2 Titans tall km to guard of eternity gate?

[Lord_Caerolion]

While it's correct that STC technology does allow for variation depending on local materials, from everything we've been shown it appears to be rather limited in the amount of variance it allows for, before saying "actually, you're just making X instead of Y now". I mean, we're not talking about a small difference in height here, we're talking older portrayals being multiple times the size of more recent ones.

If it were true, given there's no size requirement for vehicles, would I be able to convert a Baneblade on a Rhino chassis, and just say that "oh, but this is a Caerolion-pattern STC Baneblade, famed for its compactness"?

[Whitelion]

As far as I know, novels are canon, even if they are old it does not change the fact that the information they contain is

 canon.

 

@ Lord_Caerolion: you say that the old works are no longer canon, to say it you must have read an official source that states this, please could you post it? Otherwise it's just a fan speculation. The contradictions in the canon of 40k are very many, I don't see why this cannot be tolerated.

 

In any case, I do not say that the size of the Titans is hundreds of meters for everyone, I say that in some novels there are larger titans, they have precise names, and so far there has been no official announcement that belied the dimensions, therefore it remains canon. The last word on the matter lies with the authors, and since there are no official communiqués on the subject it means that they are canon.

 

In novels it is not uncommon for a super-villain or hero to be created with parameters superior to other units, it is a need for the plot.

 

Furthermore, let us remember that the size of the Titans is never constant even in the last works. In the Novels, the imperator titan varies between 43 and 150 meters, no author in the novels always gives the same dimension. Taking as Forgon only canon is not objective, because no official source has given precedence in the canon neither to forgeworld nor to the rulebook, if I'm wrong please post the official link that states otherwise. Because to consider only Forgeworld or the Rulebook means to exclude 99% of the other sources declared canon by the authors. A fan can't do this.

[Lord_Caerolion]

Because that is not how something becoming no longer canon works. Again, the earlier novels in the Horus Heresy operate on the original scale of the Legions, being in the thousands, to tens of thousands. Now, the canon scales are 80-200 thousand strong at each extreme, the smallest being the Salamanders at around 80,000. However, GW did not put out a statement that novels became non-canon. At the same time, it cannot be true that the Ultramarines are simultaneously 20,000 and 230,000 strong, so we take the newer source as canon.

The Blood Angels omnibus is a novel series about the Blood Angels (if you couldn't guess :p ) that is no longer considered canon. GW hasn't outright said "hey guys, these books aren't canon anymore, disregard them please". They just released newer codices and timelines that pointedly make no mention of the events in that series. It's the same with the Titans.

Sure, if you want to have Titans that size, it's a big universe. Those named Titans could indeed be that big, but in that case they're in stark contrast to the rest of the titans in that classification.

 

In short, GW doesn't outright state that stuff isn't canon, they just quietly and repeatedly contradict it so that people forget it was ever anything else. I'm not saying novels are never canon, I'm saying that the general consensus is that if you have an older and a newer source, the general consensus is that the newer sources are "more true". After all, if every novel ever is still canon, there's some wacky stuff in there that either doesn't fit whatsoever (Outcast Dead's timeline shenanigans), or have since been quietly retconned (Legion sizes).

[Whitelion]

Even in recent novels (not only in old ones) we see Titans well over the 33 meters of the Forgeworld warlord and the 55 meters of the emperor.

If the authors don't want a thing in the canon then they simply declare it non-canonical with an official statement, they don't need subterfuge like trying to make people forget the past slowly, because the past will always be officially canon, it's a fact. As it happened with Star Wars, the disney has declared not canon, with an official announcement, all the material before 2014. Here instead they speak of personal speculations, fruit of observation, but without official bases, and until there is a statement official will be so. I don't want to seem offensive but I'm just basing myself on objective and official facts.

However, I repeat that I am not claiming that the Titans are all 150 meters or 600 meters, I only say there are single units that appeared in the novels (with a specific name) that have different dimensions than those proposed by forgeworld. I'm not inventing, I mentioned my canon sources about it.

[Gore Crow]

Here's a blog post that you may find useful regarding 40k lore and canon, it even mentions the contrast to how Star Wars manages it's content. https://www.boomtron.com/grimdark-aaron-dembski-bowden/

 

 

 

 

[Xisor]

As far as I know, novels are canon, even if they are old it does not change the fact that the information they contain is

canon.

No, I think it's not on Lord Caerilion - or anyone else - to refute it, it's on you to substantiate this in the first instance.

 

If memory serves, Laurie Goulding's posted online to this effect, and several other staff and fans have quotes around the place, testifying to - say - Alan Merrett's(?) stance on the matter.

 

But in publication, nothing to my knowledge in BL or GW's 40k repertoire substantiates this.

 

Do you have a reference for this view, Whitelion?

Edited October 25, 2019 by Xisor

[Marshal Rohr]

No one is saying the Titans being huge weren't canon at the time. We are saying the older material is out of date now that Titanicus and the Horus Heresy has formalized and standardized Titan patterns (with input from Jes G, who made the first ones). 

 

The timeline goes Jes Titans (similar to current size) > Epic Titans (no set scale as models were handmade) > Black Library Titans (big) > Horus Heresy Titans (slightly smaller) > Adeptus Titanicus 2018 (back to Jes Titans)

Edited October 25, 2019 by Marshal Rohr

[Whitelion]

 

As far as I know, novels are canon, even if they are old it does not change the fact that the information they contain is

canon.

No, I think it's not on Lord Caerilion - or anyone else - to refute it, it's on you to substantiate this in the first instance.

If memory serves, Laurie Goulding's posted online to this effect, and several other staff and fans have quotes around the place, testifying to - say - Alan Merrett's(?) stance on the matter.

But in publication, nothing to my knowledge in BL or GW's 40k repertoire substantiates this.

Do you have a reference for this view, Whitelion?

 

Excuse me my English is not very good, are you saying that in reality the novels are not canon and that you would like to know where I knew the novels are canon?

If I was wrong to understand your post have patience, could you explain me more simply?

 

--------

 

From how you tell me then the Black Library is not canon? Since when have they decided this? I have always known that both the novels and the Codex that the Rulebooks were all canon material ...

If so, then what is the point in reading the novels?

Edited October 26, 2019 by Whitelion

[Whitelion]

Here's a blog post that you may find useful regarding 40k lore and canon, it even mentions the contrast to how Star Wars manages it's content. https://www.boomtron.com/grimdark-aaron-dembski-bowden/

I read the link, really interesting, but it leaves me a bit perplexed. In practice he says that all the sources are canon in their own way, basically, what the writer says is canon, and what he says forgeworld is canon. I think we can say that in the writer's timeline the canon defines him, and what he writes is official, and in the forgeworld timeline the same principle applies.

So the dimensions of the titans are all valid, both those proposed by forgeworld and the writers, is it right or wrong to understand something?

[Xisor]

 

 

 

As far as I know, novels are canon, even if they are old it does not change the fact that the information they contain is

canon.

No, I think it's not on Lord Caerilion - or anyone else - to refute it, it's on you to substantiate this in the first instance.

If memory serves, Laurie Goulding's posted online to this effect, and several other staff and fans have quotes around the place, testifying to - say - Alan Merrett's(?) stance on the matter.

But in publication, nothing to my knowledge in BL or GW's 40k repertoire substantiates this.

Do you have a reference for this view, Whitelion?

Excuse me my English is not very good, are you saying that in reality the novels are not canon and that you would like to know where I knew the novels are canon?

If I was wrong to understand your post have patience, could you explain me more simply?

 

--------

 

 

From how you tell me then the Black Library is not canon? Since when have they decided this? I have always known that both the novels and the Codex that the Rulebooks were all canon material ...

If so, then what is the point in reading the novels?

Happily forgiven, your English seems very good. Similarly, apologies if I have made it difficult to read!

 

I am saying that, as best I know: canon is not defined. It isn't used (even colloquially) by the GW and BL staff.

 

Questions about canon at live events tend to provoke sighs, eye-rolling and exasperation.

 

Everything that's published is everything that's published. It isn't divided into canon and non-canon.

 

At best, one might say that Roleplaying Game material can be disregarded as it won't be "in house" material published by GW and BL, but that's a different argument.

 

 

Thinking about canon is itself fanon, because GW doesn't operate an unambiguous and useful sense of canon. Not even within its own material.

 

The lore is inherently incoherent.

 

Unless: have you actually read anything that says what GW Canon is? And is that source itself canonical? If not, the measure of canon is itself fanon.

Edited October 26, 2019 by Xisor

[gideon stargreave]

Inconsistency is a feature not a bug, and a :cussing excellent feature at that. Enjoy your kilometer high titans guarding your corpse God, they will burn with the rest of the galaxy foolish manling. Anything anyone else says you can happily ignore

[Whitelion]

Ok thank you guys, I was used to scifi series in which the canon was rigid and inflexible, I didn't imagine that in 40k the canon was so elastic as to admit the contradictions as characteristic of the 40k series.

In practice in the interview with Bowen of the link the authors have specified precisely this concept (correct me if I am wrong, remember that I do not speak English well), everything is canon and it is not, in practice they said that everyone can do what it seems to him in his novels, for them it is always canon, because 40k admits the contradiction in the canon. Consequently, Forgeworld, Rulebook and Novels are all right and canon and non-value. Practically they have left ample space to the imagination, so everyone can choose the point of view they prefer.

A bit twisted and unusual in the scifi series but I find it very original and profitable for the fans, this way they do not disappoint anyone and have enormous resources to make the plot of the novels flexible, and also the practicality of the game, otherwise when you play players should carry models of titans to 2 or 3 meters high

[Lord_Caerolion]

Yeah, GW has never, and probably will never, come out and release a definitive statement that "novel X is not canon". As others have said, it's a lot more fluid. Occasional novels have been released that have egregiously taken "liberties" with the fluff *cough*C.S. Goto*cough* and the fandom tends to come to a conclusion of "yeah, let's just pretend these aren't really there", but if that's what you like then cool. 

This is most noticeable when Aaron Dembski-Bowden talks about Chaos Undivided. It used to be a thing, and you could take a Mark of Chaos Undivided. Problem was, it previously wasn't a thing, and kinda shouldn't have been a thing, so now it's no longer a thing. GW's never going to outright state "this is Not A Thing anymore, please ignore it". They'll just keep releasing codices without it included, and novels without it included, until it's forgotten about.

 

The one exception to this fluidity is the Horus Heresy/Solar War series, which now has some fairly decent oversight to make sure everyone stays consistent. No having a character killed in one novel, then being magically alive in the next.

 

Also Whitelion, your English is great from what I can see.

[Whitelion]

My English thanks you for your kindness :)

 

Going back on topic, I believe that the speech of GW is valid, even if I don't think they are going to make us forget something, otherwise they would declare it not canon to avoid misunderstanding.

I think we can say that they want to leave "open doors", in this way they guarantee 40k of a large amount of material in which to space, and so both fans who would like big titans and fans who would like small titans are happy. It is practically a diplomatic solution to make everyone happy.

[Lord_Caerolion]

No, the "forgetting" thing is literally what they do. This is coming directly from Aaron Dembski-Bowden, one of their authors, who is very open with the fandom about how things work. According to him, this is how the conversations go:

 

 

"I want to do X."

"You can't, that's wrong, the lore doesn't go like that."
"But it says in these published sources that I'm right. I just want to carry on X and Y and Z."
"Yeah, but they were wrong. They were wrong at the time, too. We never directly say they were wrong, we just never mention them again, and eventually counter them in later publications."

"But the readers think these things are true."

"Sure. But eventually, they won't."

 

This is literally their stance on Chaos Undivided as a thing. It's not a thing, wasn't a thing, and won't be a thing, but for one incorrect moment it was a thing. They're not coming out to say "this isn't a thing", they're just publishing more and more Chaos codexes where it isn't a thing, and more novels where it isn't. It's also their stance on smaller Legion sizes. They haven't outright stated "novels X, Y, and Z are incorrect in their portrayals of Legions, please change their numbers to ABC instead." They just publish more and more novels with only the larger sizes, and ignore the previous portrayal.

 

EDIT: Of course, this does mean that yes, "doors get left open".

Edited October 28, 2019 by Lord_Caerolion

[Whitelion]

I understand, thank you very much, actually this is a statement by an official writer. Of course they have a way of reasoning quite convoluted.

Did the quotation you reported always come from the link you provided in previous posts?

[Lord_Caerolion]

That was from an AMA Aaron Dembski-Bowden did on Reddit, when someone asked him what was going on with Chaos Undivided. https://www.reddit.com/r/Warhammer/comments/7igatt/im_aaron_dembskibowden_ask_me_anything/

 

It's pretty different from how most other IP's handle things, from what I've seen. 

[MegaVolt87]

 

My English thanks you for your kindness

 

Going back on topic, I believe that the speech of GW is valid, even if I don't think they are going to make us forget something, otherwise they would declare it not canon to avoid misunderstanding.

I think we can say that they want to leave "open doors", in this way they guarantee 40k of a large amount of material in which to space, and so both fans who would like big titans and fans who would like small titans are happy. It is practically a diplomatic solution to make everyone happy.

 

GW has and will never say outright something is officially non cannon. If they did they would be insulting past and present authors, burning professional bridges with them in the process. Newer lore repeated that contradicts older lore continuously is how it is done to spare hard feelings and professional relationships for BL/GW. If they did what you said, we wouldn't have even half the authors we have now and we would lose on a diversified and creative imagining of the IP as a result. 

[Lord_Caerolion]

And trust me, there's some stuff that really, really deserves to be declared non-canon...

[bluntblade]

And trust me, there's some stuff that really, really deserves to be declared non-canon...

Chondax's new form, for one.

[Lord_Caerolion]

 

And trust me, there's some stuff that really, really deserves to be declared non-canon...

Chondax's new form, for one.

 

 

What's the issue with that one? I know what Chondax is, or at least was, just not sure what this "new form" is?

[bluntblade]

In the FW version things happen that are big enough and significant enough that they should really affect the narrative of Scars. And the effect when rereading that book is that the Scars are studiously ignoring half of what happened.

 

Incidentally I also think Chondax was generally a poor choice of campaign for Malevolence, as it was just more AL being really sneaky rather than anything daemon-based, which we could've dug into with a later campaign.

[Whitelion]

since we are talking about remarkable Titans, do you remember if in some novels there are Titans bigger than the Omnia Victrum?

Edited November 9, 2019 by Whitelion