Siege of Terra - Fury of Magnus

[StrangerOrders]

I do like the concept of World Spirits, actually. We know that belief shapes the Warp, so it only makes sense that the combined feelings and impressions of a particular planet would have a reflection that forms a rudimentary Warp entity. I mean, if a famous sword can have enough of a legend that it causes a vague reflection then a planet should be able to as well.

 

What I've never liked is the implication that Fenris has enough power/identity that it's able to be used as a power source, for want of a better term, for Rune Priests. The Storm Seers of the White Scars believe they channel the fury of Chogoris too, but they're honest with themselves and accept that it's still Warp energy. The Space Wolves are special enough without having their psykers actually using fancy planet magic that nobody else in the galaxy can do.

I will say that I'm surprised that they've included Nocturne as well though, I'm assuming this is just because of Salamander shenanigans.

Cant remember where but I recall a Kyme book claiming Nocturne has giant dragons instead of tectonic plates.

 

Tbf, and it comes up especially in the BBs, almost every legion homeworld has some profoundly funky stuff going on.

 

In defense of Fenris, I do tend to think the mountain of suck that is that planet sort of justifies some neat stuff. Also, say what you want about exceptionalism but its worth noting that the Wolves pay in blood for it, their HH characterization has swung between farce and parody nonstop and insetting literally everyone treats them as a joke. Which Inferno does a good job of building out while giving them some dignity, but it doesnt get around the fairly steep insetting hate and outsetting loathing they draw (which is fair in exchange, but it is an exchange).

 

After all, we have things like Caliban somehow having the core of the Webway machines in it, Medusa is literally more or less a giant eldritch fusion of greek mythology and DAoT and so on. Not even going to touch on Baal.

 

Its more telling of a lack of attention to Legion worlds than anything else imo. And I dont mean in terms of the Legions getting books, SW books tend to spend alot of time on Fenris and flesh it out with these sort of details whereas for some reason we dont spend alot of time on Deliverance despite the RG having a weirdly large wordcount footprint.

 

I approve of weird worlds though with a unique relationship with the setting, it adds to the special sauce of it all. 

 

My big concern, which i asked about above, is focusing all of this development only for the literal spirit of a Legion to get the hell kicked out of it to flex on Magnus's power. 

 

If only because the HH in general has defined itself in part off of kicking the characterization of some Legions violently in the teeth (something I think the BBs remedy in part but elder BL writers are regrettably encouragable at times).

Edited October 9, 2020 by StrangerOrders

[Scribe]

 

The concept of the World Spirits annoys me to no end.

 

Its the Warp. All of it.

I agree that it's all the warp. But is it all the SAME warp? I find the idea of the warp not being uniform and world spirits kinda being "warp landmarks" that can be interacted with interesting enough that I allow some leniency.

 

But I also totally understand people who are just tired of Space Wolf exceptionalism.

 

 

Thats exactly, my issue.

 

"No no! Rune Priests draw from Fenris!"

 

No dude, its the Warp. Its Chaos. Anything else just REEKS of 'the wolves are just special'.

 

The Warp can be wild, and weird, and planets can echo through the tides, great. Just as long as are all cool that its REALLY the Warp, and is part of Chaos, and not some special little pocket of 'good wolf' warp stuff.

[StrangerOrders]

 

 

The concept of the World Spirits annoys me to no end.

 

Its the Warp. All of it.

I agree that it's all the warp. But is it all the SAME warp? I find the idea of the warp not being uniform and world spirits kinda being "warp landmarks" that can be interacted with interesting enough that I allow some leniency.

 

But I also totally understand people who are just tired of Space Wolf exceptionalism.

 

 

Thats exactly, my issue.

 

"No no! Rune Priests draw from Fenris!"

 

No dude, its the Warp. Its Chaos. Anything else just REEKS of 'the wolves are just special'.

 

The Warp can be wild, and weird, and planets can echo through the tides, great. Just as long as are all cool that its REALLY the Warp, and is part of Chaos, and not some special little pocket of 'good wolf' warp stuff.

 

Im actually both in agreement and also the opposite.

 

I think it can and should be warp, but I also side hard with the Priests of Fenris and the Stormseers.

 

Because I dont need every single damned metaphysical thing in the setting to be boiled down to one of four flavors. It has long passed tiresome and I have never emphasized as much with a character as the gun Daemon from Slaves to Darkness.

 

Hearing that it purposely got itself trapped in the heart of a star with literally jack all to do for eternity for the sake of some independence from the quartet is perhaps the most sympathetic motivation I have heard in the setting.

 

They could stand to also use more creative Demons too but that is another topic. Its why i love that Haley and to a degree ADB have been pushing the idea of 'Order Daemons' here and there, I don't need them to be good but if I can go through one metaphysical story insetting without a beak or a nose ring, I will be beyond happy.

[Scribe]

It doesnt all need to be one of the big 4, I'm all for some weird pockets here and there, but its all the warp, and I'm not huge on order daemons (even if the Saint is a thing).

 

I get that the tide can shift on these things over time, but Fenris? Wolf Exceptionalism, nothing but. :p

[Lord_Caerolion]

We're not saying those aren't things any more, just that any hypothetical Order Daemons would still be Warp creatures, as is the gun daemon. Where the Fenris nonsense comes from is the insistence that it has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with the Warp, that it's just the sole planet in the entire galaxy that is capable of imparting magical powers to those who lived there purely because of how gosh-darn special it is.

[StrangerOrders]

We're not saying those aren't things any more, just that any hypothetical Order Daemons would still be Warp creatures, as is the gun daemon. Where the Fenris nonsense comes from is the insistence that it has absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with the Warp, that it's just the sole planet in the entire galaxy that is capable of imparting magical powers to those who lived there purely because of how gosh-darn special it is.

Hmm... well that is contradicted in a few books funnily enough.

 

The modern lore (Wolfsbane and the like) treat things like World Spirits as more akin to focusing lenses that allow the user to impose narrative laws onto the Warp, which is the argument that actually goes back farthest in terms of HH down to Prospero Burns. Folks are obsessed with ATS but PB lays out the Wolf position fairly clearly and it has never really shifted much, the language has just updated with the rest of the setting. The Wolves are against raw warp stuff, they consider Fenris to be a metaphyscial condom, as do the WS. 

 

Thats what is established for Fenris and Chogoris anyway, I still dont understand how Nocturne is basically a space-dragon orgy in an egg. This is also the first I hear of it having a psychic component.

 

We also forget that Chogoris does have some funky stuff going on, those weird underground vaults for example. 

 

I think the Fenris thing makes more sense with Inferno though, since its explained why its so 'special'. And tbf, its not actually that unique so much as the writers refuse to shine an equal light on really badass planets with alot of similarly awesome hooks like Medusa. 

 

Not sure when the Emp figured out how to literally summon them as Pokemon though. Although now I'm a place of imagining Magnus restling with a pair of giant metaphysical condoms and I am not sure what to think of it.

Edited October 9, 2020 by StrangerOrders

[Scribe]

Yes, I'm aware PB is where this started.

 

Don't ask me how I feel about that.

[Sandlemad]

I would caveat that point about "The Wolves are against raw warp stuff, they consider Fenris to be a metaphyscial condom, as do the WS" in Prospero Burns with the note that it's the wolves' stated position, not presented as an inherent fact of the universe. PB is pretty open about the possibility/probability that they really are hypocrites who are lying to themselves, and presents that as something necessary to the 'artificial' culture-making that led to their creation. They're bred to be full of themselves, uniquely un-self-reflective and free from doubt, and that's not presented as an unalloyed good.

 

It's a rich vein, that idea of the Space Wolves identity as ultimately a constructed one, and a vein that Wraight and Reynolds pick up in their SW books. It was only Guy Haley's work (and others, I think) that literalised the idea that Fenris really is magical and resonant, and the wolves really are in touch with their pure world spirit and have found a way to use the warp safely. That cuts out a lot of tension and makes them pretty unambiguously right and correct about the warp. It's not something you see in PB and it's why Haley's work on the wolves falls flat for me; he gets the surface ideas developed by Abnett and Wraight but then pushes it in the least interesting direction.

 

(I'd also disagree with the characterisation of the White Scars' more moderate approach to the warp as being entirely tied to Chogoris being special. They talk a lot about Chogoris and the winds and the sky and so forth, but Wraight makes it pretty clear that this is more about their taking a moderate and restrained approach to dealing with the warp rather than having a metaphysical condom that lets them do as they please. It's couched in Chogorian language and imagery but it doesn't hinge on them having a uniquely special homeworld.)

 

Chogoris having DAoT vaults is cool in the same vein as Baal having a pre-apocalyptic history is. Or Medusa apparently being some sort of relatively prominent world pre-Age of Strife and collapse. Or yeah, Fenris's weirdness as explained in Inferno: as down to it being some sort of engineered DAoT monster-prison for unclear reasons. All of those are firmly in keeping with the deep time/post-Fall/lost knowledge aspect of 40k's background, on a thematic level. I'd see them as quite different to "Baal/Fenris/Nocturne is a special magical world and so the legion that lives there is also special".

 

That makes the universe feel smaller, to my mind, and also feels more... gamified, I guess? Like it's just clocking up another extra Unique Attribute for particular legions - these are the SPACE WOLVES, their unique unit is WULFEN, their world spirit is FENRIS - and then elevating that to the level of galactic importance. Like it makes the heresy even more obviously a clash between differently coloured space men rather than something with breadth and at least a gloss of historical cause-and-effect, a la the black books.

Edited October 9, 2020 by Sandlemad

[MegaVolt87]

I always interoperated it as the WS and SW really knew it was the warp, but used their planets aspect as a filter, also their denial of its the warp was just another safeguard just like their simple charms and totems having warding properties just because of their belief. So, believing in that filter created a world spirit as a result. Its not that far fetched. 

[b1soul]

"Chogoris having DAoT vaults is cool"

 

Where was this mentioned? What type of tech? Was this in Warhawk?

[Bobss]

"Chogoris having DAoT vaults is cool"

 

Where was this mentioned? What type of tech? Was this in Warhawk?

 

One of the Forge World books probably. Can't say I'm fond of the idea, even if it has trace impact on things

[Sandlemad]

"Chogoris having DAoT vaults is cool"

 

Where was this mentioned? What type of tech? Was this in Warhawk?

 

Conquest, in the relic descriptions.

 

"Recovered from the quantum-sealed tribute-vaults deep beneath the Khum Karta mountains of Chogoris, the Parthinian Serpent is a bow that is the equal of many highly advanced ballistic systems. The weapon fires bolts of highly energised matter generated and unleashed by the bearer, releasing a projectile through a highly localised micro-gravitational lense array."

 

It's minor and shows how unimportant a world's DAoT history can actually be to its character. Chogoris, like many worlds, was settled during the DAoT or before. It's nothing special in this regard and ultimately it doesn't play a huge part in its 30k/40k character. That's how far in the past it was, that's what the weight of eons does.

[Scribe]

I always interoperated it as the WS and SW really knew it was the warp, but used their planets aspect as a filter, also their denial of its the warp was just another safeguard just like their simple charms and totems having warding properties just because of their belief. So, believing in that filter created a world spirit as a result. Its not that far fetched.

As long as its steeped in ignorance and denial, fine. That's the central point of the setting.

 

When it's an actual thing, that's where it falls down for me. :D

[b1soul]

Those tribute-vaults could be something built by the WS with Mechanicum help perhaps? Not sure if they've been there for millennia prior to the Heresy?

[DarkChaplain]

So.... I guess that Magnus was somewhat Furious?

[Frater Antodeniel]

On my opinion, the concept of "World Spirit/Soul" is interresting, if well handed for two major reason :

 

- First, from the Navigators point of view, it could explain how the Navigators see the Warp while guiding their ship through the currents of the Warp. The same way, worlds like Fenris, Baal, Chogoris, and many others could end up being more "visible" to the Navigators attuned to the world's soul, expanding the Navigator lore, and explaining some warp sheinanigans as to why some, seamingly, far away worlds are more accessibles than worlds that are "closer" from the initial jump point.

 

To resume my thoughts :

 

Navigator X, from the House Y, is attuned and familiar with the strong world spirit of Baal, but isn't familiar with that of Fenris. So because of this, when he enter the Warp, he can better "sense" the world of Baal than Fenris, making the travel to Baal safer/quicker, than it would be for Fenris, and should he be asked to go to Fenris, while looking for the World spirit in the warp, the Navigator could experience sensorial interactions, like earing the howls of wolves, tasting the salt of its oceans, perhaps even fear as to the ferocious world soul...etc. Also, the better to located the world, the Navigator could rely on physical tokens that are relatated to the world he wish to travel to, be it a rock that he could held in his hand, of a vial of water from its oceans....etc.

 

 

- Secondly, from a Warp perspective, a world like any other "object" could grow a Soul through time and thanks to the living creature that worship it and/or inhabit it. It has already been stated in the fluff that object could grow a soul and become "sentient" to some extend, be it a weapon or a world, an effect that is amplified with the exposure to the energies of the Warp.

 

To resume my thoughts :

 

A Knight world could grow a noble/warlike soul akin to that of the Knights that for millenia have lived upon the world, something that could be amplified if the world is revered and not simply "used" by its inhabitants. On the other hand, a Hive world could grow a depressive soul, one that suffer from its sufferings and those of its inhabitants. As for a last example, a Religious world's soul would grow to become a bright light in the warp for those that worship the same faith, even able to "call" for help through dreams. (A Black Templars or a simple, mortal preacher or any other faithful, could hear in their dreams the call for help that the Cardinal world of XYZ emit, even if they are on the other galactic side from this world.)

Edited October 14, 2020 by Frater Antodeniel

[Bobss]

 

"Chogoris having DAoT vaults is cool"

 

Where was this mentioned? What type of tech? Was this in Warhawk?

 

"Recovered from the quantum-sealed tribute-vaults deep beneath the Khum Karta mountains of Chogoris, the Parthinian Serpent is a bow that is the equal of many highly advanced ballistic systems. The weapon fires bolts of highly energised matter generated and unleashed by the bearer, releasing a projectile through a highly localised micro-gravitational lense array."

 

This is possibly one of the worst things I have ever read

- quantum-sealed

- tribute-vaults

- micro-gravitational

- highly

- highly

- highly

[Scribe]

Again, the issue is not a world having a soul.

 

Humans have souls.

Eldar have souls.

Orks have souls.

 

Eldar world's have World Spirits.

 

The issue, is the misguided concept that Space Wolves do not access the Warp, the Sea of Souls, but instead draw from Fenris.

 

It's OK if they believe that, but it shouldn't be true.

 

They draw from the same poisoned well as everyone else, because the Warp is all there is.

[mc warhammer]

So.... I guess that Magnus was somewhat Furious?

 

The Irritation of Magnus

Again, the issue is not a world having a soul.

 

Humans have souls.

Eldar have souls.

Orks have souls.

 

Eldar world's have World Spirits.

 

The issue, is the misguided concept that Space Wolves do not access the Warp, the Sea of Souls, but instead draw from Fenris.

 

It's OK if they believe that, but it shouldn't be true.

 

They draw from the same poisoned well as everyone else, because the Warp is all there is.

honest question: where is the idea that the wolves bypass the warp being pushed without doubt?

[Scribe]

I see to think it was in one of the Campaign books, not Black Books, but one of the 40K ones.

 

That's been referred to again, lends weight to it.

 

I'll see if I can find it.

[mc warhammer]

cheers mate. as mostly a (sporadic) reader of the Bl novels, i haven't seen much to that effect yet.

[Scribe]

Warzone Fenris, I believe is what really pushed it to the fore, but I dont have it on hand.

[Lord_Caerolion]

There were also all the arguments of “no see, that’s why they could still use Rune Priests and the Custodes just watched, because they don’t use the Warp, they use Fenris”.

[deanup]

This is back up on the UK website if anyone missed it along with Ravenor LE

[b1soul]

Prosperous Burns mentions the user of Fenris, not the Warp IIRC