Why’d I make so many sons I called Primarchs?
And why aren’t half on my side?
Konrad has visions, and Magnus illusions,
And Corvus just likes to hide,
Guilliman’s anal, the Lion loves secrets, and Vulcan is really tall,
Someday I’ll finish my webway connection,
And then I can dump them all,
Tag: Warhammer
The Darkoat
All Your Warhammer 40k Questions Answered
Q: What is that tube running into Horus’s nose?
A: Perturabo installed it so he can make the Warmaster smell burning toast whenever he’s being particularly annoying.
Q: Who did Dorn kill on Pluto? Was it Alpharius or was Omegon taking his place?
A: Neither. Alpharius killed Dorn, but then took his place. Theoretically you could tell Dorn-Dorn and Alpharius-Dorn apart because one of them had kickass sideburns and a moustache while the other was clean shaven, but which was which has been censored from Imperial records along with Malcador’s recipe for Chili Con Carne.
Q: Did Malcador really have an ancient toy rocket with С.С.С.Р. written on it?
A: No, but he did have an almost complete collection of Generation 1 Transformers. His notorious feud with Erda originated from her repeated refusal to sell him her Windcharger.
Q: Why does speaking Enuncia make your teeth explode?
A: It doesn’t. Everyone in the 41st millennium just has really bad dental hygiene.
Q: Were the Cabal correct about a victory for Horus resulting in the final defeat of Chaos?
A: The Cabal were all on crack.
Q: Even Eldrad?
A: Especially Eldrad!
Q: Why is Torias Telion still a sergeant despite over 300 years of service?
A: His wicked obscura habit makes him unsuitable for promotion.
Q: Is Elon Musk the Emperor?
A: The Emperor’s parenting skills are bad, but they’re not that bad.
Q: What’s the deal with Guilliman and Yvraine?
A: They’re loyal and devoted pen-pals, nothing more.
Q: Who would win in a volleyball match between Ravenor and Eisenhorn?
A: It depends on whether Eisenhorn is allowed to sub-in Cherubael.
Q: Is it true that you’re selling video tapes of Ciaphus Cain’s wedding night?
A: This interview is OVER!
Warhammer 40,000 Map Icons v6.0
Being the tragic geek that I am, I spent several months last year coding up an interactive map of the Warhammer 40,000 galaxy. What I came up with worked beautifully in Firefox on my fairly grunty, fairly new computer, but like an absolute dog with any other setup, so I’ve had no choice but to go back and start over from scratch – a prospect so disheartening that it will be many, many months before I can bring myself to look at it again, if ever.
The upside of this failed project however is that I ended up doing a complete revision of my Warhammer 40,000 map icons. And when I say complete revision I mean a radical change in the way they’re organised. So radical in fact that I’ve decided to leave version 5.0 available in this post for those who might prefer them, while making the new version available here.
The major changes in version 6.0 include…
Separation of Environment, Class and Affiliation: There are now separate sets of icons for the environment of a planet, how it’s categorised by the Imperium (ie: what ‘Class’ it is), and who controls it.
Consistent Colours: Each major faction now has a consistent colour scheme rather than the previous hodge-podge, so it’s easier to see who controls what at a glance.
Consistent Shapes: The sizes and shapes of icons are standardised rather than being all over the place with bits sticking out the sides.
Meaningful Shapes: Five different icons shapes are provided to represent planets/moons, space stations, dwarf planets/asteroids, fields/swarms and fleets/ships.
I’ve also added sub-faction specific icons so you can differentiate between (for example) Biel-Tan Eldar and Iyanden Eldar, or Mephrit Necrons and Sekemtar Necrons, should that be your idea of a morally acceptable good time.
I present the icons here in three formats
SVG Version – This is the version to use if you know what you’re doing with Vector graphics. If you’re making your map in a vector editor such as Illustrator or Inkscape this is the superior option. If you’re not, then one of the PNG versions will probably be more convenient.
DOWNLOAD
White PNG – An export of the Icons on a flat white background.
DOWNLOAD
Black PNG – An export of the Icons on a flat black background with a white glow effect.
DOWNLOAD
I should probably add a transparent PNG version, shouldn’t I? Maybe tonight…
Anyway, share and enjoy!
It Is Accomplished
OK, I think I’m finally done with this. The sixth and final version of Warhammer 40,000 According to the Simpsons
I Can Quit Any Time I like!
For my own reference I shall now attempt to list every unfinished 40k model and/or project I have lying around. Hopefully this will motivate me to get some of them finished, or at least stop me from starting any more.
(Ha!)
Tanks and APCs
1x Kitbashed Church Tank
1x Scratchbuilt A7V Tank
1x Kragmeer Ice Chimera
1x Malcador Defender
4x Chimeras
1x Leman Russ
1x Baneblade
1x Buran Class Chimera
2x Scylla Light Tanks
Imperial Guard Bastiladon with 3 Crew
Aircraft
Avenger Strike Fighter
Valkyrie
Infantry
Kitbashed Valhallan Colonel
Giant Ogryn with Ratling sniper in a crows nest
9x Penal Troopers and 1x Overseer
Kill Team Veteran Guardsmen Box
23x Kitbashed Conscripts
Commissar
Cadian Standard Bearer
Valhallan Standard Bearer
3x Psykers
1x Primaris Psyker
8x Ratling Snipers
3x Assorted Inquisitors
Vindicare Assassin (Metal)
Calidus Assassin (Metal)
Culexus Assassin (Metal)
Eversor Assassin (Metal)
Venenum Assassin (Kitbashed)
11x Kitbashed Veterans
3x Tankers (Metal)
2x Astropaths
1x Tech Priest
5x Weapon Servitors
2x Cawdor Gangers (Metal)
1x Crusader
2x Valhallan Officers
2x Ministorum Priests
62 Assorted Metal Valhallans
3x Medics
2x Ogryn Cyborgs
2x Imperial Soldiers (Metal)
2x Death Cult Assassins
1x Metal Sister Dialogus 😮
3x Acolytes
1x Daemonhost
2x Fleet Officers
2x Artillery Officers
1x Knight Pilot
10x Orlocks
Various Cadians
Valhallan Artillery Crew (inc. Ammunition Bear)
1x Space Marine (Just the One!)
Various Kitbashed Squats
Several Forge World Death Korps of Krieg
10x Naval Breachers
Artillery and Special Weapons
Imperial Thud Gun
Valhallan Heavy Mortar Team
2x Basilisk
1x Deathstrike/Manticore
1x Hellhound
2x Valhallan Bolter Teams
3x Valhallan Autocannon Teams
2x Valhallan Lascannon Teams
3x Valhallan Missile Launcher Teams
2x Valhallan Mortar Teams
Various Unspecified Valhallan Weapon Teams
Kitbashed Inquisitor and Retinue
Ordo Malleus Inquisitor Andreus Eldrict
Astra Militarum Medic Dr Jeep
Death Cult Assassin Lucretia
Adeptus Mechanicus Pilot 2-5-0-0-0
Weapon Servitor Doktor Avalanche
Crusader Brother Torquemada
Bound Psyker “Alice” (AKA The Vision Thing)
Cyber-Mastiff Napalm
Cherubim Servitor Icke
Navigator Marianne Cedd
Savant Aegypt Hwaite
Inquisitorial Shuttle Soror Misericordum
Special Characters
Knight Commander Pask
Saint Sabbat (Kitbashed)
Inquisitor Eisenhorn
Sly Marbo (Official)
Sly Marbo (Kitbashed)
Inquisitor Obiwan Sherlock Clouseau (Kitbashed)
Commissar Severina Raine
Sister Superior Amalia Novena
5x Gaunt’s Ghosts (Plastic)
6x Gaunt’s Ghosts (Metal)
Vermin Supreme
Junith Erutia (on foot)
Space Marine Pilot
2x Last Chancers (Metal)
Xenos
1x Necron Pariah
1x Sslyth
2x Phyrr Cats
2x Phelynx
2x Ripper Swarms
1x Medusea
1x Genestealer
1x Grox
10x Kroot
2x Kroot Hounds
1x Kroot Hawk
Epic Models
Warlord Titan
Emperor Titan
Overlord Airship
Goliath Mega Cannon
Leviathan
Mole
Mole Carrier
Capitol Imperialis
Others
16x Metal Seraphim
1x Imperial Knight
4x Sentinels
Bear Cavalry (BEAR CAVALRY!)
Kitbashed Walker/Stomper
1x Man of Iron
5x Servo Skulls
1x Giant Servo Skull
1x GheistSkull
1x C.A.T Unit
Kitbashed Squat Trike
Entire Space Hulk set
Metal Chaos Dwarf
Favourite Music of the Primarchs
Art by Johannes Helgeson
And a list, for when the YouTube links inevitably break…
- Lion El’Jonson: Tocatta – Tanzwut
- Fulgrim: German Sparkle Party – The Something Experience
- Purturabo: Last Resort – Pappa Roach
- The Khan: Dchingus Khan – Dchingus Khan
- Leman Russ: Hungry Like the Wolf – Duran Duran
- Rogal Dorn: We Built this City – Starship
- Konrad Curze: Behind the Mask Obscure – Limbonic Art
- Sanguinius: Send me an Angel – Real Life
- Ferrus Manus: Lucretia, My Reflection – The Sisters of Mercy
- Angron: Down With the Sickness – Disturbed
- Roboute Guilliman: Brandenburg Concerto No. 1 in F – Johan Sebastian Bach
- Mortarion: Touch Me, I’m Sick – Mudhoney
- Magnus the Red: Abracadabra – Steve Miller Band
- Horus Lupercal: Dies Irae – Giuseppe Verdi
- Lorgar Aurelian: Dies Irae – Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
- Vulcan: Anvil Chorus – Giuseppe Verdi
- Corvus Corax: Tanzwut – Corvus Corax
- Alpharius Omegon: Hello Goodbye – The Beatles
- The Emperor: It’s Hard to Be Humble – Mac Davis
(We can observe an obvious correlation between baldness and preference for classical music)
Warhammer 40,000 Map Icons
UPDATE! Version 6.0 of the icon set is now available, but it’s a radical departure from previous versions, so I’m leaving version 5.0 here for those who might prefer the old style. Version 6.0
Many years ago I purchased the rulebook for the now sadly defuct Fantasy Flight Warhammer 40k RPG Dark Heresy. While I thought the game was great I was rather annoyed by the poor quality of the planet icons used in the provided map of the Calixis Sector, and being the kind of obsessive nerd I am I couldn’t help but make my own version of if where you could tell what planet was what without having to use a bright light and a magnifying glass.
One thing led to another and by 2019 I’d produced an entire library of icons for 40k maps, free for anyone to use, which could be found on Reddit.
Recently someone contacted me having problems downloading the icons, so I decided it was time to make some updates, and post the files here where I know where to find them without having to sort through my rather chaotic Reddit history.
So here it is – Version 5.0, for your downloading pleasure!
SVG Version – This is the version to use if you know what you’re doing with Vector graphics. If you’re making your map in a vector editor such as Illustrator or Inkscape this is the superior option. If you’re not, then one of the PNG versions will probably be more convenient. DOWNLOAD
Transparent PNG version – A PNG export of the SVG icons with transparency enabled. If your graphic editor works with transparent PNGs (which pretty much everything should these days) you should use this one. Each icon is rendered into two versions. One with no glow and one with a white glow suitable to paste onto a dark background. DOWNLOAD
Flat PNG Version – A PNG export of the SVG icons with no transparency. This is the last resort version for really old or simple graphic programs that can’t handle PNG transparency. There are two versions of each icon, one with no glow on a white background, and one with a white glow on a black background. DOWNLOAD
Enjoy!
In Too Deep, Against all Odds!
As the turning of the year speeds us onward into winter the time has come for me to actually make a post. Don’t expect this to be a regular thing mind you, it’s likely only possible because I’ve taken a week off work and hence actually have the time to think.
Anyway, this week someone on Reddit had decided to compile a list of Adeptus Astartes war cries (yes, I’m on about Warhammer again, deal with it) and helpfully posted the same to the 40kLore subreddit. When browsing through this list I noticed something a bit strange – can you spot it?
- “Doom ye! Doom ye! Doom ye!”–Doom Warriors
- “Skovakarah uhl zarûn!” (“Redden the earth!”)–Emperor’s Spears
- “Bringers of war!”—Emperor’s Warbringers
- “In too deep, against all odds brothers!”—Genesis Chapter
- “”We are the hammer!” or “I am the hammer, I am the right hand of the Emperor, the instrument of His will, the gauntlet about His fist, the tip of His spear, the edge of His sword!”—Grey Knights
- “Primarch-Progenitor, to your glory and the glory of Him on Earth!”—Imperial Fists
- “The flesh is weak!”—Iron Hands
In case you’re not an ageing Gen-Xer and the title of this post didn’t tip you off, it’s the war cry of the Genesis Chapter, who apparently charge into battle yelling “In too deep, against all odds brother!”. What immediately startled me about this can best be summed up with the inclusion of a couple of videos…
So, we are being asked to believe that the war cry of the Genesis Chapter just happens to be built from the title of a Genesis song, and a former-lead-singer-of-Genesis-Phil-Collins song?
Now, sure, Warhammer 40k is probably the most plagiarism-guilty IP in human history. It’s cobbled together from chunks of Dune, Heinlein’s Starship Troopers, the collected works of J. R. R. Tolkien, Judge Dredd, the generalised evil of Margaret Thatcher and dozens – if not hundreds – of other sources. There’s barely an original idea in the whole thing. But directly quoting prog-rock lyrics seems a little too on the nose even for Games Workshop. So what the hell is going on?
I started digging. The oldest reference I could find to the alleged war cry is on the Genesis Chapter page on the 40k Fandom Wiki – which immediately sounded all kinds of alarm bells.
Warhammer 40,000 has been a thing since 1987, and since then an absolutely titanic amount of background lore has been generated. Organising it all into a Wiki is the obvious management solution, and as a result there are a number of 40k Wikis on the web. The big three though are Lexicanum, 1d4Chan and the 40k Fandom wiki.
Lexicanum is – in my opinion – the most reliable as it insists that all information must be properly sourced. It can be a bit dry and academic though, being very much the “just the facts ma’am” 40k wiki.
1d4Chan (when it hasn’t gone offline, which it seems to do regularly) is an obscenity laced carnival of memes that – once you scrape off all the hyperbole – is often surprisingly accurate. It’s also the only of the big three to really include meta-information – that is to say info about the history and community of 40k . If you want to understand the hate directed towards C. S. Goto, or know why Matt Ward is your spiritual liege it’s the place to go. On the downside it’s not updated that much any more, and if not tempered with more reliable sources can easily delude new 40k fans into confusing memes and jokes (usually very dated memes and jokes – like those involving Matt Ward and C. S. Goto…) with actual lore (For instance the Death Korp of Krieg are not suicidal and they do not regard shovels to be their ‘cultural weapon’, and you cannot kill Orks by pointing a gun at them and shouting ‘bang!’).
The 40k Fandom Wiki… well, to be frank, I do not like it. Its moderation and sourcing rules are extremely lax – pretty much anyone can post anything they like there and it’s up to other uses to spot and correct it. Which brings us back to the Genesis Chapter…
On February 8th 2011 – yes, that’s over a decade ago folks! – some wanderer of the digital waste decided to have a bit of fun with the Genesis Chapter Fandom Wiki page and made a series of edits to the info box, which I shall display here as a before and after screenshot…
Such wit! Such satire! Actually, to be entirely honest, it’s exactly the kind of joke I’d make, but I certainly wouldn’t go and vandalise a wiki with it!
The joker’s changes were reverted pretty quickly, but whoever did it seemingly lacked the necessary knowledge of Phil Collin’s back catalogue to recognise the war cry as part of the prank, even adding quotes around it to standardise the format. And so it has sat there unchanged for 11 years, spreading through the fan community as the accepted war cry of the Chapter!
I may try to do something about this. Or I may not. All in all I suppose we should just be glad that the Genesis Chapter don’t charge into battle yelling “Billy don’t you lose my number!”
Adeptus Mechanicus Tech Support
“Sir, I need you to turn the cogitator off, recite the Third Canticle of the Omnissiah, then it on again.”
“Yes, I know you’ve already done that, but please, humour me and do it again.”
“Are you sure you’re turning off the cogitator and not just the holo-projector, the cogitator should take at least a minute to…”
“Sir, if you continue to use that kind of language I’ll end this call and inform the Inquisition.”
“Thank you. Alright, the cogitator is the large, glowing cylinder covered in purity seals beneath your desk. You should be able to see a brain suspended in the fluid.”
“No… the brain definitely should not have ‘mushrooms’ growing out of it. Are the purity seals intact?”
“Why in the name of the God Emperor did you remove the purity seals?!”
“Sir, that noo-mail was a hacking attempt from the Dark Mechanicum! Didn’t you read the security bulletin!?”
“Alright sir, disconnect the cogitator from the power feed and wait by your workstation. An Ordo Malleus support team will be with you shortly…”
