Fixing the Warhammer 40k setting Part 2: faith, fortitude and fallibility in mankind

 

9.       The Imperium of Mankind

I’ve already discussed the Imperium as a general part of the setting, but within it are many factions such as the Imperial Guard, the Navy, the Custodes and the Sisters of Battle. Since I’m on a roll from criticising and improving flawed factions, let us start with the Custodes.

a.       Adeptus Custodes

These are the golden boys of the Imperium. Once mentioned only in passing as exalted guardians of the corpse-emperor’s throne they are now a playable faction, released from their confinement on holy Terra (planet Earth) to enact the Emperor’s will across the Imperium by the new Imperial Regent. This is part of the minor plot development that the setting has undergone over the decades, with the return of Roboute Guilliman (an ancient supersoldier created by the Emperor himself when he was awake and active).

The background of the Custodes is that they are the best. That’s about it. The space marines, the poster boys of the setting, are genetically-engineered super-soldiers with various flaws inherited from their specific progenitor (such as Roboute Guilliman). The flaws are written into each chapter. But the Custodes are faster, bigger, stronger, more trained, longer-lived, clever super-soldiers taken from the Terran nobility and converted into demi-gods who are the equivalent of whole battalions, depending on what source you read. It’s a bit depressing because they’re recruited from the unknown overlord families of a fascist theocracy, and a version of feudalism in which the nobility genuinely are better than their serfs is a sad mirror of the wealth inequality of the real world.

It is not, however, a weakness for the faction that it makes me depressed because it so accurately reflects real human outcomes. As soon as they were promoted from titbit of background without much depth to them (were they just some of the best space marines recruited for a boring but important task, a sort of retirement home for honoured but elderly battle-brothers? Apparently not, but that could have been the case) they should have been given weaknesses to maintain the grimness of the setting.

They are some of the most fanatical devotees of the corpse-emperor and this, combined with the invention of the ‘sisters of silence’ suggests to me an easy way to shift the existing background a little. The sisters of silence are a group of anti-psykers who accompany the custodes into battle. In the setting there are occasionally humans who are ‘nulls’: they not only have no psychic presence, but the complete absence of presence disrupts psychic abilities around them. Sometimes they are purged as agents of chaos, but some are recruited and trained as special operatives for the Imperium.

The custodes, as fanatics who have undergone extensive training(/programming) and modification to the extent that they are no longer really human, can be said to have forfeited their humanity: they have lost something very important, but retain whatever psychic presence in the immaterium they once had. Outside of the immediate presence of the emperor, the most powerful psychic being ever to have existed (including the chaos gods themselves), this is a massive weakness. They are sensitive to even minor psykers, who find themselves with great power over these otherwise monstrous individuals. The sisters of silence are therefore a necessary accompaniment to the custodes: a vital protection, but a weaker link, since nulls cannot be made into custodians. We will need to think up some explanation for that rule, but perhaps nulls are inherently untrustworthy: they can be kept in line by self-interest and greater force, but never have the commitment required of a custodian.

Thus some of the most innately (i.e. no longer reliant on technology or machinery) powerful individuals in the galaxy can be turned into mere objects at the mercy of a relatively common, minor type of person unless their fickle and unreliable retainers protect them. The retainers usually recognise that their interest is served by supporting the custodes, since nulls are otherwise often purged from existence, but part of being a null is being fickle and whimsical, and sometimes the immediate danger of a battle seems more important to them than the punishment that might follow later.

Ideally I’d just retcon the entire subfaction and make Custodes a selection of space marines from various chapters, ancient, venerable and having proved their worth, but perhaps slow and hampered by age or old wounds in whatever way seems reasonable. One could make a faction with really good baseline statistics for the wargame, but as well as the ‘stratagem’ mechanic of paying  limited command points for one of a range of army-specific bonuses as and when you choose, it would have compulsory ‘aged’ mechanics whereby each turn you pick a weakness for the soldiers to be beset by (or maybe your opponent gets to pick!), and your opponent can try to play into this extra weakness.

Since the models, and players, exist, we can’t get rid of the faction entirely, and either of the two above options seems good to me. That adds some grimness even to these shining beacons of the Imperium: to achieve the lofty heights of great power something real is sacrificed.

b.       Sisters of Battle

The nuns with guns are an attempt to introduce women to the setting. Militaries of the past and present are overwhelmingly male, but gaming doesn’t have to be, and many people find it easier to see themselves in a model physically like them. Not every girl will want to play the Aeldari, Drukhari (space elf factions) or with Slaaneshi daemons, but might still want something nominally feminine.

That’s not a problem for the setting. It’s a bit arbitrary for the sisters of battle to be all-female, but so were convents and monasteries arbitrarily sex-segregated. Men can join the Ecclesiarchy or a few other basically male careers in the Imperial Cult, and women who prefer to be filled with the purity of faith rather than with a sordid man can join one of the holy orders of the Adepta Sororitas. In-setting the explanation is a good one: a reformer after a civil war decreed that the Ecclesiarchy should have no men under arms, so the military orders of the Adepta Sororitas form its military power without breaking this rule that forms part of the delicate balance of power between the ministries of the Imperium.

I find it hard to relate to the unquestioning devotion of these sisters. I do not experience divine revelation, and if I did I would have questions for it and myself, rather than trust. But the sisters are very much militant Catholic/Christian purity fantasy. They devote themselves to the holy Emperor alone and their faith is their shield. As with orks, whose belief in large numbers manifests itself as real, so the sisters of battle experience miracles. These are not inevitable distortions of reality when enough sisters are around, though: they are more discrete and stochastic than orkishly continual. With enough time and faith, each sister will experience a miracle, but when and how is always uncertain.

Additionally, the Ecclesiarchy is rich and can supply good weapons and armour to its militants. The sisters of battle are therefore better-equipped with armour and guns than Imperial Guardsmen who rely on massed-produced kit in their uncounted millions.

However, the oppressive life of extreme devotion and absolute, unquestioning loyalty to static doctrine is deeply flawed in itself. Living as a religious zealot would be a hateful existence, suborned to the authority of higher-ranking priests and the arbitrary precepts of a sprawling cult. Yes, it’s how many people live in the world today, but I don’t feel the need to add further flaws to this life just to make it worse than real life. It’s horrid enough, and it’s sad that some modern lives can find a place in a dystopia.

They are like Space Marines but lesser warriors and less warfare. But less warfare doesn’t mean peace and prosperity: the Adepta Sororitas maintain and prove their devotion through penitent worship and contemplation of the Emperor, including flagellation. If the enemy can’t beat you, beat yourself.

Nauseating and hellish.

c.       Imperial Guard

The Astra Militarum is grim. Legions upon legions of humans recruited or even drafted, given basic equipment and told to fight galactic horrors. If they run, the commissars are ready to shoot deserters pour encourager les autres. It’s depressingly Soviet, and occasional coincidences of heroism and success at the same time cannot change that.

True, they field many tanks and weapons platforms, their main hope being that they can shoot enough to keep the enemy away from the squidgy, tasty meatsacks they call their bodies, but desperately firing into the darkness and hoping it works is a staple of the horror of war.

Even if they have local success, whole brigades and even planets can be sacrificed by distant generals for the good of the entire campaign. And once victory is achieved, many are simply sent on to another warzone, some are purged by the inquisition or ecclesiarchy for having seen too much of the dangers the Imperium faces, and very few complete a tour of duty and return to a comfortable life on a prosperous homeworld. Their experience is the typical experience in this grim, dark galaxy.

d.       Imperial Navy

As with the Imperial Guard, the navy is the normal human experience. Individuals work on giant ships that might be many kilometres long. Hidden in the dark recesses of poorly-maintained vessels can be toxic dumps, live ammunition, or even sentient infestations of hostile enemies. Travelling through the warp isn’t perfect, and shields are regularly breached by warp entities that can manifest physically through malfunctions, twisted machinery or as dangerous daemons; or can send terrible dreams or possess your friends.

        In battle the sailors are at the mercy of their commanders. If a ship is catastrophically hit by enemy fire there is no escape. Escape pods exist, but on such vast vessels trading such deadly firepower it is unlikely that much of the crew will reach one if the void shields fully fail.

        Boarding actions are also surprisingly common. Void ships are precious and destroying them is an inferior option to capturing them. And when the navy is powerful, infiltration and sabotage remain popular alternatives to direct confrontation. Poisoned water, bad rations, failing machinery, strange disappearances… such is daily life. Sailors will still encounter the enemies of mankind up close and personally, often in the terrifyingly cramped confines of metal corridors rather than in open space.

        There needs to be no further flaw: the massive, ponderous ships of the Imperium carry heavy firepower, but heretics, orks and tyranids can still amass rival fleets, and there are inherent dangers in navigating the empty voids of realspace or the warp.

e.       The Imperial Knights

This is another faction introduced more because it looks cool rather than because writers identified a different combination of horror and character that would fit the setting. The Imperial Knights are from feudal forge-worlds (worlds linked to the Adeptus Mechanicum) and as such they combine technical ability with gross inequality. The knights are pilots of giant war machines, almost always humanoid walkers that move roughly as the pilot would move, and the rest of the planet works to support these weapons of war.

A knight must bond with the machine spirit of the ancient machine he pilots, and as we saw with the Adeptus Mechanicus, although these are not sentient they can have a host of arbitrary and irrational requirements, accumulated over many years in which no-one has properly understood the system and has merely done whatever keeps it functional.

The knights have developed a culture in which only the nobility, brought up in a culture of honour, may pilot these machines, and they are bound by oaths of loyalty to the Emperor and their home worlds, which the knight machines were once deployed to protect, being remnants of colony ships which landed once they had visited enough planets in the local area.

This is all very cute, bringing a mediaeval knight aesthetic to the setting. But does it fit? The more disparate aesthetics we try to port into one setting without careful thought, the less character the entire setting has. Feudal power relations aren’t great, but that already exists in a way in the fascist theocracy of the Imperium in which normal people are serfs to greater authority.

The Imperial knights exist despite being relics of early colonisation of the stars because they survived the Age of Strife. And they did this by shunning both the advanced thinking machines that turned into the AI rebellion, and by shunning the new psychic powers that some humans began to exhibit which caused daemonic infestations while humans learned to control the powers and defend against the side effects. The surviving feudal cultures are therefore deeply conservative, entrenched cultures because those are the ones that survived negative changes.

As a one-off planet/moon/colony in a galaxy of millions or even billions a writer can have any culture he wants. Utopias in a galaxy of endless war experience the dread and uncertainty of being preyed on by far greater powers to whom they are a rich resource. But something large enough to be a faction needs greater effort to fit the setting.

On top of this problem, the Imperial Knights intrude on things done elsewhere. The space marines have war walkers, and these are called dreadnoughts and need the superhuman physiology and battle training of a space marine. Old and venerable space marines whose wisdom is too precious to lose are interred in the sarcophagi of dreadnoughts, which keep them alive even if they had mortal wounds, but don’t dull the pain nor the suffering of being trapped in an armoured box for all eternity.

The custodes, a real problem child, are heavily armoured superhumans who are even tougher than space marines, bigger and carry the finest and deadliest weaponry the millions of worlds of the Imperium can offer. To a normal human they are war walkers.

Finally, the idea of knights has been done elsewhere: the Dark Angels are a bit like Catholic crusaders, but various secondary space marine legions are heavily modelled on chivalrous cultures, and the Imperial Fists, with their honour culture, are a first-founding chapter that are very similar.

The Imperial Knights have a bit of honour and maybe an inheritance but otherwise a normal human can hop inside one. It is a penalty- and risk-free power-up.

To fix this we need to further emphasise the mind-machine integration problem. Joining the machine should change you… maybe subtly at first, until no-one, even you, is quite sure whether you are or ever were in charge, or whether you have become an extension of the machine’s will, fuel for its operation rather than a pilot. Its will is an accumulation of programming, learned responses and remnants of previous pilots, reinforcing the rigid thinking, honour-bound attitudes and even merciless aggression imprinted from endless centuries of operation in desperate battles.

On top of the mental deterioration will be physical: primarily from being in a machine rather than exercising, but maybe also exhausting and tiring effects of being joined to it. Maybe a creeping metallic tint to the skin, debilitating exhaustion and weakness, furthering the desire to be connected to the machine more where one can move and act with ease. We could go further, with necrotic tissue at the joins, skin burned away on the scalp for the brain connection, leading to time outside the machine being consumed by medical recovery rather than fitness.

The human pilot will begin to ‘glitch’ even outside the machine, struggling to process some concepts or in desperate need of oddly relieving behaviours or rituals. A new pilot might be a powered-up human still learning how best to operate the machine best in war, but an established one will be temperamental and unreliable except in immediate combat, which it/he knows best and will feel fully familiar to both host and implanted human. It will decree odd things a matter of honour and demand others accede to its misfiring circuitry, based on its elite status, the importance of honour and its battle experience. Dealing with them is a difficult exercise in diplomacy.

The relic technology is therefore inherently inefficient: it takes considerable maintenance and specialist tech-priest expertise and it ‘consumes’ highly-trained elite pilots. For those worlds with rigid cultures built around them, they are effective fighting forces and helpful to export to battle fleets where their impressive presence and novelty can inspire troops and intimidate enemies, a powerful assault force.

But for other worlds massed infantry, tanks that don’t corrupt their pilots and can be driven easily after brief training, and heavy weapons crews on transport vehicles do most jobs more efficiently. Now we have a big flaw: the drip-drip horror of self-doubt and hurting your own friends as you detach from the admirable person you once were and sink into dementia even as everyone relies on you as the bulwark of protection of their lives and souls. And the saddest bit is that this was all kept secret. Aristocrats and the population believe that it’s a position of honour and that pilots are philosopher-kings worthy of respect, and only a few close friends of previous Knights wonder whether it’s universal or just a flaw in their personal friend.

f.        The Adeptus Astartes

The mighty space marines are the poster boys of the whole setting. Armour-clad super-soldiers mowing down the enemies of humanity, they are at their simplest a power fantasy, where the enemies are clear and obvious and one has the ability to fight them.

        That is deeply simplistic, though, and it’s hard to believe (though true) that some people stop there in their understanding of the setting. The space marines are indoctrinated, heavily-trained, genetically-engineered child super-soldiers. They hate the alien, heretic and mutant as much as any evil Christian hates teh gays. They are obedient to both the religious diktats of the Imperial Cult and to the Codex Astartes that governs how they are to live and fight, they worship and serve the god-Emperor in all things, and they go from battle to battle without rest or pause, which would be heretical. One glorious fight might seem fun and heroic, but if I force you to fight non-stop you will find it gets old very fast. Just like working 8 hours a day every day of your life does in real life.

        The Space Marines are elite troops, unable to field enough numbers to easily dominate a warzone. Each chapter therefore typically fights greater numbers, stretched thin enough that every deployment is a balanced judgement of how few can be deployed and still probably complete the mission. Only a couple of chapters such as the Minotaurs only deploy in full, crushing the enemy in that one location without thought of wider strategy.

        Every chapter has its own character in which these universal truths are accentuated or diminished, and many bring other flaws alongside them. I have already discussed the original 20 chapters and their individual characters. But as a whole we should always remember that they are all indoctrinated, faithful devotees of the Imperial Cult, more aware of the Xenos (aliens) and trained to hate them more, partly because hate is better than fear, and partly because the cult is built on the bigoted species supremacy of humanity. Touting actions as ‘for the species’ is an easier excuse to use in all circumstances than ‘for our shared principles’, because principles sometimes obviously conflict with actions.

        This flaw is shared with many other branches of the Imperium that have less individual might or operational independence, and although they’re supposed to be some of the most devoted, this is why most chapters add their own unique flaw(s) to the mix. It helps to keep the setting balanced and introduce new story-telling possibilities for grimness.

        The space marines are the poster-boys because their extra might is better than the weaknesses that come with it, but I think that the setting is best served if we keep some of the dark horror of the setting in every part of it. It’s very easy for writers and fans to imagine space marines as enlightened thinkers, philosopher-kings of great individual power and nobility who share our most civilised real-world values (or, for religious fans of the setting, faith as well). This is inevitable, and fans’ daydreams are to be encouraged, not ‘gatekept’. But writers have a duty to do better than self-insert power fantasies. Daydreams don’t change a setting whereas official writing does.

        The background for the setting should not include any such self-insert characters. Roboute Guilliman, the newly-returned primarch of the Ultramarines and Imperial Regent, should not be firmly atheist, against the Imperial Cult, the Ecclesiarchy and the fascist theocracy in which he finds himself working. He represents a potential transition of the setting away from a unique and characterful sci-fi horror setting to a generic futuristic setting where humans are flawed but their politics is broadly good and reasonable: a port of our current overt values as a society into an imagined world ( I use ‘overt’ because we could argue about whether real world society truly is good and reasonable, given that the rich buy our elections and legal loopholes via which they perpetuate their wealth, and we as a whole are destroying our only planet).

        I see some ease of use in such a transition: new ideas and new fans can adapt more easily to a generic setting, but without its distinctive character, why would they? This is a problem for many franchises that have tried to go mass-market off the back of some nice growth, and it should be avoided. If you need to sacrifice your appeal to appeal to a wider audience, it’s time for steady-state management of the niche for which you have perfected yourself… or a new venture and new product. Age of Guilliman sci-fi setting to match Age of Sigmar fantasy setting? Not that Age of Sigmar is generic and boring: if anything, it’s too odd for casual passers-by to understand. Still let’s keep Warhammer 40k and Warhammer Fantasy as the precious IPs that they are rather than corrupting them… like daemons corrupt the weak.

        Likewise the Adeptus Custodes tread on the space marines’ toes. The poster boys of the setting, superhuman but cursed with various flaws to keep things balanced, are washed away by the golden boys (and girls) who are better at everything and currently without those same flaws. The only flaw the custodes have is that there are even fewer of them, but being a small elite rather than a larger elite is inherent to the word ‘elite’ and nowhere near grim enough. This is why, as mentioned in their section, I would prefer to remove the custodes entirely as a noticeable faction. But other weaknesses are possible.

        As with the Imperial Knights, the idea of a noble elite standing against the tide is very compelling. It exists in a thousand different settings. I don’t think it’s so compelling that the character of this setting needs to be diluted to include it. The space marines do nobility, but if you don’t think they’re noble enough then maybe you don’t like 40k. It’s a bleak sci-fi horror setting, not an inspirational setting.

        Those who achieve some nobility (whatever you think that is) must also have deep flaws. The Blood Angels have the red thirst; the Imperial Fists are dogmatic. All space marines are, as I mentioned in the introduction, heavily indoctrinated, bigoted, bio-engineered child soldiers. As with individual worlds in an Imperium of millions, one might be good, but the good cannot last nor achieve much. He will be surrounded by zealots who work with him as a brother only if he maintains sufficient commitment to their culture and attitudes. If he idly wonders whether killing xenos is really a good idea there’s a significant risk that even his closest battle-brothers will kill him on the spot, and will definitely report him to the chaplain for some stern education.

        It might be that occasional circumstances will create a conflict in this ideology. The Eldar might help fight chaos and some chapters would regard it honourable to allow them to leave after such an alliance, or to continue to uphold a promise rather than slaughter them. The Salamanders want to save non-militants but some chapters regard other human life as completely insignificant: only the mission matters. Enemies who demonstrate some aspect of honour will have worth to many chapters despite being enemies.

        Those chapters that are more in tune with our real-world attitudes need weaknesses. It’s up to the creator of a chapter to decide what novel weakness his home-grown one will have, or what it will inherit from one of the first founding chapters. But again as with the wider galaxy, the more ‘good’ a force or planet is the more it will be out of step with the fascist theocracy that rules it, and will be treated with suspicion and even hostility, until it is conquered or purged in the name of purity. One is allowed some variety in how one fits in: absolute obedience can swap with absolute devotion and merely a lot of the other one. Respect and acknowledgement of the Imperial Truth is tolerated as a bare minimum if there is no sign of active heresy. But many things create suspicion and suspicion is enough for action in a world where heresy has genuine evil corrupting effects.

g.       Who is the best?

Everyone, for any fictional setting, wants their favourite character or faction to be the best. There is a sort of elite-chasing that happens which isn’t merely playing the faction with the most powerful gameplay, but having a sort of power fantasy about the setting. You want whoever is most like you, or with whom you have most sympathy, also to be powerful.

        When it’s a story about individuals, that’s fine: you sympathise with the protagonist, and the protagonist wins in the end. If there’s a team, the team wins in the end, everyone plays a part, and the issue of who contributed most doesn’t have to come up.

        But when it’s a large, complex setting that includes gameplay in which these factions can fight against each other or in which various factions play the same role, there’s inevitably a lot more tension about who is best at that role and who is superfluous and inferior.

        A designer should aim for everyone to have strengths and weaknesses. There should be a team, or different tools for different needs. But in 40k we have 8 major space marine legions and various minor ones, custodes and Imperial Knights all vying for the ‘powerful individuals holding out against impossible numbers’ heroic feel. The custodes win because they are explicitly written as being superior to space marines in genetic enhancement and equipment.

        All these factions are a sort of ‘armour-check’ faction, a term borrowed from games and gaming. Opponents will come with a variety of weapons, only some of which will be good against any one of a variety of defences, such as heavy armour. If you play all armour, you make much of the opposing army useless. Knights, Custodes and space marines, in that order, are best killed by heavy weaponry rather than small arms.

        As an ancient fan of the setting who enjoyed it before custodes or Knights even existed, I find myself asking why I would bother with space marines. If I want genetically-enhanced demigods, why not play custodes? Why doesn’t the Imperium just make custodes and not space marines? If I prefer normal humans enhanced by engineering rather than biology, Knights will be perfect.

        New fans, which the company must be aiming for, are likely to ask themselves the same question. If you remove the advertising and the massive availability of space marine models, what makes them more compelling?

        This is a power-creep problem for anything that wants continuous engagement, be it writing novels, making films or games. You start with a compelling scenario that people like and so you want to expand it, driven by those people who liked the first iteration. The first sequel explores a bit more and possibly doesn’t need to tread on too many toes. But soon you find yourself struggling to keep people interested: the initial protagonist has progressed so far, accumulating power, success, influence, that not much can challenge him. Or in a game, people ask themselves why bother with the new stuff when the old stuff works well.

        So you push the power a bit. Enemies are somehow stronger: new releases of the game are more challenging, new factions have powerful abilities and the initial scenario, which is what people found compelling, is blow away. The struggling champions who won people’s hearts seem like pathetic wannabes; the hard-won progression emphasises that feeling when new releases throw such abilities around like confetti.

        You can bring fans along on the journey, like the mythical frogs in a boiling pot, getting excited about the new thing that’s different but has enough ‘oomph’ to feel important. But as you continue to do well, you create a sprawling empire of content that is fundamentally incoherent. The fans who’ve spent all that time on the franchise and followed it understand, but anyone who dropped out, or is new, will see a massive barrier to climb for the promise of entertainment.

        By trying to be more appealing, the franchise has naturally blocked itself off from people.

        Partly this is a natural cycle of exploring a setting: there’s only so much to explore! But the space is vastly expanded if creators explore different characters as much as possible, rather than increasing power. I’ve been looking at factions by strengths and weaknesses, which are naturally intertwined with their culture. As soon as we start getting more power separate from culture, which requires commitment: the sacrifice of other opportunities and any related weaknesses, we have power creep.

        If the original tech hacker in a special ops thriller could hack computers with fancy equipment, time, and a physical connection that had to be covertly made in a special mission, there’s scope for a tense story in which the team plants the physical hack and anxiously waits the time or defends the equipment. But if a new one can do it all with a few presses on a netbook the previous character is ruined. You might rescue the situation if the new one is, ooh, paralysed from the neck down much of the time and can only do tech wizardry intermittently.

        The new hacker might feel cool. Such a fancy new addition to the side of good will make the writers think ‘we’re really obeying the rule of cool here! How could anyone not like this?’ And at a very, very surface level, it is cool.

        That’s what Games Workshop has done with its setting. The custodes are supercool. If people liked space marines, supersoldiers in power armour holding back the tide with their fancy ‘boltguns’ and chainswords, then they must love bigger, stronger ones in gold! How cool is that!?

        The rule of cool is an important consideration in selling products. I can’t deny that immediate emotional appeal matters, and should matter in entertainment. But give people too much of what they want and they can be dissatisfied. Load many children up with ice cream and they will feel sick (I was never such a child. I could eat more ice cream than was ever supplied). Give someone a drink he likes and he’ll thank you. Catch him again the morning after ten pints and he’ll groan.

        If a company wants ongoing engagement and therefore customers, it must be the responsible one. Settings, stories, lore and characters need management. If your most committed customer base thinks that the first hacker was supercool and fell in love with him, putting him directly to shame with someone cooler will make them sick: even if they want to like the new hacker, there’ll be a feeling of betrayal of what they love.

        Instead of creating custodes, the minotaur chapter of marines or yet another ‘my-pet-invention-is-actually-the-best’ faction Games Workshop should be a custodian of its sci-fi horror setting, and of the space marines as its franchise-leading concept in models, novels, television and computing. Restrictions, or weaknesses, are plot hooks. They need to be overcome: they represent challenge. A story about a character who faces no challenge at all isn’t much of a story, and that’s what we gradually progress towards with power creep. Likewise a game in which the player just wins is no longer a game even though at each step of greater power the players will welcome and celebrate ‘their’ achievement at winning the game more easily.

        Who is the best, then? Is it the Dark Angels, the secret loves of some senior writer corrupting the lore of the franchise? Is it the Emperor’s Children, whose whole character was pursuit of perfection? The White Scars, a love letter to the Mongol hordes intended to sell miniatures in the Far East where, er, they must love those barbaric invaders?

        Nope. It cannot be any of them. If anything begins to seem the best; if the weaknesses are gradually forgotten; if exceptional achievements become commonplace; then rebalancing is needed. Power and achievements will come naturally: guardians of a franchise must be quick to hand out weaknesses and flaws.

        There is a conflict here between character progression, which is expected in stories, and a static gaming franchise. I’ve mentioned this before, but it bears repeating. We want stories about events and people important to the setting, but if the setting is broadly unchanging then characters who improve too much become inappropriate.

        Iron Man teaches us the solution: they uncover new weaknesses, such as heavy metal poisoning from the tech-heart; or, eventually, their new power and virtue leads to a pinnacle of achievement which involves self-sacrifice, killing them or giving them wounds/problems that are new weaknesses. Many characters have moods: flaws that are intermittent, such as the temptation to drink heavily. These can be ignored at opportune moments in a story, but in a static setting this should rescue a character from impending disaster rather than improve the world/individual permanently. Set up an upcoming disaster well enough and saving the setting from it will seem like an achievement even though the end result is the same situation as the beginning.

        Much like good custodianship of the setting. Lots of work for nothing to change.

h.       The primarchs

I would write Roboute Guilliman, now that he is Imperial Regent and can’t remain in stasis, as a strategic master but still someone who can only think about the ‘how’, not the ‘why’. He can calculate logistical needs and timings for whole armies on the fly; he can listen to multiple radio transmissions at a time to understand battlefield progress; but he doesn’t question why he’s fighting the battle. As Regent, he brings some logistical unity and therefore breaks open ideological stalemates between high-ranking factions who have refused to work nicely with each other. But he doesn’t resolve them ideologically: he resolves them practically, either by siding with the faction that is most strategically sound to support, or if he has enough authority, by ordering them to do things properly or be guilty of disobeying the highest Imperial authority, i.e. him.

        Neither option works towards improving the culture of the Imperium: for him, the ideologies are mere barriers to getting the war machine operating smoothly. He does not question whether or how much there should be a war machine. He might, after more comprehensive briefing, grasp that some ideologies bring risks and possibilities. But he is not a philosopher king. He accepts the Imperial Cult without thinking too hard about whether his ‘father’, the Emperor, would have wanted it. If the cult disagrees with itself, he looks for an established authority to pronounce on the issue, which might be quotations from the Emperor, should they ever be relevant, but isn’t thinking for himself.

        Since he’s the leader of the biggest force in the galaxy he deserves those paragraphs fixing his character, but I don’t think there’s a need for a more comprehensive psychological profile. This is a good start and readers can deduce the rest.

        Likewise ‘the Lion’ El-Johnson, returned superhuman primarch of the Dark Angels, needs fixing. He needs to be as rigid, but with a different focus. Where Guilliman plans and organises others, the Lion does not participate in plans or strategy. He has his own and fails to work with others; he could be a brilliant tool to use in a big campaign, but will not follow orders or suggestions. He goes where he wants, including disappearing.

        His ‘forest-walk’ ability is a bit silly. It should cost him something, have a range limit, or some other sort of limitation. Teleporting around a galaxy freely ruins a horror setting where the slow speed of information and reinforcements is key in creating feelings of isolation and fear of the unknown.

        The Lion is a hunter, practiced in tracking and killing big game in a game of cat and cat. He will chase a greater daemon in a merry dance around systems even while its underlings corrupt and kill those same systems. His view is that the bigger hunters should hunt the enemies others cannot, and he does not see that he is sacrificing millions to his own pride.

        This would be an excellent source of conflict with Guilliman, who would love to use the Lion in concert with other Imperial forces but instead finds himself let down at key moments when Johnson disappears on some mysterious crusade of his own.

        It also makes the Lion, like Guilliman, a really appropriate head of his chapter of space marines. The Dark Angels are mysterious crusaders who disappear on hunts they suddenly decide are more important than whatever goal they were working with others to achieve, leaving flanks exposed, goals unachieved etc. They are prideful and do not share information, as this could be used against them or to warn their next victims; they play the role of the ‘champion’ striker in a sports team who can score great goals but refuses to do any of the other work in the game and expects full adulation and support from others in return. And exactly how great that champion is depends on whether you’re a guilt-ridden Catholic yourself or a more sane fan of the setting.

        Other primarchs are likely to return too, and one very likely returnee is the beloved Leman Russ. Games Workshop hates the Space Wolves and some heretic in their writing ranks has gradually turned them into the laughing-stock furry faction. Some commentators have leaned into this, suggesting that Russ’ long trip into the Eye of Terror will have corrupted him and turned him into a bestial beastie whom Guilliman will cunningly point and release to manage him.

        Sure, I guess. A superhuman monster who can chop the head off a titan engine and has almost forgotten who is friend and who is foe is ok in the setting. But we’re dealing with characters now, and that’s actually really uncharacterful.

        Likewise people delve into the writing and find that Russ lost to the Lion in a duel and wonder what the point of Russ is, and again miss that the duel was written to display character, not power ranking. Russ attacked Johnson in a fit of pique, and after fighting each other to a standstill, Russ did not take a winning opportunity. He started laughing at how comical it all was. For him it was always an attempt to get one back at his dishonourable but beloved brother, not a serious fight. But the Lion treats every fight as life-or-death. He has no real brotherhood: he sees everything as a world of predator and prey, strength or weakness. Social bonds are weakness. So he fought with all his might. Beating Russ who had given up and started laughing is not a victory: it is a display of Johnson’s greatest weakness.

        The same applies to Russ’ loss to Angron. Russ lured him into place to make a point about his fury: Angron found himself overextended and surrounded by Space Wolves. Russ was not trying to kill his brother (at this point in the timeline), but teach him. When you spar with your martial arts instructor and land a blow but find him pointing at your absent defence you didn’t win or prove that you are better.

        As previously discussed in a different post, Russ should have some sort of gland that empowers him even further; a biological mechanism would feel appropriate for the animalistic primarch with already-exquisite sight, smell and hearing. This would enable him to fight his brothers and win for brief periods, but be unable to repeat the feat for some time afterwards. It has also been heavily hinted that Russ had psychic powers, despite being against wizardry and guile; he could return with powers centred around knowing and influencing friendly psyches rather than directly manipulating the warp, and this would emphasise his focus on brotherhood… and possibly explain his return, as he detected his brothers, awake and active.

        When Leman Russ returns, it should be a cue to return the Space Wolves to their character of pack hunting: champions of humanity, like all space marines, but brutally efficient at working together, even when improvising. Their brotherhood with their immediate fellows and their wider Great Company should be their distinguishing feature. Leman Russ was the Emperor’s champion, at some points in official writing lionised as one of the strongest (Vulkan and Angron make bids for this) but also supremely skilled and able to work in a team. Since someone senior at Games Workshop is a simp for the Dark Angels, I guess we could allow the Lion to be a marginally better one-on-one duellist, although I see no need for this, as being the best fighter isn’t a necessary part of his background. He’s a stalker: an ambush predator who cares only about winning, not the honourable duel. But give them both a team of their marines and Russ will dominate the fight.

        Russ’ antagonism with Johnson is extensive: Johnson finds him insufficiently dedicated, an oaf who wastes time feasting, drinking and partying with his soldiers, who has no devotion to the Imperium in Johnson’s stern, ascetic understanding of devotion, is a bit beastlike like the monsters Johnson faced when he was young, and can suddenly turn on him (as Johnson experienced in their fight together) for 'no good reason'. From Russ’ point of view Johnson is a miserable, unreliable loner who can’t work in or support a team, has no goodwill towards his brothers or other allies and wants to sternly suck what joy there is out of life in the name of ‘devotion’. When Russ first met the Emperor (before Johnson ever did) they ate, drank and sparred together. His perception of his father is as a friend, not a joyless abstract deity.

        To Guilliman Russ is temperamental: as unreliable as Johnson. He would probably curse having to work with these two of his brothers out of all of them. Russ has humours: he has questions of honour, personal vendettas, social needs that he thinks matter, demands to be at the forefront or to hunt specific foes, and then in battle will deviate from a plan because he decided something was more important. He is unpredictable, and against the master schemers of the traitor marines, or careful stalkers such as Johnson, this is a benefit, but to a brother trying to manage him it’s frustrating.

        Unlike with Johnson, their relationship won’t be terrible, but Russ will have humours about Guilliman: sometimes he’s his clever, treasured brother, and sometimes he’s a rigid thinker too obsessed with order and control in a chaotic galaxy. He brings warmth to Guilliman’s life, and papa smurf (his armour is blue) himself recognises that Russ will never intentionally betray him, and is merely less reliable a tool than Guilliman would like.

        It will be easy to make Russ the obnoxious bully, forthright and outgoing, flinging his weight around. That should be avoided: we can save that for the Khan of the White Scars chapter, who thinks of himself as a little Emperor of his own empire, maybe charming when he wants but internally supercilious. Russ’ defining feature is friendship: if he has dark moods, he might act out a little, but never be malicious or superior towards his brother. Others have their devotion to faith: Russ has the power of brotherhood.

        Another likely returnee is Vulkan, primarch of the Salamanders chapter. Vulkan was horrifically over-powered, brutally strong, completely immortal, brilliant craftsman. He is more attuned to modern, real-world values than any other named character in the 40k setting, being kind and merciful. As someone more sympathetic to the audience, he should not be a powerful character, as that helps to ruin the horror of the setting, introducing hope, escape and safety to the galaxy.

        There are various ways that we could balance Vulkan. Since he regenerates all injuries, including when torn to pieces, and the only way he could come back is regenerating after having been atomised (his last appearance in the setting), we could decide that he either has been tortured from this horrific experience, or has regenerated ‘wrong’ somehow, and is not the same man. Maybe he has uncontrollable fits in which he lashes out at everything around him, making him unsafe for interstellar transport and a liability to his allies. This would play well into his conscious kindness and mercy, making him guilt-ridden and even more tortured, as well as explaining why he might try to remain hidden.

        We could make his regeneration inadequate in some way: he has contamination inside him, making him weaker and in continual pain, unable to focus. The only way he can cure himself is through another atomisation, which he fears immensely.

        And finally, and alongside some degree of the above two changes, we need to ensure that his mercy and kindness are a weakness, as I discussed when considering the Salamanders chapter. In an implacably hostile galaxy these are weaknesses and become very dangerous heresy in some circumstances. All three of his brothers would rightly regard mercy as obnoxious weakness and prefer to keep him in a workshop somewhere practicing craftsmanship. Although Johnson, who has a soft spot for redeeming lost space marines, especially ones in green, might secretly appreciate his brother’s mercy on occasion.

        It could be that one of Vulkan’s ‘fits’ is a good way to confirm Russ’ ability to dominate his brothers when required. Vulkan might overpower the Lion, who is bruised rather than injured, and retreats. As a hunter, he would let such a rage exhaust itself and not bother tackling it head on. But there are innocents nearby, and/or some of Vulkan’s craftsmanship which is both valuable and valuable to Vulkan. Guilliman doesn’t like unnecessary damage, and Russ, along with Space Wolves, attributes value to civilians: just lesser value than to fierce soldiers. So, wanting his brother to be less sad when he recovers, and also caring about those things himself, he tackles Vulkan and after an appropriately exciting fight pins him from behind, or beats him away from the vulnerable areas, or, since the writers hate having Leman Russ ever win, keeps him busy, without being harmed, until Vulkan recovers.

        Jaghatai Khan, of the White Scars, is another primarch likely to return, although probably less of a favourite than the preceding two. The White Scars also benefitted from newer-and-therefore-better syndrome, and the pendulum should swing back to balance. Jaghatai was written as a quiet, honour-bound warrior who loved and perfected hit-and-run tactics. Everything else seems to be power creep: his legion seemed barbaric, but wasn’t really, unlike the really barbaric Space Wolves. His legion didn’t have a reputation as executioners, unlike the Space Wolves, but secretly knew they were better and that being unknown was an advantage. Jaghatai was cultured, erudite and thoughtful… unlike Leman Russ. The White Scars had powerful stormseers who knew the warp well, whereas the Space Wolves had their rune priests who didn’t understand or admit where their powers came from. Jaghatai was calm and calculating, unlike the hothead Leman Russ. Whichever writer wrote all this tripe really went all-in on defining the White Scars by opposition, and in the process defined the Space Wolves for many readers as the idiotic barbarians they are not supposed to be.

        It’s a good example that it doesn’t have to be a girlboss framed as superior to, and replacing, a liked character for her to be resented. It can be a Mon-golboss.

        Let’s undo all that junk. The White Scars are established rivals to the Death Guard and Raven Guard. We can define them as fast and frail where the Death Guard are slow and resilient. The White Scars have stormseers, and they are powerful psykers; this explains the bond between Jaghatai and Magnus, the most psychic of the primarchs. But Jaghatai is firmly a warrior-primarch, not psychic himself. He is arrogant and proud, which is how he knew how to distract Mortarian in their big duel: attacking someone’s pride made intuitive sense to him, rather than it being a calculated move from his super-clever mind. He’s so proud that he thought of himself as an emperor, and scorned The Emperor as a tyrant whose decisions he, Jaghatai, could better. For example, the Emperor decreed that psychic ability was dangerous to mankind and not to be used, but Jaghatai would have welcomed and encouraged it, making the crusade even better (and, of course, giving chaos more and better ways to corrupt humankind, as the Emperor knew). Likewise, he (and the person who wrote about him) scorns the Space Wolves, firmly believing that they were arrogant boasters unlike his legion; and even after witnessing the destruction of Prospero he struggled to accept that their feast-hall talk was based on truth, not myth. This superiority complex explains the distance between him and the other primarchs, except Horus, who shared his attitude.

        Jaghatai imagines himself a hunter, like the Lion, or like Russ, but better. In truth, he is worse. They are soldiers, committed to their versions of combat. Jaghatai is not as sturdy, spends too much time on bad poetry and idle chatter, and relies on rehearsed manoeuvres conducted with speed, but which can be survived or anticipated. His treasured moments of satisfaction and poetry-fodder are perfectly-executed manoeuvres or cuts with his blade, exactly as drilled with discipline many times. But war is chaotic. What was rehearsed is not always most needed.

He can hunt the weak quickly, cutting them down faster than any. But neither he nor his legion are hunters of the strongest. Like the Eldar, they must evade such fights, the perennial curse of factions that rely on speed.

He’s at odds with the Raven Guard, supposedly, but his biography mentions not one instance of him ever interacting with them! It’s all about the Space Wolves. Corvus Corax is very content to hide in the shadows, a stalking hunter of no pride and no storytelling, but who has a reputation with those who matter. Jaghatai is jealous of him, and also scornful of some of his less warrior-like tactics. Jaghatai talks of ideals and values, but in Corax they burn so fiercely that he has no need to refine them with words. He is passionate about justice and enacts it; Jaghatai thinks that trials, consultation, discussion and deliberation are both essential to get it right and also the honourable form through which to demonstrate one’s commitment.

        This is more characterisation than his whole story seems to provide. He experiences events but seems to be a means of exposition rather than a well-defined character. Giving him frailty (for a primarch!) and overweening pride, combined with a certain hotheadedness (perhaps not quite as impulsive as Russ, but also too proud and stubborn ever to retract or change his mind) gives us something to hold onto when thinking of him. Character is defined by things which can be weaknesses: where is someone excessive? If we leave Jaghatai as ‘he is great in all things, but not to excess, and he neglects nothing valuable’ then he’s as characterless as the worst Mary Sue. If he feels his honour has been wronged, or his desire to act and be aggressive, rather than hunker down, is too strong, he will work himself up to bad decisions and never admit that they were bad.

        Fast, aggressive, haughty, claustrophobic, frail… this is a mix of strength, weakness and character that can be worked with.

i.         The beloved Space Wolves, again

We need to forget the ‘werewolves in space’ idea and return to the original blend of Nordic and pack themes: elite warriors who treasure strength and skill, have their own brand of honour, and work together in everything to the extent that one might imagine telepathic understanding, just as a wolf pack hunts efficiently even without language to plan or call during the hunt.

If the ‘Space Wolves’ are simply furry animals, I assume that the ‘Dark Angels’ all have black skin and corruption in their hearts, the ‘Blood Angels’ are bleeding all the time, the White Scars all have old injuries and the ‘Ultramarines’ have gone beyond being soldiers in some way. If metaphor or symbolism must be taken literally we’d better do so for everyone.

The Space Wolves are a problem for Games Workshop for one real-world reason: the risk of fascist gamers. We have already seen far-right people co-opt the symbolism of the Imperium, depicting Donald Trump, of all people, as the Emperor of Mankind. To the far right a fascist theocracy isn’t a dystopia, it’s desirable. The simplest, simplistic vision of space marines as crusading heroes is all the far right sees. And the Space Wolves share the far right’s interest in northern European symbolism, since their core concept is Vikings in space.

If fascists think a product is tailor-made for them the rest of the population is likely to think that this is deliberate and also think worse of the company that makes it. However, as mentioned the far-right has managed to misunderstand the setting even without finding the Vikings in space. They can co-opt and misunderstand things very well, and the Roman theme of the Ultramarines will also be good for them: after all, this is the derivation of the word ‘fascist’. Why bother with the models that are a bit barbaric (Space Wolves) when there are ones representing order and unthinking devotion to the regime (Ultramarines)?

                If we re-write the Space Wolves to be marines whose devotion to their pack protects them from corruption, in place of other chapters’ faith in doctrine, we drag them away from far-right concepts. Brotherhood and atheism are the opposite of far-right ideals of ‘Christian’ culture and neoliberal macho dominance in place of trust and support.

I would love to go a bit further: the Space Wolves were the Emperor’s executioners, able to take on rival space marines and win. Their preternatural tactical abilities and unpredictability make them perfect counters to the impeccably-drilled and -ordered warfare of other marines; their resistance to and suspicion of psykers further adds to their ability to fight chaos armies, whose scheming is often sent awry by the Wolves’ unpredictability.

They would be the setting’s embodiment of the game theory truth that when playing against a perfectly rational opponent some randomness in one’s decisions is needed to avoid giving away too much information. Against lesser opponents one can make the ‘best’ decision that, if the opponent’s situation does not change, maximises your chances. But insightful opponents will learn about your abilities and situation from your choice, unless your choices are sometimes imperfect.

Against a firestorm from the T’au or heretic Guard, or against the mobility and foresight of the Aeldari, their tactical co-ordination is mostly irrelevant. One needs broader strategy to catch the mobile enemy or outflank fixed positions. But when fighting small numbers of elite troops, rough equals who can co-ordinate far better at that small level will dominate utterly.

And in exchange for returning the Space Wolves briefly to their position as the police of the space marines, they need a big weakness. Yet again, we can focus on the pack theme. They are devoted to their brothers and perfectly co-ordinated with them. Their unit sizes are more haphazard, and this is because Space Wolves do not mix and match soldiers without great difficulty. A large unit of Blood Claws will take casualties, age into Grey Hunters, lose a few more, and age into the small packs of Long Fangs, who use heavy ranged weapons not only because they have the self-control to sit at the back and not charge into combat, but also because it’s safer and the risk of losing the last few brothers is great.

Because when Space Wolves become lone wolves they ‘do a Blood Angel’ and go a bit mad. Maybe this is another source of the Wulfen mutants. Only elite Space Wolves who slowly learned to operate as lone characters through the burdens of command or special responsibilities can manage it (the Wolf Guard), and many of them still prefer to join an established pack rather than fight entirely alone. They are powerful together, but weaker alone, gradually falling apart without a pack.

We could even write some top secret stories (in the setting) about stranded lone wolves whose desperation for a pack led them to join heretical forces: rumours that make other Imperial forces even more suspicious of all Space Wolves, and which the Space Wolves angrily suppress just as the Dark Angels keep very quiet about their original sin. This would be meaningful betrayal, as it’s an ongoing temptation/risk for current Space Wolves, whereas the Dark Angels are all ‘emo’ about something that they never did. We could change that by writing that every Dark Angel has a seed of corruption within him, a taint that can infect and tempt weak-willed people they spend time with, and which can still corrupt current Dark Angels. That would be a genuine flaw.

Anyway, the numerous Great Companies of the Space Wolves can outnumber and outfight a chapter that needs to be defeated, but their obvious lack of faith and obedience to Guilliman’s codex or Imperial authority riles true defenders of the Cult, helped along by swirling rumours of extreme mutation (wulfen) that would not be tolerated in second founding chapters, and of rogue Wolves no longer even fighting for the Imperium as every brainwashed supersoldier should.

The Space Wolves would not be an army of rigid 5s and 10s (or maybe 3s for the new primaris marines). They would come in variable numbers of firstborn marines, the way that they’ve lived and fought for millenia. They are suspicious of the new ‘primaris’ treatment, and the Mechanicum and imperial authorities suspicious of them, and therefore unwilling to share or conduct the treatment. Space Wolves remain as they have been, firstborn marines in uneven numbers, feeling somewhat chaotic, fielding mutant wulfen in their ranks, truly distinct from the new primaris marine forces.

This would create character distinction between them, which is what Games Workshop should be looking for in its array of factions. It would please Space Wolf players, who picked the chapter because of its divergence, not because they wanted normal space marines but with wolf pelt cloaks.

And it could set up some fun future storylines when it turns out that it’s hard to beat the Emperor, and the primaris marines have flaws that Cawl (the official who invented them) did not anticipate. The stubbornly firstborn Space Wolves, treated with suspicion by the Imperium, will be needed to fight Galaxy War 2 (or 3, if you count the Eldar vs. necrons as 1). And older players with firstborn collections of other chapters can form loyalist battalions alongside the Space Wolf core. With the outbreak of this new heresy GW will have a reason to make chaos marines on primaris scale!

That’s how to manage IP: character distinction and storytelling possibility, not blanket nerfs and redundancy.

2.       The forces of chaos

Chaos was supposed to be the ultimate evil, the twisted realm of the immaterium full of malice towards life and reality, home of demons (or daemons in the setting because they are divisions/experiences of supernatural power as in the Greek root, rather than entirely independent sentient beings like demons). However, it has been humanised. As we explored the motivations of the characters who fell to chaos, we saw their point and had some sympathy. It would be bad writing if the characters fell to chaos without reason or explanation, and yet having a good reason is exactly what makes them relatable. What was once horror has become mere rivalry.

The otherworldly horror of twisted forms and ineffable malevolence has faded into gods with names, champions with backstories and outcomes that are ‘you survive but serving a different master who is slightly more likely to have you killed’.

Games Workshop’s writers are in good company. John Milton in Paradise Lost tried to justify the ways of God to man, and ended up humanising the devil instead. As soon as evil has comprehensible goals and motivations it feels a little less horrific and merely selfish, short-sighted or similar.

The unknown horror and evil mind that cannot be negotiated is now the hive mind of the tyranids. It is a sentient being, but all we can guess about it is that it hungers for more, to consume all life, and leave nothing behind for life even to rebuild.

Although I have extolled the virtues of having a variety of different types of threat/horror in a setting, to allow as many storytelling possibilities as you can, I think that chaos has been weakened so far that it’s not even horrific any more. This can easily be corrected not by changing the essential lore of the setting, but by a change in focus. As people start to worship, or tolerate, chaos, they might be rebellious humans, understandable and broadly reasonable. But it should be depicted in every case as a force that then takes root and grows (literally, for Nurgle) out of control, twisting good intentions, the bodies and minds of those who let it in, and then everything else as well.

People fallen to chaos are slaves to darkness, not in a ‘that’s a cool phrase but they choose to worship and choose their own destinies’ way, but in a ‘they retain some awareness but such choices as they have carry the certainty of punishment by the malevolent forces that have infected their souls’ way. Sometimes servants of the dark gods who have failed (and sometimes just whimsically) are turned into spawn, their bodies mutated beyond all recognition as human, their souls fully consumed and their minds either completely overpowered or in such torment from inhabiting the twisted body that they can only howl with pain and hope that combat ends them.

This, to me, seems to be depicted as the moment a person’s personhood is lost. His gamble for power has been lost. But in truth the first foray into chaos seals one’s fate. It is a poison; a spore; a cancer that can grow whether one repents or not. Some people might be lucky, just as sitting in carriage with a few ‘flu sufferers doesn’t automatically mean infection. But spend enough time open to the corruption of chaos, maybe enjoying the support or ‘protection’ of its more devoted followers, and eventually it will get you too. It is the same as being an influencer or far-right troll. You start off a sane person hoping for a bit of power or fun, but gradually you turn sick in the head as the forces you hoped to take advantage of consume you instead.

All those chaos characters, the traitor legionaries, are not the people they were. Their selfhood has gone; they are puppets for the malevolence of the immaterium, but they are puppets with consciousness. The corruption dictates to them what they must achieve, but the immaterium does not need to plan how: it uses their minds to pursue its hatred of independent life.

The chaos gods are not people as we understand them: they are modes of corruption, ways that people can lose themselves and their humanity. We should pull back from them being gods with human minds and thoughts; they are coalesced psychic residue of suffering which has gradually accumulated self-awareness and wishes to grow and multiply, malevolent expressions of the immaterium’s antipathy towards independence and rule-based reality.

To really push chaos as the ultimate enemy the suffering of both the victims of its campaigns and those prosecuting the campaigns should be apparent. Both the soldiers spreading chaos and the civilians caught up in it should be depicted as far worse off, in the end. A longer story might allow for the initial rebellion to lift some of the oppressive yoke of the Imperium, but the price to pay later will be inevitable and terrible.

What we currently see are immortal humans who gain power, do what they want freely and occasionally grow a tentacle. The downside of this Faustian pact should be displayed further. There is not only the risk of spawndom, but the immortality at this point is mere prolongation of the suffering of no longer feeling happiness, of one’s soul being owned or already consumed, and therefore not really being a free, independent being.

As part of returning chaos to its horror roots it needs to find purchase on all life, and not just through its real-world devotees. The immaterium can affect anything that is conscious. Orks, T’au, Kin (space dwarves) and tyranids must all be corruptible. Maybe chaos does not focus its attention here; they are poor gruel compared to the psychic presence of humans or the super-tasty Eldar. They might be collateral damage in chaos’ war on reality.

But both by directly tainting minds, and through its physical manifestations being able to corrupt physical matter of any form, chaos must be a threat to these other factions. And I would even find it a good way to balance the setting for more psychically present races (humans, the Eldar, the hive mind) to be the ones best able to fight chaos. They are both its preferred prey, vulnerable but also, with the right will, best able to hold it at bay.

Rewriting chaos to be more of a force in itself also helps to balance the over-sympathetic portrayal of the traitor primarchs. They mostly meant well and got corrupted by accident or even against their intentions, and with chaos just a choice of allegiance rather than a powerful force they don’t seem so bad. However, as with company directors whose companies do foul things, ignorance and good intentions are no excuse. Magnus and Mortarion are hugely sympathetic if chaos isn’t much of a threat. But Magnus’ dabblings in sorcery and his relaxed attitude to his legion’s experiments are culpable negligence when chaos is properly dangerous, and the infection that has already taken root by the time of his death is his fault, even if he was not yet fully corrupted and some shards of his mind/soul were reasonable, nice, repentant Magnus.

There once was a chaos ork, although Games Workshop left that behind decades ago. There would be too many factions and subfactions in the game to keep track of if each had a separate chaos version. But staying broadly the same with slightly different models, paint schemes and maybe one special unit to be fielded like allies are alongside the normal army? That could work for the game. We could also decide that orks reduce to chaos goo on being corrupted, such that very quickly there is no chaos ork warhost: just brief appearances of unusual orks/ork squads that ‘mysteriously’ go rogue and soon disappear as the orks take surprisingly high casualties on chaos-infested worlds and ships. Or maybe chaos corruption treats orks as things rather than beings: just as it warps reality and twists the land around it, it twists orkish forms, but doesn’t affect their war-obsessed psyche.

Likewise we could decree that squat, T’au and tyranid-underling minds cannot take the strain of being infected by the immaterium, as their psychic resilience is too poor. They die sooner rather than living long, corrupted lives. No-one knows how chaos and the tyrranid hive mind itself interact; neither side confides in anyone. But there should be clear signs that chaos is a threat to the tyranids. We do not know whether there was something similar in any previous galaxies they have infested or whether chaos is a new threat for them, but the shadow-in-the-warp effect from untold multitudes of beings, or from the sheer size of the hive mind, cannot be immunity to the malevolence of the immaterium. Maybe it’s a massive meal to be fed on gradually, pieces sucked away gradually; or maybe it’s a juicy target that takes time to corrupt; or maybe chaos doesn’t notice, corrupting tyranid forms and fleets the way it infests planets.

The idea of physical chaos corruption is that the worship/infection of the sentient beings in the area breaks down the barriers of reality, giving the immaterium easy access to the real world. Beings that cannot be corrupted can’t provide this access, but maybe they can be corrupted physically… and then even without psychic presence they provide the same effect. Thus chaos corruption can infest one of these factions, which has no protection, no ability to purge the infection. When they spend some time in contact with the physical manifestations of chaos they are lost for sure, whereas a more psychically present species can purge those who have fallen to chaos and the presence of the uninfected then naturally reduces chaos’ hold on reality: there is always conflict between chaos and psychic presence.

Maybe as a consequence it is hard to feel safe when alone in space. Devout worlds provide a psychic buffer that allows people to think and feel normally, but out in the lonely coldness of space, or on unpopulated planets, even non-psykers feel the tendrils of malevolence clouding their thoughts and sapping their joy. This could be why Imperial ships are such vast gothic monstrosities: a bigger crew provides some psychic defence, and the cathedral look and feel is a symbolic reminder to both crew and chaos.

Returning to the Dark Angels again, we could change their history such that instead of being upset that some of them in the past were traitors, hurting the honour of the chapter but not really being any responsibility of the current marines, they all have a seed of chaos taint within them. They are a connection to reality for the malevolence of the supernatural immaterium, and weak minds they spend time with can succumb to the corruption. Current Dark Angels sometimes turn, although they are quickly purged by their brothers. That would be a flaw worth being upset about.

These minor tweaks of lore and focus would restore the horror of the warp. From ship design to population demographics, fear of chaos drives everything. Nothing is impervious, and the Imperium of Man is the only force that can resist it well. This is power beyond mortal man’s understanding, power with a mind of its own that is as likely to use you as you are to use it. A telling commentary on the nature of power.

 

                As we have looked at the major factions in turn a few common themes have emerged. The detail of what a ‘psychic imprint on the warp’ is needed to be expanded. We ended up with the concept that a psychic reflection in the immaterium from sentience grown in the material world is anathema to chaos, and that lacking this reflection is therefore weakness to chaos rather than immunity. This helps to balance the more recent factions, whose material power through technology and science was plenty enough to give them gameplay options: adding psychic power to them would have unbalanced the gameplay of the setting. But in the background lore of the setting it also provides balance: their technology is impressive, but they lack this psychic resilience that makes man and Eldar both juicy meal and enemy of chaos.

                Likewise we have, starting with the need to balance factions so that no ‘good’ faction offers an obvious way out or easy way to dominate, developed a rule about excellence that mimics the laws of evolution. To train someone to perform as best as is possible in certain ways (fighting, for example) they must become instant, unquestioned, unquestionable unchangeable ways of responding. The nature of being the absolute best, the pinnacle of achievement, is a loss of versatility. Should those ways ever be inappropriate, by chance or by careful design of one’s opponent, what has become doctrine, instinct and faith becomes the noose around one’s own neck: the concrete boots in a  sea of novelty.

Whether custodes, mechanicus, imperial knights or space marines, in my writing all share this weakness: becoming better has also taken something valuable from them. It applies similarly, although not identically, to the wider Imperium such as the sisters of battle: doctrine guards them from heresy and disunity, but also from progress. The 40k galaxy is one where heresy and misplaced belief is a threat, unlike in our own world. Therefore doctrine has genuine value. But the downside remains: a stultifying conformity that is suspicious of all difference, unable to distinguish progress from corruption. This is the same process that renders pandas, or blind salamanders, or polar bears, endangered species: they adapted too well to perfectly occupy a niche that is fading. Human versatility has overrun Earth in the real world; and the need for extreme adaptation in the fictional 40k one is undeniable, but brings the ossification in culture and individuals that is a weakness.

                There are only so many sources of horror, and many of them are situational rather than entirely due to the faction or entity that is the enemy. On ‘our’ side we have downsides to every solution: improvement brings weakness, meaning that there is never a final position of strength. But we have reintroduced inevitability and threat to those ‘bad’ factions that had lost them. Chaos should be the lurking supernatural evil, ever-present, always probing. Tyranids are numberless hordes. Orks are brutal warmongers who thrive in the grinding attrition of continuous battle. Necrons are the relentless, undying monsters.

                When it comes to situations, the 40k galaxy provides plenty. Loneliness and isolation are commonplace, with communication relays held together by fragile psychic beacons that are easily interrupted, and travel taking weeks or months for normal journeys. Knowledge and information is therefore equally incomplete. The enemy is frequently unknown or misunderstood and surprise conflicts are common (and constant alertness therefore required). This is exacerbated by the Imperium’s habit of purging normal humans who are too exposed to its threats, because it regards knowledge as inherently dangerous. When it comes to knowledge of chaos, it might be right: the temptation to use such power is less when no-one knows it exists.

                Isolation, limited information, dangerous, superhuman enemies, inability to trust one’s own side all are essential building blocks of horror. Alone, outmatched, ignorant… should be part of any nightmare. 40k goes further than some horror stories because it does not have any hidden rules of fairness. Many horror stories pick off the ‘undeserving’ (as judged by the author) first: the arrogant windbag or the selfish individualist. Many films, serving American values, have a chaste young girl be the survivor: a view of sex that is itself horrific. Chaos does not care about any of this: all human souls are tasty, and all can be made to suffer. The only question is whether they resist and suffer quickly now, or capitulate and serve, suffering slowly and increasingly into the future, conduits for power projection into the material world rather than solely fuel for chaos’ power.

 

                In this bleak setting, ripe with story possibilities, the deeply flawed heroes shine. Resistance and even triumph in the most terrible of situations appear that much more virtuous because of how bad the situation is. When things are hopeless and all that is left is the unconquerable will, the courage never to submit or yield, we see nobility. This is the light in the darkness of the 40k galaxy: that even if it’s a bit coloured, no longer pure, humans refuse to let the light go out.

 

                After all my Dark Angel bashing, this is why they are so beloved of writers of the setting. Their defining trait, even more than original guilt, is willpower. ‘Determination’ is their one-word character, just as ‘honour’ is for the Imperial Fists. And it is willpower that is the essence of any magic in any setting: some aspect of learning, perhaps, but magic is a way to will things into being, and stories with magic in are often a way for humans to will their way to success. In one way it’s the necessary part of magic, psychic power or even plot-writing, but it is also a cop-out. Determination isn’t always enough: the true horror of life is that sometimes fate is against us, that victory is impossible, that our hopes and possibly lives are doomed.

                40k can’t retain its essential character if the Dark Angels are allowed to be the all-powerful champions of humanity; if individual ‘determination’ is depicted as the most valuable asset. People have the best chance of doing well the more virtues they accumulate. Not even the ‘brotherhood’ of the Space Wolves nor the devotion of the Imperial Fists is all-conquering on its own. It provides light in the darkness, but can still be snuffed out. The darkness can always win and every day, every moment, is a battle that we win by remaining who we are.

 

                That should be a good place to end, but there’s more. We should discuss the business model: the bland models, the clean lines, churning out new ranges that supersede old ones rather than adding to a big galaxy. The rules updates, the power creep of newly-issued models, a constant upkeep of staying up-to-date with changing and yet streamlined rules.

                I’m not unaware of business reality. Companies need to make money, and giving everything away is a quick route to going bankrupt and killing the hobby off entirely. And yet the criticisms of Games Workshop’s price-gouging greed are valid. Companies and franchises nowadays regard goodwill and brand recognition as inexhaustible resources to be mined for value but undermine themselves, setting themselves up for collapse. Trust is vital to a good market, and if you aren’t trying to build it you’re a conman, except that large companies can’t run away. Their misguided directors and managers can, as can private equity investors who’ve already extracted all the cash via loan interest and maybe quick dividends.

                The problem is that price gouging destroys goodwill in a way that can’t be measured, and so it doesn’t go into the accounting. It’s a gradual displeasure, a disappointment, that starts off as fan chuntering even as they continue to engage as normal. Then they stop turning up quite so often. And eventually they think regretfully of the love they’ve lost, and angrily of the custodian of the IP that they loved, and sadly start all over again with something more genial.

                Likewise there are different categories of fans. Businesses trying to go mainstream feel the need to water down their offering: decomplicate it, make it bland, inoffensive and generic. They file away the rough parts that might catch in someone’s craw and make themselves palatable to everyone. This can multiple the numbers of people who engage with a product, but there is cost.

                Not all engagement is equal. Every movement, of any sort, whether social, political, or cultural, needs the cheerleaders; the devoted followers. A generic consumer might encounter bland Games Workshop sci-fi setting, nod in vague interest and bother to have a new film on in the background while absorbed in his phone. Dedicated fans will buy multiple armies of models, read all the books, watch the films in the cinema, buy some Etsy tie-pin of the Word Bearers and, through his joy and interest promote the subject to everyone he knows even when he’s not actively preaching about it. This free marketing is the best sort. No advertisement can replace the effect of someone a person knows finding joy in a product.

                And as companies charge more until they’re testing market elasticity, pricing poorer people away from their product in order to fleece richer ones of a little bit more, that joy fades. People who are already committed to the product that was will continue to follow, but with ambivalence. New people they meet who ask about it won’t be greeted with “It’s brilliant, so cool, come along and join me” but with more guarded statements: “It’s a compelling idea, but there are downsides”. Yes, people who have invested a lot already into being a fan of something have inertia. That inertia and pre-existing affection can be mined: books can be priced higher than generic sci-fi books with no fanbase yet etc. But it will die eventually, and by the time it does it will be too late for the company: what took 10 years to build and 10 years to destroy will take even longer to rebuild.

                People are not mindless moths who are drawn to whatever the shiniest latest release is and are distracted by how cool it is. Well, some are, but they have short attention spans and might well be distracted away from your brand entirely. Fans are ones who have formed parasocial relationships with your characters, who love a culture you have described, who feel real emotions about your setting. If you put that down to raise an upstart (with a raised price) you betray all that investment. It doesn’t matter if it’s a girlboss or Mongolboss, deliberately trying to bring in women or Mongolians. Both come at the expense of telling fans ‘that character you loved who was the best at this tiny niche thing? Well he’s not even the best at that any more. And those flaws he overcame to become better on his hero’s journey, or which you accepted as part of his character? Well, they’re back, worse, and the new character doesn’t have them at all.’

                I should probably go round to the Games Workshop’s team’s wives and tell them that I’m better than their husbands in every way and they should sleep with me. They should support the decision.

                Those poorer people who are priced out were more numerous than the richer ones who discontentedly continue; and it is numbers that spread the word, and convince people, more effectively. Creative ideas can’t be made into luxury products: they’re not Veblen goods and not susceptible to prestige pricing. Likewise you don’t water down your brand identity by making it accessible. When you rely on any sort of fandom accessibility must be a core part of the business goals.

                That means constant investment. Investment in low-priced entry points that are good value; investment in fans through reasonable behaviour and rewards for their loyalty; and investment in the setting, not through aggressive legal action against fan-generated IP infringement but through good guidance for writers who to use the setting and thoughtful custodianship of its character.

                Games Workshop is losing its older fans. Midwinter Minis, a YouTube channel with hundreds of millions of views of painting tutorials and 40k armies, has openly declared its disappointment with the hobby. Other creators are branching out into also covering upstart rivals… and one day soon that ‘also’ will become ‘instead’. It has higher prices for models, especially characters, than it did in the ‘90s despite greater economies of scale and massive advances in factory technology (even after adjusting for inflation). It charges for rulebooks for every faction, and releases new rulebooks every few years. The starter sets no longer enable one to play a game: they’re part of a start (and rebranded to be ‘combat patrols’ to avoid confusion, but leaving no real starter product available). The standalone game Necromunda was first released with all the components to play a campaign of many games. The new release is woefully short of scenery and has barely enough models for the first game, let alone experimentation and exploration. Further purchases are a necessity, not a pleasant extra.

                This is not unique to Games Workshop. Computer games, board games, software in general, cars… there are many products which are released in semi-usable or very basic form at the price one used to pay for a complete product, with prices attached to every upgrade.

                Cars don’t rely on fan engagement with an overarching IP or brand. They advertise their brand, and pretend that buying their cars will make you sexy and successful, but no-one truly believes that a Peugeot will attract all the women, and almost no-one falls in love with a car label. Creative industries are the ones that suffer most from mining goodwill because entertainment is so much more about liking it, and because expenditure is so discretionary.

                That’s not to say that there aren’t similarities. If Games Workshop had starter, intermediate and full-detail games systems that were brilliantly balanced and tailored to the relevant audiences then the practical concerns about good gameplay would outweigh some of the worries about price and blander background, just as Volvo’s reputation for functionality outweighed the ugliness of its cars.

                On the subject of blandification, there is no point in reaching out to a wider audience if you give up what makes anyone like you in the first place. It’s the Keir Starmer approach to popularity. Even people who don’t like your character will appreciate that you have some if you keep it. More Russ, less Jaghatai should be the refrain. Likewise blander, simpler, faster rules appeal to many, especially a wider audience, but at some point a game will become so simple that people ask why they’re spending so much on something that can be breezed through with a few tokens like a normal board game.

                Wargaming is a niche hobby. It can’t change what it is. In the ‘70s people chased brilliant games such as Russian Campaign, regarded as complex, difficult but good simulations of historical wars. The most devoted fans delight in that complexity: they have already engaged with dozens of books, thousands of pages of background and lore. Why would a few more rules hurt, if established once and then left alone.

                What hurts people is rule-sets that also change every few years, complex or not. That means that people can join the hobby a little more easily if the rules are simple, but a couple of years later before they’re fully engaged they get pushed away. It becomes a small thing they have dabbled in.

                Anyway, what business advice would I give GW if I were a Fat Four consultant asked to write a report about business strategy? Let’s give some short points, business-comms style.

1.       Have internal guidance for writers and creators that lays out how to maintain the character of the setting. Follow my rules, summarised here: keep it a characterful, sci-fi horror setting and do not turn it into a more generic sci-fi setting. Sprawling settings can be incoherent, unbalanced or have writer self-inserts. They need creative management, just as an interior designer can see a beautiful object but know that it’s not right for the current project.

a.       There is always another threat. Peace is a hard-won lull, not a lasting change.

b.       Religious devotion has some protective effect, and heresy is therefore dangerous because the weak will succumb to corruption. Real-world ideas of virtue are dangerous.

c.       Malicious forces of evil are ever-present in the parallel realm of ‘the warp’, where souls and psychic power are everything. Nowhere and no-one is out of reach.

d.       Technology is poorly understood and because of the risk of evil corruption religious devotion is more important than technology.

e.       Information about events or other worlds travels slowly. Knowledge and ancient lore are scarce: the audience knows more than the characters.

2.       Slow down the space marine releases that supersede others. Invest in writers who can create a new faction or two. Some aliens who turn out to have an empire in an unexplored part of the galaxy, or fleshing out mysterious threats that have only been half-mentioned.

3.       Set yourself up for a primaris heresy to help to undo some of the resentment caused by replacing old and loved models. ‘Legends’ rules for models, akin to the rotating play formats of Magic The Gathering, doesn’t work for investments of such time and money in miniatures. A few pieces of card in a card game are inherently more replaceable.

4.       Invest further in different 40k formats. Quick rules for beginners, tailored to smaller armies are fine. Kill Team and Combat Patrol are good ideas. They need work to make work: and the small scale products should be the best value, beginner-friendly options. Are there basic kill teams that can be painted with only 6 paints? Can you release some pre-coloured ones in a very limited range? Can someone set up a viable battlefield with cheap (if imperfect) terrain? 40k itself should have standard and epic rulesets, and epic can include all the fun of previous editions and of other rival products that has been removed or avoided in the name of streamlining. Bring back flamer templates, different psychology rules and vehicle damage tables. See if damage tables for all models, such as humans, are too much.

5.       Release at least one of these rulesets for free and keep it free and universal, such that all models can be played with the free rules. This should be a binding and trustworthy promise to customers.

6.       Forcing customers into purchases, such as rulebooks, replacement models and power-crept new releases destroys the brand. Customers should be drawn to such things from interest. Expand the setting and offer new purchases.

7.       Playtest everything, or invite fans to do it for you in exchange for early access, creative input and some small token of goodwill. Games must be balanced: if they are not, there is no game.

8.       The competition is undercutting you. Lower prices and accept lower profits now, while people are still trying to make 40k-compatible models, or face a complete change in the market when people choose cheaper game systems entirely and 40k loses its dominance.

9.       Miniatures and games cannot make obscene profits like information-based content such as runaway success in films and books. They should be the shored-up, solid base from which to launch associated ventures. Treating them as a loss-leader to ensure an engaged fanbase in other merchandise and creativity would be wiser than milking them as a cash-cow which will soon dry up.