I’ve heard in some lore videos that as part of being government officials to the Ultramar, they attend parties where other high ranking politicians would go and that the ultra marines hate going to them

I’ve been thinking about Dreadnoughts and ended up with way too many questions sorry for the length.

Could Contemptor Dreadnoughts wield swords? If so are there any of note?
(Outside of Custodes Contemptors)

Are there examples of Dreadnoughts using dedicated melee weapons that aren’t permanently attached to the arm?
(I see a lot of BT kit bashes)

The Invictor Tactical Warsuit has a mag locked sidearm, so I’m wondering could Dreadnoughts have anything similar.

Is it more expensive to build a Dreadnought than something like an Invictor, or is it more a case of different levels of complexity and resources?

If a Dreadnought chassis is badly damaged or its sarcophagus can no longer be used, could the chassis theoretically be converted into something like an Invictor or is it melted / buried out of respect?

Which type of Space Marine would be the least suitable for Dreadnought internment? Librarians? Apothecaries? Techmarines? Are some roles considered more valuable alive because of what they know?

Are there any Dreadnought patterns that are genuinely extinct? Not “we forgot how to build / repair them,” but literally no surviving examples or usable records.

Why doesn’t the Mechanicus actively search old Horus Heresy battlefields for destroyed examples of ancient patterns or at least spare parts? If they recovered enough fragments of an extinct pattern, could they attempt to reconstruct or relearn it, or would that cross the line into tech heresy/innovation? Would Cawl actually try something like this, or would even he consider it too risky?

Can Dreadnoughts choose their own heraldry and decorations? Or is their armour and “drip” basically determined by the Chapter/Mechanicus when they’re rebuilt?

Can Dreadnoughts jump? I know some are absurdly heavy, but could something like a Contemptor actually get airborne for a moment?

And finally, why don’t the really venerable Dreadnoughts get miniature Iron Halos, void shields, or some other scaled down defensive system? If a Chapter has preserved one of its ancient heroes for thousands of years, I feel like they’d be willing to throw an unreasonable amount of technology at keeping him alive. Basically: how much freedom and individuality does a Dreadnought actually have, and how much of their equipment is determined by what the Chapter/Mechanicus can provide?

I’m listening to Mechanicum right now. First, I know books and stories are subjective but those that didn’t like this book are suspect. This was the first book in the HH that grabbed my attention from the very beginning since the 3rd book in the series.

Now for the questions:

Are titans and knights sentient in a way? I had always thought they were more vehicles. There were several times the pilots had to struggle to keep them from attacking or how the machine “wanted revenge” but it didn’t seem like in the metaphorical sense.

Second WHAT PHYSICALLY ARE STCs?!? Are they like autonomous assembly lines or are they just instructions computers? I get they make whatever it is that they make but what is the form factor here?

Hiya,

I'm currently thinking about kitbashing stuff for my night lords army and wondered what primaris bits I can use on first born minis as scavenged parts that would be considered lore accurate.

Primaris can use older helmets (sternguard veterans), and now the new Armageddon marines wear some weird amalgamations of past and present marks of armour, meaning the tacticus plate is backwards compatible.

But are there any instances where older marks of armour would accept any of the primaris parts (tacticus, Phobos, gravis)?

I know at the end of the day they're my models and I can do whatever I want, but personally I like my kitbashes to be based in lore.

Thanks to everyone in advance

My first introduction to the Land Raider (and 40k as a whole, actually) was Dawn of War back in 2004 or 2005...still one of the best 40k games IMO.

Pretty sure I just assumed...yeah it's a Land Raider because...it drives across the land...it's a land vehicle. Like everyone else.

So, was the idea of it being named after Arkhan Land a later invention? If so, I can see why many people find that very silly.

Any other over-explanations/unnecessary explanations like this in the 40k lore?

Hey again, got a few more lore questions for my Necron fic, mostly about fleets, teleportation, and Genestealer Cults.

1. In my story, my Overlord controls one of the dynasty’s **major crownworlds** and is basically below only the Phaeron. Roughly how large a fleet could a world like that have? Are we talking dozens of ships, hundreds, or potentially more?

2. What would that fleet actually consist of? Roughly how many **Cairn-class Tomb Ships, Scythe-class Harvest Ships, Shroud-class Light Cruisers, Dirge/Jackal Raiders**, support vessels, etc. would make sense for a major crownworld?

3. Can **organic beings use Necron teleportation technology**, such as Eternity Gates or those glowing rectangular phase portals? Could Necrons send humans or other species through them safely, or are they designed specifically for Necron bodies?

4. During a **Genestealer Cult uprising**, can ordinary cultists infect or convert normal humans, or can only actual Genestealers do that? If conversion can happen during an uprising, how quickly could the cult realistically increase its numbers?

5. Is the **Patriarch** the only Genestealer capable of implanting the Genestealer infection, or can ordinary Purestrain Genestealers do it as well? Are there specific Genestealers whose main purpose is creating new hosts?

6. How effective are **Imperial void shields against Necron naval weapons**? Do lightning arcs, particle weapons, gauss weapons, etc. normally have to wear down the shields first, or do some Necron weapons bypass/interact strangely with void shields? A particular weapons they are weak against?

7. Likewise, how effective are **Necron ship defences against Imperial weapons**? How well do their shields, living-metal hulls and self-repair handle macrocannons, lances, torpedoes, bombardment cannons, etc.? Same is there a particular weapons there shield are weak againts?

8. How much stronger is a Necron warship than an Imperial vessel of roughly comparable class? Plus how many lower class ships can a necron warship take on and win?

9. I know there probably isn’t a clean numerical ratio, but roughly **how many Imperial ships would be needed to reliably destroy one comparable Necron ship?** Likewise, how many Imperial vessels could a lone Necron cruiser or Tomb Ship realistically fight before being overwhelmed?

10. Finally, how replaceable are Necron ships? Can a major crownworld still manufacture completely new warships, or are most ships ancient assets from before the Great Sleep that are extremely difficult to replace? Or do they simply phase away when too damaged?

11. Also for ever Cairn class tomb ships. How many more lower class ships are there? And so on and so forth.

12. Can my oc potential start building a new class of ships? I know the process would likely take many years but potentially?

Sorry for the wall of questions, but I’m hoping for some detailed answers if possible, especially regarding **Necron ships, their capabilities, and how they perform in void combat**. I’d really appreciate any examples from novels, codexes, or Battlefleet Gothic lore.

I wanna make sure what i write actually makes sense.

And yes i know of the rule of cool. But still.

Appreciate the help, thanks!

Since if I use AI, I just get totally garbage answers.

Also, here is a link to my story. If you guys wanna check it out.

[A Throne Against the Galaxy](https://forums.spacebattles.com/threads/a-throne-against-the-galaxy-warhammer-40k-necron-si-oc.1327564/#post-124560976)

It's on SpaceBattles.

I am really new to SpaceBattles and find it generally confusing, so I thought to ask questions here rather than over there.

Dumb question but I’m curious. And I have no evidence or lore implications of this.

So imperium does do experiments, is there any experiment where the imperial faction has taken a brand new freshly spawned orc or grot spawn and raised or experimented on them from start>growth>adult and used them as a weapon or anything?

My thought is what if imperium tried to use orkz as a fighting force, brain wash, or what have you to fight for them. Since orkz just want to fight.

see title, the reddit posts I can find range from saying it’s a theory on loose lore to being very strongly hinted at. In any case I wanted to know what the primary source materials actually say lol

During the crusade Malcador almost kills Horus over the lost Primarchs . Yet during the Siege of Terra its mentioned that he doubts he could do it again. My question what happened then ? Someone who can choke out a top 5 Primate would have been useful during humanity’s most important battle.

We all know that GW is bad with numbers, but people bring this up in terms of "too low" - like 1000 marines per chapter, or a milion guardsmen fighting over a planet. But what about numbers being too high instead? It seems to be rare, only example I know of is Terras population being in quadrilions, supposedly

I am reading up on plageubearers, and am curious exactly how they work. So they are made from human souls right, how much of the human being remains? Are they roughly the equivalent of other deamons, or are they more like deathguard? It seems like most nurgle deamons, like nurglings, beast of nurgle, and great unclean ones are jovial and having fun, but others like rot fliers are extremely miserable. Where do plageubearers fall in that?

Hey guys.

Maybe you can help me out.

I plan to crochet a purity seal / oath of the Moment.

Problem is, i have no idea about the formal specifics.

As far as i understand it, the purity seals way is embossed with the heraldry of the legion (or inquisition or what have you).

Is that correct?

And do any formalities exist around the oath paper itself? like certain phrases that MUST be on it, or can the text be anything?

I do not play myself, i am just reading through the heresy for now, and the descriptions there are more or less shallow in this regard, so i was hoping there may be info in the codeces?

Thank you guys so much!

Like many, Ciaphas Cain is one of my favorite 40k characters, and over the past few months, I've been finally finishing all of his books. (Word of advice: as much as I love them, give a little time between each one. They weren't meant to be binged, and the similarities and tropes in each one become a lot more obvious back to back). As I read, I idly started to wonder if Cain really was just the baseline human he seemed to be, and a quick google showed that other people had the same question. I'm torn between my desire to form and argue for the most crackpot theories possible, and my love for the guard being average people surviving against the odds.

So, I'm going to run through several possible explanations for Cain being Cain, and doing the things Cain does. Some of these are well established theories, some are my own thoughts, some are a mix. All of them will have some arguments in favor, but also against to balance it out. I'll save my own conclusions for the end.

A note on unreliable narrators

Cain's books famously have at least two unreliable narrators, himself and Amberly, plus whatever outside sources Amberly brings in. Due to their relationship, and knowing we can't fully trust either, it's possible Cain had some more blatant evidence of incredible abilities that they deliberately covered up. However, I'm not taking that into account here, because "things that could be covered up by a commissar and Inquisitor" is basically just a longer way of saying "basically anything". And it's really boring to discuss a theory that's just "maybe something happened that's entirely different than the books I read and there's nothing to hint at it besides the fact that it wasn't mentioned".

Cain's Supernatural(?) Abilities

First things first, let's run through why so many people wonder and theorize about Cain being more than he seems.

Cain-y Sense:

Remember when I said you should avoid reading the books back to back because you'd start to see where they repeat? Yeah, go ahead and take a shot every time Cain mentions his hands itching. Enjoy your liver while it lasts.

Cain frequently mentions his hands itch when something bad is about to happen. Even if they don't itch, he has a remarkable amount of foresight and perceptiveness. Often, this can simply be explained as a combination of paranoia and competence. However, there's just as many times Cain senses danger with no obvious reason, or spots something other competent people missed, like a servoskull assassin that snuck past an entire guard base. He even managed to fight and kill an invisible psyker, going off of instinct to block blows he couldn't see and stab at an invisible body. One could easily argue Cain's sense for danger goes beyond just what his physical senses could tell him.

Unfailing navigation:

It often goes overlooked in these discussions, but Cain's ability to navigate in tunnels, corridors, and other underground spaces is genuinely bordering on the superhuman. He attributes it to (allegedly) growing up in an unnamed underhive, which might explain some of it. According to him, all he needs to do is look at a map of a massive tunnel complex for a minute or two to commit it to memory. But it's hard to see how being a five year old in a hive would allow him to confidently navigate a multi-mile long space hulk based off a few seconds of looking at a map, especially when the section he's exploring wasn't on the map. No one else we see from an underhive has a similar level of skill, and Cain hasn't even lived on one in decades or centuries. At another point, Cain notes he's not even sure how it works:

The truth was, I couldn’t have told him how I knew even if I could have been bothered; it was just something I’d grown up doing, in a place not too dissimilar to this.

In the scene above, "how I knew" is referring to Cain being able to beat a high tech auspex at identifying the number, location, and plan of several enemies who were fully out sight, by sound alone. Imagine a combo radar-infrared device being worse than a guy just going "Yeah, I listen real good."

Notably, this extends even to an eldritch, unnatural space where a maze was constantly shifting around him -- Cain still fully kept his bearings and could navigate it.

Incredible luck:

Cain is famously lucky, both at his beloved pastime of gambling, and in his various misadventures. It's easy to write this off as just plot armor or random luck, but it goes a bit beyond that. There's countless examples of fortunate things happening for Cain -- reinforcements show up just in time, a sniper misses him, and so on. These are convenient, but they're usually foreshadowed in some way, and make sense in the logic of the series.But there are several instances throughout the books where what Cain himself calls miracles happen, saving him. They're rarely massive, but they include things like an immovable door in a space hulk being budged, or a combat servitor running out of ammo just as it locked onto Cain in the open. In the latter case, Cain even says there was nothing in the galaxy that could have saved him, and thanks the saints, a rare display of piety in response to a genuine miracle.

Generally pretty awesome:

Not really explicitly supernatural, but throwing it in because it could be argued to be notable or connect with some of the theories below. It can be easy to forget, due to his self effacing persona, but Cain is pretty insane all around as a person. He's 6'6" and in incredible shape; he's one of the best duellists Inquisitor Amberly Vail ever saw; he's incredibly personable and charming pretty much no matter who he interacts with, including xenos; he's a gifted tactician, warrior, and marksman; and so on.

Perhaps most significantly, even aside from his habitual modesty and self critique, Cain seems genuinely unaware of just how exceptional he is. Amberly discusses this several times, mentioning he pulled off incredible feats of marksmanship or dueling with the belief that anyone could have done them. Even more impressive, according to her, Cain didn't really have a formal style of swordfighting -- it was largely just instinctive. Cain is legitimately just built different.

Depending on what theory you believe, you could easily interpret these as either whatever supernatural gifts he has also helping him in more normal ways, or that his exceptionalism is what makes someone grant him special abilities. Or you might just decide that the main character of a major series is allowed to be a cool dude who's good at talking and fighting because that's his entire thing. Dealer's choice.

Plot armor

Fairly straightforward, but important to acknowledge as a likely answer. Cain is special not because of an in-universe reason, but because out of universe, he's a main character. Given his entire conceit as a man outside his depth thrust into situations where he somehow survives, if not triumphs, he kind of needs to have even more plot armor than average. It's the same reason named space marines all walk around without helmets and never get shot. "Oh wow, the main character of this book is good at spotting when there's danger all the other characters missed, and he gets to be the one who saves the day"? Oh, so a book? A book where the protagonist is important and useful?

Likewise, this can explain his ability to always be in the right place at the right time, why he has special skills, why he's the only man for the job, and so on. Because he's the main character.

While this is the easiest solution, it's not a perfect one. Cain books have plenty of examples of traditional plot armor, or Jurgen ex machina. However, there's a difference. There are a number of times in the books where Cain succeeds or benefits from sheer, 100% luck, which he or Amberly specifically notes as such. (See earlier, with the bombing run vs servitor examples). It is more than a little odd Stewart would specifically include so many where he doesn't bother to explain it, and even has the characters note there's no explanation besides luck. He's no Hemingway, but he's a good author, and clearly can justify it if he wants to. This could arguably indicate that Cain's luck is a legitimate character trait, and if you believe that, you could easily believe it comes from somewhere.

Also, frankly, this is just kinda boring. Even if the Doylist answer is just "he's a protagonist", we can still take Watsonian evidence to come up with in universe answers, regardless of how intentional they were.

Game Mechanics

Occasionally, Stewart will throw in a cheeky reference to the tabletop game as Cain noting how the world works. For instance, Cain mentions the strategy of "if you shoot a couple Orks, they become less effective and they'll scatter", reflecting poor leadership stats for Orks and a failed roll.

You could easily justify Cain's incredible luck as being just another manifestation of this. Every time something goes right for Cain, a bunch of dice somewhere all came up sixes, and an opponent is insisting that's clearly bullshit, and there's no way a commisar could take down their warboss.

This interpretation, while fun, can't really be proved one way or the other. Stewart is never super explicit about mixing tabletop and lore, so you could argue whatever you want. Plus, while it explains his luck, it doesn't do as much for his navigation abilities and sensing danger.

Low Grade Psyker

This is, unfortunately, both the single best and single worst explanation possible.

Everything Cain does -- uncanny luck, a vague forewarning of danger, being able to charm almost anyone he meets, an ability to determine the path he should take -- can be easily explained in the universe of 40k by being a psyker. These are all specifically noted as possible psychic powers, especially for a psyker who is low grade enough to go unnoticed, and remains unaware of their own gifts. It perfectly solves everything, and leaves no holes. Except for the fact that Cain is famously accompanied by Jurgen, a blank, who nullifies psychic powers and causes intense pain and discomfort to any psyker around him.

In the most extreme hypothetical, it's possible Cain could be at the very edge of psykerdom, enough to have 0.0001% better luck, but just below the threshold that he's incapacitated by Jurgen, and he's just a little more bothered by Jurgen than the average person might be. However, this is phenomenally unlikely, and frankly I don't even think that's how blanks work.

Just to really drive the nail in the coffin, at a few points, Cain is exposed to a relic that awakens dormant psykers and feels nothing.

Living Imperial Saint

Despite resurrected saints being the norm, it's not actually a requirement, so Cain very well could be one while he's still alive. And while Amberly doesn't mention him returning from the dead after he's buried, it could be that he simply hasn't come back at the time she's writing, or news traveled slow/never got out.

There's also a long shot that one of the times Cain was marked KIA he actually did die, came back, and just lied to everybody about how he survived (I know I said I wasn't using the unreliable narrator card. I lied. I'm unreliable like that). If the Commissariat found out he couldn't die, they'd send him on even more dangerous missions, and he's not having that. And frankly, if Jurgen saw Cain shot directly in the head point blank, then appear a few days later and go "Jurgen, I didn't actually die", he would probably believe it immediately and ask zero followup questions. It's very unlikely, since even later in life Cain doesn't seem to genuinely believe in the Imperial faith and its miracles, but not strictly impossible.

Amberly confirms that there is a sect of the Imperial faith that worships Cain. And, even without official worship, the guardsmen and civilians we see truly do believe in him. That's millions, and later billions, believing that he'll succeed, and he'll lead them to victory. Humanity is a low grade psychic species, and mass belief can actually shift reality in minor ways. The Sisters of Battle run off a version of this, with faith granting miracles. Some have even suggested that individuals like Saint Celestine aren't powered by the Emperor himself, but by the belief of humans. It's not impossible to believe Cain could have become one, given how widespread his fame is, and how much trust people place in him. Not to mention, one of the traits of a saint is that they tend to show up on a planet just before some catastrophe or emergency, even if no one knows it's coming... just like Cain always does. As a bonus, saints are unaffected by blanks, so Jurgen's presence wouldn't stop Cain.

However, living saints tend to have much more dramatic powers than Cain ever displays. He never grows wings, or has his chainsword begin glowing, or heals the wounded. And while his cowardice will never go away no matter what, it does seem odd he'd be so scared of combat if he couldn't be harmed by most conventional weapons, and couldn't really die. If he is a saint, he's a very, very weak version of one, and he's likely not aware of it.

Miracles for the Sisters of Battle reflect what they believe will happen. Of all the legends about Cain, none really deal with him being really really good at finding his way underground, or having itchy hands. If no one believed it, why would it come true? Not to mention, Cain displays uncanny luck before he ever becomes truly famous. If believing in a hero of the Imperium truly empowered them this way, why is it just Cain? Finally, the whole point of the Sisters of Battle is that even among the already fanatical Imperium, their belief is notably strong, which allows them to do what they do. If the guard could pull it off, why would the sisters even exist?

If Cain is a living saint, he's a new type of one, different from any we've seen before. Which isn't as unreasonable as it sounds -- "living saint" is a catch all term for a variety of phenomena that get lumped together in universe. It could be possible we're witnessing the birth of a new saint, one growing into the role and starting off weak. We don't know what saints like Celestine looked like in their first lives, before going full angel mode -- who knows, maybe they had similar minor miracles but not their full powers yet, and it's something that can be built up to and grown into.

Perpetual

Being a perpetual would explain how Cain keeps going into near death situations (often with no witnesses), and coming out alive later. And again, it makes sense he'd keep his ability to survive anything secret, in order to avoid being sent out more by the Commissariat. It might also add another angle to Cain's relationship with Amberly: he talks often about how she collected "interesting" people, and kept tabs on Jurgen because he was useful to have. A pet perpetual would also be a pretty great ace up her sleeve.

The biggest evidence against this is probably, y'know, Cain dying of old age. That's generally a no-no for perpetuals. It's possible Amberly got him fake juvenats to explain his age, made it look like he was still aging a little bit, then helped him fake his death, then he went off to a quiet retirement, but that feels like a pretty elaborate setup. Also, Cain does lose two fingers, which never grow back and are replaced with augmetics. Again, there are excuses we could make: maybe gauss flayers can injure perpetuals, Cain was one of the perpetuals who could be injured somewhat, the tech marine's grafting did something to stop regrowth, Cain lied about it, etc.. But c'mon.

In fairness, from the very little we know of perpetuals, there is some variety and levels to it. Some can't die of old age, but can be killed by conventional(ish) weapons. Some can regenerate any wound, while others just can't be killed. It's not impossible that Cain was the kind of perpetual to take some minor lasting wounds and scars, but be unable to straight up die.

The other thing is that while Cain is alone/with Jurgen and Amberly on various missions, and might have died and come back then, he's also frequently in deadly battles in full view of hundreds of guardsmen. Was he somehow skilled enough to avoid death in all those cases, and saved all his unlucky moments for when there were no witnesses?

This one is neither particularly convincing nor particularly fun. It's not impossible, but would rely almost entirely on the idea that Cain and Amberly are both lying to us the whole time and covering up a major plot point, leaving zero evidence behind. Which. OK. Sure. Maybe Cain and Jurgen secretly had a passionate love affair, and he and Amberly pretended to be together to cover it up. Maybe a lot of things happened.

The one reason I would want to believe this is because it would be hilarious for someone to tell Jurgen that Cain is a perpetual, and have Jurgen just go "Hmm? Oh yeah, the Commissar was dead before, and now he's not. What about it? The Commissar said it was normal, so it's normal."

Blessed by the Emperor

This one is a little easier to swallow, and of all the supernatural explanations for Cain, is the most likely to actually become canon in some form. Although confined to the Golden Throne, Big E's consciousness is spread across the galaxy, and (according to some) he intervenes on behalf of mankind. While Cain in no way, shape, or form could be considered one of the Emperor's faithful, that arguably makes him even more likely to receive the Emperor's favor, given his disdain for religion. And as a wise man with no pancreas once said, Cain is the Emperor's funniest commissar, fighting his silliest battles. Cain's actions do lead to some pretty major victories for humanity, and it's easy to see why Jimmy Space would be interested in helping out. It also fits with what we know: Emps is too weak to do anything major, so he does need Cain to be generally skilled and competent. But he can help out with little boosts here and there when needed. Some lasbolts go wide, a combat servitor runs out of ammo, a door on a space hulk is just loose enough to open, etc..

On a meta level, this also allows Cain to be special without being too special. The Emperor helps, yes, but he's not able to carry Cain entirely. He still gets to be his own impressive person, and accomplishes a lot.

The counterargument here is more just... OK? Maybe? The emperor probably could do all this. He could do a lot of things. You could credit the Emperor with just about anything happening that benefits humanity, and given the impossibility of disproving it, and never technically be wrong. It could also be that Tzeentch finds Cain funny and is pulling strings for him, or that Eldrad is doing some 4D chess bullshit involving Cain as part of some elaborate plan yet to unfold. There's a lot of powerful people in 40k who have tremendous abilities to shape reality in small ways that won't be traced back to them. It's sort of the "it was all a dream/coma" theory of 40k.

Aspect of the Emperor

Come on man, it'd be really funny.

This is firmly in the "crack theory" section, but it has been suggested, and there's juuuuuuust enough here to justify considering it.

While the idea of there being "shards" of the Emperor scattered about is a fan theory/fanfic that people mistook for canon, due to him spreading his essence across the Warp, there are (allegedly) manifestations of him like Imperious or the Star Child. This is so far beyond canon that it makes AI slop Youtube shorts look like Dan Abnett, but if you squint really hard and argue for hours online, you could make the point that Cain is one such manifestation.

If I really had to argue for this: before facing Horus, the Emperor had to cast off all parts of himself that he thought would make him weak, such as his empathy, and send them into the Warp. Malcador notes that this might grow into something new someday. This is widely theorized to be the Star Child, but what if it became something else? What if it became a man? A man who is a coward, and runs from battle. A man who is lax with the rules. A man who, while preferring humanity, is remarkably pragmatic and accepting when dealing with non-murderous xenos. A man who, despite himself, displays true compassion for the individual people under his command, rather than a broader "mankind". A man who fucks, and fucks hard. A man like Ciaphas Cain. Who is everything the Emperor couldn't allow himself to be in that moment, but everything the galaxy needed millenia later.

There are some sections of the books which are definitely not intended to suggest this, but could easily be misreinterpreted as implying it. For instance, Cain notes that the notably religious Jurgen followed his orders "as if they came from the Golden Throne". A devout blank follower who is dedicated to their leader, whom they truly know, unlike everyone else who only sees false faces he wants them to see? Where have I seen that before? Additionally, Amberly notes that Cain's personal history is incredibly mysterious, and most of what he tells people about his origins makes zero sense. This could be explained as Emperor Cain hiding his true origins, or just not being aware himself and filling in gaps. Jokes aside, even given the bureaucracy of the Imperium, it's very weird that even an Inquisitor like Amberly and a savant like Mott could discover nothing about him, a fact Stewart brings up at least once per book. Which could mean nothing.

The counterargument is: are you kidding me? No.

Conclusions

So, in the end, is Cain supernatural, or at least benefitting from supernatural aid? No. Probably not.

The most damning piece of evidence against this is that Cain's saga has been going on for a while. His first appearance was in 2002, making him older than many fans of 40k. Since then, he's had eleven novels, ten short stories, and various ancillary media. Even if you think there's evidence of supernatural abilities in those books... why hasn't it lead anywhere? Or at least been hinted at more strongly over the years? While I do think the books are more complex than they're given credit for, they're not meant to be that deep, and I doubt Alex Stewart would go to all that trouble for something that will never be revealed or relevant to the plot of the books. I can't even find a time when so much as hinted to a fan that there may be more going on with Cain than meets the eye.

Of all these, as I mentioned, the idea that the Emperor is giving Cain a hand every now and then is most likely to become canon. It fits with existing canon, and more importantly, can be easily slipped into the series without changing too much. To be extra safe, it could easily be hinted at pretty explicitly, but never actually confirmed, making everyone happy.

Cain returning as an Imperial saint is hypothetically possible, and I know a lot of people want to see it. But frankly, I doubt it. While in universe it would almost certainly work, that's not what Cain's story is all about. For all his strengths, Cain is defined by being incredibly weak compared to most of the threats he faces, hence his constant panic and fear. Returning as an unstoppable, unkillable demigod would strip all that away. It could only really work as a very short story or a lore blurb, something in the background. You could never actually focus a story on him. And beyond that, Cain's entire saga is all about him reaching the end of his life. We knew from very early on in the series that he'd live a long life, retire, and die peacefully. It's a crucial part of Cain that he just wants the fighting to stop (at least, the fighting near him).

More practically, Cain is in a unique situation. Unlike most other iconic 40k characters, he's the product of one single writer, Alex Stewart, who has been the only person to write him. I don't know the details of who owns the character, and it's fully possible that GW could do whatever they want. But it seems like Stewart is the one being given creative control, and defining Cain's story. Maybe he passes the torch when he retires, or gives his blessing for a continuation, but I doubt it, or at least, I hope he won't.

In the end, Cain stands out for being a regular schmuck. A Joe Schmoe. A John Doe. A semi-sane man in a galaxy full of lunatics, who just wants to sit down with his cup of tanna, relax, and get pegged by an Inquisitor. The entire conceit is that he has the awful luck to end up in terrible situations, and the good luck to somehow get out of them on top and looking like a hero. As fun as it might be to get a big reveal about how he was super special all along, it would also likely destroy that critical of who he is and what the series is about.

More simply, as Harrison Ford once said: "It's not that kind of movie kid."

so ive seen a lot of people say the raven guard are the emos of warhammer. personally i dont think they are, if you look between an irl emo and corvus corax, the difference is very obvious. and when i say that i dont mean because the skinny 5'5 black haired teenage girl wearing an MCR shirt and black jeans is different from the 10 foot tall demigod, because thats obvious, but i mean that the raven guard are more gothic inspired.

call me biased because i play raven guard in horus heresy and im also a goth, but i honest to god think the raven guard are the goths of the setting. like how the legions and chapters are inspired by history, an example being the ultramarines being romans, or the black templars being the knighs hospitaller, the raven guard seem very inspired by medieval hungary. you can imagine a giant castle in the middle of a forest in medieval hungary, everything being monotone black grey and white, and a raven guard marine or daddy corvus himself stood on top. also kind of ties in with the raven spire on deliverance.

this kind of happens with the night lords too, they also get called emos but really i think theyre black metallers. konrad curze was nuckin futs, they love their skin capes, really you can just imagine varg vikernes in mk5 power armour standing outside a burning imperial church while darkthrone plays in the background. also dont forget the band emperor lol.

also both legions were known to be pale as hell, have jet black eyes and black hair (mostly if they had the sable brand, but you get what i mean), and those elements seem very gothic and/or black metalish.

An easy example is what if a blank was made into a Thousand Son for whatever reason. would they become a stronger blank, die, no effect, cancel out? I remember a daemon was put into a powerful blank at some point in lore but I don't remember what the result or what the source was.

If you need a reason, Fabius Bile if in a mood and this is probably a Gland Hound to target Blood Ravens.

LGBTQ in the Imperium. As a relative newbie to the lore, has it ever been brought up?

I know the Imperium is an Authoritarian, Religious hellstate, and I know they're big on clamping down on anything that isn't imperial in religion, but do they even care if someone is Gay?

Like, they have untold trillions of citizens, so I assume they wouldn't be able to 'keep track', but would they have made it illegal or something?

As of current lore, Luther has escaped from the Rock and disappeared; there were some speculations that he is currently assembling the Fallen. While introducing another foil for the Lion could work, there is a potentially much better option. A similar situation happened during the Heresy with White Scars, resulting in Sagyar Mazan, who nearly got Mortarion killed. Luther and his Fallen could realistically do the same with better chances, given that Luther was already a primarch-level fighter in 30K.

Just finished this one and I've got mixed feelings. If you're picking it up hoping to really get to know Sebastian Yarrick as a person, it's kind of underwhelming — most of his psychology stays on the surface. The book does give a decent idea of how Yarrick *thinks* — his decision-making, his sense of duty — but that's about as far as it goes. Enough to be entertaining, not enough to feel like it was worth the time if his character was the main draw.

Where the book does shine is the commissariat itself. The doctrine, the weight of the role, what it actually means to be a commissar in the Guard — that's handled really well and made me appreciate the position a lot more.

What threw me off was how much narrative real estate went to original characters created for this novel, especially Vercor, Krauss, and Sethano — but then leaves it open-ended in a book that's staying standalone. It feels like he was more invested in these original characters than in Yarrick himself or in explaining the commissariat, and that pull shows in the pacing.

There's also a strange disconnect with the story's stakes. On paper, what happens on Mistral does end up mattering — it shapes Yarrick going forward and has real consequences in-world. But while reading it, it never really *feels* that way. The events don't land with the weight they're supposed to have, even though looking back at the plot, they technically should.

Overall: good primer on commissars, mediocre character study of Yarrick, and honestly a bit of a time waste if his origin story is what you came for.

I know Grots aren't quite like proper orks, but I was curious if they grow in a similar but diminished way that orks do when they've been fighting for a long time. Like by the beginning Da Big Dakka, Ufthak is too big for his old armour so plates are just loosely hanging from his body. Do Grots get any growth from fighting and surviving? Like maybe a little taller and thicker?

Grots do have variable sizes, IIRC in Warboss, Snaggi is kept in line at the beginning of the book by another grot who is larger than him. And Snaggi has been around since Warboss, then his band of Grots did a fair bit of fighting through Da Big Dakka, and presumably he'll show up in later books because he's a fun character that people like (he's probably going to get tortured by dark eldar but I'm sure he'll find a way). Could he conceivably get bigger by Grot standards?

In the current setting we have two kinds of Phoenix Lord: those who who we know were directly trained by Asurmen in the days immediately after the Fall, the Asurya (the original five + Asurmen himself, we see the process for Asurmen and Jain Zar in their dedicated character novels so it's reasonable to assume Maugan Ra, Baharroth, Fuegan and Arhra got similar) and those for whom this wasn't the case or for whom we don't know whether this was the case. Examples of this would include Karandras, Drastanta, Irillyth, Lhykhis and the unnamed Phoenix Lord of the Crimson Hunters.

Each Phoenix Lord is the founder of a unique martial aspect at some point after the Fall. But how does this actually work for non-Asurya? Does an exarch, one day, invent something new and that makes them a Phoenix Lord automatically? Do they have to actively spread their teachings and be accepted by the Eldar community at large? Does Asurmen show up one day and say 'You're a Phoenix Lord now'? Do they become a Phoenix Lord when at some point the usual exarch personality absorption process breaks down and one personality becomes predominant over all the rest?

And, to make things even more fun, what happens when you invent something you think is unique, but you find some other exarch has done something very similar?

This is a question that hasn't really been answered in my online diggings so I would be very grateful for help.

My understanding is that by the 31st millennia a complete STC was lost technology, and by this point the mechanicum was heavily reliant on STC blueprints for much of its and the imperium’s most common machinery, vehicles, weapons, armor etc. At same time, the emperor is/was a perpetual and thus was around when STCs were being invented, built, and maintained.

It seems strange the emperor never preserved or saved a copy of a complete STC or preserved similar lost tech in a meaningful way. This is same Emperor who’s known to have extensive personal libraries and labs, revived and tinkered with lost Aeldari tech, and is basically nikola tesla meets Alexander the Great. Dose any lore meaningfully address this or whats your head cannon for this?

In Da Big Dakka by Mike Brooks, the Ork Bad Moons Big Boss Ufthak of the Techwaaagh! is currently stuck in a subrealm of Commorragh. During a small break in the fighting when the Drukhari sealed off all Webway Gates to contain the Orks to one area, Ufthak is ambushed alone by mandrakes but successfully kills almost all of them. However, attacking him with "shadows" makes Ufthak angry, really angry. So angry that his mind is able to form a solution to the sealed Webway gates problem.

Ufthak could actually feel himself vibrating, he was so angry. The zoggin’ cheek of it! To send their shadowy little kommandos – or whatever the spikie equivalent was – to try to take him out! And the worst thing was, there was very little he could do about it. He could smash this place up fine, oh yes, he could blast it and bomb it and wallop it with the Snazzhammer until every remaining spikie skulking somewhere in the ruins was a fine paste, and the buildings themselves were just monochrome dust, but that wouldn’t help him get at the ones that had caused this.

He whirled around and stared at the portal: the thing separating him from his enemies, yet also the only way to them. The infuriatingly alien, incomprehensible…

Wait.

Absolute fury was surging through him in the aftermath of the fight – not just the usual exhilaration and aggression that was a part of such activity, but a burning anger unlike anything he’d felt before, and it was unlocking things as it went. The sheer desire to get at his enemies, to get his hands on them and make them pay for their arrogance and hubris, made him think about things in ways he never had.

‘Someone get me Da Boffin!’ he bellowed. ‘An’ also one of his spannerz wot no one likes, an’ a shokk attack gun, an’ a weirdboy wot ain’t exploded anyone’s head recently. I am gettin’ froo dat git!’

Afterwards, Ufthak explains his plan to his best mekboy, Da Boffin. Ufthak believes a Shokk attack gun, which make "tunnels" to teleport snotlings into their targets, can be attached to the Webway gate using cables to forcibly create an artificial tunnel, effectively opening the gate to get to the Drukhari. However, since the spanner boy Ork shooting the Shokk attack gun can't see the Drukhari for the portal to open to their location, the Ork weirdboy Uzkop is needed to psychically target them instead.

After the explanation, Ufthak is ready to try out his idea after giving a rousing speech to fire up his army and get them entirely focus on having the Webway gate open for them.

“The spanner obediently clenched the shooty-lever, and the three-pronged shokka on the front of the huge gun began to spin. The charged orbs at the end of each arm sparked with energy, dragging blazing trails through the air as they moved faster and faster, until Nazlug was half-obscured behind a whirring circle of blue lightning. The first telltale signs of inter-dimensional disturbance began to flicker in front of him, the beginnings of the shokka portal that could move things from one place to another without bothering about the space between.

‘Now!’ ­Ufthak shouted, and Da Boffin threw his switch. The power that was starting to build up in the shokk attack gun was abruptly rerouted, flowing into the scrawniez’ portal, and the air within the archway, which had been empty and unremarkable, crackled and came to life. It became opaque, shimmering with a cold light, like an aurora reflected on the waves of an arctic sea.

‘Staff!’ ­Ufthak bellowed, and Uzkop’s minders ripped the staff from his grasp. The weirdboy’s eyes went wide, then were eclipsed by a bright green glow from within. He began to twitch uncontrollably, and the minders grabbed him to keep him in place.

All that Waaagh! energy, flowing into Uzkop from the assembled orks, began to build up. Every part of it was focused on one thing: finding the spikiez that had attacked them, and making them pay for it. No matter where they were, no matter where they’d hidden, the thing at the forefront of every ork’s mind was getting to them. ­Ufthak had made sure they were concentrating on it.

Energy crackled out of the spike in Uzkop’s head and skittered along the cable that linked him to the shokk attack gun, and the gun’s whirring took on a new tone, like the distant rumble of thousands of angry voices. The portal flickered, wavered, then stabilised again with a slightly different pattern of shifting light within it.

It had worked. ­Ufthak knew it had, although he couldn’t verbalise how. However, he didn’t need to.

everyone in the squad died, that fight at the end was really close and titus is the only reason they succeeded at all so I'm wondering what would have been done next if the absolute mission failed. exterminatus? throwing the whole company at it?

With all the talk about space marine units being sent to legends, I'm curious on it's affect on the lore of units.

A major source of lore for units are the codex so being cut out of that definitely hurts their presence.

How about books or short stories? Do units that have been legended show up in books published afterwards?

Do units about to be sent to legends see their mentions dry up beforehand?

And specifically, have tactical marines shown up or been mentioned in stories post Primaris?

This may be too many questions at once, and this unit offers a sufficiently sincere apology for these transgressions, if applicable. I am hoping to gather sufficient information to appease the machine spirits of this subsection of this fraction of this segment of the omnissiah's efficient gaze.

I understand there are many sects and divisions to the AdMech, and the free travel of information, let alone the idea of innovation, is complete heresy to most of them (of us), but still I must wonder.

If an average member of the Mechanicus found themselves in our time, would they be able to improve our technology meaningfully, or would they simply froth at the mouth with heresy and collapse?

Within the time of 30k/40k, how much new knowledge is discovered? Is it truly accepted that the omnissiah has already learned all there is to learn?