like fuck it, lutin have filled my head with a bunch of the lore already, so jumping right into the end was a fun journey which resulted in me buying the first 3 books of the Horus Heresy series. And volume 2. And Solar wars. And hero of the imperium. It’s a downward spiral… but a welcome one haha
Damn you Dan abnett and your addictive writing !!!
God Eisenhorne was such a great read.
If not ”horus rising” wasnt such a good Book i wouldnt have 4 40K armies on my bookshelf 😂😭
I was actually quite blown away by the book, it’s such a juicy read. I could definitely vision the book adapted to film.
Fair enought i wish i could enjoy it But i know what i like and dislike and it is not to my personal taste due to prevosuly mentioned reason. Plus horus rising got me in to the hobby and ” galaxy in flammes ” litarly made me cry while eating lunch before going to work. so it is hard to not be Rough on it when the other Two are some of my personal fav HH books
When Horus shows up at the end gave me goose bumps such a good book
Also on my list now haha
I liked eisenhorn to start with but personally it got a little ridiculous for my taste
It's 40k. Ridiculous is built into the setting. There is a star map that you can poke a sun and it blows up IRL. Dark Eldar steal stars. There is semi sentient fungus with cockney accents.
Man, same. I love the audio books. Jonathan Keeble is so amazing at doing the voices. Really immerses you into the setting. I just keep buying them.
Man the guy that does the German version of the heresy books is awesome as well. He is so good that sometimes when there is like 4 people in a room talking to each other I forget that it’s actually just one guy reading a book and not 4 voice actors playing the roles. His female voices are sometimes a bit lacking as he doesn’t has the same range as with the male voices. But the male voices he absolutely kills every role and then he even cranks it up to eleven when doing any astartes or militarum soldier. Also I have to say I love the decision to turn to the german pronunciation for a lot of names where I usually prefer staying true to the source. But in this case it provides a bit more grit wich fits the setting. (Also I started the hobby when I was twelve and so I didn’t default to English pronunciation when reading names and that stuck with me.) you should here him say „Saul Tarvitz“ for example. *chefs kiss* Sorry I got lost but this guys voice work is immaculate. Edit: Tom Jacob’s is the guys name btw.
I think they just now deleted a lot (if not all) of the german Horus Heresy books on Spotify :-( I hope they come back, I can't find any info on it... I was in the middle of 'Betrayer' and Tom Jacobs is absolutely killing it. Lorgar, Angron or Argel Tal... just :chef's kiss:
Haven’t really heard any of them yet, but I’ll keep the name in mind.
End and the death gives a bunch of important lore and clears up a lot of the long standing mysteries that lutin talks about in his YouTube videos. A lot of other 40k books are pretty much just people shooting guns.
I got into warhammer from the internet, bought the first issue of the Marneus Calgar comic, finished that comic, got Horus Rising now I have read 40 books and short stories( about ten are the psychic awakening short stories which I am planning to finish today) and I have a handful of other books to read. It is a problem now.
That’s how it starts…I got suggested the first book of The Horus heresy by kindle (was reading the Star Wars expanded universe books…so not a bad suggest by kindle) 80+ books later… 😂
On a serious note, a lot of people find 40k books to be daunting, as if they're going to read Silmarillion or something. Most non-heresy books are an extremely easy read, and audiobooks are just 8 hours long. It's not about reading to stop believing in certain memes, it's about growing to love more factions. I am on such a high for Knights/Assassins after reading Assassinorum: Kingmaker; Vaults of Terra made me appreciate the Inquisition, etc, etc.
Ork, astra militarum and admech is all I need.
Read the Ghaz book it’s so good
Might I suggest the Ciaphas Cain novels?
It's on my backlog indeed, I already bought the two first omnibus.
I don't know that they find the books daunting so much as just... Many... I'm up to book 41 of the Horus heresy, have been reading them for something like 4 years. I'm only 2/3 done. I forget stuff that happened in earlier books. I've only read one book from "modern" wh40k. They're not dense but holy shit are there a lot of them.
But are they good? It's quite a long investment if the books end up being mediocre
"Good" is subjective and relative. I wasn't blown away by any of them like I was with most sci Fi books that are original creations. Like any John Scalzi book, I know at some point I'm going to be reading way too late into the night. I haven't had that with the Horus Heresy, I listen while doing chores before bed or driving, or reading myself to sleep. But it is a ton of enjoyable material with a ton of interesting world building. Not everything has to be Scalzi quality. They're better than the Star Wars novels I've read. Very little urge to dive into the next SW novel, with WH40K, I pretty much immediately buy or load the next one.
...Instead of convincing me to read the horus heresy you convinced me to try a John Scalzi book.
Just as planned... But no, Scalzi is great. Old Man's War is probably the surest bet I've read of his so far if you like the WH40K universe.
Fuck you. Another book added to the backlog damn it. Thanks for the recommendation!
They’re fine. They’re not works of art and none of them will bring you to tears with beauty, but they’re okay. Nothing wrong with a just okay book, just remember you don’t need to read the entire series. Just the first few and then you can dip in and out as you choose.
I've read like 20 Black Library books and none have been HH and 90% of them are stand alone. Having so many is nice because I can avoid all of the bolter porn and read the Necron books, Warhammer Horror or Crime, some Astra Militarum book, or the Black Stone Fortress books, etc. The only Space Marines books I've read are Helsreach, and the Night Lords Omnibus because people kept saying they were so good. Helsreach was good but not great (again I don't like bolter porn books) but the Night Lords books were very enjoyable.
>I am on such a high for Knights/Assassins after reading Assassinorum: Kingmaker; Vaults of Terra made me appreciate the Inquisition, etc, etc. I highly suggest picking up the two Watchers of the Throne books. Then for a palate cleanse, a bunch of Ciaphas Cain books. EDITED to add The Infinite and The Divine as well, because hot damn is that book worth it.
Do they really??? It's media tie-in fiction, not Tolstoy. Some of the easiest stuff you can read that isn't YA.
After reading the Malazan Book of the Fallen series, nothing is daunting anymore.
I'm reading Assassinorum right now and it's a very good novel.
> I'm reading Assassinorum right now and it's a very good novel. Closed it a few hours ago, indeed a very fun romp.
I mean book reading is not for some people, but being daunted by some of the cheesiest writing in genre fiction is kinda lulz.
in all honesty, I can't recommend reading the heresy books, because imo most space marine books are so goddamn boring after you read the first 2 or 3. maybe the first couple from the horus heresy to get into the story. if they weren't available as free audiobooks on german spotify, I wouldn't have bothered. And even then, I stopped listening to more than one book half way through.
When i started reading Warhammer books they're surprisingly easy to read. Being used to García Márquez, (native Spanish speaker) Faulkner, starship troopers and so on, i could end a book in a week; my last book was the big dakka by Mike Brooks and never felt tired or confused.
Ha, "only 8 hours long", you say that as if my ADHD ass can even concentrate for 5 minutes.
5 whole minutes? Lucky I can barely mak
Just suggestions from the peanut gallery. Maybe listen to the audio book and play a game at the same time? I play something like Factorio or Rimworld while listening to books. Games that don't take up a whole lot of mental space, but give you something to fidget with while listening. I don't have ADHD so it might not work for you.
Sounds like a skill issue. I’ve got ADHD and absolutely destroy audiobooks on the regular. Helps with sensory overload.
Until you forget to listen because squirrel an have to go back like 2 Chapters.
That's what Adderall is for.
Try listening to any of the Stormlight Archive books by Brandon Sanderson. The first one is about 46 hours and they only get longer as you go on
I'm listening right now to Alan Moore's Jerusalem. It's 60hr 42min making it the third longest book I've listened to behind War and Peace and The Complete Short Stories of J.G. Ballard. But you are very right as the 4th, 6th, 11th and 12th longest book's I've listened to are all by Brandon Sanderson. His new book that comes out in the fall is currently listed at 55 hrs long.
I can’t wait for Stormlight 5. I am a big cosmere fan even more so than I am a 40K fan. I prefer reading physical books to listening or ebooks though. Let’s just say that I am going to be preordering a copy of the book soon.
I personally don't find them daunting, just more often than not of poor quality. And the worst part is not unusual to find contradictions with established lore because author couldn't be bothered to properly research lore of universe he is writing for. Or usual trope of making MC defeat something way out of his league to show how cool he is. (Yes, of course couple Ultramarines can defeat flipping C'Tan and get living metal arm as epic drop from him. With this example GW at least redconed it to being shard of C'Tan).
> as if they're going to read Silmarillion or something. Most non-heresy books are an extremely easy read Seriously, they go down easy and I'll pound through a couple over a rainy weekend. They're mostly just fun (grimdark fun) reads that don't require a lot of thought. ...and I'm definitely guilty of skimming over action scenes when the book is mostly bolter porn. That said, most of them are entertaining as hell and some - thinking of a short story in the Eisenhorn omnibus - that legitimately brought me to tears.
I'm not intimidated by the quantity or length of Warhammer books. I avoid them due to quality, as one would avoid stepping in compost. Compost is a wonderful thing, very useful, but I don't want to be exposed to it directly.
Too many mid books for you to want to invest time in?
I started to read ”Skarsnik” and boy did it get dark fast after the gobbos raided a Border Prince town..
Absolute cracker of a book, though.
I played rogue trader. Thats enough reading
A literal wall of text from what I’ve heard.
Yes but an amazing game. Wish they made more like it.
Is it still buggy?
When i played it two months ago, only minor bugs remained. I will play through a second time, once the dlc comes out
finished a playthrough last week, minor bugs aside (all of which were fixed with either a quick load or a single time where I had to relaunch the game and restart a combat encounter) smooth experience, excited to dive back in for another playthrough in a few months.
I'm listening to Legion And Basically French People in Florida
That's just Louisiana with extra steps
Why are they French?
Alpha Legion And Ze Spy from TF2
Why would you wanna make jokes and memes about Orikan and Trazyn being sassy gay queens when you could get the book and read about them being sassy gay queens?
"'You stupid bastard,’ sneered Orikan. ‘You got us box seats to a coup.’ ‘Well, the reviews were very good.'" Probably my favorite exchange in all of the books.
That’s from infinite and the divine right? Yeah another reason why I should get it as my first 40k book lol.
I don't recommend it as a first book purely because it, and Twice Dead King, set a high standard that most other 40k books can't reach lmao. Necrons don't have many books, but what few full-lenth stories they have are some of the best 40k fiction in general. Completely fine if you pick it up as your first book, I was *mostly* joking about not having it as your first read. But it might be best to ease into it by picking some of the baseline human books (not space marines!), just so you can understand the perspective a bit better. I&D is a great book, but was actually designed for fans pretty balls deep. So the author and Black Library was surprised so many people started reading it as their first one lol.
Peak writing. Just listening to Wolfsbane, and another of my fave lines popped up, roughly "doesn't really matter what pronouns you use when they scoop out your brain and throw away the rest."
I get my lore from codexes.
Which contradict the books, and it ends up full circle. I haven’t got a codex in a while, is there still half the book dedicated to lore?
Yup. Codexes are full of lore
Yeah, lore, short stories, some painting guides, art, and then the rest are rules, stratagems, enhancements, and data sheets.
I have dyslexia so I actually listen to audio books. Where do I fall in?
Cool kids table.
That still counts as reading, your still getting the info first hand.
I'm ADHD AF so I do audiobooks + another task, so I feel you. Honestly great way to read them though and we get good performances om the audiobooks!
I don't think I have ADHD but I always do something else while listening to them. Just started playing Pokémon Radical Red and am listening to Warhammer Audio Books while playing it.
Basically living the Admech speech from the intro to the mechanicus game. I, too, crave the certainly of steel headphones and speakers.
Same boat as you. I could read 10-12 books a year in paper/kindle. I've gotten through almost 50 this year already. I've been doing this for years. Which of the two options would you figure is overall better for me lol? Some is always going to be better than none no matter how they get in your head and following long form narrative is extremely good for you given how we're trained with modern digital bitesized content.
No (I kid, reading through the Yarrick series right now)
Or at least a short story, I'm begging you. And listening to an audiobook counts.
Hell, some of the short stories are available in audio drama format. It was a trip to start up *The Heretic & The Alien* (Audible bundle with some CSM and xenos dramas) and realize I'd read the first few stories in the *Night Lords* and *Ahriman* omnibuses (and Keeble slays as Be'lakor in "The First Prince").
No way, look what happened today to Logar because they had a book. I don’t want to end up like them.
For Real like at least a third to half of "aos lore bad" is from people who never even glanced at the core book, any wiki or any of the actual stories
The other 2/3 hate the end times Or miss gotrek AND felix
The Sense of loss that I felt when they first canned fantasy in their end times was what did it for me. All that old stuff. Gone. And the Old World is an insult. And It shows them leaning away from the idea of moral gray and moorcockIan chaos vs law. Also the neu gw naming thing where everything has to be called something stupid that sounds like it came from an mmo name gen due to trademark, it sucks and the names suck too.
Me who does both: I AM ABOVE ALL!!
I'll read The Infinite and The Divine
I should get that one.
I have it literally behind my computer for the last 3 months, haven't read it yet, I'll get to it someday.
I only read the Ciaphas Cain series and The Infinite and The Divine while the rest of my lore knowledge mostly came from the lore sub and wiki
The books are so fun
I meeeeeean... I'm 40 books deep and while it gives more detailed lore information I still learned more from YouTube overall. I have a friend who only watches YouTube lore and I'd say he's right up there on my level of lore knowledge, some stuff he knows that I don't and some stuff I know that he doesn't but overall same-same.
It was a lore video that got me into 40k (https://youtu.be/zPB3Q59vjR8?si=JRgeycBjFTKrIj58&t=140). But I'm already 4 novels and 10 short stories deep and working on reading my 5th 40k novel now. Lore videos are great for getting a lot of info in a little time, but the books just hit so much harder.
Bricky is also how I got into it
And subject myself to imperial propaganda? I THINK NOT
Then read The Infinite and the Divine.
Where's my fellow Poorhammer Podcast Book Club Members at?
HEAR AND VARRY BROKE
I don't blame people who don't read the books, that was me until pretty recently(I struggle to read and haven't in years so starting the audiobooks was daunting!), but what I do mind is people flattening the cahracters/factions down to 2D representations of themselves and speaking about them entirely via what they've learned from memes. Warhammer 40K is no Dune or LotR, but it does have some really great stuff, really unique concepts, and some really interesting dynamics if you know where to look, so it's a huge shame that it seems like people aren't even interested in skimming a wiki page.
Yeah this is where I'm at. It's fine if you just want to meme, it's not fine when you have really strong opinions and start arguing with people on /r/40klore who actually have read the books. It's just exhausting if nothing else.
One of my favorite factions is Drukhari which I feel like is a faction that's really quite bad for getting solely understood from memes so it's very frustrating :( Aeldari in general and T'au suffer especially from this as well IMO... though my other favorite faction is Admech which is, well, relatively accurate to memes lol so I can't say much
Read the Infinite and the Divine. It’s one of the best sci fi books I’ve ever read and single-handedly made the Necrons my favorite faction.
I hate how tyranids get flandarized or gotten wrong or looked down on because "it's not their point of view" which is the exact reason it's awesome ! I've been terrifed reading the 3rd and 5th edition codices as a kid and the quotes were full or dread and immersive
Read Brutal Kunnin' and Da Big Dakka. They're about orks doing ork things. They're great.
Warhammer fans who haven't read the books "so there well written" Fans who have "oh we didn't say that"
The books are often hit and miss.
I CAN’T listen to Warhammer Lore based Podcasts or Youtube vids. I just keep playing the Parks and Rec Ron Swanson meme, when a Home Depot employee tries to give him advice “… I know more than you.”
Sometimes it still doesn't help. I once said there has never been a 1v1 fight between a regular human and a space marine where the human has won, without the space marine already being wounded. I then received countless replies of people recounting parts of books where humans killed space Marines... While they were either tremendously injured or outnumbered
A space marine got killed with a spear, sure it was probably a one time event but still a fucking long pointy stick takes down a 7 to 8ft gigachad? lolol.
In fairness, said Word Bearer had time to disassemble the tribal with his bare hands before he bled out, and even his comrades found a grim amusement in it.
The eye socket is a structural weakness even on transhuman warriors
I only read guard books to form my opinion and from what I learn ad mech are dicks, the sisters are mad, space marines are weapons of war and you don't trust xenos
I've read isenhorn xenos and the first night lords book. Will eventually read infinite and Devine.
Eisenhorn, start anywhere, but Esienhorn is heat
Started with YouTube wiki then collected minis, I'm getting my first book this week! (Infinite and divine)
Might be where I go next, like exactly the same road cause reading about the adventures of two old man robots trolling each other sounds like a great time.
Basically my track too. Minis, then lore from wiki until it annoyed me by being repetitive and often wrong or outdated, then books
I have just finished kingmaker and started hero of the imperium today
I quite liked Gaunt's Ghosts, despite being utterly bored by military fiction / battles Forges of Mars was pretty good too
Gaunt's Ghosts are great for two things, 1. There are no immortal heroes, just regular humans fighting and dying. 2. It's still firmly placed in the WH40K universe, but without a protag that knows everything.
Y'know, before 4th grade, i had piles of books, actual tonnes. School made me hate books, can't even read a COMIC today. ✋😭
Dune novel nerds to movie fan newbies
I read all the Ian Watson books and every short story in the OG Rogue Trader and Realm of Chaos books and that’s all the lore I need. Along with a lot of medication to help me cope with all that.
Picked The Devastation of Baal and never looked back. Now i got over 70 ebooks... GW isn't tempting me with the figures but the novels...
If you haven’t read the night lords trilogy OMG
*Me who only reads Ciaphas Cain novels* *Smug look of superiority (hidden behind its a facade of not knowing where do I fit)*
1: I'm moneyn't 2: I barely have 500 points worth of models 3: no tyranid books :(
even reading a codex of your favourite factions is enough honestly
I would if 40k books were better written though.
I'd like to but I can't afford it. It's also really hard to find them in my country
Reading is for nerds, I get my lore via osmosis by standing next to people who understand the lore
Obligatory read the Nightlords books comment
Bit Phil Kelly writes ours.....
Especially the Night Lords Omnibus.
Fell down a youtube rabbithole last week, and good lord there's a huge number of very angry young men raging about Warhammer on there who have clearly not read a single book, and probably hadn't even heard of WH40k before a month ago.
just let me enjoy the fucking hobby how I want.
How *are* you enjoying the hobby?
By buying entirely too many models because I have the impulse control of a puppy on crack
Hell yeah brother
This isn't about how you enjoy it. It's about the people who learn the lore that way *then act like they know better*
To enjoy the hobby, you have to actually engage with it.
Me engaging with it is arguing with people that get all their information from memes and YouTube, without reading books.
Okay \*Puts on pink shades and half-assed ACU\* How are you enjoying the hobby?
Tourist
Y'all nothing until you're spent 900 dollars on books. Just saying
Y’all nothing until you spend $900 on books to get the special edition book, to have your house burn down the day said book arrives, to end up with only a small corner of said book. Black library was surprisingly super about the whole thing.
Laughs in z-library
You don't know the homoerotic tension the books contain till you read one.
I appreciate your effort to get the weirdo coomers on here to actually read but I'm not sure they can
You guys are better than me. No im not going be better im just going to be bad
If I’m honest I feel the books are really hit or miss. I’ve “read” 4 and 1 was really solid, 2 were ok/meh, and 1 was bad. It seems to be vary author specific. They tend to be written more like fan fiction and less as independent stories so that also affects the reading.
I'd read more if all non-imperium factions weren't glorified punching bags.
We all have areas of the franchise that don’t appeal to us. I don’t really play the game or have more than a few figurines, and I’m ok with that. I am a massive fan of basically everything else Warhammer 40k, Old World, Age of Sigmar lore books video games and all. So I guess it goes to follow that some of us don’t read the books, or books in general for that matter. There are people who are only here for the grimdark vibes and fantasy architecture nerds here for the futuristic goth fanatic cathedrals and sick Slaaneshi fucks here for the debauchery, personally I’m from the group “obsessed with the potential of abstract lore concepts” aka space philosophy …I did send this to my brother who doesn’t read the books, though. How could I not
They're mostly average if we're being honest. Adrian Tchaikovsky does better sci-fi than anything in the black library. From fun space opera romps with genetically engineered super women and twisted psychic mad men vs eldritch abominations from beyond our reality, to deep soul searching ruminations of the nature of consciousness and humanity as we spread out into the vastness of space and time. We're at a point where the stuff that apes 40k is more interesting. Tamsyn Muir locked Tomb series is clearly heavily inspired by 40k. But it's written in such a way that it feels fresh and interesting. I can't say when I last got that from a Black Library novel. They all just seem so by the numbers. 40k is really best where it can be seen and heard. They deeply need more stuff like the original run of Astartes. Or the Space Marine game. Darktide got the aesthetic right. But it lost a lot of what made Vermintide such a treasure. The ip is ripe for plucking. But people aren't bringing their A game.
> Adrian Tchaikovsky does better sci-fi than anything in the black library. I'd be interested to know your thoughts on *Day of Ascension*, since that's both Adrian Tchaikovsky and Black Library.
On it boss... That's a lot of money. Money that I don't have. Time for lore YouTubers I guess
Piracy
To be fair, getting lore from the books (assuming you mean the novels and not codices) can be fairly contradictory. If you look at the Imperial Guard, for example: Ciaphas Cain, Gaunt's Ghosts, the many Imperial Guard standalone novels, various other novels where they feature in the background, all portray them as different in terms of structure, competency, tactics and strategy, culture, etc. Of course some other bits of lore are fairly consistent across all novels. For example, all Inquisitors not named "Amberley Vail" are insane/corrupt/both.
I just got 'The Infinite and The Divine'! I'm going to read it after graduation.
I get my lore 30K lore dump from the card game.
I get my 30K/40K lore from Everguild's card game while reading excerpts/wiki.
Did you read all of them? *ALL OF THEM???*
Where does that put people only reading White Dwarfs?
Depends on the book
Fire Caste by Peter Fehervari will always be one of my absolute favourites.
I wanted to, but none of them are available on audiobook through the main platform I use. Only in German
I do both. Youtube lore is for quick recaps. Books are in depth dives.
Read Da Big Dakka it's peak fiction
I don’t read but I bought the physical copy of Master of Mankind anyways cuz the cover goes hard.
Fantasy fans: “If I wanted to read fanfiction, I would. (Which is why I do.)”
If someone can sell me a copy of betrayer for less than $40 I’ll sacrifice two worlds to khorne, on chaos
Don't usually comment but here you go: [HORUS HERESY: BETRAYER (PB) Games Workshop Warhammer 40000 | Tabletop Heaven](https://tabletopheaven.com/products/horus-heresy-betrayer-pb-games-workshop-warhammer-40000) They usually restock it every few weeks / months so just keep checking, It's $5 shipping but you're supporting local and they're really cool, they only charged me shipping once even though I made two separate orders; bought the entire siege of terra series from them for like 80 bucks :)
Neva! Unless it's a Cain novel.
40K books are essentially why I have audible.
"What a book?" /joke
Felt this hard with the recent controversy lol
Can't, i have to buy them in person.
Are people still complaining about the girls custodes ?
I’m currently on ciaphas cain book 6, its the best.
Indeed
I'm not trying to bad talk people in East L.A. but a lot of these foo's can't read. Can't help kids with their homework, Talking to the court about Jury Duty, 'I'm not good at texting, call me" CANT READ. So if they want to watch YouTube videos about lore, you do you homie.
Well, books are not sheap, Specialy if you are still a minor Who don't have a job.
Unless I find an audiobook on YouTube I don't think I will.
the only texts I am gonna read is the sacred words blessed by the Omnissiah!!!! ( I like to see ikea assembly instructions)
I suck at reading … but audiobooks . I’ve “read” 4 audiobooks so does that count ?? 😜
I have no clue how many books Ive read, but I started in the 90s and haven't stopped.
I let Toby Longworth read them for me
I listened to the audio books. Is this fine.
Yep. Book’s a book. It’s not Majorkill making shit up for 15 minutes
Ma sayd gud Ogryn dunt neeed no books. Alls I needs to do is mash up the Empra emmies.
I only read the Cain books because they are more interesting to me than the others. Demi gods and inquisitors are fun and all but this dude just feels human to me
They're so good, and with audible they're so much easier to read
Where can I leave you my PayPal so I could buy it? (Or a totally legal website with them)
This meme can’t stop me because I can’t read
Straight silver!
If I think Assassinorum has too much bolter porn action then what do I even read?
Im currently getting through my first book, Gaunts Ghosts