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 Post subject: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-05-23 06:01pm 

Well, we reach that time at last. I've gotten around to covering the Horus Heresy series, whcih seems to be BL's attmept at doing an 'arc' story in the fashion of oh, New Jedi Order and such. This has been running as long as I've been wasting my time coming up with these silly numbers, and its been sitting around waiting to be covered for quite awhile. Over a score of novels, plus the 'Collected visions' stuff, a bunch of audio books and special edition books (which I dont have acess to at the time) and other stuff.

So how is it, in my opinion? Variable, like you'd expect. It has very good stuff and some not so good stuff. On the whole, I'd say that plot and arc wise it did a better job than its Star Wars equivalents have, and many of the books in the series are pretty good. And even some of the worst books (like Battle for the Abyss) can still be pretty fun as a popcorn read if nothing else (although its clearly filler.)

Some of the good things about the series are the way they have expanded on the historical past of the Horus heresy, filling out that time, giving us a glimpse into that mythic time. Of course, that has drawbacks too, since if you de-mythify stuff it loses some of its impact. The Series has tried to fix that too, I think - things like the Perpetuals, the nature of the Warp and 'Saint Keelor', The Watchers on Caliban, the Cabal, etc. Whether or not they keep the 'mystry' is up for debate, as they are still seting things up, but I know in reading it I have questions. The contrasts between the 'old' and the 'new' with the Imperium, how the Emperor influences things, and whether or not the Imperium really is the Great Place of Rationality it makes itself out to be is handled well, and many authors have done a good job of putting a sympathetic angle on the 'Heresy' side of things (although Chaos still mucks it up something fierce.)

We're still mostly inundated with a shit-ton of Space Marine crap despite that, although the Primarch stuff moderates that and excuses it, but I find myself wanting more novels like Mechanicum and Nemesis, where we deal with parts of the Imperium SEPARATE from Space Marines. Indeed novels like Legion almost feel like the Space Marines are tacked on - they feel more like an IG novel.

I understand that some people tend to have objections to the portrayals of Primarchs and Space MArines in this series (esp Abnett) - to which I can only say, I have no problems. If someone wants to vent why they do, I'd be happy to hear it in this thread.

I'll be starting off the series with Horus Heresy the Collected Visions, which we could think of as being the sort of 'framework' for the entire HH series - it lays down alot of the ground for what is to come, although it doesn't correspond 100% (which is not a bad thing) and there is still lots of that 'sandbox' atmosphere that 40K amanges in its fiction and STar Wars never quite seemed to grasp.

So here we go. I figure two updates for HHCV and then we'll actually start on the series proper. I have LOTS of catching up to do!

****


Page 9


Million world Imperium.


Page 9


Space marines can beat 100 men in combat. Whether this is all at once or in sequence (or osmthing in between) we dont know.

Page 9


One definition for Legion size. The series puts a different spin on it later on though.

Page 9


thousand thousand worlds = 1 million.

Page 9


Interesting comment considering other sources have noted Navigators existed since the DAoT or earlier. It is possible "unlocking the potential" means setting up the Astronomican and other standardized means of navigating (various devices) to make it faster safer and more accurate.

Page 9


One possible reason for the Empy's failure to predict the consquences of his actions or the Heresy.. the AStronomican was either a distraction or a weakenning influence.. although how he could be doing everything he did in general in addition to the Astronomican is poorly understood (or inconsistnetly applied.)

Page 9


Technologies used to hunt down psykers. I dont know if there is just one device that scours the galaxy on its own, or if such devices are spread throughout the Imperium to be used by its agents to hunt down psykers. Test stations at least seem to be the latter, some osrt of physical examination. Psyk engines could be like that Scientology "testing" Mandatory testing could be part of Imperial law.

Page 10


He's a "mutant" in the sense he's a psyker, an abnormally powerful one, but psykers are still often considered a mutation of sorts.

We also learn that the Emperor did a fair bit of genetic engineering on the human races post war, either to correct certain flaws or damages, or possibly to nehance things (like he did with Thunder Warriors.) The Chiliad might be an example of this.

Page 12


This has been mentioned before in Tales of Heresy, although not that vortex weapons were used (warp weapons to destroy warp creatures.. lol) Maybe they reference psycho-electric or wahtever those weapons from Descent of angels were. Vortex missiles might banish or destroy warp creatures whilst virus bombs destroy the physical matter - a one-two punch.

PAge 12 - Emperor's Children lascannon.. shoulder mounted seems to have a backpack power source.


Page 15


Scope of the Great Crusade. Sufficed to say its an under-statement unless itw as something like "hundreds of legions per fleet or legion"

Interesting is that the Mechanicum is implied to have some forge worlds other than Mars at this time, and they contributed equipment and supplies to the war effort, despite the fact some sources say Mars alone carried the burden.


Page 15


The War council. Primarily military forces, except for the Fabricator General and MAlcador. The astorpathic contingent suggested realtime or near-realtime communication across the galaxy for "meetings" but that is largely conjecture.


Page 15


Malcador the Sigillite. For better or worse, the Emperor's right hand man, especially on the nonmilitary side of things. As we learn he ran the administration as well as the assassin side of things. While its doubftul he ever did anything without the knowledge or consent of the Emperor to some degree, its quite possible that Empy's reliance on him did create some problems, since much of the conflict the Primarchs felt stemmed from the administrative side of things, especially as his influence grew.

Page 15 - Emperor's Children jetbikes.

Page 17


The Growth of space marines from regiments into legions, from hundreds to thousands.


Page 23 - Another Devastator group, with lascannon except these seem to be hand-carried rather than shoulder mounted (sort of like na oversized lasgun.) Again backpack-mounted power pack.

Page 24


PRimarchs only potentially rivalled the Emperor. given that Primarchs in the HH series are depicted as reflecting various aspects of the Emperor (EG Magnus his psychic power) it's likely the Primarchs matched the Emperor only in certain areas, and were weaker elsewhere - except for MAgnus none of them were really psykers.

Also they conquered "millions" of worlds in his name


Page 24


The scattering of the primarchs. as we know this was Chaos' doing.

Page 27


We never get strong clarification of these "powers", aside from the strength and durability and charisma, but they all seemed to have that to varying degrees. Some were obvious (sanguinius flight nad prophecy, Curze having prophecy... Magnus being psychic, etc.) Others aren't so obvious.

Page 27


It was Chaos.

Page 29


Technically the Thunder warriors were first, but I imagine the Custodians were second. Then the AStartes. The whole "is a Custodian better than a Space Marine" is up in the air depending on source or author.. sometimes the difference is obvious, sometimes it isn't. May depend on gear, Custodian, etc.


Page 29


There are (supposedly) only a thousand Custodians now. Rather a shrinkage since, IIRC there were 10,000+ Custodians back when. Custodians also get some very neat shit.. like hover versions of Rhinos. The Emperor himself also seems to have personal transports and battleships (as do the Custodes.) though we rarely see them.. we've seen the Emperor's personal starship a few times (Mechanicum, Descent of Angels, etc.)

Page 32


Astrootelepathy. And there is no practical way to govern or administer the Imperiunm - as laways they just muddle along as best they can.

Page 32


Origins and responsibilities of Imperial commanders. Not much different from modern times, although in the Crusade ERa they were just starting to set up the tithing/taxation scheme at the start of the series.

Page 32


Which only begs the question fo why knowledge of Daemons was suppressed, since ignorance was what best served their purposes.


PAge 32


The origins of Imperial religion. One has to wonder at the origins of those myths and prophecies. Did they have roots in pre-Imperium terra in some distant past? Psychic divination?

Page 33 - Emperor's Children with hand flamers.

Page 34


The warp defined, with its usual analogies. Depending on where the "points in space" begins and ends, you might get only a few hundred c (a few LY) to hundreds of thousands of c (a few thousand LY). The second one is implied to be a bit more better, as it suggests travelling across the galaxy in a few months, which is consistent with speeds we get in most of the HH novels (100-120K LY in 2-3 months is between 400,000 and 700,000c)


Page 34


Travel through the warp. I gather the energy "streams" are the currents that push through, and that it means that starships are pushed along by the currents (or victim to, precisely). The danger and unpredictability however become there are often numerous, different and even conflicting currents of varying strength, all acting on the craft randomly. Couple that with the way the distortion of time and space can vary in the warp, and it's easy to understand why it is so hard to navigate. The warp storm bit is pretty self-explanatory.


Page 34


Psychic powers and the connection to the warp. Precog in 40K involves "reading" the currents basically. Since the Warp is the nexus of all thoughts, emotions, actions, etc. of people, and because it can transcend time and space, it is possible to "read" either the past or the present - the Eldar novels explain it better with farseeing and the 'skein', but for now it's sufficient to note that the accuracy of precog depends on the ability of the psyker to read and interpret the dreams correctly, which can be distorted by the same factors that affect everything else with the warp (psychic powers, warp travel, astrotelepathy, etc.)

Also warp creatures are a general category - which seems to include both warp based xenos like enslavers a well as daemons. You have to wonder why the Emperor hid this knowledge at all if that was just the case.

Page 34


It's probably a good thing that most humans have onyl minor psychic talents, since it keeps one from going crazy. I wonder if this majority is included in the usual human-psyker ratios? Probably. It might mean (for example) that the 1 per 1 million is truly useful psykers, while the 1-2 per 100,000 (from Faith and Fire) is for psykers in general. Which means that 9 out of 10 psykers have no significant power.


page 34


The risks of possession - the baisc inverse relationship between tapping psychic power and drawing the attention of a warp creature, and the limits of possession.

The really interesting thing about the quote is that it suggests the defining trait that sets daemons apart from other warp creatures is the way they are psychic "gestalts" - eg thralls to more powerful warp creatures (EG the Chaos gods).


Page 37


The Emperor's role and need for psykers.

Page 37


Soul binding. It's not *quite* true that only the Emperor can do this - any powerful warp creature can. What soul binding is, after all, is just creating a permanant psychic connection between two entities, enabling power to be shared (usually one way, but it probably does go both ways.) In the case of the Emperor, he is bestowing a fraction of his power onto an astropath to bolster his own power, as well as a portion of his resilience against the warp. It's actually just a variation on sorcery, which is when daemons give a human with or without psychic powers a "safe" channel for using the warp through themselves. Expressing it in those terms, of course, woudl be heretical, but its still accurate.

You have to wonder where the Emperor found all the time to soul bind astropaths. Assuming he could only do it once every hour he'd only have bound a few million over the centuries. Even once per minute wouldn't change it that much. He'd have to be binding 100 or so every second... well you get the idea... and this still requires centuries to pull it off.

There must be more to it, and he must be able to do it whilst doing other things. The Emperor - psychic multitasker!

Page 38


The Astronomican was built by Mars.

Page 38


The astronomican has "frequencies" and modulations which Navigators are especially sensitive to. This probably could account for why other psykers could still "sort of" see it (like astropaths or Librarians. Or Gabriel Angelos) - it would just mean they couldn't see it nearly as well as the Navigators themselves. Of course one then asks "well why not use a frequency all psykers could read" to simplify navigation?" My best guess would be that the frequencies of the warp "stuff" affect its ability to penetrate the warp - much as the frequencies of a laser can affect its ability to penetrate matter (EG x-rays or gamma rays penetrating much better than IR or UV rays) - the Emperor would logically want the best "penetration" of the Warp he could get, and it would be only Navigators (or perhaps sorcerors) who have the right psychic equipment to detect the warp. Other psykers (astropaths, Librarians, etc.) can still be used to navigate, of course.

Likely this is what astropathic relays and beacons mentioned in BFG are meant to do as well - they project smaller "beacons" duplicating the Astronomican, but perhaps on different frequencies and with considerably less range. Hell there's lots of ways you could do this (EG the Eisenstein detonating its warp drive could provide similar.) We know the Tyranids use something similar to home in on target worlds (Genestealers or other vanguard forms). You probably could make portable beacons (as hinted at in the Dawn of War novels) but thier use would be limited by their stationary nature (EG as a reference point and something to fix on.)

For those of you who are bored by what I said the simple version is: FTL works similar to the Honorverse or age of sail travel (eg routes, currents, waves/tides which helps explain the predictability chartist captains use to navigate without navigators) but with some submarine/naval analogues like sonar and shit.

also the approximate difference between Navigator and non-navigator travel seems to be within an order of magnitude or two (days instead of weeks, months instead of years) depending on interpretation. That fits with my rough ideas (hundreds to thousands of c for inter sector travel, especially by Charitsts, whilst travel between sectors or segmentums can be tens or hundreds of thousands of c easily.)

Page 38



The Astronomican is mainly a reference point (as are the astropathic beacons, warp signatures of inhabited planets, and the like) for figuring out location and orientation in the warp and (hopefully) offset the disrupting effects of time/space dilation/contraction and currents.

An interesting implication of the past two quotes can explain a recent odditiy I uncovered in reading the ADB Night Lords books - it wsa noted that the Astronomican's use can be "detected" - the Night Lords avoid using it because it would give away their presence - which could be explained as anyone attmepting to absorb or tap into that beacon to navigate would "bounce" some of that psychic energy off themselves, which could be picked up and detected (psychic radar.) Heck, we know that the astronomican could be tapped that way in Mecahnicum. You probably could even tap the beacon to "bounce" the AStronomican (or other psychic) signals around to pierce the gloom in a radar (or sonar) like fashion - see what it reflects off of. I love those ocean/naval analogies.

The current Astronomican is powered by thousands (tens of thousands) of lesser psykers, giving us an idea of the Emperor's power. I guess Empy's warp connection was cut off in that way, or something.



Page 38


Good old Empy has final control over aspects of the beam. To use the radar/radio analogy, this is a directed "pulse" which I suspect fixes a specific location. Telemetry sort of - the Emperor knows where the ship (or fleet) has to go, and uses his powers to help them directly stay on course. It's more active than the passive "lighthouse beacon" of the AStronomican though, so it probably has more limits and tradeoffs (can only handle a limited number of ships at one time, can't maintain it for long, etc.)

The benefit of this is greatly increased warp speed - tens at least, if not hundreds or even thousands of times faster warp travel - I guess navigation is one of the main limiting factors on travel speed, which makes sense. For context - "Months" long journeys are the one that cover segmentum distances usually (2nd edition IG codex, HH series, RT RPG - eg 10,000+c) or a good chunk of the whole galaxy. I like this because it helps explain certain otherwise "outlier" calcs (EG Gabriel angelos crossing a segmentum in only a few days - given his "episodes" seeing the Astronomican we could chalk it up to him being blessed or favored by Empy for some reason.

I would also speculate that Astropaths can probably pull this off too, to a lesser degree. We know they can "track" people through the warp by placing part of themselves in them (beacons), and we know they can scry/observe events from far away. If Astropath relays can act as weaker, more local "beacons" then I expect they might also perform the "active" function to similer, albeit lesser, degrees. In theory, at least.

Page 38


Navigators.

Page 38


Simple version: Navigators are so special because their eye gives them the ability to "see" through the warp the best of any psyker (like having eyes that can pierce the dark or fog, or see in IR or UV.) Some predictive/precognitive ability, and the ability to make out other possible landmarks (stars, inhabited systmes., etc - all things which for some reason or antoher have a
relfection on the warp) through the haze of the warp also explain this.

Again the modulation thing. I suspect there may be artificial means of doing this - FFG material mentions DAoT artificial devices which greatly extended warp travels in a way similar to navigators, which the Navigators themselves try to suppress to maintain their own importance.


Page 38


Lobotomised psykers. not the first time we've heard of this (the novel Blind, for example as well as various other sources I've mentioned in the past.) I wonder if they did mundane tasks or they had some special psychci roles?

Page 38


Untouchables - the Silent Sisters. One wonders what happened to male untouchables. We learn that they can detect as well as disrupt psykers (As we saw in Tales of Heresy.) I have to wonder if the Sisterhood works under the auspices of the Astro-Telepathica too? If they do, they probably represented his wildcard against betrayal from that avenue, given their absolute loyalty to Big E.

PAge 41


The AdMech.

Page 41


We know in modern times there are forge worlds.. this certainly implies there were potentialyl thousands of Forge worlds. At the time of the Crusade, they had founded (or discovered) only a small number of these - indeed, the Fabricator General was rather miffed at Big E because of this slow progress - he wanted to reclaim Mars great empire.

Page 41


A bit more complicated than that, if we believe the FAbricator Generla in Mechanicum. He saw it as a mutual alliance, and believed or expected Big E to provide him aid in reclaiming the AdMech Empire in return for industrial and technological aid. This seems to imply a more optimistic intepretation (willing vassals and acolytes). This may be revisionist, but Kelbor-Hal is hardly an unbiased observer either.

We also know tht the Emperor was not universeally hailed as the Omnissiah reborn - AdMech still debated over that even up to the point of the Heresy, again according to Mechanicum. It even created resentment as the deal/restrictions on the Mechanicum did.

The navigator bits are interesting.. they have six navigator houses tied directly to them. Did this mean they had their own slave navigators before, or were they some sort of servitor analogue (one term I recall used for servitors is thrall, but its also been used for slave, as has servitor for slave/servant.)

Page 41


Cult Mechanicus weapons. Also the plasm aprojector shows what looks like A power armored cyborg with an arm mounted gun. Maybe combat servitor or tech priest.

Page 41


Not sure if this is a Dreadnought, Robot, Servitor, or what.

Also Mechanicum protecotrs seem to predate the Skitarii.

Page 46


An (approximate) indicator of the number of worlds in the Imperium pre heresy. It does fit millions, although it could be larger. It almost certianly grew over time, since the modern Imperium is larger than the Crusade-era Imperium.

Page 49


It also lead to a conflict between the War council and the Council of Terra over power and authority, which the latter seemed to be winning, judging by the early HH novels. Here, though, it suggests a more division and balance of powers - a military arm and a civilian arm, which work together but remain separate. That actually would make sense. Even though the Crusade has reached the limits of the galaxy (for the most part) in all directions, it still had (and still has) lots of territory within that scope to explore and colonize and conquer. The Astartes and Primarchs would have been busy quite awhile going back over old territory and scouring out potential threats and setting up new colonies.

Page 54


Which is hinted at in Galaxy in Flames I believe. Again the interesting thing is that it isn't so much an outright lie as a half-truth.. there are elements believable enough, that the rest can be distorted to suit Chaos' purposes (Eg the "weak men above you" bit seems true to Horus, but it gives Chaos an opening to poison the Primarch against his Father.)

Page 61 - Space Wolf support squad.. again hand flamers.

Page 62


Seems like the Terran-born marines were more prone to belief in the Emperor's divinity, although the novel series never showed this overtly.

Page 62 - Death Guard heavy support squad, appear to be using multimeltas, both a shoulder mounted and arm-carried (rifle like) variety.

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-05-23 06:09pm 

Part 2 of Collected Visions. also includes part of the 'Kaban Machine' by Graham McNeill. Plays a role later on in Mechanicum.


Page 65


Veridian would be somewhere on the edge of Tempestus close to Macragge/Calth, since IIRC they used Calth as a mustering point to invading Veridian (Orks I think.) Signus cluster is probably close to the Galactic center but on the southern end. This would tend ot suggest the shield worlds are probably similarily far away and ot the south, and Isstvan was in the north. The novels tend ot suggest months of travel (less than a year anyhow) to reach those locales.

Isstvan has to be somewhere in the northern part of Ultima segmentum close to the edge (half a galaxy away form Terra, remember.)

Page 66 - Again Emperor's Children shoulder mounted lascannon.

Pge 67 - Wolrd Eater's support squad has respirator masks and some sort of visor/targeting eyepiece connected to some back source. And spome sort of non-bolter rifle. May be a lasgun but it isn't clearly so.

Page 69 -

no text, but its worth noting a group of Space Wolves - the caption notes its a recon squad - carrying what look to be lasguns rather than bolters. I'd say its a scout company if it werne't for the fact they're clearly wearing power armor (including backpacks and helmets)

PAge 77 - Again Empero's Children Devastators, some this time carry the lascannons in the hand and some on the shoulder. It seems in this one its interchangable (although they look shoulder-carried types)

Page 79 - "Fellblade" - super heavy tank of som ekind looks like its crushing a Rhino under its feet. Looks a bit like a Baneblade but with a slightly rounded turret.


Page 81


The destruction of Isstvan III. more than a thousand bombs I'm prett ysure. and it was twelve billion. Maybe the first half died in the virus attack, the rest in the firestorm.

Page 81 - EC tactical squad carryingall plasma guns.

Page 82


Implies a fairly short firestorm.

Page 91


Well he was the only psyker of the Primarchs. Most of them had no discernable talent, and only a few (like Sanguinius) displayed anything evne remotely resembling psychic ability.

Page 91


This makes Magnus more of an asshole than he's portrayed in Thousand Sons, although some of the earlier novels (like False Gods) do this as well.

Page 92


Magnus taught the Thousand sons Sorcery.. so they had both internal and extenral sources of power.. which probably explains how they can do some insane shit. This probably also explains alot of the thousand sons novel.

Page 92


The Librarian program.


PAge 94


The Nikea edict thingy. Didn't last much past his death it seems. Apparently also the Primarchs as a whole all have psychic talents of some kind or another.

Page 94


Again Magnus comes across as a colossally arrogant ass.

Page 97


Thousand Sons tells us it was pretty damn early.


Page 98


Sounds like one of those "just as planned" Tzeentch plots to me. Would be just like the bastard.

Page 98


There are other, faster methods of communication than astrotelepathy. We've seen one such used by the Cabal in Legion, for example.

Page 98


You'd have to wonder why Magnus wasn't aware of those wards, and what they might be there for. Nevermind that if Horus could figure out what the Emperor was doing, you'd think Magnus would too.

Page 98 - STarship called Maclador's observer. Noteworthy for being Maclador's ship(s), but also because it looks like the entire ship has massive burning braziers. In space.

Page 103 - Long Fang squad using what seems to be a multi-barrel weapon. Energy weapon or gatling gun maybe?

Page 109


more of the deceptions and half truths dumped on Horus by Chaos. We also see how Horus started out with noble intentions (coloured by a sense of outrage, betrayal and hurt - he did love the Emperor and he missed having him around and felt abandoned by him) but those were twisted by Chaos by the end. He may have even been possessed (not as completely as Fulgrim perhaps, but he was subverted.)

Page 110


Horus used his authority and charisma, and the obedience of his subordinates, to carry out his plans. alongside cultists of course.

Also indentured servitude in the military.. sort of slavery (which is what the uplifting primer called it anyhow.)

PAge 113


Self explanatory.

Page 113


Prtty much as happened in Flight of the Eisenstein.

Page 114


Not all. Some only had tens of thousands (or perhaps less.) I'd say only the ultramarines had 250,000. We know the word bearers had 100,000 troops.

Page 114


Much as with the latter Imperial guard, the naming conventions seem to vary depending on who you ask, but as far as organization goes, they mean the same thing. (EG a unit of 10, a unit of 100, a unit of 1000, etc.)


PAge 114


Not quite true. Many of the Legions seemed to serve with regiments raised from their home worlds - the Prospero spireguard or the Caliban Jaegers). Hell I'm pretty sure there's mention in the card game stuff (the artwork) of Calth infantry too. And we definitely know of lots of Terran-raised infantry regiments. And while the Mechanicum remained soveregin, the fact is they basically contributed their forces as a matter of course during the Heresy (Titans, robots, Tech-Guard, etc.) so it came to effectively the same thing. It could be that they were raising regiments from other worlds by then, but I suspect this wasn't quite set in place, as they were still working out the tithing system as a rule.

The Army was basically the "mop up" and "hold ground" force. They came in behind the Speartip of the Astartes and supported their offense, held ground they took, and generally did the sorts of things that were too minor to waste on an Astartes (usually.)

Page 114


Mechanicum contributions.

Page 115 - Imperial army "speeder" listed here.. Ironically it looks like the old "Grav Attack tank" of early 40K days (the soap bottle one I believe.) We do know of a number of speeder types from Legion as well.

Page 118


Sparselpy populated worlds might provide only tens or hundreds of thousands of troops annually, whilst overcrowded Hives could provide hundreds (millions or tens of millions, depending on the size of the regiment.) I'd guess at least hundreds of billions, if not trillions, of troops annually (tens/hundreds of thousands or so from over two million worlds on average, and millions per the thousands/tens of thousands of hive worlds.)

Page 118


This would seem to be one of those things where the War council/Expeditionary fleets would clash with the administration - who collects and distributes the taxes? The warlords would just take what they need (and the world would have to provide it) but the administrators would demand to be the ones to collect and distribute it. In the case of troops this would be especially true (and probably lead to differences in training, organization and usage across the fleets.) On the other hand this also made the Space Marines more flexible and gave them more organic combat assets they always had (starships, fighters and aircraft, skimmers and gunships, tanks and infantry, and so on..) which made them more effective as an offensive fighting force.

And regardless of who they were tithed to, the troops are still basically contract servants/slaves and seem to have little say on the matter (although given what you see in the fluff, I suspect much of the Army was made up of voluntary recruiting, especially from Astartes homeworlds and Terra, as it was seen as a duty and a benefit to serve in the Crusade.)

Page 118


The "Variation" in troops. All that said I can't seriously recall many cases of "mobs", unless they were used as conscripts or cannon fodder (which they might have.) - this is something more in line with Chaos. Also the novels give much of the Army some pretty badass kit - speeders and aerial gunships and air transport are more common than in the IG.


Page 118


No Commissars that I recall, unless this was another "just before the Heresy" Change. It's also possible that that is what the genewhips were but they didnt call them commissars usually.

The Commissariat was more of the Adminsitratum/Munitorum's bueraucreatic arm anyhow.

Page 118


Tens of thousands of marines, millions of soldiers.


PAge 118 - Heavy weapons troopers from an Imperial army regiment wwith greatcoats and carrying huge shoulder carried and fired missile launchers with a top-feed magazine - at least six missile capacity by the picture. The weapons are also incredibly huge (nearly a meter long and maybe .3 meters in diameter. I suspect they might use suspensors to alleviate the weight.

Page 119 - Calth (Gropp's raiders) infantry... they look alot like Cadians but in gray fatigues.

PAge 122 - 2 Catachan/Armageddon Ork hunter like jungle regiments, which seem to look identical (right down to red bandannas on their head and tank tops) (Vallis' brigade, the Phyrian 2nd Auxiliary and McCormick's reapers, the Calth 2nd irregulars.)

PAge 122 - Fellesian 23rd Airborne - seem to be wearing partial carapace or hardshell flak (upper body) with Elysian-style helmets with visors and using either jump packs (possible) or grav chutes (more likely).

Page 122 - Helios mortar carrier for the Army. Look ot be Cadian like troops (2nd edition or so) working them.

Page 123 - Fellesian 5th Airbone auxiliary - looks to be some kind of air-mobile variant of a Sentinel. - it may have its own grav chute but it looks like its some sort of thruster setup, since it has obvious thruster nozzles and what may be intake fans above.


Page 123 - Siege Engineers - again Catachan-like including red bandannas. One of them is female who has a bionic arm and eye. (Barnald's Sappers)

Page 123 Mercenary conscript force shown. Seem to be wearing some sort of metallic (plate?) armor and carrying metla weapons as standrd or oversized lasguns without stocks.

Page 123 - Fasadian 45th Infantry, Sader's Fighters. Look alot like the Krieg or Armageddon STeel Legion troops.

Page 124


Chaplain Edict.. which seems to be designed to do for Astartes what the Commissars did for the Army.

PAge 124


Another irony.

Page 124


See!

Page 126


"Yeah. I'm just your average 10 foot tall warrior with Jesus hair and an omnipresent glow. Nothing divine about me at all!" Again his approach to all this was incredibly stupid.

Page 126


This takes on an especially amusing twist given how the Emperor has Guilliman basically purge an entire world the Word Bearers have brought into compliance because of their Emperor worship. I suppose there could be good reasons for ordering that - to make an example of religious zealots who may have killed their own unbelievers, but the idea he killed an entire civilization to make a point smacks of the same sort of shit he was pissed at Lorgar doing.

Again when it comes to this whole religion angle it seems like Big E just fucked up by the numbers

Page 127


And while I just chastised the Emperor for mishandling religion, Lorgar still has a buttload to blame for everything because of this paragraph here. Summarised it's "I'm not going to play with you anymore because you won't play the way I want to." Lorgar would not have been happy with anything less than "Emperor as god" because he wanted someone/something to worship, and the fact he so willingly looked elsehwre to have that need filled only underscores that. Everything else is just self-serving rationalization.


Page 127


Considering Lorgar and Erebus were instruments in corrupting Horus to begin with, one can hardly be surprised at this.

Page 129


The AdMech have at least "dozens" of Forge worlds.

PAge 129


Pretty much as outlined in Mechancium. Surprisingly, it was blasphemy.

Page 132


Much as happened in the series. I suspect that the murder of Isstvan may have been a prerequisite for this.. a 'feeding' for the daemons of Chaos to get them worked up. It would be in their MO to trick someone into genocide just to provide them billions of souls. The Warp storms basically futzed things up for a great length of time.

Page 133


Showing how Horus was a moron, we see that the Daemons wanted to get involved and manifest in realspace to feast and run riot.



Page 133


Techically, this refers to using a psyker as a gateway, not just possession. As in waiting for a Psyker to tap the warp and open up a gateway, then use that gate/link to invade the material realm using the psykers body. If they are already there they might use any body or be bound into it (daemonhosts, although that might be more of a summoning) or into some object.

PAge 133


In other words: Summoning is of limited success and duration, unless there is an intact warp gate open to sustain the daemons. Daemon worlds or warp rifts like the Eye are evne more desirable.

Page 134


Millions of worlds to rescue. They only recurited as I recall from the Legionary homeworlds, and Terra.

PAge 134


again repeat of "tens of thousands" of marinees rather than hundreds of thousands.

Page 134


Tens of thousands "in a few years" per Legion. Indicator of the rate of growth and replenishment.

PAge 134


Uses of the recruits.


Page 135
- Death Guard heavy plasma cannon, shoulder mounted. They're emitting solid, parallel blue beams of slightly transparent glowy death.,

PAge 138


Untouchables and the assault on Prospero.


Page 142 - Prahopte recon squad, lasguns, and power armor.


Page 143


The custodian guard, that is. In short they're everywhere.

Page 143


Custodian abilities. Their feats compared toa Space Marine seem variable (depending on the warrior, the source, etc.) In general I'd expect them to be superior due to either training or equipment, but they might be equals as far as abilities go. It may even be up to tricks like the kinds of drugs and chems they're able to gland in combat or something. Or maybe even the baseline potentials of the recruits. That said they have no Librarians.

Page 143


At least a 1000. Old fluff said 10,000. In my personal opinion I'd bet way more, just to reconcile it with all the fluff. It would be just like the Custodians to avoid showing their numbers though.

Page 143


Custodians in battle alongside the Emperor.


Page 143


Rumors about the relationships between Custodians, Marines, and the Emperor.

Page 144



The silent sisterhood, the Telelpathicus and the Black Ships. The pain angle makes it very easy to root out psykers, obviously.

Page 147 - Emperor's Children use a treaded Rapier Laser Destroyer carrier.

Page 150 - Custodian and Silent Sister portrayed near the Emperor. The Custodian is a head taller than the Sister, and the Emperor is a head taller still.

Page 153


40 companies - 4000 Marines. Daemons facilitate fast passage through the warp for Lorgar. An advantage of Chaos worship, I guess.


Page 153 - Terminator armor have 6-shot twin missile launchers on their shoulders.

PAge 158


Ultramarines source and destination. I'd guess the Veridian system is just on the edge of Tempestus where it joins Ultima, close to Macragge. I'd guess 50 thousand LY to Calth. Again the timeframe frm the series is months (Galaxy in Flames for example mentions it was a few months since the battle against the Technocracy, which was just before Horus gave his orders to Guilliman.) so we're looking at maybe 200-300 thousand c. In any case it took less than a year, so we're looking at around 50-100,000c at the very least.


Page 162


The Word BEareres had means of triggering novas or CMEs in stars (Its not a supernova no matter what they say) and they destroyed planets with geo-nuclear strikes, whatever that is.

In the novel KNF we learn the defense grid is used to blast Calth, and Lorgar's fleet was bobmarding the planet.

btw 'chemical warheads' could mean chemical explosives, or some sort of chemical reactions, although what chemicals cna trigger a supernova is interesting to speculate in either case.

Page 163


100,000 Word Bearers is "tens of thousands" and dozens of Titans.

Page 164


Effects of the battle in space and the battle on the ground. I take it "plasma quakes" refer to sub-surface plasma warhead detonations.. MT range probably, perhaps (a few) GT is possible, although at that point you're more likely to just blow craters in the crust.



Page 169 - Thousand Sons heavy support squad, with some extremely slender, long barreled plasma guns. Different from the previous plasma guns (which were shorter but thicker looking)

Page 171


Blood Angels location. Sadly we don't know where they started from, or where exactly around the Centre the place was.

Page 176


Gellar field breach control measure.

Page 177


Effect of a daemonic incursion.

Page 177


Blood Angels Elites.

Page 177


500 marines killed i nshort period of time... Sanguinius injured by psychic backlash. Rather interesting really.. you would think that many would have been killed before at some point in the Crusade, and he might have reacted to it. or known about the psychic backlash. Did it have something to do with the fact a Daemon did it? Or was it the speed and number?

Page 180

- Army regiment labeled: "Ghazal's Defenders - Fasadian 4th Infantry" looking a bit like a "laurence of arabia" type force.

Page 188


Implies contact between forces in "weeks", at most, possibly days. Millions of c considering most of the Legions are at the edges of the galaxy. On the other hand, why didn't the Legions let Terra know?


Page 188


Seems like they made it a habit of keeping at least one Legion stationed near Terra as a matter of course.

PAge 190 - Battle BArge and Strike craft *(cruiser?) that look virtually identical.. although hilariously the Gauntlet of Macragge (Battle barge) looks more like a cruiser and is less ornate than the Miatus Strike craft


Page 190


I've alreay addressed my issues regarding the whole soul binding issue and how slow the Emperor seems to go about it. Also we get the start of the whole "sacrificed to the astronomican to bolster it." Basically what happenes is becuase the Emperor was busy doing his whole webway plan, Magnus' sorcery warning disrupted it, and forced the Emperor to divert even more of his power to fending off daemons and keep a webway connection open. As mentioned previously, the Emperor's powers were already stretched maintaining the Astronomican over such a huge area, so now the beacon was failing. Plan B, it seems is to use psykers to supplement the Emperor's power.


Page 190


The beacon-sacrifice plan is initiated. This pretty much frees him up for other things. By the time of Outcast Dead, the Beacon thing is something of a punishment or a means of recycling useless psykers (including burned out or used up astropaths) Noone knows what happens to psykers assigned to this duty, though. Thousands or tens of thousands of psykers is equal to (part) of the emperor's power.

Page 192 - World Eater and Emperor's Children jetbikes.

Page 193 - Emperor's Children shoulder mounted bazooka lascannon.

Page 199


Programming servitors. Note the doctrina wafer and how it gets stuck right into the brain. somehow this gives the Servitor its instructions.

Page 199


They don't seem to have anything in their hardware that is a failsafe to prevent these sorts of errors. Rather sloppy if you ask me.


PAge 199


Servitor augmentations.

Page 201


I don't know how this follows, but I guess it does. I suppose it might indicate that their robots and what passes for "acceptable" AIs is based on human organics (either using imprints or artificially organic structures or something. that's not impossible, given we know that they can imprint animal natures into titans, grapplehawks, etc.)

Page 201


Praetorian battle servitor.

Page 201


Imperial Robots and Servitors seem to share the need to have detailed instructions provided to them (They don't think on their own at all.) That said, we know that servitors can be multitask (at least high order ones can), so it stands to reason they could do multitask robots. Or human directed AI/machine type things (like starships and Titans)


Page 201


AdMech life extension.

Page 201


Skitarii.

Page 201


Genetic testing security.


PAge 201


A few paragraphs up it is described as a "monstrous steel door" . not sure how wide or tall it is.

Page 201


Robot construction crew.

Page 202


Battle servitors. Again note no failsafes or backups to prevent accidents or system failures.


Page 202


The Kaban Machine. We see it in Mechanicum.

Page 202


Note that in Mechanicum they don't describe it as wholly mechanical. It had some organic (or semi organic, pseudo organic, or artifically created organic) components. I suspect what the true fear is self-aware, adaptive/learning, self-developing intelligences, which is basically what the Kaban machine is.

PAge 203


"vat grown protein paste" - ah such culinary delights to be had on Mars.

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-05-23 06:17pm 

Glad you made it to this series, Connor. I'm really looking forward to this, in no small part because at this stage the Galaxy was still full of minor human nad xenos star empires, the Interex, the Quietude, the Laer, etc.

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-05-27 06:43pm 

Part 3 of 4

Page 205


The supposed reasons for the prohibition on AI, which I take to be a reference to the Men of Iron. They basically don't want machines able to think for themeslves or operate independently of human control in any way. Although we do know they have things sort of like that (Starship intelligences, Titans, etc.).. although those may not count as they work in conjunction with humans. Also reference to the old Legio Cybernetica version of robots.

I'd guess what is acceptable is something that uses a machien in conjunction with a human pilot or, say, a servitor, but no self aware machine by itself is allowed (such as the tau use, although Tau drones don't generally operate on their own either, except in large groups.)

Page 207


Just like I said. I gather this means 40K sucks at making AIs. Or it may be chaos corruption.

Page 207



Martian Protectors.

Page 207


Protector weapons.

Page 207


the Kabal Machine intervenes. Note that it has a hypervelocity gun.

PAg 207


Yes we're well along the way to one of those Robot goes mad stories.

Page 208


Illegal programming perhaps?

Page 208


Phobos was converted into a giant sensor platform. Probably Deimos as well.


Page 208


Rapid transit across mar's surface in a few hours. Mars is some 6800 km in diameter, suggesting that whatever the transport is it can travel in excess of 7000 kph.

Page 211


We meet them in Mechanicum too.


Page 211


I think a ship crashses into this one at some point in Mechanicum - millions of square kilometres gets devastated.. as does billions.

Page 211


Remains of the six oblitrated Protectors. Also unsurprising that human flehs gets recycled to feed organics, even if it is just the brainless menials.

PAge 211


Tech priests assassins. We meet them in Mechanicum too. Why the AdMehc have assassins I dont know.

Page 212


We see these in Mechanicum too

PAge 212


Interesting ability

Page 212


A 100-machine strong demi-legio. Note that in Mechanicum a Legion is described as 30 machines.

Page 212


Mind controlled battle robots. I think the tripods are a "War of the Wars" reference.

Page 213


Techpriest Assassin hunting.

Page 214


"Confessor field" - Techpriest religious version of confession involves info security,


Page 215


This priest had met the Emperor. Rather obviously one of his fans. Note the way he appreciates the Emperor, and contrast this with the Mechanicum and Adepts like Zeth, compared with others like Kelbor Hal and such.

Another interpretaiton of the Aquila.

Page 215


This techpriest seemed to understand the deal. The Fab General tells things differently.


Page 215


Or the Dragon does.

Page 216


Neat trick.


Page 218-219


Servitor coordination.. also close quarters battle serivtor.


Page 219


Assassin weapon.

Page 219


Super Techpirest ninja skillz.

Page 219


Defensive screens.

Page 219


They're packing Custodian armaments. I wonder if the Emperor knows.

Page 220


Comment on Astartes plate and such. Note that Malevolus (innocent name there YEAH!) appares to be like Locum Kane and be devoted to Astartes production.

Page 221


Malevolus tells another side of the coin about the AdMech and Emperor, one more in line with the Fabbie General.

Page 228


Why that is, I don't know. It's not like they haven't vaporized whole towns or stuff to eradicate teh enemy. Are they buried belowground or something?


Page 230 - Picture describing "Torvinal Tactical Support squad" of the Empeor's Children.. carrying what appear to be some sort of man portable, lascannon like weapon that is basically an oversized rifle.

Page 230


Tarvitz reflects on events on Isstvan III. A few months have passed.

Page 230


Virus bomb attack on Isstvan III again. except its 12 billion.

Page 234


That implies there are at least 26,000 wolves, probably more than that... 50,000 or more I'd guess.


Page 236


The orbital bombardment of prospero vaporized the seas/oceans with days of bombardment. Assuming 10K ships.. 184 MT/sec. call it hundreds of megatons a sec at least. Inefficiencies and the probability I over estimated the number of ships involved is likely. Call it somehwere in the high megatons to gigatons range of firepower for ships at least.

Page 238


Dreadnought firing on Thousand sons.


Page 240


Magnus vs Space Wolves.


Page 241


Custodians vs Thousand sons Terminators.


Page 241


MJ range.. maybe?


Page 241 - Prahopte Recon squad of the Thousand sons. Power armored (Scouts?) with lasguns.

Page 249


200-300 years maybe?

PAge 252


It's possible to travel without the astronomican, but risky.

Page 252


The Astronomican beacon seems to operate at variable levels depending on circumstances. This seems to enable the beacon to penetrate the disruption of the warp better and improve the ability of ships to navigate the Warp. Would only be useful if they have lots of excess psykers.



Page 252


Again Tradeoffs of boosting the Astronomican. What's interesting is how the Astronomican is linked to communication as well as travel - do the astropaths tap into it or rely on it then as well? Is that why they can see the beacon?

They seem to get more signals each day from outlying star systems (millions of c?) Also the bit about translating and transmitting messages to the logic engines.


Page 254


3 centuries.. 200 years of Great crusade plus.. what? 100 years of preparation or so?

Page 256 - Emperor's Children jetbike squad. Again.

Page 260


Implies that communications between outlying forces took days. Although some forces are incommunicado and the distances aren't exactly known.. but if they're pulling it in from the edges of the galaxy we're talking millions/tens of millions of c.



Page 268 - world eater scout squad shown here.. but they're different from teh recon squads - the armor they are wearing looks like carapace but not power armor (no helmets or backpacks or stuff) and they look like scouts.. (pistol and close combat weapon in this incarnation) not like lasgun toting marines with power armor.

Page 272


Difficulties presented by warp storms. All the loyal legions (except the White Scars, obviously) are scattered in "remote corners" of the galaxy, far away from Terra or Isstvan.

Page 279


"weeks" and "months" since the confrontation, gives an implication about warp speed if we knew exact location.


Page 282


Pretty much as happened in Fulgrim.


Page 287 - Mordant Mammoth heavy tank... death guard vehicle.. looks to be a super heavy or baneblade variant.

Page 290 - Malbon support group of Iron Warriors.. looks to be carrying what is a shoulder-fired plasma cannon.

Page 290


The Raven Guard, Salamanders and the Vet forces of the Iron Hands engage,

Page 291
- Goldoara Heavy support squad of Emperor's Children - looks to be carrying a lascannon in rifle-fashion (no stock though) with power cable linking to backapck power source.

Page 302


Months spent straneded on the far side of the Imperium.. means weeks or months maybe (less than a year, again) to reach Isstvaan.. across either half a galaxy or a full galaxy.. can't tell. Hundreds of thousands of c.. how many hundreds of thousands is up to debate. Maybe millions.


Page 303 - Nisr's scouts - Imperial Army Look like Krieg or Steel Legion type troops - Greatcoats, skull like face masks and the helmets.

PAge 304- alpha-Omega 05 a battle robot that looks vaguely spherical and mounted on treads.. similar to KabanProject Machine (even having the tentacle/Mechadendrite type beam weapons)

Chi-Mu 25 - some sort of Ad Mech Rhino variant that looks to be mounting a whirlwind Missile launcher (six shot)

Page 309 - Fohrste OGryns of the Imperial army. They all look to be surpsisingly sophisticated and well equipped OGryns. They're wielding what looks to be some kind of rifle that is not a Ripper gun - some ogryn style lasgun perhaps? Its got glowy buttons on it (no stock though, so still close combat). THey also have grenades, and armor and webbing and other gear. And pants. One is smoking a cigar and has a soda can in one of his grenade belt loops. Maybe the BONE'Ead surgical technique was more common back then? Or perhaps these are one of the demi-OGryn Guard troops who aren't quite as stupid (something like the Kanak)

Page 312 - Vicente Six Raven Guard troops. They all seem to have suit modifications.. some sorts of devices mounted on the tops of backpacks - targeters or sensors or cameras of some kind, and odd ocular/eyepiece attachments on the left sides of their helmets. Also their armour is oddly pure white with a red skull and wings chestpiece.

Page 315 - Ornatav's barge, Imperial army listing. Has some huge guns sticking out of it (although they look small and spindly.

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-05-27 07:04pm 

Part 4. Next time we start the novels!


Page 320


The Golden Throne.

Page 320


The Imperial Dungeon - I believe is what it is called.

Page 320



The Emperor's big, great work on Terra and why he abandoned the crusade. He's trying to invade and conquer the webway for the Imperium. Speed of the webway - 100,000 LY/sec implied, although it could vary.

Page 324 - Various pictures showing the inside of the Webway show it to have cities and structures. Some of which look vaguely Eldar like in design or type, although the portal itself does not look of Eldar design I have noticed. We know from Thousand Sons that the Emperor did nto "build" the Golden Throne per se, but he found and built upon/modified it It may have been Eldar (one picture caption identifies "wraithbone ruins" which bear a resemblence to Eldar astehtic) but it may not be - it coudl be some contemporary of the Eldar, or perhaps even a remains of the Old Ones themselves.

On the other hand there is the question of why, if the Golden Throne was a Webway portal to begin with, it needed the Emperor's protection in connecting between said gate and the network...

Another possibility, and strongly hinted at in the series (with the Dragon being on Earth, and 5th edition and such) is that the Golden Throne was a Necron-built Dolmen Gate.

Anyhow, we learned in 5th edition with the Dark Eldar codex that there were Eldar civilizations in the webway, and the Dark Eldar still reside in the webway.

Page 324



I guess he constructed the webway portal. That doesn't mean he created the throne though.


Page 324


Well Magnus fucked that plan up in his arrogance, didn't he? And he claims to know the Warp better than Big E too. Of course Chaos has plenty of reason not to want the Imperium to use the webway I suppose.

This also menas that in modern times the Emperor is fighting to keep that webway shut. So if he died or if things fell apart? Terra would beg engulfed in a demon portal.

Page 324


It seems like a side benefit of Horus' actions is that he's thrown all future probability into the air - so much so the Emperor cannot accurately see the future at this time (assuming Chaos isn't just messing up that too.)

Anyhow he's talking about creating the Inquisition. Pity their loyalty is imperfect in modern times.

Page 326


Inside the webway.

Page 326


Nature of the human-built webway, including its vulnerability. I have to wonder how the Emperor intended to overcome this shortcoming. Especially since he cannot apparently close it up and seal it.

Page 326 - hover rhino of some kind, for the Custodes.


Page 332


As far as I know the Night Lords or Dark Angels didn't fight. The Dark Angels werne't able to make it from the Easter Fringe to Terra though in a few months it seems. I wonder how this meshes up with the viewpoint of Talos in the NL novels, since it implies that Curze came out to the Eastern Fringe of his own volition.


Page 334


The location of the White Scars and Space Wolves. how the Alpha Legion was to tie up both of them.. I have no clue.

Page 334


Implied that the Fists could have reached Isstvan months earlier had the Warp not interefered.


Page 337


Hundreds of Titan legions either way (assuming between 30-100 per Legion or something) Maybe some thousands. The Loyalists still have more, but they're scattered.

Page 338


the survivors returned to terra.

Page 341


Sanguinius' healing abilities.

Page 341


The blood Angels evacuated who they could, in other words.

Page 342


30K Space Marines and seveteen battle barges and cruisers. Probably not all of his Legion... but it implies he might have less than 100,000.. It's a lower limit anyhow. Tens of thousands of Marines and dozens/hundreds of ships.

Page 342


Chaos again manipulating things to frustrate the Imperium and Aid Horus.

Page 342


the Iron Warriors fleet. The oddity here is the short time between emergence from the warp point and opening fire. Even assuming the Iron Warriors emerge fairly close (half an AU to an aU out) and are travelling at a high fraction of c (.75 say) we'd be looking at engagement ranges of hundreds of thousands, and more probably millions of kms. If they are travelling slower? Or emerge from further away? The range is correspondingly greater (eg tens of millions of km) Considering it's mostly torpedoes mentioned (or possibly other guided munitions) this wouldn't be too weird.

Page 343


I think they're still close to Isstvan, so the contact seems to be near-realtime and tens of thousands of LY.

Page 343


We're probably talking minutes at best... which matches the Iron Warriors attack. That kinda reinforces we're dealing with close warp jump points.


Page 344


I don't think they are in the same system, so we're talking about near-realtime, system to system communication with astropaths yet again. Also interesting that Russ was able to tell (and warn about) the incoming Alpha Legion fleet Khan would face.

Page 345


Khan is waiting for response from Terra.


Page 345


Khan gets a reply backwithin the course of the battle.. hours or a few days tops. Prospero is about 15K LY from Terra.. so we're talking maybe 10-15K LY. Millions to tens of millions of c.


Page 350 - Imperial webway conduit described.

Also shown are the Custodians (I'd guess) and Custodian troop transports, which look antigrav. The Emperor looks to be (scaling wise) equal to 1/3 to 1/4th the height/width of the portal.

Page 351


The Emperor's magic aura seems to have anti-daemon properties. And again the Emperor has to sit on the golden toilet forever to keep it from overflowing with daemons. Frankly the fact the gate hasn't opened and invaded Terra is perhaps one of the best indicators that the Emperor is still active.

Page 351

- Bloodthirster with a Mace at the gate of the Imperial Webway... hard to gauge his height but he might be 2-3 times the height/width of the webway.. maybe 20 meters tall, judging by the Emperor and the Silent sister. Of course, this doesnt mean much, since Daemons can assume whatever size/mass they wish, if they have enough matter/energy nearby.

Page 352


Implied time for the White Scars to reach Terra from near Prospero of "days" (remember he ordered Khan back to Terra and Russ to lead off the Alpha Legion during the battle) 10-15K LY in days is 600,000c to 1.8 million c at least (900,000 to 2.7 million if 15K LY). Even if it was more like weeks, we're still talking hundreds of thousands of c.


Page 353


Rather interesting that they all arrived near-simultaneously like that.

Page 353


1.5 million Army troops and 3 Titan legions (90-300 Titans.) and a shit ton of orbital defenses. I believe at or around this point things start being more like in the past fluff, with Bill King's take on the Battle of Terra and such. It will be interesting to see how this meshes upw ith the eventual stories (in some distant future.)


Page 354


The effects of horus' bombardment. We know it lasts less than 55 days. Terra seems to have shielded much of its surface from the attacks though. Cracking the crust and boiling off the oceans suggests yields in the order of e27-e28 joules. Probably not evaporating it totally off the planet's surface, since the place still had an atmosphere I think. Also we know that Terra had ice caps of some kind (Inquisition War novels). We don't know how many ships there are but some hints have suggested up to a million. We know from Galaxy in Flames he deployed with 3000 at least. ASsuming a million and a full 55 day bombardment for ocean vaporiziation... we're talking e15 watts. for 3000 ships we go up to e17-1e8 watts, especially if the yield goes up (inefficiencies, blowing off part of the moisture/atmosphere)

This will be an interesting thing to witness in the future, as vairous novels have at different times indicated Terra does or does not have its oceans or any body of water (it was boiled away during the Unificaiton Wars and the infighting prior to the Emperor's armies conquered the planet, for example.)

Page 355


Assuming iron.. Terajoules. although we dont know how many shots, how many guns, or how to interpret it, so it doesn't help a great deal. Then again some are also vaporized.

Page 356


Titan Landers and Chaos titans. Corrupted in a matter of months or a few years.

Page 357 - Depicts white beams of energy from above precison-blasting enemy vehicles, land speeders, etc of Chaos. The title labels it as defence satellites.

Page 359


The infamous battle between Sangy and the Bloodthirster.

Page 359


The Sky Fortress was from the Horus Heresy board game. Alot of the fluff for this part of teh book is actually taken from the game, which I find very interesting

anyhow, plasma reactor blowing up.. 3 km across.. megaton range explosion.

Page 359


as I recall they were days/weeks away. The Ultrasmurfs are at Calth, the Dark Angels are on the Eastern Fringe somewhere. The Wolves were much closer (10-20K LY at least, but probably further away given Russ' orders)

Page 359


Inquisition's genesis. Note that this is also Garro and Qruze and some of those folk if I remember details right... which has formed a whole bunch of short stories already.

Page 360


Daemonic recon telling of the appearance of loyalist fleets - antoher benefit of DAemon allies. The Ultramsurfs are hours away from arriving, meaning they took a little over 2 months or so to reach Terra, and the Space Wolves took no more than 2 months. At least 60-90,000c for the Wolves, 300-350,000c for the Ultramarines perhaps.


Page 360


How are the loyalists going to get comms from outside the system?


Page 364


The Emperor consider's it a sign of Horus' power that he disrupted a teleporter beam. This tends to suggest that disrupting a Teleporter beam is not normal (at least barring shields)


Page 364


The Empy's psychic powers are tied to his magic glow aura, probably a side effect of the usage. A fraction of his power is sufficient to outright destroy daemons. (recall that Eisenhorn with his Force Staff, at Alpha psyker level, could obliterate daemons too.)

Page 364


The big battle. I really wonder how this will be handled in novel. Big E tries, but his desire to save horus leaves him exposed to getting his ass kicked, which he does.


Page 367


The last act of Malcador. He claims to have partly died (but not wholly... you figure it out) Note he doesn't think the machine will for a long time it seems, or fer that sort of thing.


Page 370


So there are psyskers sacirficed to sustain Empy as well as the astronomican. Also they know the Emperor communicates indirectly (visions, dreams, the Tarot, etc.) but that he still communicates

Page 370


That's overstating things a bit. For one thing, the Adminstratum was well on its way towards gaining control, and that would have ushered in a more defensively minded era regardless. I'm not sure that it means the LEgions would break up, but the Great Crusade as they had known it would be ended, at the very least. As it is, the transition ushered n by the Codex was largely a transition from a proactive, offensively minded force to one more reactive and defensive. That isn't to say that a defensively minded Imperium doesn't have problems (it has a great many) but it's not as if conquest and colonization completely stopped post-Heresy, after all.

It reminds me of the nostaligic nonsense Astelan vented about in Angels of Darkness, really, and that was pretty silly.

If there is one bad thing about it, it's the fact that control has fragmented - it is nowhere near as centralized as it was back during the Crusade. Of course, it only stayed centralized due to the Emperor, so its debatable whether there was any way it could have remained so. and even if it could, there's still the fear/risk of another HEresy - that would always be a danger.

Ultimately, ther was no perfect answer for the Imperium even during the Crusade, and once Big E was stuck on the toilet, there was even less of one. You manage the best you can.

Page 391
- Markov's rangers, Syrin 12th REgiment.. like 2nd edition cAdians in green camo.

Page 391 - Gropp's Raiders/Riders shown again (Calth 3rd) notable bout their lasguns is they have no powerpacks.

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-05-29 04:16am 

Didn't Lorgar had some talent as well? I remember that Magnus was his mentor when he initiated him to warpcraft.
And Konrad Curze saw visions of the future, so that's some talent as well (iirc, looking into the future is one of the more difficult psi-related stuff to do).

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-05-29 11:47am 

I know in Deliverance Lost they mentioned how they lost 72,000 mariens dead on the battlefield as the rest of the Raven Guard fled towards earth.
Know no fear by Abnett means one chapter having a quater of a million.
As for the million worlds which most likely is could be like my mom used to say "I told you a thousand times to clean your room" When it's maybe 90 times.
Or the fish was this big.

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-05-29 12:23pm 

Kurze had visions of the future. Lorgar occasionally had prophetic dreams (but he was more Warp-touched than most of the others) Sanguinus is frequently depicted with an Emperor-like halo, and if he had considerably psychic powers that could have helped him against the Bloodthirster. When Lorgar is chatting with Magnus in the First Heretic, he claims to not be like Magnus or even Russ who "can howl and all the wolves on Fenris howl with him."

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-05-29 12:24pm 

Know No Fear also metions "The 500 Worlds of Ultramar" or the somewhat heretical "New Empire

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-06-05 04:40pm 

Time to start digging into the meat of the series, beginning with Dan Abnett's Horus rising. The story proved to be a great way to start off the series in all respects - it shows us this bright, wonderful, glorious era of the Imperium, full of hope and glory for the shining future the Emperor and his forces were leading us to. We saw a Horus at the height of his power, bright, charasmatic, powerful - a man who loved his sons as if they were sons, who led his troops with respect and honour, and knew how to get the best out of the people he had - not just in his own fleet, but across the Imperium.

And then the cracks start showing. We see Horus not as some mustache twirling villain, but as a pawn. A victim of his own doubts, fears, and ultimately preyed upon by others (The Word Bearers and Chaos) to be their instrument in the upcoming war. We also see that that bright, shiny Imperium might not be as bright and shiny as we thought - through people like Karkasy we glimpse the devastation wrought by 'compliance', we see the resentment that results.. and begin that roller-coaster slide down into the hell of the Horus Heresy.

What Abnett does in the first book is really set the stage for the next few books, but he sets it well, and it manages to carry the first couple of novels reasonably well (becuase IMHO McNeill and co kind of stumbled after that.) carrying us to that turning point - the destruction of Isstvaan and the Drop Site Massacre. With that stage set, novels that have followed have more or less filled in the gaps with all that time, detailing various aspects (and people) caught up in this war.

*****


Page 14


203 years since the start of the Crusade, and a year since Ullanor.


Page 16


Horus pre-Heresy. Implied that the 63rd Expedition had conquered at least a hundred worlds.

Page 16


Stealth measres in the expedition ship.

Page 16-17


The opposition's warfleet.

Page 17


Back then Abbadon wasn't an asshole either. Again the "obscurement" which might suggest they are just running silent


Page 17-18


Anti-aircraft fire I think. Mostly beam fire, targeitng the stormbirds.

Page 18


*snicker* 140 metre tall titans. That ranks right up wiuth the sixty-storey titan from Fire Warrior.

Page 19


'modern' warfare. Draw your own conclusions.

Page 20


The 'emperor's soldiers. They're still shorter than the Astartes by at least a head.


Page 20


Half second beam of plasma fire.

Page 21


Bolter rounds blow apart individuals. Not completely, but at least burst them open.

Page 21


Collision of a capital ship on the ground, and Loken's visors dim to protect against glare.


Page 22


3 km comm range, and magnified visor range in armor for Space Marines.


Page 25



Automated gun platform that fires 1000 rounds in 5 seconds (200 rounds a escond). Loken's visor has Thermal/heat vision properties.

Page 30


Mersadie Oliton, remembrancer. Possibly genetically or augmetically modified for her task. Also note Loken's lack of experience with women. Considering their bred for war, taken at a young age... etc.. that really is no surprise is it? Tends to suggest Marines have little in the way of romantic or sexual feelings, but this may also vary from Legion to Legion.

Oliton is one of four primary 'witness' characters in the early part of the HH series, along with Keelor, Sindermann, and Karkasy. Oliton's role currently is to be Gavriel Loken's chronicler, but in the course of events she becomes Chronicler for the great tragedy soon to sweep down on things.

Page 32-33


Elite guards armed with cloaking devices that leave shimmers of distortin when moving and some odd force field weapons that do a real numbe ron AStartes armour (concussive or shock/blast effects, I guess?) Perhaps some sort of gravitic weapon, but that's sci fi crud.

Page 34


Power armor has "mimetic" polymers, and another force bolt.

Page 35-36


Thermal sensors have a range of at least 300-400 metres. Possibly reflecting gun range also.

Page 41


Bolt pistol round blows out ribcage.

page 42


Amped up super force field weapon fires. Here it is actually noted to be gravitic in nature and to also be a sort of shockwave. It seems more omnidirectional and less focussed as it simply blasts everything in range backwards without punching huge and messy holes in it.

Page 43


Horus. Note his storm bolter. One charateristic is his 'style' - everything he does is charasmatic and suave and wonderful and shit. this is one of his faces.

Page 45


Rememberancers. They encompass artists, architects, poets, journalists, etc. and represent one arm of the propoganda element of the Crusade (the other arm being the Iterators.) despite being essentially civilians, they (along with the Iterators) represent the forces that conduct the 'cultural conquest' of the world after the Astartes and Army have physically conquered it.

They are also another 'symbol' (albeit something of a subtly grim one) of that grand, bright, shiny Imperium that never truly comes about. The fate of the remembrancers in this serie is, for the most part, quite grim.

Page 46


Origins of the Remembrancers. Since it's been a year since the Emperor returned to Terra... assuming that the forces are somewhere out in the other segmeentums and beyond segmentum Solar (at least 10-20K LY) it takes at least 6 months to and back... we're talking at least 20-40,000c FTL speed, and probably still much faster. If it's up to half a galaxy (close to the edges, as subsequent events show) we're closer to 120,000c.

We also get a bit of a glimpse at the political side of things and the problems it causes with the 'Council of Terra' - something that becomes a sore point between the bureaucrats and administrators and the warriors of the Imperium (the Primarchs, Astartes, etc. who were running things up to that point.)

Page 46


The scope of the Expeditionary fleets engaged in the Great Crusade. We don't know quite (Yet) how big fleets are (yet), but this number is useful to remember for later on, when variables do pop up. Figure 4659 primary fleets and 60K some secondary. Oh and 4.3 million remembrancers amongst them all. Average is about 65-70 remembrancers per fleet, although the primary fleets likely have far more than the smaller - suggest hundreds for the primary fleets and dozens for the secondary.

Also implied it took months to deploy the Remembrancers. Note their presence is one of the major points of contention between the military and governmental arms of the Imperium.


Page 47


Yet another point of transition that becomes a point of contention, and a rather more significant one. The fate of the Astartes post Crusade, and the growth of a bureacracy that will come to dominate the Post-Heresy Imperium is a significant point of this and a number of other books in the series, especially early on. It also forms the basis of alot of other novels like "Angels of Darkness." This is actually one of those 'cracks' I mention at the start - the doubt and uncertainty about the future of the Astartes and Primarchs is a theme that runs common amongst many novels. Indeed, with revelations in latter books (like The Outcast Dead, First Heretic, etc.) the implications as to the Emperor's intentions can be quite.. dark.


Page 47-48


Post conquest efforts of the Expeditionary fleet.

Page 50


Talking servitor and 350 remembrancers are the bulk of the expeditions contingent.

Page 53


Medical procedures preceding augmetic.


Page 56


Here we are introduced to the iterators, the other forces in the cultural/ideological conquest of the Crusade. Despite the emphasis on logic and intelligence and all the "Imperial Truth", iterators are little more than propogandists and ideological manipulators - basically the secular version of the ministorum officials of 'modern' 40K in purpose and results. The Pre-Heresy Imperium is one hard-core ideology rather than hard-core religion, and it actually makes the pre-Heresy Imperium sound alot more like the Tau (just with "Imperial Truth" replacing the "Greater Good" - the outcome is the same)

1:1000 men could be astartes at this point in time. This means that from a population of quadrillions there are trillions of potential (pre-Heresy) Astartes candidates. What is more interesting is that in the "modern" Imperium (in one of the Space Marine anthologies) it is noted that 1:10,000 people could become Astartes. That means that that Post-Heresy astartes screening processes became 10x more rigid (likely as much due to mental/ideological purity as for genetic purity).

If we ever know how many iterators there are the other ratio might be useful.

Page 57-58


Loken observing Sindermann., the Big Iterator, holding lessons. Even knowing that the Iterators are little more than ideology peddlars, its still a marked difference between what they have prior ot the Heresy and what we get later, isn't it?

Sindermann is another of those 'witnesses' I spoke of. the funny thing is, he starts the series in a position of authority telling people what they should think and feel through his rhetorical manipulation, but once things start unravelling, he is put in the position of having to observe and be told what the truth is. Indeed, he is not the one who conveys 'truth' as such (Karkasy has that role), despite the fact he conveys the 'Imperial Truth' (which is just the ideological version of the Imperial Cult, as we learn.)

One other thing to note here is how Loken is being 'educated' by a mere human. Getting back to that earlier idea of the 'fate of the Legions', one thing Horus of this time encourages his sons to do is to grow and learn beyond simply being warriors. One part of this novel is the glimpse of Loken in fact doing this (as I mention a bit further on).

Also there are at least 2000 iterators in the Expedition fleet.

Page 58



The iterator ratio, and the prime qualities of an iterator. Considering that words are their weapon, it makes sense.


Page 58-59


Yes, this discussion is fraught with the irony given that this is 40K. Frankly, given this was the Emperor's preferred approach, this highlights one of the chief failings in his undertaking from the outset. By setting out to totally deny and root out religion, by treating the daemon as a myth, and by forcing others to be atheists.. he pretty much set the stage for Chaos to worm its way in. The Emperor's penchant for secrecy is, in fact, his biggest flaw, and it manifests in myriad ways throughout the series. That said, not everything that happens can be laid at his feet - the events that lead up to the heresy and the various catatsrophes have roots in many other people, and there are many different points at which things could have changed, or gone differently, or turned out less severe. It's one of the things I actually LIKe about the series - that potential for "what if".

Page 60


Yet another facet of the iterator trade that reinforces that 'ideological manipulator' angle, and the fact they are little more than secular versions of the Ecclesiarchy.

Page 60-61


The more you listen to him talk, the more it sounds like ideology, doesn't it? Just hav him saying GOD EMPEOROR with spittle flecked lips.

Page 61


Loken hits the nail on the head, and Sindermann, at least, is honest enough to admit the truth. Honesty is Sindermann's strongest quality, and one that serves him well as time goes on. I admit I'm rather fond of his character for alot of these reasons. He's charasmatic in his own way, a showman, but he also is willing to face up to things that might be contrary to what he's ben told and take them to heart.

Page 62-63


Yet another one of those contrasts between pre-Heresy Astates and modern astartes. Whereas the modern astartes might receive some sort of education or knowledge (about fighting, about how things owrk, etc.) they mostly tend to be brainwashed into loyalty and hatred of all things the Imperium hates. Pre-Heresy Horus, however, wants his warriors to be scholars as well, and its a marked difference that makes me like this Horus. Which makes the fall all the worse, I think. The Horus of "Horus Rising" is a charasmatic, admirable, and considerate being, with many talents and traits that make him the leader that he is. And this all too brief glimpse will soon be corrupted into the Horus we know and loathe (unless you're a fan of Chaos, in which caes you probably like him more than Abbadon.)

This is another one of those 'loss' symbols - at least for me - the potential for the Astartes to have been great at something else, to have been more than warriors, was hinted at by this (and by other, similar examples later on in the series), but fate and cruel circumstance seems to snatch this away. Leaving us with the Marines we have to cope with (although some, lik ethe Blood Angels, etc. try to embrace other avenues regardless of the perpetual war.)

Page 64-65


Yet another irony, IMHO. Sindermann talks about how rarely the Astartaes are used, but we are often shown in the novels how they are CONSTANTLY in use. Maybe he means this in a relative sense - not all Crusade fleets may have an Astartes contingent, for example. But there is a reason they are called the "Speartip", after all. And it is certainly implied that it is not unusual for them to be used (or called in if the situation requires.) They are bred for war, they thrive in war, and secretly what they crave is war, because without war they are bereft and uncertain about who and what they are.

This also forms the basis for what we see of the latter-day Astartes - they're weapons, they shouldn't think, etc. Which itself is a reaction to the Heresy. Kind of funny that way, since it's all the secrecy and uncertainty (a good chunk of it originating from Big E) that enables a good deal of the Heresy itself to come about, when simple honesty and truth might have averted it.


Page 64


The Vengeful Spirit is at least 5 km long. With engines and such you can probably add another 1.5-2 km at least.


PAge 65-66


Logic can be used to justify anything, can't it? Like I said, ideology, and one that echoes the tau of the modern age.

Page 69


Implies it took her about a year to travel to the Crusade fleet.

Page 70


Olitan is modified - she has memory coils, built in digital picture-capture capability, etc. It's also a very subtle augmetic, compared to the large, bovious and clanky sorts we get in modern 40K.

Page 77


We get our glimpse into the Mournival and its various members. Loken is one, as is Torgaddon, Abbadon, and Horus Aximand. Also note the commentary on the utter similarity many Astartes have (genetically) with Horus, which may be an aspect of the Gene-seed. Also a hint as to the origins of the name "Sons of horus." it's another of those upbeat aspects that really shows a more positive spin that contrasts with how things soon become.. because lines will be drawn and brotherhood split. But as long as it lasted, i liked seeing it.

Plus, I have to note the Mournival ritual. It reminds me alot of the warrior lodges we see later on. Uncomfortably so.

Page 81-82


One of the more curious aspects of this novel is the suppsoed revelation that Astartes are ageless (I prefer this term to immortal because they can die through violence or accident.) The fact that it is stated to be due to their strengths makes me suspect it may be due to various factors (suspended animation ability, their ability to regenerate/heal themselves perpetually, their greater biological efficiency and enhanced prowess, etc.) Near as can be told, they are expected to be able to live thousands of years. Probably the same is true for the Primarchs.

If this is true.. this may in fact be an indicator of just how badly the gene-seed has degenerated over the millenia, given that Marines typically last centuries at most, with only some (usually high ranking commanders) getting close to or exceeding the 1000 year mark. Of course, that lack may also simply reflect the relatively fewer numbers of the 'modern' astartes and the increased warfare they are faced with as well. There is also the one example from Salamander who "dies", but those circumstances could be debated also.

Other possibilities occur. They may remain ageless, but that does not mean that their bodies do not suffer in some way or another. Like Talos in Void STalker, we know that compatability may be a future issue, especially under abuse, mutation, etc. which could lead to abbreviated lifespans. Indeed, given the need to be monitored and medicated constantly tends to point to the fact that they are not totally free of drawback.

however its hard to say with any certainty, because of the mysteries (and the different attitudes of authors to the topic) in the astartes themselves. WE can only speculate.

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-06-06 11:25am 

correct if I'm wrong but it seems that during the heresy there were specific terminator squads/companies (similar to the Dark Angels Deathwing in "modern" times) rather then veteran squads using terminator armor on "needs of the mission" basis, at least for the Luna wolves/Sons of Horus.

Also it seems the terminator company working with Abbadon's first company has it's armor painted black, sadly we don't get to know if it's all black, black with white trim (aka reverse of the legion colors) or Black with gold trim. The reverse colors for specialist formations doesn't odd as at least Dark Angels Deathwing company and the Blood Ravens honor guard seem to do the same thing.

I have to say that I like how they made Horus likeble and kind of a "good guy" at the start so that his fall has more impact when it happens

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-06-07 10:09am 

That 'one chapter' is Ultramarines, which are noted to be abnormally large. Next largest, Word Bearers, is only about hundred thousand strong.

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-06-17 02:27pm 

Well another update for Horus Rising. I'm going to post two because I want to finish this up and move on, and its two big for a single update.


Page 92


"slave drone" might refer to a servitor, but that slavery may exist in any form kind of makes the whole 'Imperial truth' thing a joke. Although as far as the 'Imperial Truth being a joke', this is just the tip of the iceberg.


Page 96


Pre-Heresy Terra had "arctic hives" and some of which had manufacturers who excelled in antique paper manufacture. We also see one of Karkasy's defining elements of how he writes.


Page 104


Introduction of the Imperial Creed and Lectio Divinitatus. IIIRC we learn that this had origins with Lorgar's own works before he got all angsty and looked for someone who would accept and respect his worshipping abilities. It is perhaps a testament to the Imperial propoganda machine that despite the fact he is a giant glowing human who is singlehandedly responsible for the Imperium as they know today (and is many thousands - tens of thousands of years old) people will not even think of him as a god. It makes you wonder just how pervasive imagery of him is, or how many people actually see him, or artwork of him, or stuff like that. It's unlikely that people can say 'oh that artwork is bullshit' because even if they don't call him a god they revere him as the nest best thing (and insulting him in any way can be just as deadly in the 30th Millenium as in the 41st. Hell Karkasy gets injured just talking bad about the Imperial truth, and some suffer for badmouthign Primarchs.)

Also the Emperor's grand crusade to purge all religion hits some hefty bumps, which only get worse over time as the Heresy grows and actually breaks out. Despite this grand crusade to stamp out all religion (which may have ulterior motives in hurting/crushing the Chaos Gods and Chaos as aw hole) we learn that humans are stubborn (big shock) and will find ways to do what they want - and some want to worship the Emperor, whether he likes it or not (Again not unlike the Word Bearers.) Anyhow, the LD serves as the basis for what will become the Ecclesiarchy we know in the modern times, although they still have the AGe of Apostasy/Reign of Blood to live through as well. It also serves as the focal point for one Euphrati Keelor and what she becomes, as we see later on - an event with interesting implications all by its lonesome.


Page 111


Imperial army troops. Power lances. Given what we see in Legion, its quite possible these are legit military weapons.


PAge 114-115


Horus again, emphasizing his easy manner and charisma. It's quite easy to see why he wsa chosen as Warmaster, and why Chaos considered him such a pivotal figure for corruption to their cause. Also given what we learn in latter novels, its quite likely this was somethign engineered into Horus by the Emperor, for this exact reason (same way Magnus is a psyker/sorcerer - he had a particular role.)


Page 116


Another of those intereting little contradictions throughout the novel and the series as a whole.. they wreak such utter ruin and devastation, but talk of leaving behind a legacy, a future. A legacy and future approved by the Imperium, of course - which shows the whole propoganda angle of the 'Imperial Truth.'. Rather like the modern day Imperium, actually, and the conflict/reconciliation between these two ideas is a recurring theme throughout the series (starting with Karkasy and moving onwards.)

Another interetsing thing about this is, at this point Horus is still a fervent believer, although doubts have started to creep in. Once he starts doubitng the Emepror, the whole edifice comes crumbling down and leaves fertile ground for Chaos to grow.


Page 117


The "gravitic and phasic" weapons, which I'm guessing were the cloaking and force field beams.


Page 118


Pre-Heresy, conquered worlds were set up under the control of officers from the Expedition itself, along with garrison/occupation forces to help keep things along peaceful., I suspect. This means at some point they have to restock on ships and troops and such, I think. The logistics of the Heresy is one of those little quirky things - some sources (like Horus Rising and the earlier novels) imply that the whole burden is carried by Mars, whilst other sources suggest other worlds (forge worlds at least) helped, or at least served as vital stockpiling/distribution nodes. Indeed when we learn about Caliban it seems that Space Marine homeworlds are also vital sources of industry. A subset of this we learn with latter books is that many Terran nobles also hold significant offworld resources, probably a concession resulting from the Emperor enlisting their aid to support the initial conquests.

Considering the scope of the Imperium pre-heresy, there's bound to be a million or more such garrisons scattered about, which is interetsing given what we see of such garrisons later on (Davin, for example) as far as military and naval assets go.

This tradition of Army officers being installed as governor of worlds also reflects the IG practice of using older/decimated regiments as part of conquest fleets, giving them authority over a newly conquered world as its ruling elite.

Another interetsing thing is the whole 'terran/non-terran' angle, which has been played up to some degree with Astartes but not others. As we see through the series, there are still significant 'terran born' forces which are present in the Crusade, although they've started to become a minority as recruits (Astartes, Army, etc.) from non-terran worlds are brought into the Crusade. The implications of this (and the status as 'terran born) sometimes play a role in the novels - either in how people perceive them, how they view the war as a whole, etc. In this case, the governor is terran born, will probably never see his homeworld (or the people he knew/loved) again, and he is also no longer part of the Great Crusade. Loken's view of this also serves to illustrate teh growing divide in the Crusade itself, between thsoe who wage it, and those who are responsible for holidng and administering what has been won. And while I can understand Loken's view on things, I think it perhaps shows yet again why Chaos pulled off what it did - they put far too much emphasis on war for war's sake, that the true glory was in the Crusade (because that really is all the early Astartes knew), that others did as well, and it created what can best be considered distorted perceptions of things. And from what we know earlier on, there is likely a fair bit of fear of the unknown driving those atittudes as well. Which again provide ample grounds in which Chaos can fester.

Page 123-124


Discussion of the next destination in their expeditionary efforts. It seems that, by and large, the path and routes of each fleet is left up to individual commanders, and they rely heavily on scouting and recon to locate potential targets. I also suspect that since they are trailblazing what is essentially new territory, this includes finding and establishing new and useful warp routes out in these regions of space, which may explain the slow speeds between systems.

Also the nine week travel time deserves comment. It seems slow (and it probably is, even over thousands of light years, which I kinda doubt is the case here. Hundreds at best.) and it is, but we have to remember that a.) They're probably at the edges of the Imperium, and close to the edges of the Astronomican's reach - or at least further away from Earth than other worlds are, and b.) They have yet to actually map out or lay down the 'routes' between new conquests and the Imperium at large. Travelling the unknown is always slow, risky, and difficult, wheras known routes are easier, and this can contribute to the apparent differences in speed between here and other cases (like Battle for the Abyss, where they went from Segmentum Solar ot Ultramar in a matter of weeks.)


Page 129


A bit of Primarch-related fluff pertaining to Horus' rise. The mainly interesting bit is how Dorn is regarded, methinks, but the attitudes of all the Primarchs matter here. As one delves into the series, we learn that not all Primarchs feel the same way about their intended roles, the Emperor, or the Imperium, and this can engender as much resentment and bitterness (or hatred) as it does more positive things. People like Angron, Perturabo, Curze, are prime examples.


Page 130-131


Rogal Dorn and his subordinates. Sigismund is the dude who goes on to form the Black Templars in the second founding.


Page 138


The Vengeful spirit has six "embarktion decks". EAch is at least half a kilometre wide. Assuming they have 3 per side that might mean the ship is at least a kilometre across, and would make it again at least 5-6 km long.


Page 139


Stormbirds, predecessor to the Thunderhawks, bigger, toughr and can carry more troops.


Page 142


The "Oath of moment" described.


Page 146


built in viewscreen in the back of a picter - basically a digital camera.


Page 153


Terminator armour, another recent innovation it would seem, although I'm not sure all sources agree on this or not. Also, despite what Dawn of War says, Terminator armour (or at least these versions) can't backflip or jump


Page 157


Terminator assault. note that some of the built in Terminator weapons seem to include lasers.


Page 158


Remembrancer equipped with a vox bead.


Page 159


Later we learn Sindermann was acessing and reviewing over the records of the local legends and history of the planet. So I'm guessing he did a word search. The fact his data slate can link to the fleet archive (wireless communication) is interesting.


Page 161


More on the Terminator assault.


Page 162


Loken fighting insurgents - their gunfire is ineffectual against his armor, and he disintegrates them in return. Also he (unlike modern astartes) knows what surrender is, which shows that for all the destructiveness, 'compliance' is perhaps less brutal even with astartes pre-heresy than it is in modern 40K.


Page 163


Powered combat knives seem to be astartes standard in the Luna Wolves/Sons of Horus legion.


Page 167-168


Bolter fire on Astartes. One bolt penetrates and blow sout the back of the helmet.

Page 170-171


Astartes and fear, as well as a comment on how they might have been emotionally conditioned. Great if youw ant to focus on the purely military aspect of Astartes, but this whole 'geared for war' thing plays into that 'what happens to the Astartes after the Crusade' thing - that fear and doubt of being cast aside, of no longer being needed.. or being abandoned (remember Loken's words about the military governor just a short while ago?) I imagine if you start fucking with their thoughts and emotions their ability ot judge things is bound to be impaired as well.

The commentary on the 'heroic' aspect is a bit interesting, given the difference of opinion. Loken doesn't see it as heroic because it's how he is, but one can see that the fearlessness is also part of that mythic/symbolic aspect of Astartes - their ability to inspire awe/fear in both allies and enemies. Loken's comments are interesting in light of how other Astartes view this 'fearlessness' either. It has been commneted before that Astartes do feel fear, but it just has no real hold on them like others. Which has merit and perhaps reflects Loken trying to come to terms with himself and his nature - he denies having fear because he is fearless in battle, but does not acknowledge his fears on other things - fear of his fate and the future, fear of being uselss, etc.

Page 174


Imperial attitudes towards AI. It's pretty nteresting that they insist on AIs to have at least some organic components - the implication seems to be an outgrowth or reaction to the DAoT - like the inclusion of organic bits woudl somehow make AIs more trustworthy or something.) Of course, as we learn a bit in this series and in other novels - they still use inorganic machinches and stuff that should be - for all intents and purposes - AI, so this attitude is pretty hilarious - much like the 'Imperium hates xenos tech, except when the AdMech wants to capture and study it."


Page 176


The aforementioned AStartes shot in the head.

Page 177


More bolter headshots, although not all the armor is penetrated.

Page 177


Daemon-Possesssed Astartes resistance. Note that at this time they don't realize he is possessed, or even know what Daemons are or their connection to the warp. Part of that whole 'Imperial Truth' - thing therea re no gods and daemons. Not unlike the way the Imperium denies the existence of Chaos in modern times really, albeit for different reasons.

Page 178-179


punching ability of daemon possessed Astartes.

Page 179


Power knife again.

Pgae 180


Astartes combat knives are long enough to pass completely through an Astartes chest and have the tip come out the back (a good 30-40 cm at least?) and again a power blade.


Page 193


Referencing to Jubal/Samus. "ninety rounds at full auto" suggests at least 45 shots per person, reflecting an upper limit on Astartes durability (EG ninety rounds of bolter fire to kill a Space Marine is unnatural.) Also a flamer that cremates. The fact they cut it down before Keeler died suggests a matter of seconds, tops.

PAge 198-199


Horus tells Loken about the Warp. It's supposed to be a great secret from the bulk of the Imperium, but really... this is just a case where the Emperor fucked up. especially since he's still not telling even Horus everything. Which will ultimately just give the Word Bearers and Chaos their lever and allow them to pull Horus away from the Emperor. The Emperor's penchant for keeping secrets from everyone - including hte Primarchs - is really just one of the biggest ways he fucked up. I'm not saying that not keeping the secrets would have automatically meant the HEresy would not have happened - I suspect to at least some degree it was inevitable given some of the Primarch's dissatisfaction. Lorgar being an obvious example. Angron would have turned to Khorne, Curze would have rebelled, and quite probably so would have Perturabo. The Thousand Sons probably would still have been a problem, and I doubt the CAbal would have left the Alpha Legion alone, either. And its quite likely that Fulgrim was also doomed - but the severity of the Heresy would have lessened (I doubt Horus would have turned so willingly, and without Horus on their side they lose alot of the charisma and loyalty that proved so crucial. Hell even if Horus had died, it probably owuld have benefitted the Imperium more than it did Chaos.)

All that said though, I do like Horus' mentality in looking at the warp - daemons and spirits and gods are really just names, and saying that it behaves like magic or something doesn't mean its a walking no limits fallacy. I wish people in 40K debates would stop treating Chaos corruption that way, for example.

Page 199


More on the Warp. Once again, I think The Emperor would have bene better off being honest about the nature of the warp, or at least admitting there were things in it. Calling them Xenos rather than aliens or gods would have sufficed, if the Emperor was afraid of worship. If someone did 'worship' them, then it becomes consorting with aliens. It was foolish to think that the truth about Chaos could be hid or suppressed, and ignoring it just gave Chaos the openings it needed.

PAge 200


As far as Horus knows. While I doubt the Emperor had any nefarious intentions behind his secrecy, the fact is he's almost certain to know that Chaos Gods exist (or godlike beings exist) - he knows more than he is letting on, but his penchant for secrecy is what sets the stage for everything to follow.



Page 201


As we know from the Collected Visions series, The Emperor was trying to break into and conquer the Eldar webway. Frankly, you have to wonder why this was such a big secret to begin with. The fact the Emperor refused to let Horus know simply drove deeper wounds in and made the lies told to him by Erebus and the Chaos Gods all the more believable. The more we read, the more we see what sorts of secrets and lies (or rather half truths) this grand, shining Imperium is built upon.



Page 213


Horus' ship emergesf rom the warp about 86 million km from the system's planet, about 2/3 of an AU. Horu's expeditionary fleet has at least 5 troopships and 10 light cruisers (16 ships) and this is only part of his fleet. Also Horus can put into play things that can speed up his warp travel, although what they are we don't know.


Page 217


touch-controlled hololithic display.. and 140th Expedition has eighteen vessels.


Page 219


An indicator of Horus' enhanced mental faculties - he can instincitvley see/recognize things that even an AStartes can't figure out.


Page 219


an explanation for the extra ships in orbit. This implies that individual transport ships may be dispatched (with or without escortw e dont know) to provide aid or to reinforce worlds, I'd gather. Ina ny case, in addition to the Garrison fleets and the Expeditionary fleets, we can figure there are an unknown number of ships dedicated to just the transport and escort side of things - eg logistics.


Page 221


Apparently the expeditionary fleets can break up or detach/dispatch individual units to various roles as well.


Page 222


This might suggest they are a "secondary" echelon force, rather than a primary fleet (like the 63rd). Assuming a similar composition amongst the various secondary fleets, we might figure around a million or so ships. Note that that is a combination of warships AND transports, but it would reflect warship numbers to no more than an order of magnitude.


Page 225


The Xenos foes. They strike me as vaguely Tyranid like, to be honest.

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-06-17 02:29pm 

Last part for Horus Risng.

Page 226


Bolt round detonates Megarachnid's head.


Page 231


Astartes visor lens.


Page 232


Astartes in armor resistant to lightning strikes, although its possible the Astartes biology helps here too.


Page 233


Again ligthning does little to Astartes in armor, though I wonder if their biology might have some role here still.

Page 234


bolters vs megarachnids. Empty their magazines in a matter of seconds. Also waiting to ten metres? What the fuck is thsi, pre heresy 300? Either way it implies they drained the magazines in seconds.

Page 244


Horus left the vast majority of his fleet behind, suggesting that the 63rd Expedition was more than two or even 3 times the size of what he took with him.. 30-50 ships, most of which are military warships. With the aformentioned fleet numbers, we might be looking at 139,000-233,000 active Crusade ships give or take a few thousands, with over half to 2/3 of which are warships. I'd expect similar ratios amongst the secondary fleets, suggesting more than half of those fleets are warships (this ratio seems to hold for other fleets in the series, as well.) Between probable numbers for primary and secondary fleets, we're probably looking at 3/4 of a million to a million Crusade fleet warships (also implied in First Heretic and other HH onvels) active easily, not including things in garrison or shipyards/docks or on other detached duties.

Page 246


Pre-existing fraternal lodges. The cynical side of me suspects the existence of these is Chaos (through their agents the Davinites) laying down the framework for the eventual infiltraiton and corruption of the Astartes Legions.

Page 249


Duration of trip between Terra and the general location of Horus' own expedition fleet. Rather slower back than coming too it would seem. A few thousand to a few tens of thousands of c.


Page 278-279


An interesting insight into pre-Heresy tactics. Orbital bombardment is preferred if an enemy is too tough, rather than wasting men and lives. Although they will risk more lives if it means getting other Astartes out. Personally, I also suspect a bit of Astartes ego is dictating choices here - it's obvious that the Astartes forces want to fight the Megaarachnids.


Page 286


And.. the cracks start to show. And predictably it is the warrior lodges where it starts.


Page 308


barracks of tenth company including weapons maintenance.


Page 310


Technobarbarians from teh Unificaiton era of old Earth (prior to the GEoM) used "dirty atomics" What's rather interesting is we have a sort of Fallout-esque
wars in the Unity era, mixing both high technology (or that which was left over) with some more primitive fallbacks. Gives a good idea of what 'primitive' actually means in the Imperium (Eg not just stone axes and bows and arrows or black powder or earlier.)


Page 315


mimetic polymers again.


Page 316


Vox-cuff. Off duty comms.


PAge 325-326


Jubal photograph, capturing the fact he is possessed. Interesting detail, isn't it?


Page 327


Keeler is of course, talking about the Imperial Creed/Lectito Divinatus, but she doesn't want to admit that to Loken.


Page 330


Self explanatory.

Page 331-332


Post Ullanor. It gives you an interesting glimpse into AdMech industrial feats and ability to move aorund large quantities of matter. It isn't even an extraordinary feat for them, ti seems.

Page 339


The scope of the battles on Murder.

Page 343


Some sort of implied FTL-type signal, related to detecting warp travel, but clearly passive.


Page 353


Horus talks about his past with the Emperor, and the Emperor's vision. It reflects another one of the key aspects of the Heresy - Horus feels estranged and abandoned by the Emperor - a feeling felt by many of the Primarchs and a good many of the Astartes, army and related troops. It also serves as one of those openings that the Word Bearers and Chaos use to turn Horus and his supporters to their ends, eventually. This plays into that secrecy angle too.. the Emperor may have been a loving father, but he clearly had issues trusting even his 'sons', and what's worse, Horus and others must realize that.
Heck, you could probably write entire novels (or short stories) on the issues pertaining ot the interpersonal relationships of the Primarchs and the Emperor.


Page 354


A rather indirect reference to the very early fluff about the Emperor's origins in the Realms of Chaos stuff.



Page 356


Again, we get a glimpse into Horus and what drives him, or rather what haunts him. He is a man, a great man, but one who puts himself under a great deal of pressure and must shoulder it alone. Not unlike the Emperor himself, but Horus is not the Emperor and he clearly wishes the Emperor were still here.



Page 357


An interesting argument about whether or not it is better to find ways to coexist with aliens when you can, or if obliterating them is the only option. It really kind of shows up the flaws in the Imperial way of thinking, which set the stage for what is to come in the future. AT this point in time they're not quite so hardcore about Xenos extermination, although there's still plenty of that there too.

Funny enough, this could prove to be another of those wedges driven between Horus and the Emperor. He is clearly well meaning, but he's running up against what is (basically) Imperial 'Truth'. Between that conflict and the engineered betrayal later on, it seems liek Horus gets frustrated no matter what he tries to do.

It also provides another one of those potential glimpses at what the Imperium might have been had things been different, I think.


Page 358


Various detail on the interex. Pretty neat, really.


Page 360


Details of the Interex technology. Again the dreaded AI.


Page 363


Kinebrach get mention in other sources priro to this, including IIRC some of the Gaunt's Ghosts stuff.


Page 370


Something I mentioned before pops up now. We are introduced to yet another issue that drives a wedge between the Imperial military and its adminsitrative side, and represents what will become the long term tradition of the Imperial tithe, although they call it taxes here.

The interesting aspect of all this is twofold: a.) that all the "compliant" worlds brought into the Imperium through warfare are struggling to recover, and are not in a position to contribute economic or militarily, and b.) that Terra has been shouldering a burden for the war effort for centuries. To be honest, I'm not wholly sure I believe that Terra is the ONLY world supporting all those expeditionary fleets - later on we're introduced to various worlds (forge worlds, etc. like in fallen angles) who provide production and suchnot.. and we know the various homeworlds of Primarchs acted as supply depots and places to repair and rearm. Rather, I interpret it as meaning that Terra is one of the few worlds with a substantially intact and effective industrail base, and it has contritbuted the lion's share of military and economic resources to the Crusade as a whole, but it is not the only world to do so.

Hell, even with other worlds supporting, the fact that Terra was a major contributor is still a damned impressive feat.


Page 371


You can just smell the beginnings of our beloved Adminstratum coming into being. Given that, I admit I can't blame Horus for wanting to rebel, especially since the Emperor should have been paying attention to this sort of thing. Interpersonal conflicts between your military and adminsitrative branches is not a good thing, and even Malcador seems to not have noticed this. On the other hand, there's still that whole 'only war' angle I talked about earlier.


Page 372


Horus describes how this taxation could prove to be a destabilizing element, and vents his frustrations on the whole "warriors vs Burecreats" angle. Funny enough, I suspect this may be one of the things he played upon when he did turn traitor, and what lead to so many worlds rallying to his cause. As he demonstrates now, being Warmaster puts him in an ideal position to be aware of these myriad flaws and propblems, as well as being able to exploit them to his advantage.


Page 375


Sixteen minute bouts, sword blows landing 3-4 times a second.


Page 380


Interex architecture.


Page 383


The weapon plays a role in later events in many ways. The interesting thing is the "sentient metal." at first I was thinking that it was something necron like, but now I'm wondering if it refers to some sort of warp entity being bound into the blade, like a Daemon sword. If so, given the Interex view on chaos, why the hell do they just have it lying around???


Page 385


Portable obscurement device (privacy screen I guess).


PAge 386-387


More on the whole "xenos or no xenos" conflict.


Page 387


Some of the last moments of the likable Horus. enjoy them while they last. Things go downhill real fast.


Page 392-394


The Interex know about Chaos, and its dangers. The Emperor could have taken a lesson from these guys, really. The great irony is that while this could have been a turning point that prevented the Heresy, things just happened to fall apart before that could happen (thanks to Erebus, the dick.) And at the same time, Erebus manages to use Horus and the Luna Wolves to wipe out a potential threat to the Chaos God's plans. And I don't doubt for a second meeting the Interex wouldn't have thrown a monkey wrench into Chaos' plans.

Also the Eldar are on terms with the Interex.



Page 395


The interex can dampen sensors and comms.


Page 396


Not unlike Eldar armor. Note the "microfine" edges gouging but not cutting through the armor.


Page 396


"vox and sensor links" between various components of the Imperial force.


Pag e396


"polymer muscles" and variable power outputs for the power armor. Similar is seen in other novels (like Savage Scars.)


Page 398


Millisecond reaction times involved in the duel between Tull and Loken.


Page 399


Loken's bolter fails to penetrate Interex armour, but blunt trama still does it work. Probably an intentional design of the bolter, either through sheer kinetic force of a large calibre, high velocity round, or the shock of the explosive effects.


PAge 400


Storm bolter exploding Interex troops, six or seven bolts to penetrate armor apiece.


PAge 403-404


Oh the irony. Part one of Erebus' plan is complete.

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-06-26 02:01pm 

Pointing out something that I've noticed ever since the Horus Heresy novels started coming.. is there a reason why "Throne!" is used as an expletive even before the Emperor's Ascension?

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-06-28 07:59pm 

Well with Horus Rising out of the way we move to False Gods. One update for two posts, because frankly, I'm not as fond of this one as I was Horus Rising.

The HH series is kind of interesting in that the way I regard the 'good' authors like Abnett and McNeill depends on the book. I liked Mechanicum and 'The Last Church' for McNeill, but I disliked False Gods and Fulgrim was 'meh' (as are most of the EC-related short stories like the one in The Primarchs.) I liked Horus Rising and Know No Fear, but I'm pretty blah about Legion and . Alot of it may just be the subject matter - I'm still not convinced McNeill writes CSM as well as he does Loyalist Astartes, and he's got a positive gift for the Mechanicus (I can't wait to see his Mechanicus novel coming out). I can't quite explain why I dislike Legion, except that its too... ambitious. And Prospero Burns was well written, I just didnt' care for the Space Wolf characterization (which is pure nostalgia and bias on my part.)

False Gods chronicles Horus' actual descent, picking up just after Horus Rising and pretty much carrying us towards the Catastrophe of Istvaan and the Drop Site Massacre, which ultimately set the stage for the Horus Heresy as we know it. For the most part its a decent book, and the 'turning' bit is only at the end when we get to the actual 'turning point' - which I feel simply didn't match the buildup. It could be that I'm just biased against CSM - and False gods is very much 'chaos-centric'. Also, I'm not sure I could blame McNeill for that, either. It's such a pivotal moment in the series (as much so as Istvaan, the Battle for Terra, etc.) that it may be no writing can truly live up to expectations, so maybe I'm just expecting too much from it..

Anyhow, on with the book.

Page 14


An overly complicated means of transcription, using some sort of MIU or something.

Page 14


Fractally manicured nails. Talk about extravagance.

Page 17


Augmetically enhanced bodyguard, pleged with his life to protect his charge.


Page 18


43 metre tall Imperator class.

Page 19


Plasma cannon that can "level cities" Also hab-block sized guns.. which is interesting considering the Titan is a mere 43 metres tall.

Page 20


The Titan hangar in Horus' flagship is 2 km long. Probably not the only one, but it means the ship is at least 7 km long probably. with engines, more like 10 km.

Page 20


Various titans part of the Legio.

Page 24


Titans are riveted and bolted.

Page 25


"shock pistol" some sort of pseudo-particle beam weapon. Exotic Admech weaponry I suppose.



Page 26


the liquid metal stuff is disturbingly reminiscient of Necron tech. Which, given what we learn from Mechanicum, seems oddly prescient.

Page 27-28


Linking into the Titan. Ouch.

Page 32


Mersadie Oliton and her remembrancer augmetics.

Page 33


This seems to imply that their actual immortality may be up for debate

Page 36


Six decades since Davin.

Page 36


the Davinites. Letting them live was a mistake. Letting them anywhere near the word bearers an even bigger one.

Page 54


Yes things went rapidly downhill since the ending of Horus rising, mere weeks past. And Erebus no doubt has been making them worse. We're well on our way to stage two of the Master Plan.

Page 60


Indication that Davin was left with a military/garrison force as well as a commander.


Page 60


Implying some sort of space-transport capability.


Page 72-73


Gellar fields protect Horus' ship from destruction.

Page 88


Stormbird armaments.


Page 89


10,000 "rebel" army soldiers, giving an idea of the Garrison. About 500 or so Astartes are being dispatched, which means that 1 Astatres is worth slightly less than 100 soldiers.

Assuming this Garrison held constant throughout the galaxy, we're looking at 10 billion or so soldiers at least. That's almost certianly an under-estimate, as Davin is a feral world, and hardly needs a large garrison. I'd expect civilised worlds to have at least 10-100x more.

Page 89


Discussion of different kinds of bolter ammo. It can be subsonic and supersonic. supersonic ammo seems to be the armor piercing type. Both seem to be non-explosive, since they flatten and create exit wounds, and supersonic shells can overpenetrate.

"mass reactive" seem to be a third type.. suggesting that they carry both explosive and non-explosive rounds. I wonder if the "mass reactive" rounds can be sub or super-sonic?

Page 92


Stormbird armaments again.

Page 92


600 vessels, a full Legion, 2 million army troops and 100 titans deployed. That may suggest that the full naval strength of the Legion was 600 ships.

Page 94


The purpose of the remembrancers. Yet another bittersweet irony to come from the Heresy.

Page 98-99


The assault on Davin. Various points of interest: Stormbirds launch at intervals of seven seconds, implying they launch from the sides of the ship. hundreds of army drop ships accompany them, each carrying 100 men (tens of thousands of troops) along with AdMech Titan transports the size of city blocks and using inertial dampers to protect against the descent.

Oh yes, and Temba's force not only had soldiers, but also a force of starships to defend - a flagship, cruisers, and escorts (wolf pack squadrons?) Assuming one flagship, two cruisers, and two escort squadrons (4-6 ships) we're still talking many millions of ships devoted to Garrison duties. Hell even if I'm off by an order of magnitude thats many hundreds of thousands of warships right there, nevermind those in the Crusade fleets.


Page 114


Its nice to be in the Army and serving with Titans, isnt it?

Page 115


600 metres minimum range is "too close" for an air target vs a Titan.


Page 117


Power armor has drug/stimm injectors. Oh yeah, and plague zombies.

Page 117


single bolt rounds exploding chests and smashing skulls.


Page 118


Loken has traded his power blade for a chainsword in this novel.


Page 122


Kirlian rapier in action.


PAge 123


Gunfire (bolters I think) tearing apart zombies. Again.

PAge 124


Pre-Force Force weapons.. but clearly its a warp-baesd weapon.

Page 132-133


Titans bracing themsleves before unleashing massive firepower. Enough to rock the ship at least with impact.


Page 134


Titan fire had punched holes in the hull of a crashed, damaged, and possibly decayed ship (this is nurgle magic after all.)


Page 135


Signal locator.

Page 139


Wrecked tarship impact likened to an orbitla strike.

Page 140


Horus' resilience to damage, especially compared to his Astartes.

PAge 141


Horus' memory.


Page 142


More on Horus' super biology.

Page 144


Horus fighting plague zombies.


Page 149


Subsonic rounds "explode" in the target, which means they do have super and subsonic mass reactive ammo. I wonder if perhaps "mass reactive" is some exotic form of deformation or fragmentation of the round for maximum wounding, rather than a detonator for a literal high explosive, given the earlier discussion.


Page 154


The blade is from the Interex, stolen by Erebus as I recall. Which suggests it is indeed a daemon weapon of some kind.

Page 171


Magnus contemplating his act of greatest stupidity. It will be interesting to read A thousand sons and contrast this attitude with the latter, more benevolent depiction.

Page 172


Much as I consider Magnus a fool, he does have a point. The Emperor's denial of these things only served to create the situation the Imperium is rapidly heading towards. Not to mention pushing Magnus into his own brand of stupidity. At least he comments on the fact that the 'Imperial Truth' is as much of a joke as I've noted it is.

Page 192


Use of Larraman's cells as a direct medical agent..a t least for astartes if not for others (we've known Astartes blood is used for medical purposes even on nonhumans, so this may be what we typically see/hear about.) Unsurprisingly Horus must have Larraman's cells in his body too.

Page 192


Apothecaries have no knowledge of Primarchs biology.

Page 194


Again, lack of knowledge about the Primarchs hampers them more than helps.

Page 194


the kill mechanism of the daemon weapon. Remember the Interex weapon was designed to be "tailored" to kill its enemy.

page 195


Titan recovery processes.


Page 196


Yet anotehr fun member of the Imperial Cult.

Page 201


Horus talking of his early time with the Emperor.

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-06-28 08:05pm 

Part 2 to the end.

Page 202-203


Horus commenting on the bureacracy vs the military side of things in the Imperium. a comment towards the future.

Page 225


Flamer cremation yet again.

Page 231-232


Loken starts to get suspicious.

Page 232


Abhuman, in other words.

Page 235


The Emperor is also a plagarist it seems

Page 246


Erebus speculates on the scope and timeline of this plan.

Page 256-257


Sejanus (or the dream Sejanus, possibly a daemon) is telling Horus about the nature of the warp and what the creatures supposedly are. And what it is proposing, of course, is at least sorcerous links to the Chaos Gods, if not outright possession.

Page 263-264


Chaos is good at its halftruths and misleadings. The interesting thing about it is tht I suspect that there was a 'power in the warp' - the human god form being shepherded by the reincarnated shamans - we know the Emperor is a gestalt entity after all. What Chaos seems to fear is the rise of an aware, human god. something with the power (perhaps) of the Ork gods, but nowhere near as random. Were it to be "born" it probably would crush the other or at least drive them away.

Page 277


referenceing the birth of the Primarchs.


Page 283-284


Yet more half truths. The insidious aspect of this is that it all plays into Horus' fears and doubts, the things he's been afraid of since the Emperor left and returned to Terra. and Chaos knows it.

Page 284


Hints about the "unknown" Primarchs and Legions.


Page 290-291


Again Chaos plays on the fears and doubts of Horus, his prejudices and his secret fears and desires, sprinkled with just enough fact to give it the semblance of truth.

We also learn a bit about the nature of the Primarchs. Despite being superhuman they weren't meant to be overtly powerful - no death rays shooting from eyes or zapping with beams of power (unless you're Magnus.) Their skills/powers were more innate and subtle - Physical power and endurance to allow them to kill any foe or survive any wound. Superhuman intellect and willpower to make them great statesmen, diplomats, generals, able to formulate plans and strategies rapidly as the situation requires. And great charisma to make them figures of inspiration and loyalty. They, like the Astartes, are virtually avatars of the Emperor.


Page 291


Implication that the reason the Emperor couldn't make more primarchs is because of having to deal with the Warp as well as science. I suspect this is another half truth. I have long suspected that the Primarchs, and the Astartes themselves - have some passive psyker-like tap into the warp that powers their abilities. But just because that is so does not mean the Emperor had to deal with the Chaos Gods to make it happen. But it would be convenient to persuade Horus that it was so. Just another hold on him.

Note as well that gene-seed having some warp-link would also help explain why it cannot be replicated.

Page 292


More half truths, again I am sure. If he did deal with gods, who said he dealt with the four chaos gods? Naturally it is in the Chaos Gods' interests to paint themselves in the nicest way.

Page 293


I suspect the Emperor IS too powerful to attack directly, in realspace or in the warp. Which means they need to create a pawn from one of his Primarchs to topple him...

and the Warp always spreads the same lie that the warp can be used if the person is strong or wise enough to do so. Of course they claim that, because they want you to use it and succumb to their power.

Page 294


Custodians were around at the birth of the primarchs.

Page 295


Primarch > Custodian. Of course this assumes this is an accurate vision. Since it is in Chaos' best interests to fool Horus, this could all be a trick. Either way its managing to fool Horus and feed his sense of betrayal.

Page 296


honestly, I'm not sure what to make of this.

Page 306


Somethign I'm actually inclined to agree with. That whole "great power comes with great responsibility" thing, to paraphrase a silly movie.

Page 309


Because the Emperor has bene aorund that long. It's amazing that people can see such a huge, wonderous being and not imagine he's the same one. It's like Clark Kent and superman.

Page 318


Keeler's Editing engine for her picter.

Page 327


And Saint Keelor is born. Sort of.

Page 331-332


Keeler banishes the daemon. Honestly, this scene was far more interesting to me than the whole bit with Horus falling to Chaos, because a.) it wasn't dragged out so far and b.) it creates alot of interesting questions. How did Keeler pull it off?

One possibility of course, is that she is/was a latent psyker, and she's awakened this power. I don't totally rule out this possibility, but even back then the Black Ships were efficient at capturing psykers, and if she had such ability you'd think Ing Mae Sing would be aware of it and know what Keeler was doing.

The second, and more likely (in my mind) explanation, is that she is a "saint" - or rather a sorcerer. She's channelling the power of the latent human god (or possibly the Shaman gestalt acting through the Emperor-Avatar), believing it to be the "God Emperor", and banishing the daemon. And this is certainly the more interesting possibility of the two. we know the Emperor denies he is a god (and really, he isn't) and we know he believes that fervently. But that does not mean he's not an Avatar for another entity, or godlike being (which ties into the Thorian doctrines from the 40K RPGs). He may not (and probably isn't) even aware of it, or aware that he's it's puppet, but that does not mean it doesn't exist. Whehter it is some latent human godling (Star child?) or it is the combined psychic might of the thousands of Shamans who created the Emperor - or both - we don't know, but it is quite obvious taht there is some separate, external, but ultimately benevolent power independent of the Emperor at work here.

Page 338-339


Discovery of yet another human world.

Page 340


... and the Chaos Horus leads them into war with them. Deliberately.

Page 340


Missile launcher used for anti-air roles.

Page 341


And the missile launcher can engage ground targts. Armour piercing plasma warheads.

Page 341


Self explanatory.

Page 342


Gunfire breaching Loken's armor.

Page 345


Their adversaries.. back when they weren't adversaries.

Page 346


They have STC. Power armour then seems to be a STC design.

Page 346


Bolt pistol blows apart a head. and war starts.

Page 348


Millions of powered armoured troops, albeit human ones.

Page 358


Mnemonic implants.


Page 362


STC tech at work.

Page 362-363


Horus's agenda makes it self clear. He sacrifices the Technocracy to make allies. Interesting that Regulus thinks STC would allow them to travel to other galaxies or reach the Halo Stars (implying they currently lack the range or ability to do so.)

Page 367


At this time (before Isstvaan) Russ had been unleashed on Prospero. This was also before the Ultramarines were redeployed to Calth.

Page 376


Legio Reductor, Titans and months of bombardment to finally breach the defenses.

PAge 382-383


Seismic mines, and Angron supposedly killed. Oh no..

Page 389


He's BAAACK.

PAge 390


Varvarus brought low, his body "ripped open" from the inside from a bolter round exploding inside him.

Page 401


Keeler post-daemon.

Page 402


Bolt rounds are distinctive and can be tested to determine their origins. Also bolt rounds frgment inside the target, meaning that some (at lest) are more than mere concussion grenades.

Page 405


The scope of the Imperium's military might.

Page 405


Russ hasn't reached prospero yet, it seems.

Page 406


The Chaplain edict.

Page 406


Horus dispatches the Ultramarines to Calth prior to Isstvan, and the Blood Angels to signus, etc. Implies both Legions might be in or around Terra - close enough to be threats, anyhow.

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-06-28 08:11pm 

I see it as a reflection of his 'unquestioned' (til the Heresy) rulership of Mankind and a reflection of the ideological fervor it spawns. Even if he forbids worship of him as a god, people still treat him as being godlike in all but name in terms of reverence and devotion. And the way they treat people who do not show him due reverance and devotion. We see this with Karkasy's beating in the first book at the hands of the Imperial Soldiers. They're just as fanatical as their 'modern' religious counterparts, they are just more hypocrticial at this time about it.

I actually dont know how widespread knowledge of the Golden throne (or what it is) responds, but Terra is his Throneworld (effectively) and he rules from there.

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-06-28 09:41pm 

I wonder if the emperor has a passive "Clark Kent-effect" field to allow him to remain unnoticed (sort of), he might even be personally unaware of it.

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-07-01 11:54am 

Theres nothing sub-concious about it, he can change his appearance and hold in his aura at will. In fact its more likely that the Golden Being of Power is something he has to actively project while the utterly bland featured native american which he sometimes appears as is his natural at rest state.

One of the more, personally, interesting parts of this story which Connor left out is Horus' deathbed confession that he feels Sanguinius should have been made Warmaster.

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-07-01 05:33pm 

Hestur Sejanus was Erebus in disguise too.

When the chaos gods show Horus his creation time, they show him an emperor who just couldn't care enough to save his "sons" from the chaos storm that took them away.

My favorite part, is those shrine worlds, where all the loyalist primarchs and the Emperor are revered as holy figures, with the Emperor as a benevolent god, all because Horus turned traitor and made it be so.

Had Horus not turned traitor, those visions would have been completely different. It is very subtle of the chaos gods to show Horus the exact repercussion of his heresy and then claim it's a future he might avoid if he rebels, when in fact, the very act of rebelling will lead to the future he saw.

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-07-01 10:23pm 

Mainly because a.) Its been a long time since I read the earliest HH novels, and taking time to reread and re-update my analyses there would put me even further back. I had to put a limit on how far back I reworked things

Also, I can't quite cover every little tidbit when I did this mostly for technical. Alot of extra stuff has just creeped in over time, so I have to be careful about what I do or do not comment on because otherwise I should just post the entire novel . Sometimes I also just forget things. The main reason I probably skipped over that line was because I'd already commented on Horus' insecurity and self doubts existing, and that line about Sanguinius pretty much reinforced that in my mind. Horus is/was without a doubt the one intended to be warmaster from the get go (by the Emperor as well as Chaos) - it just turns out he's more human than might have been anticipated, and the responsibility and pressures with that role are too much even for a Primarch. And that pressure must be even worse for Big E

I'll also be curious to see how Sanguinus turns out in the HH - I believe we have a novel about him coming up sometime this year (James Swallow as well.) Sanguinius may very well have his own burdens to share.



I must not have picked up on this or forgotten about it then.



I would caution that we have to take alot of the visions we see in the HH series with a grain of salt, regardless of source. Between what Chaos tells the Traitors (at least some of which is doubtless manipulation, as civil war is in Chaos own interests), the general randomness of the warp itself, and shit like the Eldar and the Cabal... there's lots of room for (mis)interpretation and speculation and whatnot. Indeed guessing at whether or not things said in the series might actualyl be true, only believed to be true, or whatnot is one of the ways they counter the 'de-mythifying' inherent in the HH series.

One of the recurring elements of the Series is that not everyone is quite as forthright and honest as they should be, especially Big E.

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-07-03 01:18am 

Completely agree with you about the complete lack of honesty and lack of straight forward answers.

I'm just saying the comment about the tribute world, because we've seen what the 40k universe looks like.

But in universe, when Horus is shown the world where he and his traitorous brothers are completely ignored, he can not possibly know it's because he's being turned toward chaos. which is extremely amazingly well done by chaos to recruit him.

I've started re-reading the books as of this past February, I'm reading the thousands son atm.

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-07-11 10:41pm 

Next up: Galaxy in flames, by Ben Counter. Basically it 'concludes' the little story begun in Horus Rising and kicks off the actual Heresy by covering the destruction of Istvaan 3 and the purging of the loyalists from Horus' ranks. It's mostly an action story, but really.. it just didn't resonate all that well with me. Not sure if its because of Ben Counter's writing (which as discussed previously can be hit or miss) or what, it just felt.. off. Not quite the conclusion I'd expected. It could be that we know what happens and the fact they try to play it up as 'averting catastrophe' is already known, or something. Anyhow, subsequent novels will cover this and the dropsite massacre again, but from different POV (flight of the Eisenstein for example will overlap with Galaxy in Flames some.)

On the other hand, the novel does continue that 'Saint Keeler' subplot from the last book which I found so interesting, because it really plays into the whole 'gods and divinity and the Warp' angle, and to me reflects a throwback to the days of the 'Realms of Chaos' books and their commentary on daemons and the warp and such.

Two posts in a single update, although neither is particularily big.

Part 1

Page 16



Keeler is a saint and the religious belief in the Emperor has spread.


Page 17


Interesting, isn't it? They claim the "Emperor's Soul" is battling in the Warp against Chaos. Not the Emperor directly. This may highlight a cruical misunderstanding of things - again a distinction between whatever power in the Warp is championing humanity and the forces of order, and its (unknowing?) mortal avatar the Emperor in realspace. It really opens up questions as to the nature of that entity as well as the origin of the Imperial Cult. For example, could it be that the religion has its roots in the old fluff concerning the shamans? Maybe they were the ones who set this cult into place thousands of years ago, knowing a time would come when it would be important, regardless of what the Emperor himself believed.

Either way, this would tend to reinforce the idea that such a division exists.


Page 17


Imperial Truth vs Imperial Creed.

Page 20


Sending "hundreds of messages" across the galaxy, recently I'd gather.

Page 20


The warp storms begin.

Page 21


"months" to contact Mars from the Warmaster's location. Probably close to the edges of the galaxy. Tens to hundreds of thousands of c minimum to travel.

Also Russ' conflict with the Thousand Sons is still ongoing at this time.

page 22


"few weeks" to send perhaps hundreds of messages across the galaxy, and with the Fabricator General in particular. Assuming only a hand ful of messages (a couple either way) means one message taking 4-5 days to cross 10-20 thousand LY (at least.. we know that Horus is far outside Segmentum Solar) to up to 60,000 LY (on the edge of the galaxy, whichever edge we're talking about) At least 1-1.5 million c for 15K LY, 4-5 million c or so for 60K LY. If she was sending hundreds of messages in that same timeframe (less than "few months" anyhow) - we're talking a matter of hours per message, and thats tens of millions, if not hundreds of millions of c.

Substance of messages unknown, emotions behind them clear.


Page 22


The UItramarines are nearing Calth - Ordered there by Horus at the end of False Gods.. implying they crossed half the galaxy or more in a matter of a few months tops. hundreds of thousands of c. Lorgar in pursuit, suggesting he is travelling faster.

Page 22


Self control is important to astropaths.

Page 24


only a "few months" have passed, it would seem, since the battle against the Technocracy.

Page 37


Mention again of a Garrison force left on a complaint world. The animals in question are the Orks, and this is Tarvitz warning that they shouldn't be underestimated

Page 43


Since the Emperor's Children join the Warmaster before proceeding to Isstvaan, we could conclude that all forces are close to the planet.

PAge 45


Scope of the Emperor's Children Legion and the scale of typical Astartes deployments.

Page 47-48


It's kinda up in the air at this point who left the message. It could be something more mysticl or spiritual, but it is implied that Ing Mae Sing did so. Also no more than a year or so has passed since the start of the series, it would seem

Page 49


"warp integrity fields" handling reentry.

Page 53


Referencing the bolter shell fragments that killed Varvarus in the last book, and again noting that bolter rounds cause fragmentation.

Page 63
'

Servitor manned catrography drones. It seems its possible to deploy drone controlled warp craft. Then again we know of Inquisitorial Kill Ships doing similar, so this isn't terribly surprising.

Page 66


Maggard enduring further enhancement via processses provided by Legion apotehcaries. It echoes the sorts of enhancements that Luther and those like him underwent on Calibran. Some sort of proto-astartes. All this has happeneed in a "few months" confirming the earlier notion that the events of the last novel occured a few months ago.

Page 67


Maggard's pistol blew Karkasy's head apart.

Page 73


Again orbital bombardmen suggested over ground assault.

Page 74


Chooral city on Isstvan

Page 75


Post-compliance defenses. That means their capabilities echo what the Imperium is capable of at this time.

Page 84


Like I said.. its likely Sindermann was warned by Ing Mae Sing.

Page 91


Bearing in mind that Daemons lie (such as the fact they do want to infest the material plane. They hunger for it), this is an interesting comment, as it suggests the Emperor's attempts to infiltrate the webway threaten daemons in some way.

Page 92


Implies the Emperor could detect what Horus is doing without the Warp storms, although again this is from a Daemon's lips and thus suspect.

They do confirm they can affect warp currents to give horus favorable passage, which at least is probably true.

Page 94


From Isstvaan to MArs.. half a galaxy away.. 60K LY in months perhaps?

Page 96-97


Yet another "miracle". This time time stopping. Again possibilities are this is innate to Keeler or external, but it would be odd to know of a psyker this powerful (rare) and rather surprising that such a one got by the Black ships and the AStra TElepathica. It's more likely that some other faction is channelling the power of the warp through Keeler's faith (EG sorcery), which again suggests some godlike, pro-human/pro-order entity. Given their penchant for referencing alot of 1st edition stuff with this series (fanservice!) its quite possible we're looking at some sort of 'Star child' type reference or something to that effect, updated to suit modern canon.


Page 111


Isstvan soldiery. Whether they are army troops, or native forces we don't know.

Page 116-117


Interesting how the ideology of "Imperial Truth" serves as much of a purpose as the imperial Creed in fending off Chaos? It tends ot show that the key component is faith in something. Something tangible at least.

Page 120


Psychic singing banshee creature.

Page 121



More psychic banshee attacks. Part song, part sonic, part TK I suspect.

Page 122


Warsinger can block bolter fire.

Page 123



Eidolon vs Warsinger.

Page 123-124


Eidolon strikes back. Beginnings of Noise marines, and the handiwork of Fabius Bile (as we learn later.)

Page 135


Sindermann having a change of heart.

Page 145


Fabius Bile's chamber of horrors.

Page 146


Fulgrim is encouraging genetic enhancement of the Emperor's Children. Eidolon's sonic attacks are merely metabolic/chemical.

Page 147


we see the battel with the Laer later on, but this is where it started. It tends to suggest as well that perhaps the Emperor's Children, like the Thousand Sons and World Eaters, may have been doomed to a path of betrayal. But it's less certain.

Page 155


Admech modifying or enhancing titan performance.

Page 157-158


Reiteration of Astartes being "functionally immortal" as in the first book.

PAge 180


Whether these are energy weapons or projectiles of some kind, I don't know. Siome sort of needle gun I guess?

Page 181


Power sword has thermal effects.

Page 189


Flames from a flamer devouring bones.

Page 190


Power punch daggers.

Page 190


Head bolter destruction.

Page 193


Preparation for orbital bombardment. AG compensating for movement.

Page 194


"cannons" that can level cities.. implied individually, although I suspect that isn't how some will interpret it Tank sized shells loaded into a gun, manually of course. 100 men per gun.

Page 196


virus bombs being fired from bombardment cannon.

 Post subject: Re: Horus Heresy series analysis thread

Posted: 2012-07-11 10:50pm 

Part 2

Page 196


Tarvitz contemplates the Life Eater. Apparently at this point in time mass-extinction scale life eater virus requires large fleets.

Page 200-201


Magnus flees Prospero at the time of Isstvaan just prior to the Virus bombing.


Page 206


Astorpathic message "in transit" from Fulgrim. Implied to be from light years away and fairly realtime.

PAge 210


Garro's augmetic.

Page 212-213


TArvitz' implied distance from the Death Guard fleet, as he is pursued by fighters.

Page 216


Eisenhstein shot down the fighters.. implied range of hundreds if not thousands of km.

Page 234


Full magazine of bolter shells blows apart a horde of troops.

PAge 237


Lucius's sword again burning with its power field.

Page 249


Isstvanian weapons are less than a lasgun.

Page 249


Istvaan troops.


Page 251


500 metre range for Dies Irae.

Page 252


Lockdown procedure for Titan against virus bombing, although implied this would be the same against atomics (implying an Imperator Titan could survive an atomic blast)

Page 253


thousands of rembmrancers here.

PAge 255


Effects of bolters on bodies. What happens is that Horus basically calls together all the Remembrancers and then has his marines massacre them utterly, with only Sinderman and the others escaping. I have to say that despite my general feelings for the rest of the book, this scene was suitably well done and chilling, as it serves as a physical symbol of Horus killing the Emperor's dream (although as we discover later, that dream is not so great and shiny as it is made out to be so..)

Page 257


Virus-bomb proof shelters/bunkers.

Page 258


Virus bombs from orbit to ground in minutes. Probably tens of km/s.

Page 260


The virus bombing. Apparently the fleet over-saturated to ensure killing. Also, despite the bombs covering the whole planet, tehy seem to concentrate more areas than others (cities for example.)


Page 261


The effects of the Life eater. Worth oting is how it has "corrosive" agents that bypass Power armour seals, showing it has properties of chemical as well as biological weapons. Not to mention the ifrestorm

Page 270


Dreadnought is safe against virus bombing.

Page 270


The virus-proof bunkers are Imperial designs.

Page 275-276


More of the virus bombing. Note the reference to the gases.

Page 277-278


Firestorm. Interestng that they needed a lance strike to trigger it (something that latter virus bombs don't need), but this may again reflect the fact the technology is more refined in the 'modern' Imperium (we know from Planetkill they improve upon virus bombs)

The firestorm is another oddity. Despite a supposedly widespread (even global) firestorm, melting stone or metal, and cremating bodies... all that energy disappears remarkably quick. MAybe its a magic warp weapon, but I'd dobut that. Alternately, the firestorms were concnetrated over population centers and the gas simply hadn't had time to spread out. The temperatures probably even out over time and the firestorm dissipates away.

It may be possible that the firestorm also alters the composition of the atmosphere.. it gets thinner or something. Hard to say.

Page 279
\

Dies Irae survives it of course. The context implies it could have been no more than hours, days at the most, before the firestorm passed. For most "real" global firestorms that is simply too short a time, which again means it wasn't really global, it was less energetic than implied, or the atmosphere changed somehow. Or its a magic firestorm.

Page 284


Aftermaths of the attack. The fact combustibles are still burning suggests there is some oxygen in the atmosphere, at least.

Also note the implication that "minutes" have passed, which is DEFINITELY too short a time for any actual global firestorm to dissipate.

Page 285


Gunfire and lascannon strafing the loyalists.

Page 291


plasma reactor a "ball of nuclear flame".


Page 293


Maggard is wearing Astartes-grade armor that resists bolter shot.

Page 294


AStartes combat knife as long as a normal sword.

Page 294


Maggard is nearly equal to an AStartes in physical power. I do admit this is Qruze's time to shine and his scenes were rather nice to read, at least for me.

Page 294


Or it's greater.

Page 295


Maggard's pistol fired by Sindermann.

Page 296


At least a thousand other Hive worlds. This probably is Necromunda type worlds, probably.

Page 300


Space Marines and fear.

Page 310


vox-jamming.

Page 355


The fate of the sword that nearly killed Horus.

Page 357


Bolter round on AStartes chest.


Page 376


Armor-dispensed stimulants again.

Page 378


Astartes blows owuld kill a mortal "a dozen times over"

Page 390


Despite its size, it is possible to fight like a normal Astartes in Terminator armour if you are skilled.

Page 392


plasma gun melts multiple Astartes.. GJ range.

Page 394-395


We don't quite know how big the temple is, but 1/3 of its mass has to be alot.. gigajoules, if not terajoules of energy easily.. (hundreds if not thousands of tonnes at least.) assuming 30 cm thick stones and a 20 meter cube temple would be 800 tonnes.. 1.6 TJ.

PAge 397


Terminator armor provides greater strength boost than regular plate.

Page 399


The temples are smaller than the Imperator.

Page 403


Second wave bombardment. I do have to say that the fate of many of the loyalists was also one of the 'highlights' of the book, although not as much (to me) as Keeler was (for example) or the deaths of the Remembrancers. And there was still a sense of appropriateness for Loken and Torgaddon meeting Aximand and Abbadon here for a 'final' confrontation, although as I learn later Loken survives and Torgaddon seems to have been possessed, so their stories aren't quite over. I think Saul Tarvitz is dead though, which is sad because he was enjoyable to read about here.