Fantasy Author Reacts - Every single Warhammer 40k (WH40k) Faction Explained | Part 1

[@RyanPetersonReacts]

Links: Discord: discord.gg/r2WeevN3Ua Twitch: www.twitch.tv/ryanpeteslive Gaming Channel: kzbin.info/door/q93DC9Jrmz_tQY9jakgouA Main Channel: kzbin.info/door/A0d4wih_ecEWiLjy0Ws4Tg

[@AlbertoMartinez765]

Part 2 Please

[@davidfrancisco3502]

Warhammer is a multiverse with the warp as the nexus that binds everything.

[@kennyburkamp4054]

I suggest videos from major kill as he makes lore videos and stuff on Warhammer 40k that are like 10 to 20 minutes long at most

[@bryanmcclure2220]

You should react to warhammer 40K vs star wars by fan with too much time

[@praisethesun.praisedeussol6051]

If you ain't reading 40k books cause you need fantasy books to read then I'd advice Warhammer fantasy

[@phueal]

I actually love the "Innocence proves nothing" motto for the Inquisition - it's not just a meaningless badass phrase. What they're actually getting at with it is that in this world, you can have done nothing wrong but still find yourself corrupted or associated with heretics. You can be completely innocent, but that doesn't mean you haven't been secretly infected by a genestealer cult, that you haven't found a tainted artifact lying around and taken it home, or that the "society of friends" that you've been hanging out at after work with the strange handshake and the charismatic leader isn't actually a chaos cult aiming to summon a daemon next Wednesday. For the Inquisition, it doesn't matter at all if a person is innocent or not, only whether they are adjacent to some heresy, xenos, or daemonic influence - no matter how inadvertently or obliviously they have come by it. And the motto, well, that reminds them to look deeper and deeper, not to stop with establishing a person's innocence.

[@bad-people6510]

Except the quote is actually "Innocence MEANS nothing," and it comes from Judge Traggat for the Adeptus Arbites. That said he is a staunch supporter of the Inquisitional Puritan order.

[@janehrahan5116]

Those are two separate quotes.

[@trashdoge1217]

also you could be completely innocent but they found you guilty so it doesn't mattter

[@fuzzwobble]

My favorite Inquisition quote regarding this concept is "A plea of innocence is guilty of wasting my time." This doesn't just represent how important they are in comparison to other citizens, though at face value it gives such an impression. Nobody is truly innocent, but some are only 'flawed and mortal' enough to perhaps be allowed to live with punishment. To them, you might as well cooperate as much as you can so the Ecclesiarchy can help find what repentance you 'need'. To them, the ones they most consider valiant are those who openly admit that they are sinners; all are sinners, all are insults to the purity of the Emperor whom should strive in vain to approach the glory He deserves. To the Inquisition, you are insulting them and the Emperor with your cowardice with you plead innocence. You ARE guilty. Even THEY are guilty. By not acknowledging your pathetic nature, you are less than guilty; you are delusional. To understand what this means to them, it's not as though they *want* to run around punishing everybody. However, there's a lot of... specific, things a common person can do to help remain pure, especially when they've had a glancing with the Warp. It's just unfortunate that usually the best contribution in such a case is confession, final rites, and sacrifice to ensure they don't possess and pass on corruption.

[@PsychoticFruitfly]

everyone is guilty of something, it's just a mater of what and to what degree.

[@Alpharius_1994]

After watching Part 1: "Why does the imperium hate everyone else?" After watching Part 2: "Oh, that's why".

[@TheDark1903]

Legit made me laugh out loud.

[@williamthehammer1]

Yep, that right about there.

[@tjalvehund82]

Whats charming about 40k lore is that there are in fact lots of good guys and heroes. Those are the ones we follow in the books, at least for the most part. The thing is that they can only accomplish so much within the limitless size of the setting. Also, a hero in ones eyes, is a villain to someone else. It is this that truly makes the storytelling of this franchise so unique!

[@ASEVENK]

This, my personal fav is Garviel Loken, the GOAT luna wolf himself.

[@satzbau9185]

I mean the whole Great Crusade arc is rather inspiring, humanity spreading out to reunite lost worlds after a dark age, with some hope of regaining some glimmer of a bygone golden age, and the Emperor reuniting Earth, forging an alliance with the Mechanicus, and others, finding his sons, founding the Space Marines, victory after victory. And then the tragedy of the Horus Heresy. Reminds me of Berserk's Golden Age arc. Good stuff, the hopefulness and progress of the beginning just elevates all the grimdark that comes after. Top tier fiction no matter how you cut it, just a good tragic tale, and the hope that one can find in struggling against overwhelming odds.

[@jeffrobagman2834]

Lots... is a bit of an exaggeration, methinks. There are some good people sure. Maybe even thousands, but hive cities can have populations in the millions. The number of good people, per capita, is likely less than 1%. Unless you count cogs in the imperial machine as 'good'.

[@aquila4460]

@@satzbau9185 To be fair, in my eyes a galactic genocide and brutal conquest aimed at enforcing the rule of a tyrant is not really inspiring. The Great Crusade is not some kind of blessed time upended by the grimdark that comes after, it is just as grimdark as 40k, simply with a nicer paintjob and the worst parts of the Imperium of Man are not a perversion of its ideal, but rather a continuation of them.

[@TheNightWatcher1385]

The Imperium is so vast that it’s impossible for it to even know all of its assets. Entire planets are regularly lost due to simple clerical errors.

[@Zolwiol]

lost BUT ALSO reconnected to. It's a constant flux.

[@13basses]

Just as something to mention, when it comes to the warhammer fanbase if you get corrected its generally not coming from a bad place or trying to be "well actually", its more that a lot of us are excited about the lore and its fun to share what we know with people who are getting into the series.

[@dekai7992]

This.

[@TheTrveMothlord]

It’s also so vast it’s very very easy to misunderstand things hahaha

[@FermentingSmeg]

It’s fine, nit picking is fun apparently

[@satzbau9185]

But also I don't think anyone should want to mess with the Warhammer fanbase. It's large and comprised of people who have spent years in the hobby-- decades even, and way too much money on miniatures, books and the video games. There are few hobbies and settings where the fanbase is half as involved and engaged as the Warhammer fanbase. We're talking a multi-generational fanbase, like Star Wars, but cooler because grimdark puts hair on the chest. So while I appreciate his honesty and candidness, I would caution some degree of humility, to at least attempt to engage with the lore and the material in a more meaningful way then just trying to poke holes in fanmade, hyperbolic videos and actively stating that you have no interest in engaging with the actual material that isn't essentially the cliffnotes. It's kind of like saying you've seen The Godfather trilogy or Fitzcarraldo or Citizen Kane, because you read the plot synopsis on Wikipedia.

[@dariojanjic402]

Exactly, the dude is just so arrogant that his definition of "nit-picking" is fun, and us correcting him in a normal tone are haters, not understanding concept of fun...

[@4myzelf]

The imperial guard tactics is basically lets send 500k, they all died? This time send a million, all dead?, 5 million then!, they got wiped out again!? Fine, send some space marines with 10 million....only 1000 survived? Mission accomplished, good job boys

[@MannIchFindKeinName]

And to be fair, the request was something along the line of "We need some Space Marines, Grey Knights, the Inquisition and some 3 Million Guardsmen with the heaviest weaponry that we have, or they will land" and the support came 2 years late

[@Zolwiol]

Depends on the regiment

[@jeffrobagman2834]

​@MannIchFindKeinName Nobody asks for the Grey Knights, almost nobody knows they exist.

[@canadiangopher4443]

There were technically 20 primarchs not 18, but 2 of them we don't speak of. They have kind of been wiped from existence. But what it kind works out to is the ability on tabletop to create your own chapter of space marines or chaos marines.

[@andraskovacs5431]

And one of them became twins so 21-19

[@oxylepy2]

​@@andraskovacs5431eh, Alpharias Omeron are one Primarch in about all but number of bodies.

[@QuanNguyen-me8tc]

Wrong, you can't homebrew your own legion, only successor chapters

[@fussytom3093]

The inquisition would like to know your location XD

[@ЯАга-я4л]

Used to ​@@QuanNguyen-me8tc

[@daviddalke926]

The setting is evil and oppressive, the factions are evil and oppresive, but, within the setting and within the factions - there are 'heroic' characters and characters that you can root for, especially in the books focused on normal humans - guardsmen and such. The Tanith First and Only featured in the Gaunt's Ghosts books are amazing and inspiring.

[@felipebisi4145]

Funny how everyone even Bricky goes: I like Salamanders because they are the nice guys. 1~2 Years Later Night Lords are my favorite

[@acrab6527]

@@felipebisi4145 Because good guys are boring. Bad guys screwing over the other bad guys, for completely logical and fleshed out reasons, while the good guys try to escape is great.

[@sabnock31]

I think my most favorite character, at least from Imperium of Man, would be Ciaphas Cain. It's just funny how a dude who only tries to survive is regarded as hero. He's selfish, arrogant, one can say cowardly, but he still got his happiest ending in a way that can be in 40k universe. Retiring from active service and teaching recruits? What can a man wish for in Warhammer?

[@felipebisi4145]

@@acrab6527 to me it just shows that the "good guys" just lack flavor in every universe they act in exact same way

[@Xynth25]

​@@felipebisi4145because the Night Lord books by ADB are some of the best in all of the Black Library. They're the most humanized view of what are otherwise satirical villains, flawed villain-protagonists.

[@danielk4335]

Its Warhammer Fantasy and Warhammer 40K. Originally it was connected and Fantasy was the origin of 40K but later on the company (Games Workshop) separated the two into different settings with their own origin. But they still have many similarity.

[@themalcontent100]

Games workshop loved to steal other people's shit

[@oxylepy2]

​@@themalcontent100 yes, and their legal team likes to violently protect their IP, to their own detriment. GW exists as a satire of corporations.

[@A.M_slime]

What he said.

[@Anthyrion]

@@oxylepy2 Yeah i remember that back in the 90's there was the Harlequin Publisher and the Miniatures, which thy developed, nearly looked like the regular Warhammer Fantasy Miniatures. But instead 5 Miniatures per Box, they had 10 of them (all Metallic, all looking the same). So you had a small unit to start with, with for the exact same price, which GW wanted for their 5 Miniatures Box. But of course GW did, what they always do. Sue the other company for copyright and the Miniatures were gone

[@nukem8128]

​@@themalcontent100people steal other people's shit literally all the time.

[@Fyn114]

Obviously watch part 2 of this, then after that we usually direct people to watch bricky's space marine legion video and then his timeline video; that's usually the first videos we recommend for newcomers, like a "Bricky initiation". After that, I'd recommend the videos from The Exploring Series and Scholar's Lore; I think they would be more of your style. I'm really enjoying seeing your deep dive into this franchise, can't wait for more! :)

[@Souledex]

Then watch people who are more accurate than funny. Or who know the lore and not the overview Like Oculus Imperia! Or Vaults of Terra, Leutin’s okay, and definitely skip Arch

[@bad-people6510]

What you have to contend with is Warhammer 40k is a game first and a story second. The universe was built around the concept of selling model armies, and so they created a setting wherein any faction could end up fighting any faction under any conceivable circumstance.

[@Ottuln]

19:00 People say every one is a villain, but it's not really true. Most factions are working toward what they consider to be a moral goal. Sometimes their goals are corrupted or misguided, sometimes they give into the temptation to use powers to achieve those goals that are considered evil, but most protagonists are working to protect or save something that is fundamentally a moral core.

[@identity7536]

Actually 40K is Grimdark for the narrative purpose of increasing the significance of the hope humanity retains all be it at an imense cost. But the whole theme of humanity from an emotional standpoint is a display of hopeful deviance in the face of a hopeless situation that proves to be worth fighting on for them over and over again. even tho they have to sacrifice so much like their morals and ethics. Bricky does break it down very far cause he has to, but from a writing standpoint the lore is not ONLY depressing, it tends to build up the catharsis of deviant victories by making the situation bleak or turning good situations bleak, but not for no purpose of the writing

[@nuclearsimian3281]

11:15 Warhammer fantasy takes place entirely on one world within Warhammer 40k, this world is situated in the middle of what's called a 'warp rift' called the Eye of Terror. Its canon to 40k and ongoing at the same time, there's just SOOOO MANY worlds that this one hasn't been really bothered. Its why so many almost exactly similar characters keep popping up in both.

[@Iselas181]

The Primarch of the 13th legion, Lord Commander of the Imperium, the Avenging son Roboute Guilliman. He is a good man and the only hope against the night

[@epyjacek]

For the Emperor and Ultramar!

[@VeritasTemplar860]

Was about to comment that. He would like Guilliman. The good man with common sense alone in a dark place needing to adapt himself to it so he can be heard.

[@SecondSince]

He blue!

[@Kepora1]

Commander Farsight, too.

[@Alkusanat]

And he likes at least one eldar... that's less xenophobic than the rest of the Empire...

[@jonathanryan9946]

No one is blaming you for not knowing the numbers Bircky didn't bring up. Many of us here had these same thoughts when we started our 40k journeys too. So we just love that you're thoughts are similar to what ours once were and are helping you understand that 40k doesn't operate on other franchises scales, but is much much larger

[@robertscott2651]

“I want someone to root for” that’ll be the Salamanders bud. That’s as close as ur gonna get lmao

[@JayPlusForerunner]

Pretty much

[@ShinigamiSamaH]

For a little more context into the "Innocence proves nothing" quote: There are many factors that need to take into account, even if the individual is innocent on the surface, there is no telling if they are being manipulated by Daemons, some Warp trickery is involved, or maybe an alien parasite is controlling them...etc. There are more than one way for someone to not even realized they committed a crime after all. While I am sure there are Inquisitors that would kill all suspects without a second thought, the quote is more or less to remind them to never take things at face value. Their goal is to uncover conspiracies and threat rooted in the Imperium, to dig deeper and connect dots to find potentially bigger issues than the current case.

[@themalcontent100]

There is no such thing as a plea of innocence in my court, a plea of innocence is guilty of wasting my time. Guilty." - Inquisitor Lord Fyodor Karamazov

[@Xaytan]

You're giving the inquisition too much credit. They're bad people doing bad things.

[@themalcontent100]

@@Xaytan that's putting it lightly. Wait until he learns about the months of shame and Badab.

[@Comandate7]

​@@Xaytan Bad people, bad things but lots of time stopping or delaying. I'm not going to defend the inquisition, but there are inquisitors like eisenhorn or sindermann who are at least interesting to follow and not too trigger happy.

[@DianeticsJr]

Numbers are jacked up in 40k. Don’t try to follow the numbers proposed because it doesn’t line up. I just add my own head cannon numbers to make it work better. It’s fiction, and I understand that when trying to write something of this scale, it’s gonna fall short of realistic often. I don’t fault the writers and I don’t see it as that big of a deal.

[@NicholasLaRosa0496]

Blame the Administratumn for any poor record keeping.

[@DianeticsJr]

@@NicholasLaRosa0496 this is the way

[@Valthyrion]

The numbers are underestimates, not over.

[@phueal]

Plus, it's not as if even the Imperium itself knows how many citizens they actually have... I'm not even sure they know haw many planets they have!

[@NicholasLaRosa0496]

@@phueal They don't.

[@juliangonzales3490]

The lore doesn't really say the exact number of worlds the Imperium has, only that it has over a million worlds. But we also have to consider the continuous number of worlds that are being colonies, found, or lost due to invasions. So the number of worlds continuously falls and rises.

[@chadwhitfield6946]

Plus some of those worlds might have a million ppl while others have 10 billion. The number of thr fighting force, including marines, sisters of battle, etc is supposed to be a trillion.

[@ainznewgate1532]

Hello fellow Warhammer Fan trying to help by answering a few questions 1) Warhammer Fantasy and 40k are different universe's. But same themes and Chaos Gods. Fantasy came first 2) There are 21 Primarchs. One per each of the 20 legions except the 20th legion that split as twins. But two Primarchs where deleted from history. 3) The Guard don't have 500k total. Thats per battle. They number in billions if not trillion. 4) Maybe wrong about this with the sisters but I'm pretty sure the flying babies are not actually kids. But clones or something similar. 5) The grey knights is the best a space marine can be. The best one can be with more organs and training. But Custodes are the absolute max potential of the human race at a genetic level. Imagine a character with the potential to increase its stats to 75 points and max out one talent tree. Custodes are 100 point max on every tree.

[@majorianus8055]

29:00 500,000 is probably referring to one Cadian division sent to worlds that has already tens of millions of guardsmen in a Battle

[@ryanwight9116]

As a writer myself, mostly Mediaeval fantasy and Sci-Fi, Warhammer 40K inspired ALOT of my creativity. There’s just so much in the franchise that my creative/adhd mind goes nuts

[@chadwhitfield6946]

40k is grimdark, but many of the books have happy endings. The Ciaphas Cain books are can be funny at times and end in victory each time. The Eisenhorn books are basically James Bond stories without the glamor. They're grimdarl because they're brutal and the characters sometimes make brutal choices. Still an enjoyable read.

[@KT-pv3kl]

Most numbers in 40k are incredibly low compared to what realism would dictate. A few million guardsmen for a major crusade fleet is laughable as our own planet which would be classified as a low-grade civilized world in 40k can sustain and easily field over 100million soldiers if necessary. The Imperium of man has over 1 million worlds, many of them have a hundred or even thousand times more population and industrial output than earth, so a major crusade should at least have billions of guardsmen. The same is true for their space fleets. A few hundred capital ships for an entire sector is so low that it isnt even enough to provide basic protection for 99% of the sector, given the incredible size and number of major planets in each sector. The same is true for the fleets of terra that measure in a few thousands at most.

[@TheDexterSherman]

I absolutely love being a part of the beginning of your journey into warhammer lore. Not only am I subscribing just to follow you as you go deeper, I find it deeply hilarious that these are the videos that are getting major traction and it’s not even your thing. I hope you make 5 hour long videos

[@satzbau9185]

Warhammer 40k, the only thriving fanbase in 2023 when it seems really in vogue atm to speedrun completely destroying franchises

[@jeffrobagman2834]

​@satzbau9185 hopefully Cavill breaks that trend. His devotion to the source material will help, but greed = pump out sequels at cost of quality. Look at the MCU, and I say that as someone that likes a lot of the more unpopular shows/movies.

[@thevoid8578]

Warhammer ina nut shell. "You're siding with the Nazi's because they are fighting Cthulhu"

[@mileswakefield2298]

The 40K fandom has many aspects and ways to enjoy it. Some people focus on the tabletop, others focus on the video games and some just the lore. Don't worry about the people correcting and complaining. The fandom can come off kinda prickly at times but most of us are just nerds happy to have someone new in here.

[@whisped8145]

Taking out the Grimdark from the Grimdark is like taking out the science fiction out of science fiction, or simply the adventure out of adventure. If you forsake your core to chase the elusive mythical unicorn of the wider audience, you will not only fail to capture it, but also lose your foundation, your core audience.

[@chrisspink8873]

Nah you have genuinely heroic and loving characters which makes them even more endearing since they exist in such a brutal and hostile universe. People be-love these characters above a lot of the others because they are so human.

[@satzbau9185]

And having great characters makes it really sting when they die heroic, tragic and sometimes brutally undeserved deaths. It's tragedy-- it's good stuff, it really runs the gamut of emotions. Some people say there are happy endings in 40k in these comments, but I haven't personally read of any of those, except Ciaphas Cain. Otherwise the happy ending tends to just be the protagonist and their close associates not being murdered to death. Really wish Bricky mentioned the Lamenters because there's no better chapter to really exemplify this than that-- just a bunch of really cool dudes who's motto is "For those we cherish we die in glory" who have nothing but the worst luck, and face tragedy after tragedy, yet persevere to defend what they hold dear. Much more interesting than Salamanders imho. 40k is a really good setting to read about because it's so grim and dark, it acts as a really good foil for its characters, themes and events. Not to mention the whole Noblebright or nobledark or w/e interpretation of the Imperium some people ascribe to, which makes the Imperium a little nicer of a faction for those goody-two-shoes who can't stomach a little villainy.

[@justafella8896]

it's less that "Everyone is shitty" and more "The factions are shitty" You can still have good guys in bad factions.

[@Shadow952013]

Little bit of a meta thing-- Games Workshop is notorious among the fanbase for being bad with numbers for various things (most notablely for military troop numbers) So sometimes headcannon may make more sense on some things. Lore wise, it is impossible to quantify the population of the Imperium. By the time you've gotten halfway through a census, entire generations may have passed. Personal head cannon would put an average population per world around modern day levels (~7.4 Billion souls.) Assuming the Imperium does control a million worlds that would mean mankind alone has several QUADRILLION people! Military personel (Militarum only) would measure in the trillions and Psykers would number in the billions

[@VelociraptorsOfSkyrim]

Well, I'd say the average population of a planet would be roughly 10-15 billion. Hive Worlds hold a _LOT_ of people

[@MixstaNoctes]

Still recommending "if the emperor had a text to speech device" Best WH40k content on youtube!

[@themalcontent100]

Too early. He won't get the jokes.

[@allmightyweakling4167]

I would argue that Helsreach is on par with it.But they are a different genere so... 🤷‍♂️

[@allmightyweakling4167]

I would argue that Helsreach is on par with it.But they are a different genere so... 🤷‍♂️

[@jeffrobagman2834]

That, and the guy that does the tiny zealot stuff. 😂😂😂

[@RetroVGamer1]

Majorkill does a good job with lore in smaller chunks, he can be a bit mature in his presentation but really gives it in the style of your best bro explaining the lore.

[@DianeticsJr]

I love seeing your take on the 40k universe as you learn more. I’ve been into the lore for the past 20 years and have read many tens of thousands of pages of lore. It’s ridiculous and inconsistent at times but that’s kind of why I love it. It feels as overwhelming, confusing and dark as a dying and repressed empire should. Everything is cranked to 13 and no one are the good guys. But there are so many moments and stories of humanity, human moments and hope against the backdrop of despair, endless carnage, barbarism and hopelessness. Some people want to be negative and that’s a reflection on their place in life. It has nothing to do with you. Thanks for being awesome! Ave Imperator

[@candel0692]

THE EMPORER PROTECTS!!!!!!

[@martenkahr3365]

11:15 Warhammer 40k Rogue Trader, released in 1987, was the very first edition of 40k, and it was basically "Warhammer Fantasy races go into space and keep fighting each other", with some new stuff like Space Marines tacked on top of that premise. By the development of 2nd and 3rd editions, GW realised that original Rogue Trader premise was too chaotic to be unworkable in the long-term and created most of the foundational lore that established Warhammer 40k as a fully separate setting from Warhammer Fantasy. Pretty much the only thing that survived from Warhammer Fantasy was the existence of Arrogant Elves, Arrogant Sadistic Elves and the Chaos with its Four Gods. The original Rogue Trader was also more of a tabletop RPG with a GM vs Players setup, with the added mechanic of the player characters having small numbers of troops or vehicles at their disposal, rather than the full tabletop wargame that the later editions became.

[@whatevernotmatter18347]

lately some "heroes" have arisen on the wh40k narrative world but its still tense and they often feel weird

[@Roggay47]

There are plenty of heroic characters in 40k. People often mistake the setting being grim, to the characters being bad. Good guys can live in a bad setting, which is often what makes things interesting. Hell they even managed to make me root for some of the necron characters (which managed to somehow feel more humane, in their way, than many of the space marines). It would be way more weird if everything was always grim and dark, which is sometimes refered as grimderp.

[@thomaswetzel6796]

2 Primarchs were expunged from the records

[@TerribleScroll]

You have someone to root for in Warhaammer 40k they are part of the Imperium and are called Ogrynns

[@Shamoart]

I get wanting to have a good guy to root for. Sometimes warhammer 40k can be a bit depressing. It is nice to see reactions with different opinions on the universe, seeing different takes is always refreshing. :)

[@jeffrobagman2834]

Hard to find someone better to root for than Gaunt, and he has issues too.

[@AvgJoeHobbyShow]

Ironically some of my favorite 40k stories are the rare times when it’s not grim dark, opposing factions/races put aside differences for greater goals, Evil villains with surprisingly deep and emotional connections/moments, etc.

[@KT-pv3kl]

how are deep backstories not grimdark? same question for temporary alliances? how do any of these elements remove the overarching dread and inevitable doom that the setting is projecting?

[@ODDnanref]

​@@KT-pv3kl Because everyone dies eventually, but will that stop you from doing some good in the world? Does the dread of your inevitable death stop you from taking care of your children? Does it stop you from making friends? If it does, then you can admire these people who do not let the setting of their story suck their hope up and stop them from doing what they think is right. If it does not, then you understand why it is inspiring.

[@KT-pv3kl]

@@ODDnanref so how DOES a deep villain backstory take away from the fact that 40k is grimdark?

[@ODDnanref]

@@KT-pv3kl Why does it need to take away for it to be a message of hope? Maybe I misunderstood your argument here, because a setting being grimdark does not mean it is hopeless.

[@j9lorna]

40k fans do love to comment for sure. This is something that we have been absorbing for decades in some cases and we have very strong feelings about certain subjects. I myself have multiple armies but have only ever played fewer than a dozen big games with them but jave read almost every bit of fluff about the universe.

[@afanwithtoomuchtime4375]

Hmm, I wonder what you would think of my own series. Sorta a grand take on Star Wars vs Warhammer 40K. I try to contrast the styles and themes of each against the other, and it may be interesting for you to examine, if the mood should strike you. Let me know if you ever do, my audience is always eager to meet more reviewers and reactors.

[@pub1]

Hey Fan. When he mentioned Star Wars my immediate thought was "i wonder how far into knowing the wh40k lore he needs to be before we recommend the star wars v 40k series" 😂

[@Grimdark-Melodies]

19:54 when you said that every character in this universe is shity in one way or another, its not true. Personaly I think its the factions that are all bad in some ways but not all the characters. Yes some of them are not perfect, but that makes them human. They are not perfect and can fuck things up acidentaly and stil have good intentions. For me Warhammer 40K is showing human resiliance at its peak. What could humans endure when pushed to limit. Never give up, stand up from dust and face head on against anything that can posibly be in this universe. Hope is the thing that keeps me in WH40K, that is the message it spreads. No matter what, dont give up. Characters who stand by their believes even when it means certain death, because its right thing to do. Best example is Ancient Rylanor who is all of these things. He waited for ten thousand years in cave wounded and preparing trap for his traitorous prymarch. And after those ten thousand years his prymarch shows and Rylanor is ready to give his last fight. Even when he was mad and wounded it was right thing to do. And before his primarch killed him, he detonated virus bomb to kill everyone in that cave. But psycher freezed time around explosion. Rylanor knew all was lost so he said for me the most powerfull line in WH40K: "I am Rylanor of the Emperors children, Ancient of Rites, Venerable of the Palantine host and proud servant of the Emperor of Mankind, beloved by all! I reject you now and for always!" Then Rylanor was savagely killed by his prymarch. But when psycher saw what happened before his eyes he realised what his prymarch truly was and let the bomb explode killing him. Prymarch survived but part of his pride was killed in that cave.

[@chainer8686]

The term Grim Dark is said to have come from Warhammer 40k back in the 1980s. The numbers are all over the place in this universe. Mankind is said to be in the quadrillions, thats 10 with 18 zeros behind it. The population of planets varies greatly from massively congested hive worlds to remote planets with cavemen. There are a million planets in the Imperium. Some, like Kreig and Cadia, are dedicated to producing more people for the Astra Militarum. There are Pleasure Worlds that are just tourist spots for the upper class. The bookkeeping is also exhausting. A request for reinforcements could be lost amongst many others and may not be answered until it's too late. There are a million Space Marine chapters, regarded as literal angels of the Emperor, and most humans won't ever see them in their lifetimes. If they do, it's probably because the scenario is gone to hell or about to.

[@kolosmenus]

14:43 Fun fact, the quote "In the grim darkness of the far future, there is only war" is the actual origin of the term "Grimdark". Warhammer 40k is literally what defined the genre

[@cl1cka]

When you finish with these videos I highly recommend Bricky's Timeline of 40k - it explains some of the stuff here better and put into perspective major events. It's also much better quality.

[@Ulmaramlu]

As far as I can tell, the fantasy and scifi version of the game are separate entities with similar (one might say rhyming) setups.

[@thomasbest2998]

People have probably already recommended him but the channel PancreasNoWork is a good for shorter form videos on both 40k and Fantasy/Age of Sigmar I enjoy your reactions btw, keep up the good work!

[@Disappointed_Philosoraptor]

All this numbers talk got me interested enough to do a little calculation myself so, for anyone who is interested, here it is: 1.000 psykers a day means 365.000 per year. Can the Imperium meet this demand? The Warhammer 40k human population is impossible to determine. The number of occupied planets ranges from 1 to 40 million, depending on whom you ask/who wrote the book or fanfic. Let's ignore all of them and only focus on hive worlds. The number of "known" hive worlds on the fandom wiki is listed as about 32.000. For the purpose of this little math exercise I'll lowball all numbers to prove a point. Population of the average hive world: 10-100 BILLION. Again, we lowball and set the average to 12 billion. On earth, 140 million people are born each year to 8 billion people. To get to 12 billion, we mltiply by 1,5. The average hive world in our calculation gives rise to about 210 million humans and therefore ~200 low-grade psykers per year. Multiply this by 30.000 and we get 6 million. Let's say only half are discovered and brought to terra in one piece, so we cut that number down to 3 million. in other words, even if we disregard anything between 97% and 99,975% of all human populated planets and only focus on hive worlds, of which we assum all of them to have the minimal population. the avaliable supply is about 8 times as high as the demand. To gain a steady supply of 365.000 fodder-psykers a year, all we need are 365.000/100=3650 hive worlds with a population of at least 12 billion and a psyker capture ration of at least 0.5. In short, even if we lowball all numbers every step of the way, the supply is easily met by the most sparsely populated 15% of the hive worlds. If we were to say the remaining 1.000.000 human worlds have a population of, on average, a measly 100 million per planet we can add another total population of 1.000.000*100.000.000= 100 Trillion. 100 trillion divided by earths population of 8 billion is 12.500. As stated above, in the 40k universe current Earth would bring forth about 140 psykers per year. The remaining worlds would therefore provide a supply of 140*12.500= 1.75 million psykers per year. Even with bad logistics and a subsequent loss of 75% of them in some way or another, these worlds alone are enough. The emperor is not going hungry any time soon. Also, big numbers are stupidly unintuitive to work with and therefore provide funny results when you actually crunch the numbers.

[@starburst98]

Another thing for Salamanders, they get to visit their family during their off hours. And yes they get off hours.

[@IKMojito]

Great stuff man, i think having that critical eye for lore is extremely important. If we never looked at what we wrote critically, warhammer would still be an 80s action romp with straight up stolen names and ideas from every other setting. Keep up the great work man, so glad to have found your channel

[@leoghigu]

No worries, you're having fun nitpicking, we're having fun correcting you. Everyone wins.

[@ex-matter3192]

Too bad most of the time he doesn't actually take any corrections as anything else but hate

[@Vitalabyss]

Honestly, this was the better place to start. In gamer terms: Bricky is the best Tutorial to Warhammer Lore. Definitely watch part 2. Luetin09 is for Mid-Endgame Lore observers. (The books themselves are the true endgame... there are so many...) I recommend: Astartes Project by Syama Pedersen and any Sodaz shorts you can find. (Many of his were removed for copyright but they are real good). These aren't info videos so much as animated short stories from the universe of 40K.

[@le_bourgeoisee]

The big picture is grimdark hopelessly evil. But from the point of view of the individual protagonists, they act in good faith, each "faction" with its own inner conflicts. There is room for every kind of story in this universe.

[@cyberash3000]

just to let you know Bricky is missing one faction. as it was released after he made the video. The leagues of votann, they are space dwarfs

[@jeffrobagman2834]

Space stunties!

[@alexanders.1359]

To ease your mind on the whole sacrifice thing: There is a whole fleet of "black ships" crewed by silent sisters that goes through the universe and captures psykers to sacrifice. A whole fleet of ships who only do that... Fulltime! Furthermore we dont really know if the 1 in 1 million number stands for all psykers or only those stable ones that get training and are in some form approved and allowed to live. So we don't even know if the sacrificed psykers are even counted in that number. In astartes the psykerratio is even higher. Pretty much every chapter has some form of librarians that are psykers. There are even some chapters or legions (before) that have been made up entirely of psykers. So I guess the 1 in 1 million number excludes those poor tortured and sacrificed souls

[@stevencavanagh7990]

Funny thing is that since the Great rift opened and split the Galxey in two the number of Psykics needed to feed keep the Emperor alive had doubled.

[@TheInfamousRPGGroup-on-Rumble]

As a new 40k fan, who GMs the 40k Wrath and Glory tabletop RPG, the "everyone is evil" thing is similar to saying "nobody's innocent" in The Walking Dead. Rick Grimes has killed people, but he's still less evil than Negan. The key is being able to tell the story of a protagonist who must live and survive in this awful world and walk the line of being relatable to your average reader, and being ruthless enough to do what's necessary to survive. So "everyone is evil" is more of a meme than a fact or truth of the setting

[@TheInfamousRPGGroup-on-Rumble]

Also I recommend the short film Astartes

[@Grarnir]

Yeees more Bricky and 40k

[@ageridthesilverdragon4440]

oh yeah i hope you watch part 2. BRicky also gives a few recomendation of books to read if you want something at the end of that.

[@ageridthesilverdragon4440]

the 40k is supose to be our world in year 40.000. warhammer dark fantasy is supose to be a different dimension. with nothing of the same other then Orcs being a race in both

[@hadesdogs4366]

The phykers don’t have to be trained, they just have to have a phykic ability and that’s about it, again whilst a phyker is very very rare with say the population of New York there might just be about ten phykers out of that entire population and again this is on a galactic scale where entire planets are essentially just one big massive city much like coruscant which is how and why the imperium has such a vast amount of man power to call upon and why human life is so barely valued where again if say the same number of people killed in ww1 and WW2 were to happen on a hive world due to say a factory disaster causing a massive explosion, the real concern isn’t about those who’ve been killed in the explosion but the loss of a more valuable installation which in turn has a nock on effect on the planets overall economy and output which would result in harsher sanctions or much stricter quotas as well as the execution or purge of the family or people responsible for such an accident, rather than the death of the millions of people who died in the massive explosion which in turn resulted in several entire Hab locks to collapse killing more people, again the imperium is just that massive, all the while any and all people with any magical or phsykic abilities would be hunted down and tend for collection via the black fleet, which roams across the stars, sowing fear and dread as their black hulls sink slowly onto a planets surface, where the unfortunate and helpless victims would be dragged into the black ships never to be seen again, all the while sacred wards and blanks operates the ship all the while the sisters of battle stand guard, ready to kill anyone that poses a threat, all the while as they’re traveling those who are shown to be mentally stable and well fortified would be selected for the axilia as combat pshykers who will be trained on how to use their abilities to aid the imperial guard in combat, whilst everyone else would be selected as a sacrifice and again whilst this is happening hundreds of other black ships re prowling across the imperium, collecting its cargo of unwanted and unfortunate cargo just to ensure that the god emperor never truly dies

[@VelociraptorsOfSkyrim]

Oh, my sweet summer child. :p The 50 minute videos _ARE_ the shorter ones.

[@totallylegit4092]

Inquisitors are carefully selected and groomed for their role. For the most part they arent malicious and take their job seriously. That’s why he said the “moral dilemma”. The good ones walk a thin line of “I dont want people to just suffer”, while still knowing full well that some will suffer so that they can do their jobs. And their jobs is to prevent some very real and tangible threats to mankind. A heretic uprising can cause the deaths of hundreds of billions of people for instance. So in the books, they always have to walk that line…doing what MUST be done while not losing their souls basically.

[@jeffrobagman2834]

Most inquisitors start off pure of heart, then become numb because if what's needed to do the job, and many eventually fall. Gregor Eisenhorn is a great example, starting off pure, and he still thinks he's fighting the good fight... he'll, he IS fighting the good fight. IMO, some of the best 40k books. Dan Abnett is a great writer. Loved his first X-Calibur run too.

[@ThorMan91587]

Arbiter Ian is a great channel to dive into. He has lore videos like "Horus Heresy in" x amount of time. I forgot the actual length, but he does both long and shorter form videos. And he's pretty honest and objective about it. As I recommended in your previous video, I think Occulus Imperia is by far the best lore channel on KZbin. Of any genre or nerd universe. He's that good. Buuuut his work can get quite long, and quite dense. So it probably wouldn't be ideal for reaction

[@xryuran]

The answer to the warhammer fantasy question is maybe. There used to be a place that was cut off from the 40k universe by massive warp storms that was hinted to be the location of the fantasy. But ever since the Fantasy universe had some world ending cataclysmic events , it seems like they have abandoned the shared universe lore.

[@whatevernotmatter18347]

you need to understand that thats the way in wich this fandom work, we are always seeking bring in more people and dont pay attention to the dickheads, just enjoy your way

[@soffren]

Warhammer does well on KZbin because it's fans arr insane and always comment. Also, I recommend only one book in the franchise. Its titled "the infinite and the devine" and it's self contained. It's a lot closer to your ususal genre than most of the guts and glory type stories Warhammer has.

[@RedCascadian]

I love that Warhammer 40K is simultaniously the origin of 'just push the damn button!' trope, and also 'sometimes the toaster *will* get angry.'

[@ilyana1126]

This was a a great reaction video. Thank you for posting this, it was great to see your insight and opinions on the lore.

[@4myzelf]

Most of us also arent really attacking, just clarifying so that hopefully you'd get more interested so hopefully these clarifications help get your mind around it. Psychers became more common after a major event. Its not that hard to see if you just think 1000 worlds lose 1 person every other week or so

[@HamishHorizon]

The Custodes aren't Space Marines so Bricky got that wrong.

[@epyjacek]

The golden boys are all unique works of art and superior to all warriors except the primarchs, with very few exceptions.

[@mawdeeps7691]

@@epyjacek kaldor draigo

[@jameslewis2635]

After Brickey's videos to get some background in 40k, you should check out the 'Astartes' animation as that shows what Space Marines would be like in action. Also if you want a laugh I would highly recommend 'If the Emperor had a text to speech device'.

[@Gift_Of_Victory]

According to the numbers I ran, if you need 10 sextillion people in the galaxy to feed the emperor, you would only need about 100 times the approximate number of available exoplanets in the galaxy to support that number, presuming that you could fit 1 billion humans on every planet.

[@Texas-Goose]

I think the everyone sucks so you cant root for anyone is fairly narrow minded. The fact that "everyone sucks" refers to the factions and the setting, but takes nothing away from the individual stories of heroics and the triumph of good over evil. If anything it further goes to show just how impressive these heroes are, In a universe that is only war, moments of compassion and sacrifice burn even brighter in the darkness.

[@NathanielAcharya]

WRONG AGAIN (DW I like you) The imperium's population has been partially calculated and is beyond actual normal mathematics. It gets into signs and numbers, but the current population of the Imperium stands at around 1.1e+46 (about 100 trillion multiplied several times over, using stated lore for the population of planets then multiplied by the number of imperial worlds listed in the lore, and this is not accounting for being multiplied by decades or centuries or generations, at which point it verges on around 9.9e+83, These numbers are all exponentials btw fun video btw!

[@hadesdogs4366]

Doesn’t mean that you can be inspired or motivated by something else even if you’re not interested or related to a given subject I guess😂

[@panzermkii7675]

So what fantasy novels have you written?

[@ex-matter3192]

None, at least none that he's published. He isn't an author, he's a writer pretending to be an author

[@The0Stroy]

About the number of Primarchs - originally, there were 20 of them. But because of some undisclosed "treason" or other reasons, two of them (2nd and 11th) were sentenced to Damnatio Memoriae, and any information about them got wiped out from Imperial records. Even their brothers were banned from talking about them (There is a scene when the Emperor's right-hand psyker Malcador, almost kills Horus with his powers, for even trying to utter the name of one of the lost primarchs).

[@14USMA]

I think Bricky's timeline of 40k is the most concise breakdown of the world and lore out there

[@kittensmakingcandles]

"Whoever you pick you are going to be the bad guy. But that's the fun of it." "Warhammer 40k's purpose and its existence is every single faction f***ing sucks, every single being here is s***." This is not accurate. The setting for 40k (and Horus Heresy) is a "dark time" (dystopia) for most races in it. But the actual individuals, groups, and factions of 40k are all over the spectrum in terms of their alignment. It's also VERY important to understand that there are very different types of fans of 40k. And some of the more vocal 40k fans in social media are really passionate about focusing on (and shouting from the rooftops) specific "concentrated aspects" (picking out, fixating on, and publicly celebrating only some parts) of 40k. Such as "Moar/More Dakka" (more usage of more firepower), terrible things doing terrible things (see Chaos, Dark Eldar, etc.), etc. Make no mistake, 40k is one of the best world building exercises and productions out there (+ or - based on which revisions you include in that). It is the product of a UK based creative and business think tank that has been running, across mediums, since the 70s. And that think tank has bolstered itself through the very crafted and measured expansion across those mediums, with the inclusion of medium superstars as well.

[@albigucko9518]

There's actually a moment in Warhammer Rogue Trader game, where you escape the planet, that's being corrupted by chaos. You're then given three options: to commit exterminatus (destroy the planet), to save at least some people (nobles or common folk) and to save strategic technology. Guess what? The only choice that would not give you a permanent debuff, and the only reasonable one is to destroy the world with all inhabitants on it. Love this universe.

[@skiadrum9029]

Honestly while i am running a pretty much "good guy" rogue trader, the moment i knew the world was doomed, exterminatus by thermonuclear ignition of the atmosphere was the good guy option. Like, what do you think will happen if you extract nobles and such? Those guys will impose on YOUR crew. Want to save as many as possible? Goddam now u have refugees to take care of that will never in their life experience normal (by imperium standards) life Edit: not to say the chaos cultist too will board you

[@dagonofthedepths]

@@skiadrum9029 Eh wouldn't call blowing up the planet the good option it's the easy pragmatic option, but it's not good. Like Guilliman during the plague war turned a verdant world into a hospital planet to save war casualties which is the good option. It got corrupted by chaos because the dumb, dumb set up a hospital to heal people that where hurt fighting a plague god, but the fact he tried shows he cared. Besides to get meta you know about chaos corruption but your character probably shouldn't. Kind of have that problem that lore wise the audience knows way more than the cast.

[@MannIchFindKeinName]

@@dagonofthedepthsbut that is exactly why you have religion. Everyone back then knew how to get rid of evil spirits, just burn it down. And now you face an actual evil spirit and dont really know what to do... burn it down.

[@skiadrum9029]

@@dagonofthedepths true, its the pragmatic easy option, if you think about you and your crew first, like, what would happen if you by accident let aboard a few cultist? Now you'r putting in danger your ship, your 10,000ish souls , yourself and your retinue. So long story short i agree, not the lawful good choice, but considering all above: is it the good choice to rescue possibly more cultists that will endanger everyone aboard?

[@dagonofthedepths]

@@skiadrum9029 25,000, but yeah, I agree but that's the point with a lot of stuff in 40k. The pragmatic option is almost always the safe one and the "good" option is always the one that will bite you. I mean I chose that option to save anyone because I wanted to see if they will punish you for it and also, I don't like inquisitors and wasn't disappointed. But what it ultimately comes down to is you have the power to save whatever the capacity of a frigate is in innocent people (well 40k innocent) while risking the lives of people that are effectively in the military anyways on the chance (pretty much 100% but still your character probably shouldn't know that) some may be heretics and/or crazy. To me letting them die is not any kind of good. It can be neutral sure, but really, you're watching billions of people burn with a match you struck and not lifting a finger to save any of them. Besides, it's a good lesson on the universe 40k is in. Although it made a few people quite apparently.

[@biggshoverwelder3690]

22:50 Two of the sons just got destroyed right off the bat, within the original crusade/close to their discovery by the emperor, likely for being heretical, or extremely corrupt, and them and their legions are used for players to kinda make their own as nothing is known about them beyond that.

[@sebastianfernandez8613]

If you wanna read a 40k book that isn’t grim dark check out the Ciaphas Cain series. Highly recommend

[@AtlasCrafted]

As a writer I have one detail you may really enjoy about 40k lore. I personally find this a genius decision on behalf of the many writers and team behind 40k. All lore, all books and stories are always told from the perspective of someone IN UNIVERSE. Either told directly to you by them, or you experience it along with them. Only being aware of the same things they are, not given extra information. This plays perfectly into 40k having numerous writers and accidentally writing themselves into corners, or contradicting another author. Information is a currency in 40k. Knowledge is lost, warped and misused. Some is heretical and some can literally just kill you. It makes perfect sense that even the people living through it wouldn't have any coherent understanding of it. Or have been lied to and manipulated themselves. Everything is both canon and non-canon at the same time.

[@dredgenauryx3382]

The funny thing is that if I have not fucked up my lore somewhere... The Star Wars galaxy a lot bigger then the Warhammer galaxy... The math just really does not work out... What was it 6 million Clones in the entire Grand Army of the Republic? 20 fleets in the navy? those numbers are really small on a galactic scale...

[@ragnar97]

"The need to pee and poop" when it comes to space marines, grey night or custodes is taken care by their armor.

[@Borgadun]

Why everyone loves Warhammer 40k? It doesn't sugercoat. War is horrible, death is gorey and bloody, and the Authors don't shy away to be graphic with those details.

[@RedCascadian]

Star Wars(EU) and WH40K are both pretty easily in the quintillions of population. WH40K might have more hive worlds than SW has ecumenopoli, though. They also occupy the same spot in VS debates where they either steamroll everything with sheer scale... or get absolutely bodied by hyper-powers like The Culture, or Xeelee.

[@TheNightWatcher1385]

40k is definitely a setting that is so vast that a good primer is necessary for new folks to get into it with as little confusion as possible. This one is a good choice!

[@christerprestberg3973]

"In fealty to the God-Emperor, our undying Lord, and by the grace of the Golden Throne, I declare Exterminatus upon the Imperial world of Typhon Primaris. I hereby sign the death warrant of an entire world, and consign a million souls to oblivion."

[@crow6050]

04:50 1000×365×10000 = 3 650 000 000

[@atlashellfire6486]

So, the problem with your problem about the Psychers in WH40K is that the 1/1 million is the number when they started to appear during the dark age of technology. Humanity was just awakening to Psychic Power. But when Humanity fell, they're number grew largely more and their proportion grew to, so you're sticking with 1/1 million but you're wrong. You can even rewatch the video, luetin precised that. And a Psychers doesn't mean automatically a trained Psychers. Not all of them can be trained and most of them can be a danger for themselves and the others. So in the Imperium view, it's not a waste to sacrifice those unfit to control their psychic power

[@al-Bass]

dont worry about the details. its 40k worth of info about an entire galaxy, and things that come from the outside. the lore is vast. thats why its great. there is comedy, horror sci fy, fantasy, etc the lore is so vast, one cannot get it all. just enjoy it. "ith each hive housing between 10 to 100 billion people and 5 to 20 hives per planet, the sheer number of Imperial citizens on a Hive World is staggering" over 30k hive plants in imperium. 16billion psykers on hive planets alone.

[@fullmetalmustachio]

That notion of "Well this doesn't make sense.." only to realize slightly later that in a lot of the cases its partially because we're not sitting on enough information, or we just hadn't heard another key factor yet, of the Universe setting as a whole yet. That feeling is very relatable. The vastness of the 40k setting is a bit ludicrous, though it has its charm. I just recently got into 40k because I started playing Inquisitor: Martyr after having it sit in my Steam-library for years unused so I just tag along for your journey to expand the lore situation as well. I'm usually far more into epic fantasy or it's closer niches than science fiction, so it's very entertaining to see a fellow fantasy enthusiast get experience the information overload that it brings.

[@gurkhajake]

53:24 Your confuzzlement is very normal. Everyone has a similar reaction when first diving into the lore. You get used to it 😂

[@ger5956]

32:12 Yes! And that’s the point Bricky is trying to make, an Imperial Guard army could have literally hundreds of models, so building a full army is super expensive even by Wh40k standards. Think thousand dollars plus as opposed to several hundred dollars.

[@satzbau9185]

Just a note: Inquisitors are above the law and in many cases, The Law, not just in a court sense, but a religious sense as well (they're seen as agents of the Throne as they are seen to answer only to the Emperor, who is essentially a vegetable atm), but they do have some checks and balances-- mainly other Inquisitors. They have a hierarchy amongst themselves and if one of them is deemed to have gone a little to far, or to be flirting with some heretical stuff, or just not be orthodox enough, they are stripped of rank, excommunication style, and sometimes arrested and executed. Rogue Inquisitors are def a thing, like outlaws, who still can command Imperial assets if they never turned over their badge of Office, the Inquisitorial Rosette (which is also a powerful piece of technology) which has led to schisms and wars of faith. Some Inquisitors like Ecclesiarchs can even buy into their line of preaching and be taken by a religious mania, where they literally believe themselves to be the sole executors of the Emperor's Will, chosen by him to do as they please, or see fit. It's important to note that all the lore touched on by Bricky or any other KZbinr is usually just the tip of the iceberg, and the potential for story telling is vast and deep because of the breadth and depth of the worldbuilding and lore.

[@brian6766]

Love the reactions, keep digging deeper

[@chaddabob3958]

"I'm familiar with them ... they have an emperor." .... you nailed it mate, thats all you need to know about the Imperium of Mankind. xD ... I love it. :)