Warhammer 40k Fluff Discussion XVII: Call Necrosius, The Old Thread Is Dead!

[Eldan]

I think in 40k, Undivided is a bit of a relic from Warhammer Fantasy, where Undivided was much more of a thing, and Be'la'kor had a bigger story role.

[Fergie0044]

I always figured you can be "chaos undivided" fairly easily, you just worship the gods collectively as a pantheon like the Word Bearers do. However once you start getting demonic gifts and the like you need to commit to one single god. As big A shows, it IS possible to get quite far without any demonic gifts, but he is more the exception than the rule.

Given how disapproving the WBs have been in some novels about mono god chaos marines, I wonder how they react to their own possessed/warp talons etc that have to choose a single god?

As for Ingethel, I always assumed she was Tzeentch aligned, but can't say for sure. She was definitely not Khorne, as we can see in the Aurelian novel when she doesn't react happily to An'ggrath showing up!

[Grim Portent]

So, quick question. I haven't read the First Heretic, but I'm told that in it, Lorgar is guided by a Daemon Prince called Ingethel. My question is, what god does she serve? Neither her actions or her looks point to any in particular? Is she Undivided? Because I thought that was just Be'lakor and eventually Lorgar and Perturabo.

I don't know about any future appearances by her, but in the First Heretic she isn't openly devoted to any specific god from what I recall. Safest bet of the four would be Slaanesh as she brought Lorgar to a place in the Eye that was still reeling from the effects of Slaanesh's birth, and her form is reminiscent of the ones common to Slaaneshi daemons even if only slightly.

Undivided is something that GW has been moving away from for a good few years, I think to make Chaos more brainwashy than it already was. Historically daemon princes could belong to any of the gods, all of them or none of them at all, and it was possible, but rare to ascend with no divine intervention or to just drift away from the gods once you were in the Warp. Various 'wild' daemon princes of ambiguous origins existed, primarily invested in their own petty affairs and fearful of the attention of any of the gods and their servants, who tended to be more powerful and not interested in sharing.

Of the top of my head one appears in Blood Gorgons, and there's Balphomael from Dark Heresy, who is basically the original take on Be'lakor in 40k with a shadow and fire theme and secrecy and plotting being his cult's gimmick, the Warsmith from Storm of Iron, Nemeroth from Space Marine, but there's definitely more daemon princes who were either openly unaligned, undivided or of no declared master that I just can't remember right now.


Be'lakor being added into 40k made GW retcon that all other daemon princes are devoted to one specific god, despite having previously supported unaligned princes in the tabletop and having several seemingly unaligned daemons in the novels and RPGs. It doesn't make much sense, but it's easy enough to say that Be'lakor is just the most powerful of all such princes to exist before Lorgar and Perturabo ascended.

[Wraith]

As big A shows, it IS possible to get quite far without any demonic gifts, but he is more the exception than the rule.

"Abaddon doesn't have any daemonic gifts" is the opposite of what happened. He's up to his eyes in them as the Pantheon have alternatively rewarded him for his successes, and then tried to bribe him to join one God over another. Not all demonic gifts are obvious physical mutations, after all.

I always figured you can be "chaos undivided" fairly easily, you just worship the gods collectively as a pantheon like the Word Bearers do.

The important thing to remember is that "Chaos" isn't a single unified religion - it's a conglomerate of factions who loosely worship warp-based entities, and even that is a broad-strokes definition. Chaos Undivided is equally about worshipping all 4 Gods at the same time, as well as worshipping a nebulous and vague version "Chaos" from which the 4 Gods were born, in the same way that lesser daemons are small, peeled-off pieces if their associated Gods. It is at the same time a sort of "none of the above" group of those who don't know enough of the more eldritch Chaos lore, as it is those who know too much and want to play the REALLY dangerous game.

I don't know about any future appearances by her, but in the First Heretic she isn't openly devoted to any specific god from what I recall. Safest bet of the four would be Slaanesh as she brought Lorgar to a place in the Eye that was still reeling from the effects of Slaanesh's birth, and her form is reminiscent of the ones common to Slaaneshi daemons even if only slightly.

I was torn between Undivided - because they spend their time giving the quick cliff-notes version of Chaos to the newbies like Argul Tal - and Slaaneshi, since they also spend all their time talking about the Eldar, their former worlds and that sort of secret lore that tends to be Eldar/Slaanesh relevant.

[Grim Portent]

I was torn between Undivided - because they send their time giving the quick cliff-notes version of Chaos to the newbies like Argul Tal - and Slaaneshi, since they also spend all their time talking about the Eldar, their former worlds and that sort of secret lore that tends to be Eldar/Slaanesh relevant.

I think given her job as the ambassador of Chaos to Lorgar she would be made privy to the lore relevant to the Eye of Terror's existence, the Fall was a big part of their time weirdness demonstration to Lorgar, presumably as the most recent impressive deed of Chaos and one which he would have some context for.

I'm on the fence about what exactly she was to be honest, I don't recall the pre-Imperial Cadians being obviously Slaaneshi, and Ingethel herself preaches the Primordial Truth, which is Chaos Undivided by another name... but that could all be because the pantheon had a specific job for her and were willing to play nice while they got their claws in Lorgar fully. Her daemon form is a combination of serpent, insect and has four arms, which is a really strongly Slaaneshi image, but given the weird forms most daemons had at the time that might not mean anything. The lines between the god's minions seemed somewhat blurry at points in the Heresy.

[Archpaladin Zousha]

Random question: I've seen some art and info on Amethyst Wizards that indicates they have no body hair, whether that's shaved or Shyish's influence makes it fall out is unclear.

"All members of the Amethyst Order and its associated Order are clean-shaven from their scalps to their toes—they are as hairless as bleached skeletons."

This is corroborated by the iconic Amethyst Wizard in most of 4e WFRP's artwork. On the other hand, there's also other art showing characters who clearly ARE Amethyst Wizards that DO have hair:

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Also, clearly Elf mages who have the Lore of Death do have hair (at least as far as the Total War games show).

So...which is correct here? These are all from comparatively secondary sources (the tabletop RPG and the computer games), so I'm not certain if anything in the actual wargame's lore says it one way or the other?

[Grim Portent]

The multipart wizard kit (featuring options for five of the wizard colleges*) for the tabletop had an amethyst wizard head with a beard, so I'm inclined towards them having hair as that's about as primary a source as can exist.

Hair in the empire is not necessarily real mind you, wigs of various kinds weren't unusual for the nobility of several of the times and places WHF draws on. Beard wigs are more complicated to keep on as I understand, and a less common fashion accessory, but in a society as big on facial hair as the Empire it's plausible that some wizards would choose to wear fake moustaches and beards.


*Only missed the colleges of Life, Beasts and Shadow if I remember the bits correctly.

[Lord Torath]

Humble Bundle has a Black Libray bundle if anyone's interested. Good for another 6 days and 5 hours or so.

[Cheesegear]

Humble Bundle has a Black Libray bundle if anyone's interested. Good for another 6 days and 5 hours or so.

The cheap bundle of 6 has Devastation of Baal in it, which I can recommend, The Solar War is the first book in the Siege of Terra, so that's worth reading if you're into that. Of course it's likely to pull you into the rest of the Siege of Terra which is probably the point. But $1 for at least Devastation of Baal on it's own is a good deal.

The bundle of 14 adds Rynn's World, and Fear to Tread. There's a couple of AoS novels I'm not sure about. But they can't all be bad, right?

The whole batch of 25 novels is almost definitely worth getting. Even if you get a few bad ones in there, it will be vastly outweighed by the good novels.

[thethird]

The cheap bundle of 6 has Devastation of Baal in it, which I can recommend, The Solar War is the first book in the Siege of Terra, so that's worth reading if you're into that. Of course it's likely to pull you into the rest of the Siege of Terra which is probably the point. But $1 for at least Devastation of Baal on it's own is a good deal.

I personally enjoyed ghoulslayer it's not as good or as funny as the old Gotrek novels but it is entertaining and it's a nice point of contact with the whole age of sigmar mythos. As Gotrek does Gotrek things.

[The Glyphstone]

I gave up on Gotrek after the conga line of character assassination that was Slayer, but it was an End Times novel so I suppose the editorial mandates were to blame.

[Cheesegear]

I gave up on Gotrek after the conga line of character assassination that was Slayer, but it was an End Times novel so I suppose the editorial mandates were to blame.

Slayer was a good story, that required Gotrek to not act like Gotrek. I don't want to say he was given an Idiot Ball, but something close to it.

The problem with AoS-Gotrek, is simply...He has unbreakable plot armour. More plot armour than Drizzt Do'Urden - and that's saying something.

[Brookshw]

Slayer was a good story, that required Gotrek to not act like Gotrek. I don't want to say he was given an Idiot Ball, but something close to it.

The problem with AoS-Gotrek, is simply...He has unbreakable plot armour. More plot armour than Drizzt Do'Urden - and that's saying something.

A let down as far as I was concerned. Malaki shows up for no reason, so they can go on a quest I guess, which results in dwarf god going off to save the dwarves - which failed - Felix asphyxiating in a cave. No heroic end, just more pointless stupidity end times.

[Clistenes]

I always figured you can be "chaos undivided" fairly easily, you just worship the gods collectively as a pantheon like the Word Bearers do. However once you start getting demonic gifts and the like you need to commit to one single god. As big A shows, it IS possible to get quite far without any demonic gifts, but he is more the exception than the rule.

Given how disapproving the WBs have been in some novels about mono god chaos marines, I wonder how they react to their own possessed/warp talons etc that have to choose a single god?

I dunno... one of the novel shows a group of Word Bearers traveling into a zone close to the core of the Milky Way where the Warp has been quieted by lots of Necron Obelisks, and all their mutations and gifts cease to function... they are suffering horribly, and they pray to the Chaos Gods for succor... these guys had gifts and such, but they were worshipers of Chaos Undivided...

Also, aren't Erebus, Kor Phaeron and Zardu Layak very powerful followers of Chaos Undivided with lots of gifts...?

[Grim Portent]

They are, worshippers of Chaos Undivided get plenty of gifts, they just don't get certain specific ones.

Each of the gods has some mutations that only they grant, and they usually only grant them to people who worship them specifically. An example being the bloated rotting physique of Nurgle worshippers, or the daemonette claws and one feminine breast of Slaanesh worshippers.